{"id":278,"date":"2011-11-18T21:08:47","date_gmt":"2011-11-19T02:08:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/?p=278"},"modified":"2011-11-18T21:08:47","modified_gmt":"2011-11-19T02:08:47","slug":"an-honest-look-at-mitt-romney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/2011\/11\/an-honest-look-at-mitt-romney.html","title":{"rendered":"An Honest Look at Mitt Romney"},"content":{"rendered":"

From the time the GOP presidential primary contest got under way, Mitt Romney has been heralded in the media as the <\/em>frontrunner.\u00a0 Since its crushing losses in \u201906 and \u201908 and the ensuing rise of both Barack H. Obama as well as the Tea Party movement, the Republican Party has claimed to have learned the error of its ways.\u00a0 It alone is the party of \u201climited\u201d or \u201cconstitutional government,\u201d the party of liberty.\u00a0 Yet during its reign of power under the tenor of George W. Bush, it not only abjectly failed to reduce the size and scope of the federal government; it significantly expandedWashingtonD.C.\u2019s control over our lives. Now, the GOP promises us, it will \u201creturn to its roots.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

From the time the GOP presidential primary contest got under way, the media has treated Mitt Romney\u2019s nomination as virtually inevitable.\u00a0 How, though, does the idea of an allegedly repentant Republican Party renewing its commitment to individual liberty square with the idea of Mitt Romney as this party\u2019s presidential nominee?<\/p>\n

To put this question another way, is Romney a credible standard bearer of the party of \u201climited government?\u201d<\/p>\n

To answer this question, we need to look not so much as what Romney says now, <\/em>during a Republican primary race.\u00a0 We need, rather, to look at what he has said and done <\/em>throughout his career.<\/p>\n

Abortion<\/strong><\/p>\n

The first thing of which to take note is that in spite of his assurances that he is opposed to abortion, for most of his political career he has been a proponent of women\u2019s \u201cright to choose.\u201d\u00a0 Mind you, it isn\u2019t just that Romney refused to ally himself with the opponents of abortion; he actively sought to counter their efforts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 1994, while he was running for the Senate in Massachusetts, Romney was photographed at a Planned Parenthood <\/em>fundraiser.\u00a0 That same (election) year, he insisted that \u201cwe should sustain and support\u201d Roe v. Wade, <\/em>as well as \u201cthe right of a woman to make that choice\u201d to pursue an abortion or not.\u00a0 Whatever Romney\u2019s or anyone else\u2019s \u201cpersonal beliefs\u201d regarding the wrongness of abortion, he adamantly rejected the possibility that it would be appropriate to interject them \u201cinto a political campaign.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

When Romney\u2019s opponent in the Senate race, Ted Kennedy, accused him essentially of flip flopping on the abortion issue\u2014Romney was \u201cmultiple choice,\u201d according to Kennedy\u2014he replied that among his most cherished beliefs is the belief that he must not \u201cimpose my beliefs on other people.\u201d\u00a0 Upon losing \u201ca dear, close family relative\u201d who had \u201cpassed away from an illegal abortion,\u201d Romney said that he, his mother, and his family \u201chave been committed to the belief that we can believe as we want, but we will not force our beliefs on others on that matter [i.e. abortion].\u201d\u00a0 So that there would be no doubts regarding the strength of his conviction on this issue, Romney unequivocally asserted: \u201cAnd you will not see me wavering on that, or being multiple-choice, thank you very much.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

As of 1994, then, Romney confessed to having been a lifelong advocate of \u201cabortion rights\u201d for women.\u00a0 By 2002\u2014when he ran for the governorship of Massachusetts\u2014things had not changed in this respect.\u00a0 Romney pledged to \u201cpreserve and protect a woman\u2019s right to choose\u201d and his platform reiterated his stance on this topic: \u201cThe choice to have an abortion is a deeply personal one.\u00a0 Women should be free to choose based on their own beliefs, not [those of] the government\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Romney relays the story now, all of this changed for him in 2004 when he had an encounter with Harvard University stem cell researcher, Douglas Melton.\u00a0 When Melton explained to Romney that destroying two week-old embryos via therapeutic cloning was unobjectionable, the governor supposedly had an epiphany.\u00a0 Turning to his chief of staff, Beth Myers, Romney told her that \u201cwe have cheapened the sanctity of life by virtue of the Roe v. Wade <\/em>mentality.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Melton, however, takes exception to Romney\u2019s account of their meeting.\u00a0 There was, he insists, no talk of killing embryos at all.\u00a0 That a year later, <\/em>in 2005, Romney underscored that he was \u201cabsolutely committed to\u201d his \u201cpromise to maintain the status quo with regards to laws relating to abortion and choice\u201d suggests that perhaps there is more than a grain of truth in what Melton says.<\/p>\n

So up until he decided to run for the presidency in 2008, Mitt Romney was essentially \u201cpro-choice.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, many Republicans and self-declared conservatives will miss the main significance of this.\u00a0 From the perspective of a champion of \u201climited government,\u201d the primary problem isn\u2019t that Romney was effectively \u201cpro-choice.\u201d\u00a0 The problem is that he favored usurping the right of individual states to negotiate this most controversial of issues for themselves.\u00a0 Romney defended an obscene power grab on the part of the federal government, a concentration of government authority over an even greater part of our lives.<\/p>\n

Yet this was far from the only time that Romney betrayed his sympathy for Big Government.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Education<\/strong><\/p>\n

Romney, like most Republicans, supports \u201cschool choice\u201d and charter schools.\u00a0 And, like most Republicans, he wants to preserve the Department of Education.\u00a0 There is no inconsistency here.\u00a0 The rhetoric of \u201cchoice\u201d is politically appealing, but when it comes to this issue of education, Republicans are no more interested in depriving the federal government of the role in education that it has assumed over the decades than are Democrats.\u00a0 Romney, furthermore, is actually a fan <\/em>of the Department of Education.\u00a0 In the GOP primary race of 2008, Romney remarked that he had come to \u201csee that the Department of Education can actually make a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n

Oh, and he is a proponent of \u201cNo Child Left Behind,\u201d a law that has served to strengthen <\/em>the federal government\u2019s grip over state schools.<\/p>\n

The Second Amendment<\/strong><\/p>\n

It turns out that Romney hasn\u2019t been all that much friendlier to those committed to protecting the Second Amendment than he has been to the unborn and the champions of states\u2019 rights.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While campaigning for the governorship of Massachusettsin 2002, Romney both acknowledged his state\u2019s strict gun laws and <\/em>expressed his belief in them.\u00a0 He was unequivocal: \u201cWe do have tough gun laws inMassachusetts; I support them.\u00a0 I won\u2019t chip away at them.\u00a0 I believe they protect us and provide for our safety.\u201d<\/p>\n

And lest one object that Romney was just governing a specific state in accordance with the prevailing sensibilities of the majority of its residents, we would be well served to recall that during his Senate campaign, he endorsed \u201cthe Brady Bill\u201d\u2014a federal <\/em>piece of legislation requiring all would-be purchasers of firearms to wait five days before they can follow through with their purchases.\u00a0 He commented that his decision to do so was \u201cnot going to make me the hero of the NRA [National Rifle Association].\u201d\u00a0 But that was fine with Romney, for as he proudly noted, \u201cI don\u2019t line up with the NRA.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2008, on the eve of the declaration of his candidacy for president, Romney acquired a membership with none other than the NRA.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Other Domestic Issues<\/strong><\/p>\n

Government Subsidies and Industry<\/em><\/p>\n

Romney supported the government\u2019s bailout of the automobile industry.\u00a0 Not only, though, does he call for the federal government to subsidize this<\/em> industry, he also believes that it ought to continue subsidizing the agricultural industry.\u00a0 Romney wasn\u2019t always this sympathetic to the latter, though.\u00a0 While he was running for the Senate in 1994, he demanded what he referred to as \u201cthe virtual elimination\u201d of the Department of Agriculture.\u00a0 However, in 2007, when he was pushed on this point, one of hisIowa spokespersons assured farmers that \u201cGovernor Romney believes that investing in agriculture is [the] key to our economy and families.\u201d<\/p>\n

Romney has also made known his fondness for the federal government\u2019s indispensable role in \u201cinvesting\u201d in technology.\u00a0 For Romney, it isn\u2019t enough that, to his own admission, \u201cwe as a country already invest an enormous amount\u2026in defense technology, space technology,\u201d and \u201chealth\u201d; we need as well \u201cto invest in some of the emerging technologies that are important at a basic science level such as fuel cell technology, power generation, materials science, [and] automotive technology.\u201d\u00a0 The federal government must also combat the \u201cmoral pollution\u201d that engulfs America\u2019s children on a daily basis.\u00a0 To this end, Romney wants to coerce home computer manufacturers to install a device that will permit parents to block objectionable content.\u00a0 According to Romney, \u201cWe have to recognize that where we invest as a nation, both<\/em> from a government <\/em>standpoint but also from a private standpoint, those are the areas we\u2019ve been most successful\u201d (emphasis mine).\u00a0<\/p>\n

Global Warming<\/em><\/p>\n

Romney doesn\u2019t just believe in \u201cglobal warming;\u201d he thinks as well that human beings contribute significantly to it.\u00a0 In and of itself, this belief is neither here nor there, but as we know all too well, believers in \u201cglobal warming\u201d\u2014especially when they are politicians, like Romney, with dreams of amassing vast quantities of power\u2014invariably jump all too easily from this belief in an impending apocalypse to the conclusion that \u201cwe<\/em> must do something to thwart it.\u201d<\/p>\n

And this, of course, means that we need bigger and bigger government.<\/p>\n

When he was governor ofMassachusetts, Romney authored a 72 point \u201cClimate Protection Plan\u201d and supported the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative\u2014both measures designed to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Though he has thus far said little about it, you can bet the bank that as president, Romney would be ever so eager to combat \u201cglobal warming\u201d at the federal level.<\/p>\n

Health Care<\/em><\/p>\n

There is very little that hasn\u2019t already been said concerning \u201cRomneycare.\u201d\u00a0 Still, it bears repeating: Romney\u2019s socialized health care scheme for the citizens ofMassachusettswas instrumental in the formation of the \u201cPatient Protection and Affordable Care Act\u201d\u2014i.e. \u201cObamacare.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Regrettably, for Romney, his attempt to establish a morally relevant difference between his health care plan and that of Obama\u2019s has failed abysmally.\u00a0 Certainly, there is indeed a difference between policies enacted at a state level and those enacted at the national level.\u00a0 But much of \u201cRomneycare\u201d is funded by the federal government.\u00a0 <\/em>That is, the citizens of the 49 states\u2014American taxpayers living outside of Massachusetts\u2014have been made to part with their resources so as to finance \u201cRomneycare.\u201d\u00a0 This much Romney never mentions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Furthermore, in the hard cover edition of his book, No Apology: The Case for American Greatness, <\/em>Romney said that he would like to do for all <\/em>of America\u2019s citizens vis-\u00e0-vis healthcare what he did for the citizens ofMassachusetts.\u00a0 Since \u201cObamacare\u201d became woefully unpopular, the paperback version of his book has been released.\u00a0 Only this version is slightly different from its predecessor inasmuch as it omits this line.<\/p>\n

Foreign Policy<\/strong><\/p>\n

Romney is no different from any other Republican inasmuch he enthusiastically embraces a robust, activist military, a military that is engaged in exporting \u201cDemocracy\u201d throughout the Middle East and (potentially) beyond.\u00a0 He supported invading Iraq as well as \u201cthe surge\u201d of 2008.\u00a0 Romney doesn\u2019t deny that we continue to face real challenges in Iraq, but he attributes these problems, not to the fact that we are there, but to our government\u2019s \u201cmismanagement\u201d of the situation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That is, like all proponents of Big Government, it is never the government itself <\/em>that accounts for the disasters that occur when government seeks to intervene in this or that; it is always specific government office holders <\/em>that are responsible.\u00a0 It isn\u2019t that government cannot <\/em>get the job done correctly; it is that government just has not <\/em>been able to do so thus far.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n

Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n

There is much more that can be said about Romney.\u00a0 But I think that what has been said should suffice to convince readers that Romney is as devoted a lover of Big Government as anyone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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