Romney launching more false attacks
I don’t know what it is, but people just aren’t warming up to Mitt Romney. A new Washington Post-ABC News poll indicates Romney’s support, even among Republicans, appears to be a mile wide, but an inch deep — at best. In other words, many of the people who support Romney only support him because they dislike President Obama.
The poll shows that Romney’s favorability among voters is holding steady at 40 percent. That’s unchanged since May. But the number of voters who look at him unfavorably has jumped from 45 percent to 49 percent.
Meanwhile, Obama’s personal popularity continues to remain higher than Romney’s. Fifty-three percent of those voters polled have favorable opinions of the president, while only 43 percent view him unfavorably.
The poll also took note of those voters who have “strongly favorable” feelings about each man. Only 41 percent of the Republican voters polled have strongly favorable opinions of Romney, while 61 percent of Democratic voters have the same feelings about Obama.
There’s something so wooden, so charmless, and above all, so calculating about Romney, that he’s like that kid on the playground, who, when faced with the prospects of defeat, starts to take his ball and go home. That is, until somebody reminds him, “That’s not even your ball.”
So now, he has to figure out some new ways to win. Dishonest attacks seem to be his best modus operandi.
He’s already mischaracterized Obama with a number of questionable campaign ads. That’s nothing new. His primary challengers frequently complained that he’d say or do anything to win the nomination.
Back in January, Newt Gingrich called Romney a liar after he launched some nasty ads against him. “I just think he ought to be honest with the American people and try to win as the real Mitt Romney, not try to invent a poll-driven, consultant-guided version that goes around with talking points,” Gingrich complained.
But the negative ads worked, and Romney’s campaign has since realized that his fellow Republicans will never fully fall in Romney-love. So, the next best thing is to try to deceive voters into thinking that Obama is doing things that he’s really not.
A recent lawsuit filed by the Democratic National Committee and the Obama re-election campaign is seeking to restore Ohio’s three-day-early voting period for all of the state’s voters. Under a new Ohio law, only military personnel and military veterans will be allowed to vote early. Yet, Romney has dishonestly claimed that the lawsuit is designed to prevent early voting by members of the military.
“If I’m entrusted to be the commander-in-chief, I’ll work to protect the voting rights of our military, not undermine them,” Romney claims, as if any president would actually want to diminish the voting rights of anybody in the military.
I’m surprised Romney doesn’t go on a tirade because he thinks Obama is trying to take their weapons.
But Romney’s latest political charade is a doozy. Romney’s campaign has launched a particularly seedy attack on the Obama administration, which could be a sign of just how desperate Romney has become to scare up votes. According to a Romney television ad, the president is trying to “gut welfare reform by dropping work requirements.” All of this because a couple of Republican governors had requested and received waivers from the Obama administration to better help provide jobs that could make it easier for welfare recipients to get off welfare.
And worse, when Romney was the governor of Massachusetts, he’d requested the very same kind of waiver. What was good when he was a governor is now bad when he’s trying to become the president.
No wonder Bill Clinton, who signed the welfare reform bill into law, and the Republican architect of the law itself, have both taken issue with Romney’s claim.
It’s clear that Romney has serious likeability problems. That Washington Post-ABC poll points that out. But as the presidential campaign moves forward, and with Romney making more and more false attacks, you have to wonder if he’ll even like himself by November.
Edward A. Owens is a three-time Emmy Award winner and 20-year veteran of television news. Email him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net
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