What A Pickle Romney Has Put The Left In

Let me highlight President Obama's dilemma in criticizing Mitt Romney in two paragraphs. Paragraph one from liberal David Sirota of Salon:

Why are movement conservatives so uneasy with Mitt Romney? Is it because of his past statements defending a woman’s right to choose an abortion and his previous declaration that he’s a “progressive”? Is it because of his record mounting a campaign against corporate tax loopholes – one more aggressive than almost any other politician in both parties? Or is it simply because he governed one of the most liberal states in the country — a state whose liberal policies (despite the Obama campaign’s efforts to mimic George H.W. Bush’s 1988 assault) make it one of the nation’s best, according to most empirical measures?

Got that? Mitt Romney is a flip-flopper with no soul and will do whatever is politically expedient. Now on to Sirota's next paragraph.

All of that probably has something to do with it — but it doesn’t explain the whole story. Policy-wise, Romney has campaigned for president as a lockstep movement conservative, discarding or outright renouncing most of his previously left-leaning positions. That suggests if he wins, he knows he will owe his victory as much to the conservative movement as any prior Republican candidate — and he will likely deliver for that movement as payback. That’s because policymaking is less an expression of lawmakers’ personal preferences and much more a reflection of the demands of coalitions who put politicians in office.

Whoa! I thought Romney will do whatever is politically expedient? Now you are saying that he will "deliver" for the conservative movement? Why? If Mitt Romney does whatever is politically expedient, won't he try to appeal to the middle of the country now and after he is elected since the political middle of the country represents over 40% of the electorate? He just glazes over the fact that the country is not made up of right wingers. It is made up of a large center, whose approval Romney will need to pass his agenda and then get reelected. But Sirota would have us believe that Romney will forgo all of that just so he can say thank you to the Tea Party (who incidentally did everything they could to prevent Romney from winning the nomination).

Here is what is at play. Sirota wants to label Romney (a) a flip-flopper with no soul and (b) a right wing partisan with a conservative soul. Never mind that A and B contradict each other. And it will be a frosty day in Hades before Sirota or any partisan Democrat refers to Romney as a moderate, the very thing that Romney has consistently been accused of being his entire career. If I could give Sirota and the Democrats my suggestion, I would tell them to stick with A, because B ain't happening. It's just not believable. And when you try to swing for the fences on both of them, you end up striking out.

How about another example in liberal confusion over what to do with Romney: Andrew Sullivan.

First, let me say that I recently decided to continue reading Andrew Sullivan, not because I think he is a serious thinker offering empirically-based observations of the political world. No, if Andrew ever did any of that, he gave it up the day Obama came out in support of gay marriage. Now, Sullivan is an Obama cheerleader and the mere mention of Romney causes frothing at his mouth.

Rather, I happen to enjoy watching Sullivan be handed bad news on a daily basis regarding his rugged warrior and then try portray the state of affairs for Obama in such a hopeful light.  

Nevertheless, Andrew Sullivan, in order to maintain his large audience, must pass himself off as some kind of forward-thinking inclusive kind of guy. You know, the kind of approach that a homosexual journalist seeking gay equality would adopt.  

Yet, here he is on Romney's faith:

Here's a question: if Barack Obama had to go through a brutal process of defending the doctrines, sermons and ideology of a church he merely attended, why is Mitt Romney exempted from explaining the doctrines and statements and ideology of a church he was an actual leading official in?

In the rest of the article, Sullivan tip toes around the elephant. He lauds America for being great in its diversity. Furthermore, he knows he can't directly attack Romney's faith, but he's got to portray Romney poorly somehow.  He won't indict Mormonism, be he will ask questions. Lots of questions. Liberals will be able to maintain their self-image of how inclusive they are, while secretly pondering how weird Mormon Mitt is and how backwards his Mormon thinking is.

By the way, in case you missed it, anti-Mormon bigotry is up and you will never guess who are the culprits.