Mitt Romney, Candidate of Mystery

It's kind of ironic that the candidate whose primary opponents ran as his antithesis is running as the antithesis of his opponent. After facing down various Not-Romney candidates for his party's nomination, Mitt's running as the Not-Obama. And that's pretty much the gist of it. The seems to have no ideas and stands for nothing other than the idea that Barack Obama should not be the president.

This has been obvious for a while now, but the media is just starting to notice it.


[Politico:]

...Vague, general or downright evasive policy prescriptions on some of the most important issues facing the country are becoming the rule for Romney. Hoping to make the campaign strictly a referendum on the incumbent, the hyper-cautious challenger is open about his determination to not give any fodder to Obama aides hungry to make the race as much about Romney as the president.

Romney is remarkably candid, almost as though he’s reading the stage directions, about why he won’t offer up details: he thinks it will undermine his chances to win.

“The media kept saying to Chris, ‘Come on, give us the details, give us the details,’’’ Romney has said about New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s 2009 gubernatorial race. ‘’We want to hang you with them.’”


It's this brand of political courage that's marked the Romney campaign from the gitgo; he'll tell you what you want to hear and if he's not sure what you want to hear (or can't tell you that), he won't tell you anything at all. The result is a candidate who's kind of a Mystery Date. For example, Politico cites Romney's response to Obama's new immigration policy -- i.e., Mitt doesn't have one.


Mitt Romney’s aides suggested that when the Republican appeared before a Hispanic advocacy group on Thursday he’d address immigration.

But when Romney spoke to the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO), he only reiterated what he had said earlier in the week about the citizenship status of children of illegal immigrants.

“I will put in place my own long-term solution that will replace and supersede the president’s temporary measure,” he told the group about President Barack Obama’s hotly debated directive regarding the DREAM Act.

But on the question of what exactly such a long-term solution would be, the GOP nominee isn’t saying.


Let's be clear here, it's not the press Romney's worried about, it's the voters. The press can't "hang you" with "the details" if the details are brilliant, can they? What Mitt's really saying is that he's unwilling to reveal a plan's flaws -- and all plans are flawed -- be revealing too much about any given policy.

And "too much" is apparently defined as "almost anything." To go back to his immigration response, the very most he seems to be willing to share is that he has a "long-term solution." Is it a particularly good solution? Well, you're just going to have to buy the unlabeled can to find out what's in it. For all we know, Romney wants to shoot the children of undocumented parents over the Mexican border out of a cannon. His response is so lacking in anything even resembling detail that we really can't rule that out based on all the evidence.

Here's hoping the debates force Mitt to come out with some actual positions on actual issues -- if Mitt even agrees to participate. And here's hoping the media keeps reporting the fact that Mitt Romney is touring the country saying nothing of substance and offering no solutions on anything.

Right now, that's the most important thing about the Romney campaign; that what their candidate would do with the Oval Office is -- by design -- a complete mystery.

-Wisco