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Go Home Romney Death Watch

JONATHAN CHAIT MARCH 30, 2010

Romney Death Watch

BY JONATHAN CHAIT

Mitt Romney's old explanation as to why his Massachusetts health care plan bore no resemblance whatsoever to President Obama's was that Obama's plan had a public option. His new explanation is federalist:

“We solved our problem at the state level. Like it or not, it was a state solution. Why is it that President Obama is stepping in and saying ‘one size fits all’ ’’?

Republicans believe that the Affordable Care Act is socialist tyranny. Romney's position is basically that socialist tyranny is okay as long as it's imposed on a state-by-state basis. I don't see this argument winning over the GOP base.

This is why I've been skeptical for a while now about Romney's 2012 prospects. The Atlantic Monthly's Marc Ambinder takes issue with those of us writing off Romney:

That's anchor bias -- the same type of bias that consigned the Democratic majority to history the day after Scott Brown won Ted Kennedy's Senate seat in Massachusetts -- the same type of cognitive error that Barney Frank made on the night of Brown's victory when he said, well, maybe we ought to slow down again.  Human beings are very bad at figuring out how long an effect will last, and very bad at predicting how events they cannot anticipate will influence future probabilities.

Actually, I think Ambinder has this backwards. Right now, Romney looks fine -- he has money, name recognition, decent polling, and the like. What you have to do is project how the current dynamic is going to play in 2012. At the moment, Republican leaders are trying to demonize the Affordable Care Act, so they have little incentive to point out that it's basically Romneycare plus cost controls. But in the context of the 2012 race, with the Affordable Care Act settled into law and a contested GOP primary going on, there will be lots of Republicans playing up the comparisons between Romneycare and Obamacare. Romney appears politically viable right now because most Republican voters have not been exposed to the Romneycare-Obamacare comparison -- or if they have, it's been made by advocates of the latter, rather than by Republicans who they trust. When the attacks come, Romney just has no convincing reply.

Indeed, you're going to see more quotes like this, from the economist who helped devise the basis of both programs:

“Basically, it’s the same thing,’’ said Jonathan Gruber, an MIT economist who advised the Romney and Obama administrations on their health insurance programs. A national health overhaul would not have happened if Mitt Romney had not made “the decision in 2005 to go for it. He is in many ways the intellectual father of national health reform.’’

This is going to be the basis for a devastating attack, and I don't see how Romney answers it. I'd like to see Romney win the nomination, because he's intelligent, competent, and has some decent moral instincts buried somewhere beneath a thick coat of pandering demagoguery. I just don't see it happening.

Update: Ed Kilgore has more.

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19 comments

I don't understand Ambinder et al's belief that Romney has a future. One simply has to ask, "What does Romney offer Repubicans as a nominee?" Romney's whole appeal rests on his reputation for executive competence. Not ideological purity, not service to country or party, not intraparty seniority. If the GOP were ever going to nominate a "competence" candidate like Romney, it would have done so in 2008, when it was trying to counter public disillusionment with Republican incompetence. 2012 will not be a competence election for Republicans, so Romney will not be the nominee. Worth remembering also that if Republicans awarded convention delegates proportionally, as Democrats do, rather than on a winner-take-all basis, Romney would have been the GOP nominee in 2008.

- rhubarbs

March 30, 2010 at 3:36pm

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In quitting early, Romney was a better GOP soldier than Huckabee in 2008, so he does have that party prerogative going for him. But that faithful service is not going to prevent him from taking massive attacks from his right about healthcare. Combine that with his pre-existing reputation for prevarication, and he is probably in an untenable situation. Any explication will be seen as an equivocation. Palin will savage him for heresy. Pawlenty will beat on him for pandering. Ron Paul will just randomly beat on him. In short, he will not be able to look like Ronald Reagan, and isn't that the ball game for Republican candidates? Maybe that leaves Paul Ryan to a run a Romney-like campaign (complete with hair product) without Romney's baggage/achievements.

- propjoe

March 30, 2010 at 4:00pm

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What I'm not clear on, is how anyone can make any inferences about Romney's instincts, whether in terms of decency or anything else. The most parsimonious bet in terms of his instincts is that they appear to be primarily geared at who he thinks his electorate is. Sure, earlier on when he was trying to be the one in charge in massachusetts, he appeared reasonable to us liberals. And then when he ran for GOP nomination we assumed he was pandering to their elements when he reversed himself. If anyone knows who Romney was 'really' pandering to and who he 'really' is, well, they're better than I am. I''ll trust the decency of his instincts when he's running for president of the ACLU or the Sierra Club.

- miceelf

March 30, 2010 at 4:05pm

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miceelf: That's what I'm talking about. Any attempt to explain himself exposes Romney to everyone's deep-seated fears about his motives. That's a sticky wicket to say the least.

- propjoe

March 30, 2010 at 4:11pm

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I hate statements like this: "Human beings are ... very bad at predicting how events they cannot anticipate will influence future probabilities." Oh, yes. What a great piece of Gladwellian wisdom. People are bad at predicting the unpredictable. I'm sure there is a book about this phenomenon with a one-word title like "Surprise" or "Twist."

- jhildner

March 30, 2010 at 4:14pm

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I disagree that he is toast because of Romneycare, his Mormon faith is a much bigger handicap. I truly do not think most rank and file Republicans, especially in the non south, are foaming at the mouth teabaggers, Wall Street money will not go to Palin (if she even runs, which I doubt) it will go to Romney. And the wingnuts vote will be divided between the wingnut candidates. The Republicans nominated McCain, Dole, Bush 1 who were all establishment candidates and Bush jr. seemed like he could bring the establishment with the virtue of looking all countryfied so unlike Rhub. I am not writing him off (except for his Mormonism, which I really do not know how it will play out)

- blackton

March 30, 2010 at 4:31pm

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Romney's faith is definitely a big deal, which we didn't see play out fully in 2008. That said, so was Obama's relation to Jeremiah Wright, which I thought might be a deal killer in the summer of 2008. The key difference between Obama and Romney in this regard is that Obama was able to explain himself in way that won over people. Romney begins with the reputation as flip-flopper, which means that people either listen skeptically or don't listen at all when he explains himself. He has the very handicaps that sunk Kerry, and (as rhubarbs notes) he is not a war hero or a long-suffering party vet. This healthcare issue is of no help to say the least. I think it's right to say that Palin will be busy making money elsewhere in 2012, but there are a lot of people who will take advantage of these weaknesses. Anybody could.

- propjoe

March 30, 2010 at 4:51pm

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Either way, Blackton, you're looking at a split in the Republican party ranks. And, since there are fewer of them numerically, a general election split between the Teabagging fundamentalists and the Wall Street traditionalists will doom the party's chances in 2012. We can only hope. Reminds me a litltle of the Ross Perot problem in '96.

- desertdog

March 30, 2010 at 4:55pm

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I'm gonna out myself here as a Mitt sympathizer -- or a "Mittpathizer" as we like to call ourselves. Seriously, I have a warm place in my heart for the man. For one thing, I have an irrational affection for Mormons; I knew a lot of them in the Army, and to a man (come to think of it, they were all men) every single one was a decent and likable fellow. Crazy underwear aside, I don't think I've ever met a Mormon who I wouldn't trust to watch my dog. More importantly though, I really like Romney's shameless pandering. Think about it! Have you ever seen a politician blow more transparently in the political winds? There are teenagers in South Dakota running for Junior High School class president who are more subtle about courting votes than Mitt Romney. Who would you rather have with a finger on the big red button: Sarah Palin, by all appearances a true believer, or Mitt Romney? Gimme the dude with the hair. At least you know his hand won't be twitchy from too much caffeine.

- ratnerstar

March 30, 2010 at 5:06pm

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I get your logic blackton, but I disagree. We just don't know who the candidates are yet, and so we can't know which will win the dollar primary. There's no George W. Bush this time to prematurely sweep the field of establishment donors. Pawlenty, for example, could look like a very good investment for Wall Street types. As could Virginia's Bob McDonnell if he runs. Hell, so could Palin; for all her faux-populist spitting, the policies she supports are exactly those of the moneyed elite. She talks like a Teabagger, but her platform is completely establishmentarian.

- rhubarbs

March 30, 2010 at 5:17pm

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They almost always nominate somebody who has been around the block before-run on the national ticket or run for the nomination. All of the people who fit have problems. Mitt's are discussed above; Gov. Hayseed says he isn't running and I doubt Pailin is. MCcain and Dole and Bush sr are too old Bush Jr is ineligible and Kemp is dead. The last time they nominated someone who didn't fit was 64 whichthis year resembles in the sense of the right wing nut noise and activity and indications that they are going after low level party jobs. The outcome of that election would give them pause if theywere rational....

- stanmvp48

March 30, 2010 at 5:30pm

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Ratner...I agree with your sentiments about Mormons. Romney could likely get more support among Demos than Repubs. After all, the D party is much more tolerant of religious diversity than the R party. I (we) don't really care what religion a person is, for the most part, unless you're talking about using the force of the state to impose it on me (us) or to bring about an early Armageddon. That kind of talk is what scares the crap out of a non-denominational, somewhat agnostic Christian liberal like myself and makes me recoil in disgust at many of the radical religious types that seem to have found their voice through the Teabagging movement. Mitt's problem is he's in the wrong political party, first, and a flopping chameleon, second. Sara Palin? Oh my God that screachy voice alone is enough to make me want to shoot myself in a mercy kill. Never mind that she has nothing whatsoever to say of any substance.

- desertdog

March 30, 2010 at 5:34pm

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- Mitt won't need anyone else on stage to debate questions posed to him. It could be Mitt versus Mitt. However, it will be complicated if he's one on one (or one on one&one). Does he get extra time to debate himself?

- michael

March 30, 2010 at 5:56pm

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"Why is it that President Obama is stepping in and saying ‘one size fits all’" 1) You get economies of scale – often enormous ones 2) You get economies of simplicity – often enormous ones 3) It's extremely difficult and costly for voters to monitor and judge a bazillion little local programs, and their administrators. 4) Most Americans believe that no matter which state an American lives in, travels to, or moves to, there should be certain minimum rights and standards for them and their children. 5) We live in one country, not 50 separate countries, or thousands of separate county or city sized countries.

- serlin

March 30, 2010 at 9:47pm

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ratner, my Army Intell experience with Mormons was even better - because of their mission requirements, they all speak a foreign language and are well traveled. Great soldiers. As for Mitt, I'm not writing ANYONE off for 2012 in March of 2010. yes, the evangelicals will have problems with his Mormonism, but depending on how the next 2 years go, the desire to beat Obama may trump even that. We'll see - it's waaaay too early for this sort of navel-gazing.

- butchie b

March 31, 2010 at 10:41am

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We have the same experience, butchie: I was a Korean linguist. There are a lot of great Mormon linguists out there, although curiously they often ended up at DLI learning a new language rather than just working the one they already had.

- ratnerstar

March 31, 2010 at 1:10pm

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True enough, ratner, as few missionaries found their way to the USSR in the 70s and 80s and I was a Russian linguist and many Mormons were with me at DLI. Desertdog - for Xmas, the collected speeches of your sweetheart Sara on DVD. Where should I send it?

- butchie b

March 31, 2010 at 3:40pm

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Thanks Butchie....send it to my mother-in-law's place in CA.

- desertdog

March 31, 2010 at 4:38pm

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Romney would be my first choice among the front-runners, which means he may not have a chance. He was also the anointed of the national defense community. As for Mormons, once a denomination reaches a few million members, I think they're diverse enough that the charges of insularity, etc., ring hollow. After all, we Episcopalians were subject to the same whispering campaigns, yet we remain proud. We are the backbone of the world sherry industry.

- haricot

March 31, 2010 at 6:14pm

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