Mitt Romney headed to his home state of Michigan today to deliver a speech on health care reform. But health care wasn’t only the subject. The subtext was the reintroduction of Romney as an “authentic” candidate, as if that’s possible.
Speaking at the University of Michigan today, Mitt Romney embraced the health care plan enacted during his tenure as Massachusetts’ governor, a plan that inspired President Obama’s national model.
“I did what I believed was right for the people of my state,” Romney said of his reforms, which Republicans have cited as evidence that Romney doesn’t have conservative interests in mind.
While embracing his political past, Romney made sure to mention he doesn’t think that such tactics should be spread from coast-to-coast. States, not the federal government, should adopt their own policies, allowing each individual area to be its own “laboratory of democracy.”
“I’m convinced, however, that the Obama administration fundamentally does not believe in that experiment,” Romney declared, trying to distance himself from the Obama.
But the appearance today was about more than standing by his reform policy and defusing a political land mine. It was, as Chris Cillizza points out, about presenting Romney as an “authentic” candidate:
It wasn’t just the words Romney used that aimed to push the authenticity narrative.
He spoke without a prepared script and without a TelePrompter, choosing instead to use a PowerPoint presentation to make his case. He wore no tie. He was accompanied to the speech by just three staffers.
The entire presentation screamed openness, pushing the idea that Romney is someone willing to be transparent about what he believes and why he believes it.
As Cillizza also notes, Romney needs to dispose of an image that haunted him in 2008: that of an ever-polished, flip-flopping millionaire. That’s a tall order.
Even without a tie, and even when he rolls up his sleeves, as politicians are wont to do when appealing to the “everyman,” Romney comes off like a Ken doll: well-coiffed, handsome and undeniably wealthy.
The former governor may be able to feign authenticity in a controlled setting, like today’s speech, but when he’s forced to confront the American voter, Romney will without a doubt fall flat, as evidenced in this lamentable video of him trying to bond with black youth back in 2008…
May 12, 2011 at 11:32 pm, Stomadial said:
Romney’s most authentic trait is his fraudulence. He needs to come out and own it.