Romney switches positions again
If there’s anything consistent about Mitt Romney, it’s his inconsistency.
The last time he ran for president, he came out squarely (as squarely as he could ever be) against the involvement of the courts in campaign finance laws.
“It is the people who are sovereign in America: not a few folks in black robes. Time and again, judges add things that aren’t in the Constitution, and they take away things that are in the Constitution. They let the campaign finance lobby take away first Amendment rights,” was Romney’s unequivocal (as unequivocal as he could ever be) stand before a conservative audience in July of 2007.
But that was before the five conservative members of the U.S. Supreme Court (who happen to wear those “black robes”) became the majority in that questionably decided case known as “Citizens United.”
It was thought by some that Citizens United would allow the voices of the people to be drowned-out by spigots-full of campaign dollars spent by corporations that could buy political candidates, and their loyalties.
In fact, soon after that Supreme Court decision, President Obama voiced his concerns about that decision during his January 2010 State of the Union speech.
“Last week the Supreme Court reversed a century of law that I believe will open the floodgates for special interests — including foreign corporations — to spend without limit in our elections. I don’t think American elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities,” he said to widespread applause, except for the black-robbed Supreme Court justices who’d been skewered by Obama’s words.
In fact, Justice Sam Alito was clearly shown uttering the words “not true.”
You’d think, with Romney’s stand against court interventions in constitutional matters, and the seeming greater influence of what he’d previously called “the campaign finance lobby,” he would’ve been in full agreement with Obama.
He wasn’t.
He sided with the right-leaning Supreme Court, but, more importantly, against himself.
“The president found it inexplicable that the First Amendment right of free speech should be granted not just to labor corporations and media corporations, but equally to all corporations; big, medium and small,” he said during a speech a few days after the president’s scolding of the Supreme Court.
Romney even sided with Alito’s two word (“not true”) dissent.
But here’s where Romney’s perpetually evolving stands on issues have become the source of frequent attacks by his political competitors.
He has now reversed himself — again!
He’s been the beneficiary of buckets-full of campaign cash thanks to the lack of transparency wrought by Citizens United.
He, more than any of the other Republican presidential candidates, has had campaign ads paid for by what is known as super PACs.
Super PACs don’t contribute directly to political campaigns. They enable people and corporations with deep pockets to spend money in support of candidates — and even without their consent or knowledge.
It’s this kind of practice that Obama bemoaned during that State of the Union speech.
Last week it was reported that so far, $27.5 million has been spent by super PACs on all of the political campaigns.
The pro-Romney super PAC, Restore Our Future, has already dished out $8.1 million in TV ads and mailers.
His super PAC’s ads were so active and so vicious during the run-up to the Iowa caucuses, Newt Gingrich nearly launched a separate campaign against them.
Romney, though, had been sidestepping the alleged undue influence his own super PAC may have had on his candidacy.
But when confronted by his opponents who’ve been subjected to heavy attacks by his super PAC, Romney being Romney (Whichever Romney that conveniently is), he, in effect, sided with Obama, and against those people wearing those “black robes.”
At last Monday’s Republican presidential debate, he stood before the nation (the part that hasn’t used Republican debates as a sleep aid) and he claimed he “would like to have super PACs disappear.”
Of course, he’d say that. But he knows they won’t disappear.
They’ll continue to fuel his presidential campaign’s inconsistencies.
Edward A. Owens is a three-time Emmy Award winner and 20-year veteran of television news. Email him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net