Yesterday, the blogosphere was abuzz because of the comments Mitt gave during an interview with Fox News:
“I’m not in favor of [L. Ron Hubbard's] religion by any means,” Mr. Romney, a Mormon, said. “But he wrote a book called ‘Battlefield Earth’ that was a very fun science-fiction book.” Asked about his favorite book, Mr. Romney cited the Bible. A spokesman said later it was one of Mr. Romney’s favorite novels.
Well, instead of letting the story die like he should have, he issued a clarification statement. Unfortunately, just like what happened during HunterGate last month, his clarification just added fuel to the fire.
Asked about his comments during a Fox News interview Monday that L. Ron Hubbard’s Battlefield Earth is his favorite novel, Romney said Huckleberry Finn is his favorite fiction and that the book by Hubbard, who founded Scientology, is his favorite science fiction reading.
`It’s a great science-fiction book,” Romney said. `He hadn’t founded Scientology at that point.”
But as Soren Dayton notes, this isn’t just stupid, it’s also very wrong. Hubbard founded Scientology in 1953 and Battlefield Earth was written 29 years later in 1982. That’s a big discrepancy in terms of years. Was he just confused?
So, he manged to make a slightly amusing non-story into a head scratching actual story in the span of 24 hours. Why does he always make things worse?
May 2nd, 2007 at 8:20 pm
LJ, I think the answer to your question is because Romney is trying too hard. He wants it too bad, which is not a good thing in my book.
I have always said that what scares me are the candidates who won’t feel complete as humans unless they become president, the guys who have organized their lives around winning the presidency, the ones who will be devastated if they don’t make it to the Oval Office. Clinton and Gore and George H.W. Bush came across that way to me.
The old system where groundswells and party leaders asked candidates to run may have been better than the new system where bored, rich folks look in the mirror and decide they should be Governor or Senator or President.
May 2nd, 2007 at 8:58 pm
Not Kerry? More than the Clinton or Bush41, for sure. McCain, too, but Kerry wins the big prize.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:06 pm
Yeah, Kerry, too. An oversight for sure.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:12 pm
Republius
He doesn’t really strike me as someone who would suffer that much from defeat, as long as he knew he tried his best. He’s got too many other things going for him.
Personally, I don’t care that much how up he is on literature trivia.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:13 pm
Umm, why does this even matter? It sounds like he wasn’t sure on the date of book that he evidently liked. The point of Soren’s lame post (as much of his anti-Romney site is) is that Romney has multiple books he likes. Hey thanks Soren, I have more than one book I like too, big whoop.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:14 pm
Well, LJ, you did it. You found Romney’s fatal flaw. He didn’t have his facts straight with regards to when scientology was founded. Now I wouldn’t go bashing him too hard, lest we need to point out that everyone’s candidate has a flub here and there. As for this becoming an actual story, I disagree. It’s still quite stupid.
Republius, it’s quite a leap for you to say that this story shows Romney to be a bored rich guy. Could it be, perhaps, that Romney’s detractors are determined to pick apart every inane little trip he makes?
I think people here are forgetting the most common feature of human beings here.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:17 pm
I think Romney has a ton to offer, but he is running an awful campaign other than on the fundraising side.
I honestly thought that the biggest problem Romney would have was being Mormon. I never would have imagined he could create so much controversy as to squeeze out (at least for now) the Mormon issue.
If Romney would just try to be himself rather than some presidential candidate product, I think he would do a lot better. His business experience and training may be getting in his way – he is trying to sell himself rather than introduce himself.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:18 pm
My dad is a Thompson guy first, a Romney guy second, and he said, “Wow…that makes him sound stupid. And I don’t want someone who sounds stupid as president.”
Just an anecdote I thought I’d share.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:21 pm
Republius,
I think Romney is telling people he likes a book. How is not remembering the year it was written not being your self?
I love Mohler’s 5th symphony, but I can’t rember the date or when in his life it was written. Is this me pandering to the jewish classical composer future Romney supporter base?
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:22 pm
Oh no. Now Romney’s going to lose the nomination. I’m so disappointed.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:28 pm
Republius,
Nobody who was trying to be the presidential candidate instead of himself would say that he liked that book.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:38 pm
Jason,
No, but if you said, “I love Mahler’s fifth symphony. The fact that it was written during the holocaust really brings out the poignancy in it,” then the fact that you made a statement about the date could be offensive to some, since you got it wrong.
He should have just kept quiet about it.
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:46 pm
I would just think it was someone who didn’t know much about Mahler, didn’t mean they didn’t like the piece. The point of the argument that Romney is not being himself by saying he liked this book begs the question, who was he trying to please by mentioning this book if not himself?
May 2nd, 2007 at 10:01 pm
Tom Cruise? Xenu?
May 2nd, 2007 at 10:03 pm
Trey Parker and Matt Stone?
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:00 pm
I like Mahler’s 5th too
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:01 pm
LJ, agreed. If he had to make a faux pas, he should have said he supports federal funding of abortion. Then the controversy would have gone away in about half a day. But Battlefield Earth will live forever in infamy, because, you know, the base just can’t take Battlefield Earth.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:02 pm
Did Romney mention the book to win votes? I don’t think so. What is damaging though is his ability to draw attentiont to a negative news story by giving it oxygen. Clarifications should be used very sparingly.
(as Sir Humphrey once said “Clarifications are not to make things clear, they are to put you in the clear”)
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:03 pm
Nusrat (#8) thanks for the anecdote. A question though, did he vote for Bush 43. Cos of all the Presidents he probably takes the cake when it comes to mangling words. Or maybe I’m just misunderestimating him.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:08 pm
Yeah, he voted for Bush 43 twice. But he voted mainly as a “least worse” deal, and since we live in the oh-so-important primary state of Indiana, I don’t think he took part in our primary. And even if he had, usually all the others drop out by that point, anyway.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:18 pm
Nusrat,
Exactly. If Romney didn’t know when Battlefield Earth was written, why did he volunteer an answer? I agree with the Romney supporters that this is a stupid, trivial story, but Romney showed remarkably poor discipline to respond to this. Politicians make minor flubs all the time (McCain’s made several over the past few months), but usually if you ignore it or issue a brief statement through your campaign and it goes away. You don’t try to explain it away by saying something that makes you look even more uninformed.
But for what it’s worth, I just caught the segment 2 of Romney on Leno and I thought he did a lot better answering the hunting question than he did on the stump. Ah, the wonders of prepping ahead of time.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:28 pm
Segment one was pretty stiff
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:31 pm
LJ, don’t get me wrong. Romney will die a death of a thousand cuts if he’s not more careful. But this particular instance doesn’t seem to rank up there. If you already view Romney as insincere, this confirms it. For those who support him, this seems minor. And if you know nothing about him, you’re probably not paying enough attention to care, anyway.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:34 pm
I just saw Romney on Leno, he was moderately funny. But someone might want to tell him he is running for Commander in Chief, not Pretty Boy in Chief. WAY too many hair comments. If you get a prime time, two segment slot on the Tonight Show, you have to really let people know who you are and what you stand for. Mitt Romney failed to articulate that tonight.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:46 pm
Tommy,
I was all set to watch it but I lost track of time. Hopefully someone uploads it to Youtube soon. I look forward to it. How did Romney handle the stiff questions?
JF,
Oh, I definitely agree. But to me, it’s the fact that he responded in such a non-presidential way. He has poor political discipline. I wouldn’t have even made a post out of it, but it fits into a pattern of his. Reiterating Republius (#7), last year around this time I assumed that Romney’s Mormonism would be his biggest hurdle in obtaining the nomination. But he succeeded in eliminating that threat, only to make himself and his flip-flops the main story. Almost every week there was a video of Romney contradicting something he said only a few years earlier.
The only reason it hasn’t been talked about much in the past 2 months is because his past positions actually seem like less of a deal compared to Giuliani’s present day positions (public funding for abortions) and past unexplained flip-flops (partial birth abortion, the Hyde Amendment).
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:49 pm
Mahler was born Jewish but converted to Christianity.
Romney is a little like the first president Bush: A great guy, but not a regular guy. He makes little mistakes sometimes when he tries to sound like a regular guy. He should run hard but relax and be himself.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:49 pm
LJ,
In fact, Mayor Giuliani does NOT support federal funding for abortions. He takes the classic federalist approach, the very same approach the very senior Sen. from Arizona USED to trumpet, and says that it should be left up to the states.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:57 pm
Romney succeeded in eliminating the threat of his Mormonism? Um, no. It’s why he’s stuck around 10% and is unelectable.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:58 pm
David B, are you sure you wouldn’t feel more comfortable in the Democratic Party?
May 3rd, 2007 at 12:04 am
Geoff,
Haven’t we been through this enough already?
Rudy in 1989:
Rudy in 1993:
Rudy in 2007:
Notice that he says “even if,” that’s key. Had he said, “it must be a state by state decision” it would’ve been a slightly different story, but he added “even if” as an afterthought.
May 3rd, 2007 at 12:09 am
David B,
Can you name anyone who has publicly come out against Romney because he’s a Mormon? I can only think of Damon Linker.
Can you name anyone who has publicly come out against Romney because he’s a flip flopper and just generally not a good politician? I can think of several dozen people.
I think the latter is a much bigger problem for Romney and is the cause of his lackluster polling.
May 3rd, 2007 at 12:22 am
I agree with LJ and Republius. Romney is clearly trying too hard here, and trying to please too many people. Don’t be afraid to say something people might disagree with Mitt! Don’t preface every potentially controversial remark with “well, I’m not…”! Don’t offer corrections and explanations to every utterly unremarkable story under the sun. I’ve been reading up on Romney’s 1994 and 2002 races, and he did the exact same thing. He was overly cautious, afraid to make controversial remarks or be aggressive. I’m no psychologist, but frankly he learned his father’s lesson far too well. The key isn’t avoid saying controversial things, but rather to avoid saying very controversial things, about very important subjects. Anything, like how often he goes hunting, or his favorite book, is so entirely unnoteworthy, that he’d be better off telling the press to take a hike when they try to make a story out of it. I’m still 100% behind Romney, but it’s not me he has to sell.
May 3rd, 2007 at 12:47 am
LJ, it’s because it’s not acceptable to put in print. It’s the 800 lb. gorilla in the room that is not spoken of.
May 3rd, 2007 at 12:48 am
JF: How does what I said have anything to do with the Democratic Party? As a person who believes in unbridled capitalism and taking much more military action against our enemies, why would I have anything to do with the Democratic Party?
May 3rd, 2007 at 1:07 am
Your hostility to religion was the red flag. If a Catholic can get elected and a Quaker can get elected, I don’t think Mormonism will be the issue. The harping on the insincerity of his positions is a far more legitimate line of attack, not one that I personally endorse, but you’ll find yourself on firmer ground there.
May 3rd, 2007 at 1:19 am
It’s simply a fact that most Americans consider Catholic mainstream religion, and they consider a Quaker closer to mainstream religious, whereas they consider Mormonism on the road to Jehovah’s Witnesses, Scientology, etc. The boys-on-bikes evangelism is probably the cause of this.
If nobody wants to talk about this perception, then nobody will have a full context for understanding what is happening with Romney’s campaign.
A lot of mainstream writers *have* discussed Romney’s “Mormon problem,” though they rarely specify what that means. I’m just fleshing it out a little.
May 3rd, 2007 at 2:09 am
How closely does a normal human being have to observe Romney to find his flub-ups?
I’ve watch him in public appearances on C-SPAN and other channels and I’ve always had a flub-up appear on here before I see it myself.
What worries me about Mitt is that he’s taking these superficial critics too seriously. He needs to get the John McCain attitude towards superficial critics “Get a life”.
May 3rd, 2007 at 6:22 am
Can I please say something?? This has NOTHING to do with the fact that its just about a silly book, or what his favorite book is. What this whole issue does is further point to the fact that Mitt Romney is out of touch with mainstream society, that he is an extreme oddball and that America does not like what it sees in this man. All it knows is that he is touting himself as the “best candidate”, etc. This is what I have been saying all along.
May 3rd, 2007 at 6:51 am
You got it KT. Mitt Romney likes Battlefield Earth so he’s an extreme oddball out of touch with the mainstream of American society. I guess…that…uh…the mainstream of American society likes to crossdress then?
May 3rd, 2007 at 8:57 am
Oh god, the Romneyite hitmen out in full force again. Is it just me, or was this article simply pointing out that instead of letting a non-story die out, he needed to make a bigger deal out of it by issuing a statement that turned out to be factually incorrect and thus keeping the story alive longer?
And then Republius’ comment simply made the correlation of Romney’s seemingly constant attempts to court voters to the desperate-for-the-presidency style of candidate seen in HW Bush, Clinton, and Kerry?
Judging from the comments from the Romneyites here, you’d think it was some kind of slanderous hit piece or something.
May 3rd, 2007 at 8:58 am
JF, my honest review of last night’s appearence on Leno;
Romney looked like a pretty honest, nice guy, but he also has the tendency to stiffen up in an uncomfortable situation, and he didn’t look like he was real comfortable, or relaxed. Some of it might have to do with the type of humor that the Tonight Show uses, because Leno, it seemed, was trying hard not to embarrass him. He lightened up a little bit with the hunting jokes in the second segment, and seemed to do a little better. It just didn’t seem like he was comfortable with how to relate to that kind of audience.
For example, Billy Clinton was a natural in this setting. No matter how much you hated the guys politics, he always looked comfortable in his own skin, and that makes those around him relax. I’ll give Mitt credit for going out there though.
The only real negative that I noticed is that the more I watch him, the more he reminds of Mr. Belding from Saved By the Bell, and I don’t know if thats a good thing, for I don’t know how well he’ll be able to connect with the young the late generation Xers like myself.
May 3rd, 2007 at 11:01 am
Why Does Romney Always Make Things Worse?
Why does LJ always exagerate?
May 3rd, 2007 at 11:06 am
late Xer right here…voting for Mitt….of course I still haven’t figured out how to connect to my generation…although I call them worst generation ever…in a tight race with the baby boomers
May 3rd, 2007 at 11:32 am
Yawn….
May 3rd, 2007 at 11:45 am
DavidB…..enough with the Mormon stuff. It’s over….talk about issues not your fears and hatred.
Anyone have real issues to talk about?
May 3rd, 2007 at 2:34 pm
JohioW it does matter (mormonism). The lifestyle is completely out of touch with mainstream America. And romney is further out of touch with average citizens.
May 3rd, 2007 at 2:38 pm
KT, in what ways is Mitt’s lifestyle “completely out of touch” with mainstream America? Have you got anything except one-liners?
May 3rd, 2007 at 4:24 pm
What worries me about Mitt is that he’s taking these superficial critics too seriously. He needs to get the John McCain attitude towards superficial critics “Get a life”.
Exactly. Republius conclusion that Romney is a psycho is absurd, but Romney does need to shrug off the nitpickers of the world more than does.
May 3rd, 2007 at 4:27 pm
JohioW it does matter (mormonism). The lifestyle is completely out of touch with mainstream America. And romney is further out of touch with average citizens.
No, sick little bigots like you are completely out of touch with mainstream America, and thank God.
Like Mormons, most Americans get married, have kids, stay married, go to church, work hard, support America, and keep their noses clean. If you think that lifestyle is “completely out of touch with mainstream America” I think you need to get out of San Francisco a little more.
May 3rd, 2007 at 4:29 pm
Henry, That is an easy thing to say now. But back in December when the “flip-flopping” meme first surfaced, Romney’s organization decided to “shrug off the nitpickers of the world” and basically ignore them.
Was that a wise decision?
May 3rd, 2007 at 4:38 pm
Mark,
my political advice is worth every penny you’ve spent on it.
May 3rd, 2007 at 5:39 pm
Henry,
That can be said for practically everybody here.
May 3rd, 2007 at 5:42 pm
Whoop-de-do! What difference does it make what book Mitt liked, even if it is this one that has gotten everyone upset over. As long as he doesn’t espouse to the beliefs of the author, which would be concerning to most. It just shows he is diverse in his reading and that is not a sin as far as I know.
As far as his response to it, oh well. I know that most EVERYTHING he or any of the candidates will say will cause people to nit-pick saying, “See, he said/did that, that is why I like/hate him.” But really, a book that is fiction? Most people can find bad and good in all people. It’s called “judging with a personal agenda”. But is it justified in this case, really?
An example of the judging is like Tommy mentions on #41 above about how he thought Mitt looked “stiff”. I wasn’t home to watch the Leno show but my husband was. I asked him how he thought Mitt did and he said that he did “amazingly well” and looked “very comfortable in his own shoes which says something for him, especially in that kind of environment”, even though my husband is not squarely in Mitt’s camp. So, it’s all a matter of personal perspective. In the case we are talking about from the post, it is not life or death to Mitt’s candidacy either. No, no one is perfect and he and ALL the others will make mistakes, whether real or imaginary is up to the eye of the beholder. I guess it is for all your reading/blogging pleasure.
OK, I’m ready. You can all crucify me. It seems that is what many people like to do here to each other.