Posted on 04/09/2012 2:18:46 PM PDT by xzins
It was just one line slipped into the middle of a paragraph of Mitt Romney’s speech on April 3 celebrating his primary victories in Wisconsin, Maryland and the District of Columbia: “And the most vulnerable have been hurt the most — over 30 percent of single moms are struggling in poverty.”
Seemingly unremarkable, these 19 words represent one of the many steps Romney will be taking as he treks back to the center in the aftermath of a primary campaign dominated by the hard right. It was only two months ago, after all, that Romney told CNN: “I’m not concerned about the very poor. We have a safety net there.”
Without drawing attention to his rhetorical shift, Romney, in a speech on March 30 at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisc., abandoned his attack on President Obama’s “entitlement society,” faulting Obama’s “government-centered society” instead.
There is a powerful rationale behind this shift.
In the primaries, Romney’s target audience was well to the right of the mainstream and deeply hostile to the notion of entitlement programs. In the minds of many conservatives, such programs are direct transfer payments from “hard-working” better-off citizens to the “undeserving poor.” Denouncing Obama’s “entitlement society” played well to angry Republican primary voters.
In the general election, however, voters are less inclined to adopt hostile views of redistributive government programs.
(Excerpt) Read more at campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com ...
Ping to the article.
Romney will wage this campaign from the middle to the left. He KNOWS that conservatives will not vote for Obama. With only 20% of the nation being left-wing, the squishy left (otherwise known as middle) are available to the liberal governor of Massachusetts.
Romney is no conservative, never has been, never will be. What he is is a lying, Massachusetts LIBERAL two-bit political whore. FUMR!!
More ‘compassionate’ conservatism. Welcome to mob rule and the pol’s who enable it.
I sure would like to get more input here about the six candidates running under the Constitution party.
With Romney target center to left, this is the right God-given time to found or strengthen a real alternative to the one-party RepubliCrat system.
Don’t be overwhelmed, Jim. You will be attacked as an Obama Enabler, as a traitor to conservatism.
We know reality, though. The author of the $50 abortion, of the same-sex marriage licence, and of big government forced healthcare is NOT a conservative and never will be.
Leave it to the NYT to cherry pick a quote.
He is right though...the people that Obama has pandered to the most have been hurt the worst. Just look at black unemployment. I hope he pounds Obama every day on this.
Stalin would be called a “Centrist” these days
We know reality, though. The author of the $50 abortion, of the same-sex marriage licence, and of big government forced healthcare is NOT a conservative and never will be.
I agree.
I've never claimed he was a conservative, and never will.
DANGER! DANGER! YOUNG WILL ROBINSON!
While Romney is certainly not a conservative, this article is from the New York Times. The idea is to cause trouble.
Romney is not as bad as Obama, but I would not trust him to be a conservative.
People here should know the left will use sites like this to get voters to stay home.
It is a win win for Obama and they know it.
If Romney is the nominee I don’t think I have any more interest in the campaign. I know that is messed up, but I cannot see any reason to be enthusiastic or even a reason to care mildly if its Obama vs Romney.
Obama will beat Romney like an unfaithful muslim wife anyway.
Nobody to blame for that but moderately liberal Mitt and the Grand Old Plantation.
What’s the point?
Romney is gonna get the nomination.
All this defeatist crap will get us nowhere.
We need to concentrate now on supporting Romney and on electing conservatives to the House and Senate.
No. Go to hell and die. In that order.
"In Obamneyland, hell come to you!"
If Romney had any interest at all in Conservative points of view he’d drop out of the campaign NOW!
Whereas, the Obama life raft has a dozen holes in it. The Romney life raft only has a couple holes.
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