Mitt Romney Bashing at the WSJ – Kimberly Strassel Weighs In

She Doesn’t Understand – Mitt is Already Running in the General Election as the Republican Nominee

The Wall Street Journal is not happy with Mitt Romney and in opinion writer Kimberly Strassel’s column it is easy to see why.

Mr. Romney, they see, is in the full throes of Guilty Republican Syndrome. . .

Having initially fought these caricatures, Mr. Romney has since begun to exhibit all the syndrome's symptoms. He's put forth a 59-point economic plan that eliminates the capital gains tax—but only for people who earn less than $200,000 a year. He's declared, at a New Hampshire town hall (and at every other opportunity): "I'm not running for the rich people. Rich people can take care of themselves. They're doing just fine." He's developed a form of Tourette's that causes him to employ the term "middle class" in nearly every sentence.

Ms. Strassel just does not understand Mitt.  She takes his words for commitment.  Mr. Romney realizes that if he wins the Republican nomination by appearing just as radical as his Republican opponents, his chances in the general election are substantially reduced.  He is also smart enough to realize that winning the Republican nomination and losing the general election is not the goal here.  So he is donning the mask of the moderate (compared to every other Republican) candidate.

Don’t worry Ms. Strassel, it is just a mask.  You should know by now that you cannot take Mitt seriously.  Just wait, if Mitt gets in with a Republican Congress you will get all the radical, middle class bashing, taxing poor people, supporting rich people rhetoric and legislation that you want.

There is one other curious, yet telling comment in Ms. Strassel’s column.

Mr. Romney is a multimillionaire, and through his own hard work. It's a great American story,

Now Ms. Strassel is a serious writer, not ever given to humor, but this was laugh out loud funny.  “His own hard work”.???  Mr. Romney was born into privilege.  His father was President of an auto company.  He grew up in the luxury of suburban Detroit.  His current wealth does not come from hard work, but from borrowing huge sums of money to buy companies and then sell them. 

Sometimes that worked, sometimes the companies failed but in almost all cases, even when the investments and debt resulted in bankruptcy and loss of jobs for workers,  Mitt made millions through what any regular person would call a serous lack of hard work.

It is not a great American story, and the real tragedy is that it is a common American story among the very wealthy.  Mitt didn’t build anything, he just exploited the American financial system.