Who’s the Real Flip-Flopper?

Who’s the real flip-flopper?

Mitt Romney or Rush Limbaugh? (Hint: it’s not Mitt Romney)

As you may have heard by now, in February 2008 Limbaugh said  “I think now, based on the way the campaign has shaken out, that there probably is a candidate on our side who does embody all three legs of the conservative stool, and that’s Romney.” For those unfamiliar with the stool analogy, the three legs of conservatism are generally defined as “social”, “economic”, and “foreign policy”. As you also may have heard by now, last month Limbaugh said “Romney is not a conservative. He’s not, folks. You can argue with me all day long on that, but he isn’t.”

So Limbaugh went from saying that Romney was a candidate who did “embody all three legs of the conservative stool” to someone who’s “not a conservative.” That’s a real change of position.

Let’s do this again:

Who’s the real flip-flopper: Mitt Romney or Mark Levin? (Another hint: not Romney)

In January 2008 Levin wrote an impassioned piece in the National Review Online titled “Rally for Romney”, where Levin said “The only one left standing who can honestly be said to share most of our conservative principles is Mitt Romney.” However, on his radio show on June 3rd of this year Levin was singing a different tune about Romney: “I can’t support this man in the Republican primary without compromising all my principles.”

Really Mr. Levin? Voting for Romney would compromise all your principles? As a conservative, voting for a man who never raised taxes, actually cut taxes, cut spending, cut the size of government, vetoed all pro-choice legislation that came across his desk, and fought for a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage – in Massachusetts, no less – that would compromise all your principles?

Let’s go one more time:

Who’s the real flip-flopper: Mitt Romney or Rick Santorum? (Last hint: still not Romney)

Back in February 2008, Santorum said “If you’re a conservative, there really is only one place to go right now…I would even argue farther than that. If you’re a Republican, if you’re a Republican in the broadest sense, there is only one place to go right now and that’s Mitt Romney.” Then last month, in the Christian Post, Santorum said Romney was “a Republican who is well certainly less conservative than I think most of the Republican Party is today.” A week later Santorum said to CNN of both Romney and businessman Hermain Cain “I don’t think either of them have great conservative credentials.”

Going from saying Romney is the only place to go for conservatives and Republicans to saying Romney does not  have “great conservative credentials”  is quite a stretch.

What would cause Limbaugh, Levin, and Santorum to so radically change their rhetoric about Mitt Romney? These men are not alone, either. There are many among the conservative movement who supported Romney last election but who are now waffling. But again, why the change in position? After all, Romney’s record as governor didn’t change one bit since the last election cycle. Neither have Romney’s positions.

One of the main reasons is the rightful lack of popularity of “Obamacare” and it’s perceived similarities with Romney’s healthcare plan. There are big differences between the two but because of the individual mandate and the demagoguery surrounding the issue, it’s been easy for the Obama administration to fool people into thinking the two are essentially the same. I will go into much more detail on this in an upcoming post, but for now, I’d just like to say that Obamacare is essentially a wolf in the sheep’s clothing of Romney’s plan. As New Jersey Governor Chris Christie said in his endorsement of Romney, any attempt to compare the two is “completely intellectually dishonest.”

Of course, Romney’s plan had already been implemented for almost two years by the time the first votes were cast in the primaries last time around, and not only was it not an issue, many conservatives even praised the plan. But rather than getting bogged down with all the details of healthcare policy, and losing your radio listeners, it’s far more easy to just say “Romneycare and Obamacare are the same and we can’t trust Romney to repeal Obamacare.”

To be fair, when many conservatives praised Romney as the most conservative choice you could make the argument that they were comparing Romney to a more liberal field than is running this time around. That’s fair. But these statements that Romney is somehow not a conservative anymore are really over the line and represent a major position change that some might call a “flip-flop”.

Now, I think the term “flip-flop” has been greatly overused and misused by the media. It represents a kind of “gotcha” politics that does not serve our civic debate well. On this front, no one has been more grossly misrepresented and smeared than Mitt Romney. In fact, I would say that the Mitt Romney that many good, but misinformed conservatives have come to distrust is not the real Romney, but a caricature created by his political enemies and perpetuated (without proper fact checking) in the mainstream media.

Senator Jim DeMint said it well in a January 2008 interview:

“All the candidates now are trying to grab a clip of what someone said 10 or 15 years ago and say ‘oh – look, look.’ But all you have to do is look at what they’ve done If you want to know what Mitt Romney’s values are…He has never acted in any way opposite of what he said he was gonna do.”

So, in the WhyRomney tradition, let me “set the record straight” on some of the more common misconceptions:

While Romney campaigned on the promise not to change the abortion laws in Massachusetts, he did exactly that by vetoing every single pro-choice bill that came across his desk as governor and fought against embryonic stem cell cloning. At the end of his term, Romney received a medal from the Massachusetts Citizens for Life. John J. Miller of National Review Online observed: “Romney has done his best to defend the culture of life on what is possibly the most inhospitable terrain in the country…a good case can be made that Romney has fought harder for social conservatives than any other governor in America, and it is difficult to imagine his doing so in a more daunting political environment.”

Romney never changed his position on gay marriage in the least. He has been 100% consistent on the issue. When the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that it was unconstitutional to deny gay couples the right to marry in the state, Romney fought hard to get the legislature to put an amendment banning gay marriage on the ballot. Again, Mr. Miller of National Review Online observed: “there’s no denying that Romney has pulled every lever within his reach to defend traditional marriage.” Matthew Spalding of the Heritage Foundation noted that “In the worst possible circumstances, he confronted one of the toughest issues of our politics with considerable moral seriousness and political skill, that’s the mark of a conservative statesman.”

On gun control, Romney has always supported the second amendment right to keep and bear arms. He has always supported background checks. He actually signed legislation relaxing gun restrictions as governor.

On these and other “social issues” Romney has governed consistently conservative. You can check out all of the facts on our website here.

Now, there are a couple of issues that Romney has also been consistent on but are not viewed as “orthodox” by the mainstream conservative media. They are global warming and healthcare.

Romney has said that he believes in global warming and that some of it may be man made. But he has always supported a “no regrets” policy where we should act in a way that if global warming were not manmade, we would still not regret our actions. This means acting in a way that is pro business. Romney pulled out of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative as governor because he said the plan imposed too steep of penalties on businesses.

On health care, Romney has been 100% consistent that the plan enacted in Massachusetts should never be implemented at the federal level and if it did go national, it should be done so on a state by state basis.

Political opponents have disingenuously pointed to the removal of a passage in the hardback copy of his book as evidence that Romney secretly wants to implement his plan at the federal level. The line that was removed said:  “We can accomplish the same thing for everyone in the country, and it can be done without letting government take over health care.” (No Apology, pg. 177)

This argument is rendered completely moot because in the paragraph right before that line (in both the hardcover and paperback versions) , Romney says this: “My own preference would be to let each state fashion its own program to meet the distinct needs of its citizens. States could follow the Massachusetts model if they choose, or they could develop plans of their own.”

Agree with him or not on these issues, Romney has been consistent.

The fact that Romney has stood by his claims on global warming and healthcare in the face of intense criticism from members of his own party and the fact that he stood tall for conservative issues in the bluest of blue states demonstrates that he is a principled politician.

Now in light of the inconsistent comments from Limbaugh, Levin, Santorum, and many other critics on the Right, I ask the question again:

Who’s the real flip-flopper?