Even After the Election, Mitt Revisits His '47 Percent' Mentality
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It's been over a week since the country (well, half of it at least) decided that Obama should have another shot at this whole being-President thing. We spent a few days philosophizing about what it meant for our country, then heard from the racists, then heard about Petraeus and, now, here we are. What a maelstrom of news it has been. Thanks Twitter.
Anyway, we haven't heard much from Mitt Romney. When compared to the other members of the American Election Loser's Lounge, it's different for him, not having a job and all to return to. Kerry and McCain returned to the Senate; Al Gore returned to the Earth; and Bob Dole returned to... wherever. Even Paul Ryan has work he still has to do as a Representative in Wisconsin.
But, Romney... what's he going to do? Get a job with Fox News like Palin? Or, even worse, get a Mormon billionaire reality show on TLC... like Palin?
Alas, we spoke too soon. Yesterday, Romney sat down in a conference call with his highest donors to talk about what exactly happened on Election Night. Remember the last time he talked to these guys? And then someone secretly recorded it, put it on Mother Jones and permanently changed the campaign's public persona? Well, this time around, the only noticeable difference was the timing.
Here's a preview of some of the reported remarks:
"The President's campaign focused on giving targeted groups a big gift - so he made a big effort on small things... You can imagine for somebody making $25,000 or $30,000 or $35,000 a year, being told you're now going to get free healthcare, particularly if you don't have it, getting free healthcare worth, what, $10,000 per family, in perpuity. I mean. this is huge."
The 'gifts' that Romney prescribes to the voting populace strike a clear chord with the undertones of his '47 Percent' speech, where he proclaimed that those who don't pay income tax and receive costly handouts by Big Brother all support Obama. The conservative spiel sounded different, though, during the campaign; after that speech hit headlines, the whole robotic businessman caricature that was gradually being built for him had made landfall. But, now that we know what become of that campaign, this version from the ex-Presidential candidate comes off as white noise.
The 'gifts' perspective of public policy was ruled out at the ballot box; that 47 percent Romney staked out soon turned into an electoral majority. In other words, the warped ideology of how a government should view its people was locked out at the front door by those same people almost faster than Romney himself.
Knowing that, this could be Romney's last political breath of air - a final atonement to an idea that America just didn't wanna accept. And a loss his huge donors didn't want to bare.
"I'm very sorry that we didn't win," he said. "I know you expected to win, we expected to win, we were disappointed with the result, we hadn't anticipated it, and it was very close but close doesn't count in this business."
Gifts, anyone?
[jsurico15@gmail.com/@JSuricz]
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