Romney; Inconsistencies

Mitt Romney's presidential campaign is over before it begins.

By all accounts, Romney is an intelligent man. He should be smart enough to know that when a media narrative like this begins to solidify, your chances of winning the hearts and minds of the voters are nearly nonexistent.

The former Massachusetts governor's equivocations on major issues — and outright position changes on others — threaten to derail his nascent 2008 campaign.

As previous White House hopefuls have learned, once a candidate is perceived to have a pattern of inconsistency, labels like flip-flopper and waffler are extremely difficult to shake.

"The problem for Romney is there are so many of these things that go back not so long ago that it becomes a question mark to conservative voters in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina," said Greg Mueller, a GOP strategist. On the other hand, he said: "They really don't know him yet, which gives him a huge opportunity."

Keenly aware of the dangers, Romney is working to convince skeptical Republicans that he's sincere in his current stances on issues such as abortion and gay marriage that the party's right wing holds dear — and quickly define himself before top rivals John McCain and Rudy Giuliani do it for him.

The problem, which Romney does not seem to understand, is that he doesn't have to worry about McCain or Giuliani defining him in negative terms. He has already accomplished that through his shameless pandering to the Christian right on issues about which he might or might not agree with them. His about-face turns on gay rights, gun rights and reproductive rights mean:

• He was telling the truth when he articulated liberal views on those issues, and is lying now.



• He is telling the truth now, and was lying then.

This, it should not require explaining, is a wretched position to be in when you are trying to convince people that they can trust you with their party's nomination for the highest office in the land.

And to think, I used to believe Romney's biggest hurdle was the fact that he's a Mormon in a party dominated by the Christian right. Silly me.