Peggy Noonan on Mitt Romney

[ESF]

I like this op ed. I think she really nails the problems that the Romney campaign is having.

blogs.wsj.com/peggynoonan/2012/09/18/time-for-an-intervention/

Time for an Intervention

What should Mitt Romney do now? He should peer deep into the abyss. He should look straight into the heart of darkness where lies a Republican defeat in a year the Republican presidential candidate almost couldn’t lose. He should imagine what it will mean for the country, for a great political philosophy, conservatism, for his party and, last, for himself. He must look down unblinkingly.

And then he needs to snap out of it, and move.

He has got seven weeks. He’s just had two big flubs. On the Mideast he seemed like a political opportunist, not big and wise but small and tinny. It mattered because the crisis was one of those moments when people look at you and imagine you as president.

Then his comments released last night and made months ago at the private fundraiser in Boca Raton, Fla. Mr. Romney has relearned what four years ago Sen. Barack Obama learned: There’s no such thing as private when you’re a candidate with a mic. There’s someone who doesn’t like you in that audience. There’s someone with a cellphone. Mr. Obama’s clinger comments became famous in 2008 because when people heard what he’d said, they thought, “That’s the real him, that’s him when he’s talking to his friends.”

* * *

And so a quick denunciation of what Mr. Romney said, followed by some ideas.

The central problem revealed by the tape is Romney’s theory of the 2012 election. It is that a high percentage of the electorate receives government checks and therefore won’t vote for him, another high percentage is supplying the tax revenues and will vote for him, and almost half the people don’t pay taxes and presumably won’t vote for him.

My goodness, that’s a lot of people who won’t vote for you. You wonder how he gets up in the morning.

This is not how big leaders talk, it’s how shallow campaign operatives talk: They slice and dice the electorate like that, they see everything as determined by this interest or that. They’re usually young enough and dumb enough that nobody holds it against them, but they don’t know anything. They don’t know much about America.

We are a big, complicated nation. And we are human beings. We are people. We have souls. We are complex. We are not data points. Many things go into our decisions and our political affiliations.

You have to be sophisticated to know that. And if you’re operating at the top of national politics, you’re supposed to be sophisticated.

I wrote recently of an imagined rural Ohio woman sitting on her porch, watching the campaign go by. She’s 60, she identifies as conservative, she likes guns, she thinks the culture has gone crazy. She doesn’t like Obama. Romney looks OK. She’s worried about the national debt and what it will mean to her children. But she’s having a hard time, things are tight for her right now, she’s on partial disability, and her husband is a vet and he gets help, and her mother receives Social Security.

She’s worked hard and paid into the system for years. Her husband fought for his country.

And she’s watching this whole election and thinking.You can win her vote if you give her faith in your fairness and wisdom. But not if you label her and dismiss her.

As for those workers who don’t pay any income taxes, they pay payroll taxes—Social Security and Medicare. They want to rise in the world and make more money. They’d like to file a 1040 because that will mean they got a raise or a better job.

They too are potential Romney voters, because they’re suffering under the no-growth economy.

So: Romney’s theory of the case is all wrong. His understanding of the political topography is wrong.

And his tone is fatalistic. I can’t win these guys who will only vote their economic interests, but I can win these guys who will vote their economic interests, plus some guys in the middle, whoever they are.

That’s too small and pinched and narrow. That’s not how Republicans emerge victorious—”I can’t win these guys.” You have to have more respect than that, and more affection, you don’t write anyone off, you invite everyone in. Reagan in 1984 used to put out his hand: “Come too, come walk with me.” Come join, come help, whatever is happening in your life.

You know what Romney sounded like? Like a kid new to politics who thinks he got the inside lowdown on how it works from some operative. But those old operatives, they never know how it works. They knew how it worked for one cycle back in the day.

They’re jockeys who rode Seabiscuit and thought they won a race.

* * *

The big issue—how we view government, what we want from it, what we need, what it rightly asks of us, what it wrongly demands of us—is a good and big and right and serious subject. It has to be dealt with seriously, at some length. And it is in part a cultural conversation. There’s a lot of grievance out there, and a sense of entitlement in many spheres. A lot of people don’t feel confident enough or capable enough to be taking part in the big national drama of Work in America. Why? What’s going on? That’s a conversation worth having.

I think there is a broad and growing feeling now, among Republicans, that this thing is slipping out of Romney’s hands. Today at a speech in New York with what seemed like many conservatives and Republicans in the audience, I said more or less the above. I wondered if anyone would say, in the Q&A, “I think you’ve got it wrong, you’re too pessimistic.” No one did. A woman asked me to talk about why in a year the Republicans couldn’t lose, the Republican candidate seems to be losing.

I said pre-mortems won’t help, if you want to help the more conservative candidate, it’s a better use of your time to pitch in with ideas. There’s seven weeks to go. This isn’t over, it’s possible to make things better.

Republicans are going to have to right this thing. They have to stabilize it.

It’s time to admit the Romney campaign is an incompetent one. It’s not big, it’s not brave, it’s not thoughtfully tackling great issues. It’s always been too small for the moment. All the activists, party supporters and big donors should be pushing for change. People want to focus on who at the top is least constructive and most responsible. Fine, but Mitt Romney is no puppet: He chooses who to listen to. An intervention is in order. “Mitt, this isn’t working.”

Romney is known to be loyal. He sticks with you when you’re going through a hard time, he rides it down with you. That’s a real personal quality, a virtue. My old boss Reagan was a little colder. The night before he won the crucial 1980 New Hampshire primary—the night before he wonit—he fired his campaign manager, John Sears. Reagan thought he wasn’t cutting it, so he was gone. The economist Martin Anderson once called Reagan genially ruthless, and he was. But then it wasn’t about John Sears’s feelings or Ronald Reagan’s feelings, it was about America. You can be pretty tough when it’s about America.

Romney doesn’t seem to be out there campaigning enough. He seems—in this he is exactly like the president—to always be disappearing into fund-raisers, and not having enough big public events.

But the logic of Romney’s fundraising has seemed, for some time, slightly crazy. He’s raising money so he can pile it in at the end, with ads. But at the end will they make much difference? Obama is said to have used a lot of his money early on, to paint a portrait of Romney as Thurston Howell III, as David Brooks put it. That was a gamble on Obama’s part: spend it now, pull ahead in the battlegrounds, once we pull ahead more money will come in because money follows winners, not losers.

If I’m seeing things right, that strategy is paying off.

Romney’s staff used to brag they had a lower burn rate, they were saving it up. For what? For the moment when Americans would rather poke out their eyeballs and stomp on the goo than listen to another ad?

Also, Mr. Romney’s ads are mostly boring. It’s kind of an achievement to be boring at a moment in history like this, so credit where it’s due: That musta taken effort!

* * *

When big, serious, thoughtful things must be said then big, serious, thoughtful speeches must be given. Mr. Romney is not good at press conferences. Maybe because he doesn’t give enough, and so hasn’t grown used to them, and confident.

He should stick to speeches, and they have to be big—where America is now, what we must do, how we can do it. He needs to address the Mideast too, because it isn’t going to go away as an issue and is adding a new layer of unease to the entire election. Luckily, Romney has access to some of the best writers and thinkers in the business. I say it that way because to write is to think, and Romney needs fresh writing and fresh thinking.

Romney needs to get serious here.Or, he can keep typing out his stray thoughts with Stuart Stevens, who’s sold himself as a kind of mad genius. I get the mad part.

Wake this election up. Wade into the crowd, wade into the fray, hold a hell of a rally in an American city—don’t they count anymore? A big, dense city with skyscrapers like canyons, crowds and placards, and yelling. All of our campaigning now is in bland suburbs and tired hustings. How about: New York, New York, the city so nice they named it twice? You say the state’s not in play? It’s New York. Our media lives here, they’ll make it big. How about downtown Brooklyn, full of new Americans? Guys—make it look like there’s an election going on. Because there is.

Be serious and fight.

If you’re gonna lose, lose honorably. If you’re gonna win do it with meaning.

* * *

Romney always seems alone out there, a guy with a mic pacing an empty stage. All by himself, removed from the other humans. It’s sad-looking. It’s not working.

Time for the party to step up. Romney should go out there every day surrounded with the most persuasive, interesting and articulate members of his party, the old ones, and I say this with pain as they’re my age, like Mitch Daniels and Jeb Bush, and the young ones, like Susana Martinez and Chris Christie and Marco Rubio—and even Paul Ryan. I don’t mean one of them should travel with him next Thursday, I mean he should be surrounded by a posse of them every day. Their presence will say, “This isn’t about one man, this is about a whole world of meaning, this is about a conservative political philosophy that can turn things around and make our country better.”

Some of them won’t want to do it because they’re starting to think Romney’s a loser and they don’t want to get loser on them. Too bad. They should be embarrassed if they don’t go, and try, and work, and show support for the conservative candidate at a crucial moment. Do they stand for something or not? Is it bigger than them or not?

Party elders, to the extent you exist this is why you exist:

Right this ship.

* * *

So, these are some ideas. Others will have more, and they’ll be better.

But an intervention is needed.

[heyjude]

If Peggy Noonan and David Brooks are slamming Romney...probably time for Romney to reassess.

[ESF]

Sept 19, 2012 11:41:12 GMT -5 heyjude said:

If Peggy Noonan and David Brooks are slamming Romney...probably time for Romney to reassess.

Bill Kristol ripped into him yesterday too.

I check in on the National Review from time to time, and from what I've seen, nobody on that entire staff has yet to cut him loose, so Mittens still has some buddies.

[heyjude]

Bay Buchanan and Mary Matalin gave a huge defense of him yesterday on CNN.

[smock]

I agree that her assessment of the problems with Romney's campaign are spot-on. It's almost like Romney is running the campaign as a political operative, not as a leader. He's assuming that raising the most money and writing off "unreachables" is the way to win elections, instead of winning people over with a vision and plan for the future.

And I also think she's right about the cities. No one campaigns in the cities any more, but the media coverage alone would reach many more people than the suburban campaigning.

[downtoearth]

Very interesting...but now that she put this out there, if Romney "changed" his campaign strategy would he be chastized for it or would it actually work? I wonder.

[copzgirl1171]

Sept 19, 2012 12:05:30 GMT -5 heyjude said:

Bay Buchanan and Mary Matalin gave a huge defense of him yesterday on CNN.

Really? Mary Matalin has been working a nerve with me lately. Off to look.

[Deleted]

I, too, think she's spot on about the problems with the Romney campaign.

But I also think that Romney can't "[w]ade into the crowd, wade into the fray." Romney inevitably appears very uncomfortable any time he attempts that. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think he's spent so much time in his super elite, super rich circle that he honestly can't relate to people outside of it. And it shows.

[ESF]

Sept 19, 2012 12:14:17 GMT -5 @angryharpy said:

I, too, think she's spot on about the problems with the Romney campaign.

But I also think that Romney can't "[w]ade into the crowd, wade into the fray." Romney inevitably appears very uncomfortable any time he attempts that. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think he's spent so much time in his super elite, super rich circle that he honestly can't relate to people outside of it. And it shows.

I agree. He always seems uncomfortable. He seems like he's stretching so hard to make himself likeable. It actually makes me uncomfortable because he seems so far out of his element.


Here's another interesting link

www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/18/right-wing-to-brooks-toe-the-line.html

Gist of it is that most conservative pundits are coming to Romney's defense and are hanging those who dare to criticize, like Brooks, out to dry.

[Deleted]

That's a really great article. I'm a Democrat, but I think people are the same across the political spectrum--they want to feel something! They want to be inspired. I think Obama proved that you don't have to make people angry and scared for them to follow you.

Things aren't great now--why not paint a vision of what a better world would be to those who may want to vote for Romney.

I don't know about anyone else, but I personally feel grateful for any chance I get to have a little faith in mankind.

[OscarQ]

Sept 19, 2012 12:18:25 GMT -5 ESF said:

Sept 19, 2012 12:14:17 GMT -5 @angryharpy said:

I, too, think she's spot on about the problems with the Romney campaign.

But I also think that Romney can't "[w]ade into the crowd, wade into the fray." Romney inevitably appears very uncomfortable any time he attempts that. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think he's spent so much time in his super elite, super rich circle that he honestly can't relate to people outside of it. And it shows.

I agree. He always seems uncomfortable. He seems like he's stretching so hard to make himself likeable. It actually makes me uncomfortable because he seems so far out of his element.


Here's another interesting link

www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/18/right-wing-to-brooks-toe-the-line.html

Gist of it is that most conservative pundits are coming to Romney's defense and are hanging those who dare to criticize, like Brooks, out to dry.

Excellent (said in a Mr. Burns voice while rubbing my hands together with glee)! Let chaos reign over his campaign and the R's for the next seven weeks. Let it spread to down ballot races and drag them down into the abyss with Romney.

When I read Brooks yesterday and Noonan today I worried for a hot second that he'd actually take their advice and right his ship. Glad to hear they're the lonely sane voices.

[Deleted]

My concern is that people are getting overconfident. I told DH I wanted to make another donation to the campaign and he said "Obama's got it." I told my boss I wanted time off work to go do voter protection and he said "Obama's walking with all 50 states." I don't see how we can say that in California; I 100% thought no way was George Bush getting reelected, and we did it. So I'm happy because the big campaign money will leave Romney as the perception of loss strenghtens but it is troubling all the same.

[teflep]

Sept 19, 2012 12:35:25 GMT -5 OscarQ said:

Sept 19, 2012 12:18:25 GMT -5 ESF said:

I agree. He always seems uncomfortable. He seems like he's stretching so hard to make himself likeable. It actually makes me uncomfortable because he seems so far out of his element.


Here's another interesting link

www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/18/right-wing-to-brooks-toe-the-line.html

Gist of it is that most conservative pundits are coming to Romney's defense and are hanging those who dare to criticize, like Brooks, out to dry.

Excellent (said in a Mr. Burns voice while rubbing my hands together with glee)! Let chaos reign over his campaign and the R's for the next seven weeks. Let it spread to down ballot races and drag them down into the abyss with Romney.

When I read Brooks yesterday and Noonan today I worried for a hot second that he'd actually take their advice and right his ship. Glad to hear they're the lonely sane voices.

I don't think I'd go this far. They are team players, doing the rah rah so as not to show weakness.

[ESF]

Sept 19, 2012 12:34:10 GMT -5 @kcpokergal said:

That's a really great article. I'm a Democrat, but I think people are the same across the political spectrum--they want to feel something! They want to be inspired.

I agree.

Peggy Noonan is one of my favorite writers. I don't agree with her politics but I think she has such a beautiful and elegant writing style, and she's so evocative.

Mitt Romney is so out of touch and so robotic that he can't paint a picture of America that actually resonates with people. And if someone else paints it for him in a prepared speech, he can't deliver it because it doesn't connect with him. And the American public is not going to be inspired by images of welfare queens.

[ESF]

Sept 19, 2012 12:53:52 GMT -5 elle said:

My concern is that people are getting overconfident. I told DH I wanted to make another donation to the campaign and he said "Obama's got it." I told my boss I wanted time off work to go do voter protection and he said "Obama's walking with all 50 states." I don't see how we can say that in California; I 100% thought no way was George Bush getting reelected, and we did it. So I'm happy because the big campaign money will leave Romney as the perception of loss strenghtens but it is troubling all the same.

I agree that this is a big risk. I don't think Obama has it in the bag yet, and a lot can happen in seven weeks. But, Romney isn't generating any excitement. He's just dead in the water.

While I think there are going to be challenges getting Obama voters to the polls, ultimately, I think Obama wins this because the people that would have voted for Romney stay home.

[teflep]

Sept 19, 2012 13:05:26 GMT -5 ESF said:

Sept 19, 2012 12:53:52 GMT -5 elle said:

My concern is that people are getting overconfident. I told DH I wanted to make another donation to the campaign and he said "Obama's got it." I told my boss I wanted time off work to go do voter protection and he said "Obama's walking with all 50 states." I don't see how we can say that in California; I 100% thought no way was George Bush getting reelected, and we did it. So I'm happy because the big campaign money will leave Romney as the perception of loss strenghtens but it is troubling all the same.

I agree that this is a big risk. I don't think Obama has it in the bag yet, and a lot can happen in seven weeks. But, Romney isn't generating any excitement. He's just dead in the water.

While I think there are going to be challenges getting Obama voters to the polls, ultimately, I think Obama wins this because the people that would have voted for Romney stay home.

Could be and I had little thought of Romney winning. An October surprise could help (big maybe) or a focus like a laser on the economy. Forget the noise and all other issues...focusing on the economy alone could reenergize his base, along with local races.

[heyjude]

I don't want to be cocky, but unless it comes out that Obama is dating some dude in the Muslim Brotherhood, I think we got this.

[Deleted]

Sept 19, 2012 13:08:06 GMT -5 heyjude said:

I don't want to be cocky, but unless it comes out that Obama is dating some dude in the Muslim Brotherhood, I think we got this.

No! Don't say that! Seriously, though, how do people in the battleground states feel? I mean, I feel like Obama's got this, but I only know two conservatives (my aunt and uncle), and they are in the tea party, and they are insane, and even they are kind of quiet after the latest . . . . my aunt is an enthusiastic poster of meaningless picture/slogans and today she has just had a few Ryan pictures. Romney hasn't been around in a few days, actually.

[Deleted]

Today we have: "Remember when Teachers Unions were Formed to Protect the Interests of Students;" "MOre than half of Obama's twitter followers are fake;" "War on coal to shutter 204 cole plants;" and "what does a marine feel when shooting a terrorist? recoil."

Nothing for Romney. So that's my own barameter of how well he's doing.

[IIOY]

Sept 19, 2012 13:10:51 GMT -5 elle said:

Sept 19, 2012 13:08:06 GMT -5 heyjude said:

I don't want to be cocky, but unless it comes out that Obama is dating some dude in the Muslim Brotherhood, I think we got this.

No! Don't say that! Seriously, though, how do people in the battleground states feel?

According to Brian Williams, I live in one of the twelve dispositive counties in the nation for purposes of this election. IMO, and as speaking as someone who was 100% enthused about the prospect of a very detail-oriented campaign focused on some hard-core discussions of economics, I think the Romney campaign is a complete mess, almost to the point of being a caricature of itself. My takeaway is that the base doesn't really support Romney and although he gets the requisite defense whenever something new erupts, whatever enthusiasm once existed - the apex seemed to be when Ryan was named as his VP pick - is dead in the water. I could be totally wrong, but I think a lot of Rs have written this campaign off.

Now to be fair, I don't perceive much in the way of enthusiasm from Obama folks either, and this entire campaign season strikes me as one giant MEH on all sides. No one is happy. However, as the incumbent, Obama gets to act Presidential. People see him in the paper on a daily basis looking like someone in control, and the power of that, especially in contrast with a campaign that seems to be in a constant defensive mode, cannot be underestimated. Romney's best hope at this point is probably that Netanyahu does something provocative in October.

[meshaliuknits]

Sept 19, 2012 13:08:06 GMT -5 heyjude said:

I don't want to be cocky, but unless it comes out that Obama is dating some dude in the Muslim Brotherhood, I think we got this.

If anyone can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, it's the dems.

[teflep]

Sept 19, 2012 13:28:46 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Sept 19, 2012 13:10:51 GMT -5 elle said:

No! Don't say that! Seriously, though, how do people in the battleground states feel?

According to Brian Williams, I live in one of the twelve dispositive counties in the nation for purposes of this election. IMO, and as speaking as someone who was 100% enthused about the prospect of a very detail-oriented campaign focused on some hard-core discussions of economics, I think the Romney campaign is a complete mess, almost to the point of being a caricature of itself. My takeaway is that the base doesn't really support Romney and although he gets the requisite defense whenever something new erupts, whatever enthusiasm once existed - the apex seemed to be when Ryan was named as his VP pick - is dead in the water. I could be totally wrong, but I think a lot of Rs have written this campaign off.

Now to be fair, I don't perceive much in the way of enthusiasm from Obama folks either, and this entire campaign season strikes me as one giant MEH on all sides. No one is happy. However, as the incumbent, Obama gets to act Presidential. People see him in the paper on a daily basis looking like someone in control, and the power of that, especially in contrast with a campaign that seems to be in a constant defensive mode, cannot be underestimated. Romney's best hope at this point is probably that Netanyahu does something provocative in October.

This goes with my thought that Obama is not winning this election, Romney is giving it to him. That is not a great stage to be in,

[heyjude]

Sept 19, 2012 13:31:16 GMT -5 meshaliuknits said:

Sept 19, 2012 13:08:06 GMT -5 heyjude said:

I don't want to be cocky, but unless it comes out that Obama is dating some dude in the Muslim Brotherhood, I think we got this.

If anyone can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, it's the dems.

That's pre axelrod dems. Post axelrod dems have cajones.

[teflep]

Sept 19, 2012 13:36:32 GMT -5 heyjude said:

Sept 19, 2012 13:31:16 GMT -5 meshaliuknits said:

If anyone can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, it's the dems.

That's pre axelrod dems. Post axelrod dems have cajones.

They do? When'd they find them?

[meshaliuknits]

Sept 19, 2012 13:37:32 GMT -5 teflep said:

Sept 19, 2012 13:36:32 GMT -5 heyjude said:

That's pre axelrod dems. Post axelrod dems have cajones.

They do? When'd they find them?

I was gonna ask the same thing. I certainly haven't seen any sign.

[heyjude]

Somewhere around the same place they found the ad of Romney singing about America to newspaper quotes about his offshore activities.

[eddy]

Sept 19, 2012 13:10:51 GMT -5 elle said:

Sept 19, 2012 13:08:06 GMT -5 heyjude said:

I don't want to be cocky, but unless it comes out that Obama is dating some dude in the Muslim Brotherhood, I think we got this.

No! Don't say that! Seriously, though, how do people in the battleground states feel?

I am in Iowa. All I know is Obama and Biden are hitting the ground hard in this state. They are personally here every week. Romney and Ryan are not putting in as much time.

I just feel like Romney is not generating any excitement in Iowa. And this is the state that put Santorum in first place so there is certainly a conservative base here.

[ESF]

Sept 19, 2012 13:28:46 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Sept 19, 2012 13:10:51 GMT -5 elle said:

IMO, and as speaking as someone who was 100% enthused about the prospect of a very detail-oriented campaign focused on some hard-core discussions of economics, I think the Romney campaign is a complete mess, almost to the point of being a caricature of itself.

I think the mistake they made was trying to talk about the entitlement state (problem) instead of talking about the solution (jobs). Then they screwed up even more with the convention, because it not only focused on the problem of entitlements, but then made the bizarre contention that those entitlements were what were holding people back from finding work.

While I think there are legitimate discussions to be had about whether the burdens of the federal government from those entitlements are putting a strain on the economy from the investment/job creation side, I don't think most Americans believe that food stamps are keeping America from working, nor do I think people on food stamps are going to vote for Obama because they want to avoid working.

I think the reason the Romney video is so destructive is because it does suggest that is what is at the core of his philosophy.

I don't really see how they dig themselves out of this mess they've created. In hindsight, the Ryan pick looks like a mistake, because now they are forced to tell the American public (nearly all of whom receive some form of entitlement, whether its SS, a tax credit/deduction, or food stamps), who gets to keep their entitlement and who doesn't. Because that's going to invite more problems, they are forced to stay mum about a lot of the details or just backtrack altogether.

I do think we need a long, hard discussion about the budget, but I cannot believe how much they botched it. They have now been shoehorned into some kind of class warfare campaign of hating on the poor, and I don't really see how they get out of it.

I think Romney's other problem is similar to that of McCain. He got the nomination because he appealed to moderates and the farther right candidates knocked each other out. Now that Romney has moved to the right, and has made it exceptionally clear he's not the man he was in Massachusetts, the people who supported him in the primaries are finding Obama more appealing. Ryan is a stronger VP than Palin, but probably not enough to save him.

[heyjude]

Sept 19, 2012 14:24:52 GMT -5 pennypenny said:

Sept 19, 2012 13:08:06 GMT -5 heyjude said:

I don't want to be cocky, but unless it comes out that Obama is dating some dude in the Muslim Brotherhood, I think we got this.

See. I think this thinking is going to make the young and the olds stay home. And if that happens Obama is screwed.

True.

Young and olds? Please ignore me!