In yet another sign that the Republican base may be switching to post-mortem mode, the 700 Club's David Brody suggests in his latest blog post that Mitt Romney may not be the right candidate to deliver the Republican message.
The problem seems to be two-fold. First of all, Romney is not a “base” guy to begin with and he’s trying to turn out the base. He’ll get far with the anti-Obama crowd but can he get over the top? He’s not a flame-thrower and a crowd pleaser and that’s exactly what is needed to grow the base of conservative voters that Romney needs.
Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, Romney doesn’t seem well positioned to make the redistribution argument against President Obama. Fighting against the idea of redistribution of wealth calls for a candidate that isn’t filthy rich because you essentially need to argue in defense of upper income people. That reinforces the stereotype of Romney that the Obama campaign has been trying to make stick; that he doesn’t care about the “average Joe” out there. A rich guy arguing FOR wealth redistribution actually has more potential to attract votes.
Shorter version: "We have the right message, one that Americans can rally around--but we just don't have the right guy delivering it." Gee, I thought Romney got the nomination because he was the adult in the room, and therefore was best suited to selling the Republican message to independents, swing voters and disaffected Dems. So if the guy who was supposedly best suited to appeal to that demographic isn't the right one to deliver the message, who is? Methinks Brody just tacitly admitted just how bankrupt the GOP is in policy.
Brody's blog is a must-read among social conservatives, so it's a pretty safe bet he's voicing the concerns of a lot of fundies as well. If they're already thinking like this now, it could be shaping up to be a very good November.