“Stop it. This is hard. You want to try it? Get in the ring. This is hard and, you know, it’s an important thing that we’re doing right now and it’s an important election and it is time for all Americans to realize how significant this election is and how lucky we are to have someone with Mitt’s qualifications and experience and know-how to be able to have the opportunity to run this country.”
—Ann Romney, speaking on Radio Iowa, to (or about) Republicans who have criticized her husband's campaign
Having all her adult life been surrounded by people who will more or less do her bidding without question or resistance — her children, servants and other hired help, and likely Mitt himself — Ann Romney finds herself vexed and confused by pundits and the public alike in their refusal to behave as she would wish them to behave.
This attitude — that those around her owe them deference, herself in particular — has been evident for a while now. If you watch her introduction speeches from the primaries, she is not so much energized or excited by cheering crowds so much as she seems annoyed by them. In Michigan, where no one expected Mitt to lose the state, she began her
remarks saying, "As usual, I have a long list of thank-yous, and I'm going see if you're all going to behave, and listen to this list without cheering in between. We'll see if you can get this right." The crowd could not, and Ann did her best to contain her irritation.
The same thing happened earlier in Florida, where at one point through a gritted-teeth smile, she said, "You're not listening to me!" She read a few more names, then said, angry, "Well, I give up."
This is a person who, when not given the deference she feels is her due by those she considers beneath her*, holds a grudge. With schadenfreude that one suspects is all too genuine, she has remarked multiple times on the campaign trail that her "greatest joy as (a) grandmother is watching (her) grandchildren misbehave." Not watching her grandchildren take their first steps or speak their first words or ask for more pie, but that they should become a curse for her own now-grown children, who deserve nothing less than to be visited by the same horrors of parenthood to which Ann herself was subjected (or believes she was subjected).
Perhaps on some level, she takes it very personally that everyone — everyone — doesn't love her husband. Not so much because she herself loves him so much she can't understand anyone who doesn't (although she may in fact love him a great deal; this writer certainly doesn't claim to know), but rather, that she regards rejection of her mate as an indictment of herself for standing by him, and indeed for choosing him in the first place.
Why does any of this matter? It probably won't, as Mitt is not likely to win the election. But supposing he does, this sort of deep resentment for others — particularly those of lesser means — and a signle-mindedness that your will and your will alone shall prevail in all matters will do little to heal the emotional chasms and mistrust between various peoples in this country. Indeed, it will be counter-productive to the task of rising to the voices of our better angels to have a role model who regards the rest of the populace as "the help,"† or at best, as lesser colleagues.
But does this matter? Is there consequence to the intolerance of spouses of our governmental leaders? Might a review of mid-century Argentine history prove instructive? Discuss.
* Which, it seems, includes just about everyone.
† See her awkward speech to the Latino Coalition.