The Romney idea of charity: A campaign event in Ohio collecting canned goods for a disaster hundreds of miles away after the Red Cross said it wasn't accepting canned goods.
Mitt Romney's third run for president is being plagued by questions about whether he can shed that whole heartless-rich-guy image. The wealthy donors Romney needs to fund his campaign are concerned that, despite polls showing that Republican primary voters want him to run, all those out-of-touch statements from Romney's 2012 campaign will prevent him from gaining real traction. For his part, Romney
continues to promise he can change:
To break from his image, advisers say Romney will highlight his charitable giving with donors and voters as part of an effort to show “he’s generous to those that haven’t been as economically successful as him,” one adviser said.
Mitt Romney has given a lot of charity to all you 47 percent moochers, so would you please forget, when voting, that he thinks you're moochers? Seriously, "but I've given some of the money I got by destroying good middle-class jobs to poor people" is not like the world's strongest rebuttal to a well-established image as a super-rich guy who doesn't know what it's like to not be super-rich.
Okay, fine, you gave away some money. But personal charity is not a policy that will reduce income inequality. The fact that Romney is still thinking in terms of charity shows that his views absolutely haven't shifted from there being 47 percent of the population "who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it."
One group Romney definitely believes should continue to get aid from the government is the top one percent—his own people. Speaking at a California resort hotel Monday night, Romney objected to President Obama's plan to make college more accessible and give middle- and low-income families tax breaks by raising some taxes on the wealthy, saying:
"In my experience, the only system that's been able to lift people out of poverty is free enterprise."
Where, exactly, did Romney acquire this vast experience with lifting people out of poverty, one wonders. But the upshot is that Romney is kicking off his Warrior for the Working Class campaign by bragging about giving to charity and opposing tax increases for the very wealthy. That seems like a less comprehensive reinvention than the situation calls for, to put it mildly.