is pretty much how he reacted to Rush Limbaugh’s spittle-flecked tirade against Sandra Fluke.
Before I saw tonight’s press conference, I’d have said this kerfuffle will ultimately have less effect on the election than it seems like it will right now. After watching it, I’m not so sure. Number one, he didn’t really walk back any of his statements at all. He just tried to vague-ify them. “I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives” becomes “Those who are reliant on government are not as attracted to my message of slimming down the size of government.” Same thing, just ahem, Elegantly Stated. Number two, look at him. He looks…ruffled. His hair’s mussed up. Given how hastily this presser was thrown together and how tidy and controlled this stuff usually is seems to indicate the campaign may be rattled.
You’re likely right, but this will impact voter enthusiasm for the Repubs in a negative way. I can’t imagine it as a positive for the Romney team, no matter how anybody can spin it.
On the other hand, minds can be changed. After all, my wife and I actually started a Forbes 2000 group in Atlanta in 1998… and voted for Obama 10 years later.
It’s so much worse the more context included, not only did he say 47 percent of people aren’t going to vote for him anyway he went on to say:
He believes the president should only represent 53% of the population. Last I checked the presidents job regardless of political affiliation was to represent all of America.
This overall isn’t going to kill Romney. It certainly makes more work for his already struggling campaign. They’ve been working hard to destroy the image that he’s out of touch with average Americans and every time he speaks he sets them back. That has to be so frustrating for his staff.
Romney still has voting suppression efforts working in his favor and today’s news cycle kept that under the radar, so this incident didn’t actually put them as far behind as one would think. Taking 730,000 voters in Ohio out of the election does wonders for his chances there.
That sound you just heard was half the population of Florida spitting out their Medicare-funded dentures in disgust at being called freeloaders by Mitt Romney.
If only because they might see the campaign as bumbling and incompetent after several bad Romney news cycles - many from unforced errors - stacked together. This tends to deflate supporters, and they not might show up on the big day. Carter voters might have felt that way.
Except a quick glance of right-leaning cites would show the exact opposite, since the prevailing thought in conservative circles seems to be “He’s exactly right”.
It’s kind of weird that you would try to equate Carter to Romney.
He called a significant percentage of his supporters “Takers” and said that it’s not his job to worry about those people. He is demonstrating a shocking lack of tact, diplomacy, and the ability to just STFU.
If you don’t believe me, check around the web, read the comments. He’s going to get pounded because of this - by the press, by the President, by the public. When the debates come about, Obama will remind people that this is the guy who only wants to be President for half of America… and all Romney can say (given his speech tonight) is that he regrets his “inelegant” wording.
This won’t affect the die-hards, but it will bother the swing voters, the independents that Romney needs in order to have half a chance at winning this thing.
He’ll get pounded because of it because he’s a Republican-- like he’s been getting pounded for however long now. That’s nothing new. And this’ll cause him to lose the election in much the same way as every other purported gaffe. Again, it’s nothing new. Romney won’t lose any Independents over this. In fact, dare I say it, he’ll probably widen his lead among Independents over the next few weeks. He said nothing that isn’t a sentiment shared by a rather large portion of the electorate; there are too many people who want to be takers and a large portion of the electorate who will continue to vote for someone so they can remain so.
It’s not politically correct to say but it is what it is.
Not at all. I meant that sometimes voters wake up in the morning and realize they were backing a losing, embarrassing ticket. Surely some large group of folks woke up with that thought in '80. They didn’t show up in November. You know the rest.
And Obama gets pounded because he’s a Democrat. Your point being?
I doubt any true independent will be swayed to Romney’s side by these remarks. They’re cold, callous, and unpresidential - who the hell running for their country’s highest office says their job is to dismiss half the country?
Conservatives seem to think that the attitudes Romney expressed are not only factually accurate, but that a significant portion of people outside his (Romney’s) base agree with them.
I’d be interested in actual arguments to support that, other than, “of course that’s what real Americans believe.” At the very least, the comments seem to strike me as politically unwise for being so easy to rephrase (or twist, depending on how you see it) into something like, “half of the country is made up of losers I couldn’t care less about” or “Mitt Romney only cares about half the country - which half are YOU in?” I mean, yeah, if you really do believe that the majority of the country agrees with you, go ahead and own them, but the fact that Romney doesn’t seem to be embracing them so far tells me something about how he, at least, views what he said.
Not to the same level as Romney. Yes, yes, I know. Conservative persecution complex and all that.
I see a no True Scottsman Fallacy.
But, no, he didn’t dismiss half the country. He said there’s no use in trying to win their votes. In elections, that’s true. There isn’t a single presidential candidate who has tried to win 100% of the electorate. I mean, just look at the DNC-- clearly not aimed at everyone.
As a presidential candidate, the only thing he has to convince people to do is to vote for him. As President, he can go ahead and “convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”
You might claim he wasn’t speaking as “President Romney”, but I don’t see what the quote has to do with his job as candidate.
This is Romney’s biggest blunder yet which is saying a lot. His statements are stupid on so many levels, both substantive and political.
The 47% may not pay federal income taxes but they play a lot of other taxes.
Many of these 47% do in fact vote for Republicans. The white working class is a crucial demographic which Romney desperately needs but Romney is doing a fantastic job of alieanating them.
If you take his words seriously, Romney is a certain loser which isn’t the smartest thing to say at a fund-raiser. At one point he says the president starts off with a “huge number”, 48,49%. How is Romney planning to win then? Does he believe that everyone in the remaining 51% will vote for him?
A couple of months back when commenting on the race I said that Romney makes a lot of unforced errors which is why I thought his chances were worse than the polls indicated. However even I am suprised at the string of blunders in just the last two weeks: forgetting veterans in his convention speech, Eastwood, Libya and now this. And there is no reason to believe the gaffe parade is going to stop.
I hesitate to say that Romney is finished. He still has the incredients for a win:
a) a mediocre economy
b) business and governor experience
c) a huge pot of campaign money
However I think this is going to hurt him badly. I would have rated his chances of winning at about 30% yesterday. I think they are now about 20%.