As soon as the following exchange took place in last night’s Republican debate, the intertubes erupted with mockery and loud predictions that Willard Mitt Romney had dug his own grave and killed his campaign.
RICK PERRY: I’m– I’m– (THROAT CLEARING) I’m listenin’ to you, Mitt, and I’m hearin’ you say all the right things. But I read your first book and it said in there that your mandate in Massachusetts which should be the model for the country. And I know it came out of– of the– the reprint of the book. But, you know, I’m just sayin’, you were for individual mandates, my friend.
MITT ROMNEY: You know what? You’ve raised that before, Rick. And– you’re simply wrong.
RICK PERRY: It– it– it was true then. (CHUCKLE) It’s true now.
MITT ROMNEY: That– now, this– Rick, I’ll– I’ll tell you what. (CHUCKLE) 10,000 bucks– (APPLAUSE) $10,000 bet?
RICK PERRY: I’m not in the bettin’ business, but, okay.
Not captured in the transcript is the fact that the audience was beginning to boo Rick Perry for being a dick before Romney said anything in response. The transcript does capture the applause when Romney offered up a ten thousand dollar wager to back up his argument that Perry was distorting his record.
This exchange may actually hurt Romney. But, if it does, it will only be because it is treated like an ‘aaaargh’ moment by the press and played in an infinite loop to prove that Romney is out of touch with regular voters. Who, after all, has ten grand to blow on a casual bet?
But let’s pause for a moment to reflect. Romney isn’t running in a general election. He’s running in a Republican nominating contest. And the entire rationale for his campaign is that he is a rich motherfucker who knows how to get shit done. Need proof? Here’s the first thing Romney said last night:
MITT ROMNEY: Well, having spent my life in the private sector, I understand where jobs are created. They’re not created in government, they’re not created in Washington. They’re created on Main Streets and streets all over America. And to help make America the most attractive place in the world for investment, for new enterprise, for entrepreneurs and for job growth, there’s seven things you have to do. There’s not just one, there’s seven…
People aren’t going to vote for Romney because they want to have a beer with him. He doesn’t drink beer. They won’t vote for him because he’s the most conservative or principled candidate. He is probably the biggest flip-flopper in the history of electoral politics. They’ll vote for him for the same reason that Donald Trump was briefly at the top of the polls. They’ll vote for him because he’s the kind of guy who can light his fondue with c-notes and not even flinch. He’s filthy rich, and that’s why people are attracted to him.
We’re talking about the Republican base here. Their heroes are all CEO’s. They reflexively defend bankers against accountability and corporations against regulations. When John McCain couldn’t remember how many houses he owned, they thought he was cool. When Bush said his base was the have-mores, they convinced themselves that they would one day be part of Bush’s base.
It didn’t hurt Romney that he bet $10,000 in the debate last night. It was an applause line.
However, the press and the other candidates and the Democrats may succeed in turning it into a liability. But it has to be turned into that, because, in itself, it didn’t hurt him at all. Quite the opposite.
I disagree. Romney has been trying to sell himself as an everyman throughout this campaign. He pushed the idiotic line that “I’m also unemployed” when meeting with a group of unemployed Floridians at a campaign stop last summer, despite the fact that he probably made more last year than most Americans do in a lifetime. His wife tries to sell their 6 room mansion as “A little place in Wolfeboro” and his son likes to talk about their “two-bedroom house, pretty small” in San Diego (3,000 square feet, btw.).
He’s been pushing this personal frugality theme for a while now. Currently headlining in the New York Times Two Romneys: Wealthy Man, Thrifty Habits which tells us he “has never become comfortable with his own wealth”.
At best, he scored a pointless goal against Perry among a very select group of Republican debate watchers. Perry, who effectively lost the campaign months ago. This does Romney no good, now or in the general election. His only competition right now is a man named Gingrich.
First of all, I’d argue that those “everyman” efforts are misguided as they apply to the primaries. He’d be better off bragging about how much money he has. That’s what Newt does when criticized about Freddie Mac. “That’s chump change, I make more than that on a single speech. I’m have 13 best sellers. I’m too rich to be corruptible.”
It’s Romney’s pattern of thinking he has the nomination wrapped up. He doesn’t.
He’d be better off bragging about how much money he has.
Maybe, but he isn’t. He needs to pick one. You can’t be a frugal, middle class guy with a small two-bedroom house and then casually bet $10,000. And it’s quite obvious that Romney has been selling the first image for the entire campaign.
I don’t think Mitt can choose a different position. He really, really wants to be elected President, not just become the nominee of the Republican Party and then be beat in the general election.
Based on that assumption and on the assumption that since he has the Party elite behind him he’ll get the nomination, Mitt has been running with an eye on the general election. He doesn’t want to say anything that will weaken his position against Obama. That’s where the bet will hurt him.
Everyone else in the nomination gaggle is running flat out to knock Romney off the “inevitable nominee” perch. The gaggle of clowns can all act like rich kids and play to the Republican base. Mitt has to play to the independents even as he runs for the nomination.
Mitt has been acting thin-skinned recently. I suspect that is because the clowns are hurting him and he can’t fight back directly without damaging his race in the general election.
A couple of weeks of bad notices from the “liberal” media is exactly the tonic that the Romney campaign needs now.
Knock some of the ‘elite’ burnish off of him, it will.
Exactly.
Boo,
I’ll bet you a million dollars this doesn’t hurt Romney in the long run.
Still buying Romneys at the market.
“People aren’t going to vote for Romney because they want to have a beer with him. He doesn’t drink beer. They won’t vote for him because he’s the most conservative or principled candidate. He is probably the biggest flip-flopped in the history of electoral politics. They’ll vote for him for the same reason that Donald Trump was briefly at the top of the polls. They’ll vote for him because he’s the kind of guy who can light his fondue with c-notes and not even flinch. He’s filthy rich, and that’s why people are attracted to him.:
Yesh, the people who do vote for him. But alternatively, there are a lot of people that won’t vote for him.
It’s very difficult to make a coherent, rational analysis of a clown popularity contest, especially when the people voting are also clowns.
It says to the rich, “He’s our kind of guy.”
It says to the working stiffs full of admiration for John Galt, “Wow! What a guy!”
And it says to me we need a constitutional amendment to bar rich people from elective or even appointive government office.
The Gracchi were stinking rich aristocrats, and therefore incapable of performing the role of tribune of the people.
And any reader satisfied with a system that pits one bunch of aristos against the other, one set bidding for support with crumbs for the plebs while the other does not, might regard your remark as a telling refutation of my suggestion.
As for me, I am not satisfied.
How did that work out in Rome, by the way?
Oh, yes.
The republic fell in a civil war between those two ariso factions, and was replaced with a quasi-hereditary military dictatorship for about 5 hundred years.
Good job.
Were Romney a better campaigner, he probably would have said something like “Rick, if you can find a passage in my book that says what you say it says, I’ll buy you a steak dinner with all the trimmings.”
Yeah, that’s what he should have said. But Mitt doesn’t think like that. He thinks like an extremely rich man who throws the weight of his wealth around to get his way.
Here’s how it works.
A relatively small percentage of the voting public actually watches these debates, and even the members of that small percentage have attention lapses as they go get a snack, head for the bathroom, scratch their itchy ass or whatever else vies for their (mostly severely limited ) attention.
But afterwards?
A much greater number of potential voters glom onto what the talking heads have to say about what just happened. Over a day or two or three, an “Aaaaargh” moment can be created out of thin air if it is in the interest of the fixers to do so.
As I said above, this whole “debate” process is really nothing but an extended screen test. If the word is out in PermaGov circles that Romney can’t beat Obama and/or that the fix is not yet in for Obama, that $10K bet will send Romney even further down because the gerbilheads will gather around his body and nibble him on down yet another few notches.
On the other hand, if the fix is indeed still in for Obama, then that won’t happen. Gotta have a good-looking patsy, after all. At least Romney doesn’t look like a tomato can.
American politics in the reality show area.
Bet on it.
AG
I think this does Romney no good even with GOP voters especially when it seems that the primary voters are looking for any reason to vote “not Mittens”.
Besides, if Oprah Winfrey (billions), Warren Buffett (billions), hell even Jay Z (millions) bet anyone a million dollars on anything, then hell yeah people would believe that they could pay said million.
It’s the $10,000 figure that screams “eliticism” in Romney’s case. We’ve all played “the betting game” to shut people up, but it’s usally IDK, something like $1, $5 or even 1 million dollars (usually with a pinky to the corner of your mouth ala Dr. Evil on Austin Powers). But $10,000 just seem like a more arbitrary number to most people and it was used by Mittens so fluidly that it seems like it’s a monetary amount that slips easily off his tongue regularly?
I actually surprised that more focus isn’t paid to Gingrich’s “Teddy Kennedy” line to Romney early in the debate. I’m no fan of Gingrich at all, but when I heard that line and the nasty delivery even I thought “Damn” straight to Romney’s gut. I actually think that was the what put Romney off his stride a bit. I know Mittens came up with some NFL line, but seems to me the damage was done.
Gingrich is just a nasty dude, and Romney is just not equipped to go as nasty on Newt as Newt was obviously willing to go on Mittens.
If any of the other candidates are running for anything but VP, then actually hitting Romney hard and quick seems to discombobulate the Rom-bot circuitry enough for him to be open for slips like the $10k line.
That was a great line by Newton, but I have to admit Willard recovered from it well. Even my brother, who pays zero attention to politics but happened to be in the room for that part of the debate, thought Romney did a good job of thinking on his feet there.
BTW, I mentioned Perry’s reaction to the Romney bet. Here he is playing it for all it’s worth:
Perry: Romney “Out of Touch”
Definitely an unforced error on Romney’s part.
Team Newt On Mitt’s Bet: ‘I Wonder If He Had The Cash In His Pocket?’