Romney's Weakness

Another thought on Romney's campaign.  In a lot of ways, I think this NY Times story about a gay foreign policy spokesman who was hounded out of the Romney campaign is emblematic of the relationship between Romney's natural instincts (he had no qualms about hiring a gay man), the right wing of the Republican Party (which freaked the fuck out), and Romney's unwillingness to stand up for his beliefs (he didn't support the spokesman and acquiesced in his resignation from the campaign). This played out again and again throughout the campaign, until Romney finally made vague gestures toward moderation in the first debate. But even after that, he remained beholden to the extremists who dictate the policy positions of the GOP, and he wasn't strong enough to chart out a different course that might have appealed to the electorate.   As Tony Blair would say:  weak, weak, weak.


 

[UPDATE:  Another great example is Romney's weird courtship of Donald Trump.]