Anybody followed the gay Romney spokesman who was (allegedly) forced to resign because of the religious right's pressure?
Gay GOPer asks: Why didn’t Romney stand up to right’s attacks on Richard Grenell?But whatever you think of Grenell, the problem for gay Republicans like GOProud remains that the Romney campaign didn’t meaningfullly stand up to the attacks while they were going on As Jennifer Rubin notes, prominent social conservatives were not privately asked to quiet the storm on the right. Romney’s aides may be right on the question of whether Grenell was or wasn’t asked to leave, but it’s hard to see how that changes the broader story here, or makes this whole affair any less of a referendum on Romney’s leadership or willingness to take on extreme voices within his own party.
Then I read this, as being claimed by Andrew Sullivan, which I'll take with some salt. (Remember his fixation on the Trig Palin conspiracy?) But as he claims, Grenell as the foreign policy spokesman/expert, himself set-up a media call on the subject and allegedly was totally
muffled by Team Mittens in response to the right-wing complaints. There only to be seen, not heard.
But the storm was not likely to pass if no one in the Romney camp was prepared to back Grenell up. Hence his dilemma. The obvious solution was simply to get Grenell out there doling out the neocon red meat - which would have immediately changed the subject and helped dispel base skepticism. Instead the terrified Romneyites shut him up without any actual plan for when he might subsequently be able to do his job.
This story won't be remembered in detail 3 months later, but I truely think Mittens was given an opportunity disguised as a shit storm of which he could've turned into an emerald cloud, and instead he's covered in manure with no benefits except pleasing the same group of assholes who were going to vote for him in the fall. Like they would've bolted for Obama.
He's the fucking nominee. He won that fight. Allegedly he's supposed to pivot to the center in the next few months, and he took a wrong turn.
Imagine if he had let that spokesman do his thing, total redmeat on foreign policy in response to Biden's recent comments. Alot of those same right-wingers bitching would've felt comfort that in spite of that "problem," this guy with his FP opinions makes him one of the boys.
Or better yet (if self-admittedly unrealistic), Mittens would've released/given a statement to the effect that to fire Grenell would insinuate that he had done something wrong, and he hadn't. Sure Grenell as a gay American is for marriage equality, but a minority of Republicans are too.(Including Dick Cheney and Ted Olsen) We're a broad political coalition. We won't agree on every single little thing, just the broad big picture. It's why we had both Evangelicals and Gay Republicans. Besides that disagreement is pure tangental to foreign policy. Will being straight make Iran quit building a bomb? I picked him because we both agree on our alternative foreign policy to that espoused by the White House. We're not Tehran, we're goddamn America. We're all different.
This might've given an impression on independent/moderate voters that Mittens is about results, not methods. Conservative, but tolerant. It would've won at the least my personal respect, even if I ultimately won't vote for him. I'm sure I'm not the only one. It also would've possibly dampened, even castrate two core themes of attacks Obama is using: (1) Mittens is an extremist (and homophobic), and (2) he's a spineless pussy who's unwilling to stand-up against his party's base.
Instead, Mittens publicly confirmed both stereotypes. Even if he isn't a homophobe, then he gives off the impression that he's a coward unwilling to back up his own people. Obama pissed off his own base with the tax deal he cut with the GOP in '10. Dubya pissed off his own base with his failed attempts at immigration reform. Would Mittens even have the fortitude to attempt either? This raises that question.
For an expected close race, every layup matters.
"The Democrats didn't have any pro-life speakers. They stopped them from talking. We had everyone, from far-right to pro-choice. It's ludicrous to say the Republicans were intolerant, were filled with hate." - Ric Grenell, 1995
