Here we are on the cusp of the Democratic Convention and the
party’s response to a fusillade of Paul Ryan’s fabrications, Mitt Romney’s adequacy
and Clint Eastwood’s – um – cryptopathological improvisational admission of the
GOP’s intellectual bankruptcy – but that’s not the most recent strategic
mystery the Romney-Ryan campaign has engaged in – their latest is to ask “Are
you better off now than you were four years ago?” The answer might surprise them.
Earlier, the Romney campaign unleashed a blizzard
of ads with actors portraying real Americans who had voted for Obama in
2008 but had grown disappointed in the rate of how their lives were getting
better. The premise, apparently, is to
reach out to people with this mindset that if they weren’t happy with Obama, it’s
about time to give someone with the exact opposite approach the reins for a
while. That it’s brought to you by the
people who’ve tried to arrest the president’s progress at every turn is
supposed to be conveniently forgotten.
But back to whether you were better off now than you were
four years ago – it follows the same trope of Mitt’s that we all wanted to
change things, but President Obama’s change just didn’t happen as fast as
Romney’s would. As though Mitt Romney’s
focus has been on giving Americans affordable healthcare, cleaning up the
banking mess, saving
GM and Chrysler and getting us out of Iraq and Afghanistan but that he’s
got a better plan for getting all that done.
It’s like saying, “You barely escaped this mugger who accosted you as
you were walking through a dark alley – and even though you fought him off, you
might not be running away from him fast enough.
Maybe you should just go back there and give him your wallet. I’m the mugger and I approve this message.”
It’s puzzling to think the Romney campaign thinks Obama
voters are so credulous that they think the only difference between Obama and
Romney is one of degree – but even Paul Ryan made that point in his speech
before the RNC last week when he compared Obama voters to kids getting tattoos
because they thought it was cool. And it’s
not unusual to hear Obama portrayed as a dangerous America-hating radical
hellbent on experimenting with our economy using tricks he found on the back of
a box of Stalin-Os and his supporters as a coalition of the greedy, the lazy
and hopelessly idealistic dupes. So how
does Team Romney hope to appeal to this caricature of a group of befuddled
losers? Oh, right – lie to them.
Not that they’re happy about it – but hey, if these are
stupid, self-interested dupes who fall for a pack of lies in the first place,
why should the GOP tie one hand behind its back by not making
shit up when it was to their advantage?
Unfortunately for them, though, this perceived demographic simply doesn’t
exist – people lived through the economic collapse of 2007 and know exactly
what caused it. Many lost houses, jobs
and their cherished way of life – and sneering at them as though they were kids
disappointed with the latest cool Android app is likely to blow up in Team
Romney’s face.
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