RNC 2012: For Romney, voters’ love would be nice — but their respect may suffice
TAMPA — Giving a glimpse at Mitt the man was Ann Romney’s job Tuesday night, and she framed her story as one about love: hers for him and his for her, their family and his fellow man.
Defining the choice between the Romney Republicans and Barack Obama’s Democrats was Chris Christie’s job immediately afterward, and he framed his story as one about respect: the kind, as he said his mother taught him, a person sometimes has to seek instead of love. The kind that leads one to make tough decisions, to say “no” when it’s right, even if “yes” would be easier.
“Look into your hearts,” Ann Romney implored.
“I believe we have become paralyzed by our desire to be loved,” Christie intoned, not so many minutes later.
And any number of people watching the first full night of the 2012 Republican National Convention must have thought, Um, THAT’S awkward.
But the two messages were not as incongruent as they appeared at first blush. Christie explained why early in his speech: “love without respect [is] always fleeting,” but “respect [can] grow into real, lasting love.”
“I think,” he continued, “that advice applies to America today more than ever.” Certainly, he and Ann and the entire GOP hope it applies to Mitt Romney.
Unloved by much of his own party, Mitt Romney won its presidential nomination almost bloodlessly mechanically: with superior organization, discipline and resources. He was unloved, but he came to be respected. And to judge by a night when, for long stretches of time, the only full-throated cheers came when the speakers on the stage invoked his name, his party’s faithful have developed something like the respect-driven love Mama Christie told her son about.
Now the task is to repeat the trick with the broader electorate, against an opponent with whom voters fell into something more akin to infatuation four years ago.
It was to that end that Ann Romney spoke about respect as much as Christie did, and as deeply, if not explicitly, as she spoke about love.
There was the respect for parents — and especially for mothers, without whom, she said, “there would not be an America.”
“It’s the moms who always have to work a little harder to make everything right,” she said. (This dad knows that’s true.)
“We don’t want easy. But,” and here she distinguished between women’s usual burden and the heavier one they’ve felt during an administration that likes to talk about a War on Women, “these last few years have been harder than they needed to be.”
It’s not just “the little things that pile up,” like the cost of gas and groceries, but “the big things — the good jobs, the chance at college, that home you want to buy, just get harder. Everything has become harder.”
Then this applause line, one of the night’s best: “We’re too smart to know there aren’t easy answers. But we’re not dumb enough to accept that there aren’t better answers.”
There was also the respect for individual success. Here, she made one of the best cases yet offered for respecting, not demonizing, her husband’s business career.
“It amazes me to see his history of success actually being attacked,” she said. “Are those really the values that made our country great? As a mom of five boys, do we want to raise our children to be afraid of success? Do we send our children out in the world with the advice, ‘Try to do [just] OK?’ “
Then another kicker, again bringing it back to the decision at hand: “Let’s be honest. If the last four years had been more successful, do we really think there would be this attack on Mitt Romney’s success?”
Of course not, she — and any intellectually honest person watching her — said.
Mitt Romney and his partners created success for themselves, success “beyond their dreams,” she said. But it didn’t stop there. “The jobs that grew from the risks they took have become college educations, first homes. That success has helped fund scholarships, pensions, and retirement funds.
“This is the genius of America: dreams fulfilled help others launch new dreams.”
The many, many Americans who understand that truth may or may not love Mitt Romney now. But in the end, he’s not asking them to love him. Nor, really, is his wife.
– By Kyle Wingfield
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121 comments Add your comment
finn mccool
August 29th, 2012
10:09 pm
Dusty, i asked for onion rings, not fries. Come on friend!
JamVet
August 29th, 2012
10:09 pm
It would require you removing your head from a certain location, dusty!
Thanks finn!
Off to see the sandman.
Later, taters…
Dusty
August 29th, 2012
10:14 pm
getalife,
Why, Sugah,, my Southern hospitality is brimming over.
Where’s yours??
Dusty
August 29th, 2012
10:17 pm
td
Condi always speaks the truth. That’s why I like her.
td
August 29th, 2012
10:21 pm
Dusty
August 29th, 2012
10:17 pm
Yes she does. I still believe she was the best Sec. of State we have ever had. I hope Mitt is smart enough to offer he a place in his administration. We need her truthfulness and experience to bring us back.
Dusty
August 29th, 2012
10:23 pm
Finn,
You will have to ask Obama for your onion rings. .
He’s the one with the handouts.
I just help pay for ‘em.
.
td
August 29th, 2012
10:23 pm
“We have no other choice but to lead, and you cannot lead from behind!”. — Condi at the RNC
Dusty
August 29th, 2012
10:24 pm
td
I AGREE.
td
August 29th, 2012
10:36 pm
“Without a change in leadership, how can the next four years be better then the last four years” Paul Ryan RNC
They BOTH suck
August 29th, 2012
10:49 pm
As I predicted last night, the right will say the speakers were magnificent and the left will say it was horrendous.
Next week will be the opposite.
Guess what? It was the same the last election and will be the same in 4 yrs.
Friends do not let friends watch those awful, cheesy, propagandized infomercials that both parties conduct each Presidential election.
Have a great night.
finn mccool
August 29th, 2012
10:50 pm
the Democrat cruncher is “ask Mitt what his house address is”
blank stare……………………blank stare
Mitt: :ummmmmm. which house……ummmm. they have adresses?”
finn mccool
August 29th, 2012
10:54 pm
When did Eddie Munster get a gig speaking at this convention?
finn mccool
August 29th, 2012
10:56 pm
Paul Ryan, vampire……………….
No sheeeot
finn mccool
August 29th, 2012
10:58 pm
Mitt Romney grew up in the heartland of Baird, of Bain, of Harvard, of Stanford……..the heartland, you idiots!!!!!
finn mccool
August 29th, 2012
10:59 pm
Mitt Romney – prayerful, thankful, and 15 wives,,,,,,
Lil' Barry Bailout - Vote American
August 30th, 2012
6:22 am
Getting close to the end of the month, eh Finn? Get a little cranky waiting for your EBT card to get topped off?
md
August 30th, 2012
12:51 pm
“Mitt Romney – prayerful, thankful, and 15 wives,,,,,,”
I’d definitely vote for him if he could make it through life with 15 wives………….
ld
August 30th, 2012
4:52 pm
Romney does not need love or respect — all he needs is religous stupor. THAT is the strategy of the modern GOP that has been willing to alienate “groups” other than angry white men.
The moneyed investor class employer class has come to believe that RELIGION will cross all those “group” barriers and that, by creating, rousing and appeasing the zealots, Republicans will be the permanent majority…
…even though by otherwise depending upon angry white men to be their “base” , the demographics are beginning to work against them.
All those “values laws” the Republicans have been pushing that are anti-gay, anti-women, anti women’s rights, anti-abortion, anti-contraception, anti- “free will” — anti individual liberty are for the specific purpose of paying, rewarding and seducing the gullible of the “follower class” ilk to go to the polls in a religious stupor and vote for Republicans.
The GOP I once supported no longer exists. Although I am reasonably certain Romney knows more about how the US and global economy work than Obama does and may ever will, I am equally convinced his efforts as president would continue to be to enrich the richest, WITHOUT REGARD to the SUBSTANTIAL DETRIMENT his actions heap upon the EMPLOYEE CLASS and the future for USA itself.
There is a lot NOT to like about the Obama administration; however, at least their policies are aimed at TRYING to help the majority employee class.
The policies of todays GOP can be summerized as sow religion and fear and eap power and profit$ from it.
Support school vouchers…
… to satisfy the religious zealots’ need to indoctronate and brainwash another generation to supplement their own numbers and their enhance their own power, and
…to benefit the moneyed investor employer class by teaching the employee class that though greed is good for businesses and corporations and their owners because that is good for the strenght of our “Christian” nation needed for the “inevitable” global conflagration (self-fulfilling prophecy of Armageddon) to come, any desire on the part of the employee class for a life better than indentured servitude or sharecropper is greed and envy since they should be being “meek” and await their reward in “heaven”.
The religious zealots will see beating the drums of war as a part of that “self-fulfilling prophecy of Armageddon” prefacing “second coming” of their God;
The moneyed investor employer class will reap the actual effect of the GOP economic policies who have seen war as a pursuit of profit$.
pam
August 31st, 2012
12:19 am
It’s tough to worry about the planet right now when you’re unemployed with huge student loans. Gas prices rising and real estate values declining. Once we’re on our feet and stable we can concentrate on “global warming”. It’s called priorities! Romney nailed it tonight.
pdavistate
August 31st, 2012
8:36 am
I love what our RNC has done for America but let’s be truly honest, Romney does not have a plan. What is his plan only to attack Obama.
Obama has a proven record on saving America from distinction where we give him the credit or not.
Just because one party shouts the loudest doesn’t mean Victory. Americans aren’t stupid we all know you have to be well equipted in so many other areas. President Obama is due his respect. RNC we have to admit our wrongs. We said Obama would never get the unemployment down to 8.9% during the recession and he exceeded our expections.
President Obama is a christian who just needs guideance and so many people are praying for him and this nation daily.
We owe President Obama and we will never forget:
• Captured- Bin Laden- Just like he said
• Got Unemployment under 9%- Just like he said
• Changed Medical history- Just like he said
• Created way more jobs during the recession than Bush’s whoe 8 years- Just like he said
• Helped college students with tuition and loans- Just like he said
• Made businesses more transparent- Just like he said.
• Got the housing market moving in the right direction- Just like he said
• Provided opportunity of success to everyone- From the bottom up- Just like he said
• Through Technology changed America’s election process- Just like he said
• The bail out worked- Just like he said
Now that big businesses got Big money for free with accountability attached to it, they want to outst the President we it’s not honest, true or Christian.
Thank you Mr. President!
American RepDemInd
August 31st, 2012
8:39 am
Obama we do owe you much! Stop being timid and go off your record. You have done so much, remind the people often.