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 ...
+1000
NFW.
I will never vote for ORomney. He is a socialist turd that is actively trying to tarnish the conservative movement by claiming to be one.
I’ll vote 3rd party for Pres. Don’t blame me if Zero gets re-elected...blame the GOP idiots that crammed this liberal loser down the throat of the base.
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| Mitt will change his policies at any given moment depending on who is listening. Just too fake, plastic and untrustworthy. The GOP is now giving the election to Obama and the Entertainer, Rush Limbaugh, helped. The Republican party is dead if he's the best Republicans could hope to get.
Romney's the Dems' dream come true.
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Fine, all you people should meet somewhere and pat each other on the back for your excellence and purity.
There is no imaginery third party candidate you could find who would satisfy you.
I don’t have the words to express my contempt for you and your ilk and, yes, I will blame you all if Obama is elected again.
It's vitally important to keep this degenerate fraud and military service avoiding coward out of the WH.
It's not too late to get an independent conservative candidate into the race, Perot announced on February 20 and set up his first phone bank on March 12.
We can get a candidate on the ballot in all 50 states by 5/30.
Somebody needs to step forward, I don't care who the hell it is as long as its not the Coward from Kolob.
Very classy.
But don’t you have to die first.
Before the hell, I mean.
You people have passed idiocy and gone to insanity.
Sorry I know you.
Fire up the Etch-A-Sketch!
Willard has never been a Republican either.
Excuse me, but talking about Ross Perot only reminds me that we got 8 years of Clinton, in part because he split the vote.
Good point.
Wrong.
We got 8 years of Clinton, algore won the popular vote, and a skinny muslim communist faggot punk is now in the WH, because of UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE.
A concept the FOUNDERS explicitly warned against.
Contrary to what you might believe genius, the FOUNDERS didn't put a right to vote in the Constitution for a reason.
Washingtonians have amended the Republic into collapse.
The sooner, the better, for we can reset, and enfranchise only the worthy.
You know, Castro and Chavez and Putin and Ortega were all elected, thanks to UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE.
Go ahead we are used to it, from the socialist pukes in the DOPe leadership.
Allow me to repeat: Romney is the author of the $50 abortion, the gay marriage license, and the imposition of government-forced healthcare.
Why the heck would a conservative vote for THAT??? He is NOT a conservative. So, it’s not a matter of purity. It’s a matter of identity. Obama isn’t a very pure conservative, either.
"The [my] only connection [to the Republican Party]is I'm registered as a Republican"--Mitt RRRRRomney
Comparing Romney to Obama is like comparing Stalin to Trotsky.
Noob, that was uncalled for, and makes me wonder if you joined this forum what - a couple weeks ago, simply to cause trouble to help get Obama re-elected.
Did you? The post you were “responding” to was civil and I thought quite right. It wasn’t full of seething hate for Romney, but not everyone here is...
You really should apologize to the lady.
Romney then used ingeniously ambiguous language that lends itself to multiple interpretations, including the idea that he just might be open to finding a way for illegal immigrants to stay in the United States:This will be a priority of mine, if I become president, to make sure we finally reform our immigration laws step by step, secure the border, improve our legal immigration system, so we can keep people here and welcome people here who will make America a stronger nation.
Notice that “so we can keep people here.” For those interested in the subtle movement of politicians away from the ideological extremes they advocate while primaries are underway, the most interesting part of the Romney transition is almost certain to start very soon.
This is the same Romney who was oh so truely anti-illegal when Rick Perry or Newt Gingrich were getting heat.
And many will not vote for Romney neither. In fact, you can include me leaning that way. There are other candidates.
I Rick Perry supporters had been even *half* as aggressive toward Romney as they were determined to tear down Palin from the get-go.
(so doing, helping Romney)
We might have been looking at a Palin / Perry ticket now.
me too.
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