| Excellent reporting by the LA Times today on slick Willard Romney.
"You need someone like me in Washington," he said, according to [Deborah] Allen and two other abortion-rights activists, whose group was deciding whether to endorse Romney in the 2002 race for governor. Though running for state office, Romney hinted at national ambitions and said he would soften the GOP's position on abortion. The Republicans' hard-line stance, he said, was "killing them."
...
And he presented himself as a future ally. "He said, 'I will be a voice of reason'" within the GOP, recalled Allen. "He said, 'That makes me useful to you, because people will note that a more moderate position succeeded.'"
The reporter has found a new treasure trove of Romney dirt: the notes of people with whom Romney met in the course of trying to become Governor.
Though Romney's policy shifts have become widely known, his meetings with activists for abortion rights and other causes - which have received far less attention - show he put much work into winning support from Massachusetts' liberal establishment only a few years ago....
He met gay-rights activists on their turf, in a restaurant attached to a popular gay bar, and told skeptics he would be a "good voice" and a moderating force within his party. And in many cases, he said his commitment had been cemented by watching the suffering of someone dear to him: a grandchild whose asthma left him worried about air pollution; his wife's multiple sclerosis, which had him placing hope in embryonic stem cell research; the death of a distant relative in an illegal abortion, convincing him that the procedure needed to remain legal.
It gets better.
"There's a benefit to simplicity. I'm a strong believer in stating your position and not wavering," he said at the 2002 meeting with the group, according to notes taken by then-NARAL officer Nicole Roos that were private until being shared with the Los Angeles Times.
According to her notes, Romney insisted that only a "crisis" would cause him to change his mind on abortion. When the activists asked for an example of a crisis, he drew a puzzling parallel, noting that a Soviet attack on the U.S. might prompt an anti-tax president to raise taxes.
"I want to be really careful about not changing my position," Romney said, according to the notes. "I will do what I say I'll do."
Romney also argued that his judicial picks would be more likely to protect abortion rights than would those of a Democratic governor, according to notes of the meeting. After all, he reasoned, Massachusetts Republicans tended to favor abortion rights.
Hey, Romney ♥ liberal judicial activists! Cool!
And here's a new wrinkle that hasn't gotten as much attention as some others: environmental issues.
Weeks after taking office, the new governor led an army of staffers and activists to Salem, north of Boston, for a news conference outside a coal-fired power plant. He was there to demand that the plant draft a cleanup plan by the next year.
The new governor said something that struck the environmental activists as remarkable. "I will not create jobs or hold jobs that kill people," Romney said in a heated exchange. "And that plant - that plant kills people."
"I thought, 'Whoa, I wouldn't even say that,' " recalled Lori Ehrlich, a local activist who wanted the plant cleanup....
Romney told [a group of religious leaders] he was "terrified" about global warming, a phenomenon he described as "quite alarming," according to notes taken by one of the participants, Nancy Davidge of the Episcopal Divinity School at Harvard University.
Then, in December 2005, Romney surprised even his own staff by pulling the plug on a key element of his environmental agenda. Romney withdrew Massachusetts from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative agreement with other Northeastern states. Though Romney's team had taken a lead role in crafting it, the plan could prove too costly to power-plant owners and consumers, the governor said.
Romney is now going around holding meetings with influential conservatives, just like he did in 2002 with influential liberals. In light of this story (along with everything else we know about him), why oh why would anyone believe anything he says in any of those meetings? |
