More and more Republicans are moving swiftly to distance themselves from losing Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s claims that President Barack Obama won re-election by basically bribing various constituencies with gifts. To wit:
“I’m very disappointed with Governor Romney’s analysis, which I believe is insulting and profoundly wrong. First of all, we didn’t lose Asian-Americans because they got any gifts. He did worse with Asian-Americans than he did with Latinos. This is the hardest-working and most successful ethnic group in America. They ain’t into gifts. Second, it’s an insult to all Americans. It reduces us to economic entities. You have no passion, no idealism, no dreams, no philosophy. If it had been that simple, my question would be, why didn’t you outbid him?
“He had enough billionaire supporters, if buying the electorate was the key, he could have got all his Super PAC friends together and said, don’t buy ads, give gifts. Be like the northwest Indians who have gift-giving ceremonies. We could have gone town-by-town and said, ‘Come here, let me give you gifts. Here are Republican gifts.’ An elephant coming in with gifts on it.”
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie:
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie on Friday joined the chorus of Republican governors and other officials criticizing Mitt Romney’s assertion that “gifts” from President Barack Obama helped the Democrat win reelection
.
“Yeah, sure,” Christie replied when asked by MSNBC host Joe Scarborough if Romney’s comments were “a terrible thing to say.” “You can’t expect to be the leader of all the people and be divisive,” Christie continued. “You have to talk about themes, policies, that unite people.”
Christie tries to keep his comments balanced but the underlying message is clear:
“Mitt Romney is a friend of mine,” Christie said. “I understand he is very upset about having lost the election, he’s very disappointed. … I’ve lost elections, but never for the presidency. I’m sure it stings.”
“Do I wish he hadn’t said those things?” the New Jersey governor added. “Of course. But on the other hand, I’m not going to bury the guy for it.”
His comments, however, are yet another shovel of dirt on the Romney political coffin the former Massachusetts Gov. has selected for himself: his concession speech was gracious but his comments about “gifts” echo his politically damaging 47% comments. Insulting more than half of the American electorate doesn’t make you the kind of political figure others want to latch onto or even be identified with.
Look for more GOPers to chime in the same way if asked about Romney’s comments.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.