Thursday, February 2, 2012

Poor Mitt — Ctd

By now everyone’s seen the clip of Mitt Romney saying that he’s not concerned about the very poor because they have a safety net, nor is he concerned about the very rich because, well, whatever, we’re cool. He just cares about the rest of us Americans.

A lot of people are calling this a gaffe, and the right wing is throwing up its collective hands because, once again, Mr. Romney has handed out a sound bite like “I like firing people.” And even if you give him the benefit of the doubt and accept that he’s saying he cares about the vast middle class, it still comes across as if he’s just done an inventory of the bakery and there is plenty of cake to go around.

The message isn’t the problem. We get it: he cares. The problem is that he can’t articulate it very well, which tells me that he really doesn’t get it. And when you don’t get it, chances are you don’t really mean it. If you did, you’d know it by heart and wouldn’t have to twist yourself into a pretzel to explain it.