Mitt Romney, angry chipmunk? (Jessica Rinahldi/Reuters)
The GOP's
descent into absurdity is complete:
Interviews Wednesday with GOP officials and strategists in several states found no panic or calls for Romney to crank up his criticisms of Rick Santorum to secure the nomination. But they expressed varying degrees of worry that Santorum's and Newt Gingrich's attacks on Romney are inflicting wounds that might not fully heal by Nov. 6.
So Mitt Romney and his Super PAC spent about $50 million dropping bombs on Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich in January and February alone ... and Republicans are worried that Mitt might not be able to handle the rocks that Santorum and Gingrich are lobbying back over the fence? And by the way, thank God they aren't calling on Romney to "crank up" his attack machine or nobody in a primary state would be able to turn on the television without getting
mudSantorum all over them.
My advice to Republicans is that if they're worried about Mitt Romney's negatives, they should stop. Mitt Romney is never going to be a likable guy. Even his own campaign calls him "weird." Romney's path to victory is and always has been to destroy his opponents. And the real problem he faces is that it's going to be orders of magnitude harder for him to destroy President Obama than it was for him to destroy Rick Perry, Herman Cain, Michele Bachmann, Newt Gingrich, and Rick Santorum. That's not just because President Obama and his team are smarter than Romney's Republican rivals—it's also because people like and trust President Obama, and he's done a good job in the White House despite inheriting the worst economic and foreign policy crises in generations.