Well, it's clear that White people are Romney's base, and he has no chance to move past that. He has to stoke people's fears and anger (not necessarily racial!) against Obama in order to get enough votes to win this election. I really didn't know why the Democratic Party doesn't appeal more to White people who share identical concerns with their non-White counterparts, but after having talked recently with an upper middle aged White male, I think it's coming into focus. For the record, I'm half White, so I've got older White males in my life that don't fit the mold.
I tend not to talk politics in mixed company. I was over a friend's house to get some work done, and I saw a copy of Newsmax on the table with Rmoney and CorporateWifeBot right on the cover, talking about Rmoney's success in gutting businesses and killing the American dream for fun and profit. I had been warned by my friend not to talk politics, so when I was sitting to dinner and talking with my friend's father, I tried to steer the conversation to fluffy, happy-go-lucky stuff. The man is successful by pretty much any standard. He's a top professional in his career, he worked very hard and studied for years, and he has four children and a wife who is no nonsense and takes care of business. He took us out to dinner at a really nice restaurant and bought whatever he wanted, no care in the world. He was taking the next two weeks off to go on vacation, to vegetate and enjoy himself before getting back to the rat race. Did he have help? His grandfather got a REALLY good union job which paid his way through school. Government loans, yada yada yada you know the deal.
But he was unhappy. Anyone could see it in his eyes. He wasn't living the way he wanted. I couldn't shake that feeling. I'm an empathic person. My friend told me his father was having a bit of a crisis. He didn't know why the other men in his field, people he went to school with, had their own private islands and he didn't. I didn't think much of this complaint, but his unhappiness seeps into all areas of his life. He's become overweight and eats excessively. He is a very lovely person, but something's missing. His confidence is not there, the confidence of someone who has mastered their craft. We got on the issue of healthcare (he's in the industry) and man did I get an earful about Obamacare. I did what I normally do, and play dumb and not try to argue points with someone I'm not trying to insult. He went on about the IPAB board, where bureaucrats will try to determine whether you really need certain operations or procedures. He also went on about the fact that dialysis is apparently not going to be paid for by the federal government anymore, and we're becoming more like Germany in that regard (fact check someone please?) He then remarked that the British were flocking to private insurance and leaving their socialized medicine in the dust.
He took another swig of scotch and said "Everything's gonna change."
I felt sad. There was no reason for him to be the way he was. He clearly didn't have a problem with the federal government paying for certain things for people because it was the right thing to do. He said a large part of the problem is that healthcare is for profit, which it shouldn't be in his view. He hates it when he catches doctors using the billing codes to maximize their profits and charge patients for things they don't need. I told him about a Medicare scam out of Texas (but left the fact it was a Tea Partier that did it) and it disgusted him that no one reported it. He clearly likes Medicare and a lot of what the government does for people, but also has a cartoonish view of unions and made Al Gore jokes. Al Gore wants food producing regions of the world to remain that way, and you hate him for it.
It hit me: he likes Romney because he feels that what Romney has is something he deserves. If he votes for Romney, he can vicariously live through him and undo the "failures" of his life. He'd have the corporate wife, the yacht, and everything he dreamed about as a young man. He views not being master of his domain as a failure. I don't know where these lofty views of the self came from. I don't know who told him being a sultan was free. He has everything and more, but he is getting on about himself for not being Romney. That's a lot of what attracts these men to him.
Do me one favor in your comments: no slander of being racist please. It gets old. He's not racist. At all. He doesn't think the brown people are stealing away his gold. He's an intelligent, mild mannered man who actually has a good heart, and I think a lot of these older Republican men do if they could just break through the Newsmax induced haze over their brains. Thank you.