Counting On Romney

George Will is normally the most dependable of shills for the Republican Party establishment. And if Romney's consistent pattern of flip-flops and his utter contempt and disdain for principles is driving Will off the rails... well, it helps to explain why the inevitable GOP nominee against Obama can't get the backing of more than a quarter of Republican voters no matter what he-- or, more important, any of the other lunatics-- does. Last week's column, Mitt Romney, the pretzel candidate may have been more painful for Will to write than for Mitt to read. "A straddle," he scolded Romney, "is not a political philosophy; it is what you do when you do not have one."

Republicans may have found their Michael Dukakis, a technocratic Massachusetts governor who takes his bearings from “data” (although there is precious little to support Romney’s idea that in-state college tuition for children of illegal immigrants is a powerful magnet for such immigrants) and who believes elections should be about (in Dukakis’s words) “competence,” not “ideology.” But what would President Romney competently do when not pondering ethanol subsidies that he forthrightly says should stop sometime before “forever”? Has conservatism come so far, surmounting so many obstacles, to settle, at a moment of economic crisis, for this?

Well, if history is any clue to the future, take a look at the video up top of Romney endorsing Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson for a second term. Republicans might be forced to at least understand if Romney were endorsing ultra-conservative Blue Dog Jim Matheson. He's a fellow Mormon and he's actually been more consistently behind basic conservative principles than Romney has. But Rocky is not Jim Matheson. He's not "liberal for Utah," he's LIBERAL. When Romney and Rocky worked together, Rocky was one of the most progressive mayors in America. According to Wikipedia "As Mayor, Anderson rose to nationwide prominence as a champion of several national and international causes, including climate protection, immigration reform, restorative criminal justice, GLBT rights, and an end to the "war on drugs." Before and after the invasion by the U.S. of Iraq in 2003, Anderson was a leading opponent of the invasion and occupation of Iraq and related human rights abuses. Anderson was the only mayor of a major U.S. city who advocated for the impeachment of President George W. Bush, which he did in many venues throughout the United States."

Now watch that fulsome Romney endorsement again.

This year Rocky left the Democratic Party, but not to join Romney in the GOP. He sent the dreadful DCCC a letter telling them to take him off their mailing list.

Anderson said in an interview that he thinks people are fed up with the Democratic and Republican parties, Congress and the Obama administration to the point of being ready to do something about it.

"I think the answer is a new political party that actually will advocate for and promote the interests of the public rather than the narrow interests of the wealthy who bought and paid for not only Congress but the White House," he said.

...Anderson wrote that he wants no part of the Democratic Party until it "shows some spine and draws a line in the sand-- that an end to the tax breaks for the wealthy needs to be part of any debt/budget bill." ... "The Constitution has been eviscerated while Democrats have stood by with nary a whimper," he wrote. "It is a gutless, unprincipled party, bought and paid for by the same interests that buy and pay for the Republican Party."

That sounds like he's attacking Romney's base. But I do wonder what Republicans like George Will will think if they ever look into the on-going political alliance between Mitt Romney and Rocky Anderson. Or will they just chalk it up to anything expected Romney flip-flop?