It’s amateur night, a youth-encampment campaign of non-pols clueless to the in-fighting and elbowing of a presidential race.
Where are the experienced hands and hardened pros? Even loopy Michele Bachmann for a time had Ed Rollins on board to make her look plausible until nuttiness won out.
But Mitt Romney seems impervious to help. As his 47 percent stumble goes on and on, nobody steps in to limit the damage. The rescue plan consists only of more unvarnished Mitt. Lots of luck with that.
Yet, what his epic lapse reveals is less Romney’s disdain for the underprivileged than what Eisenhower’s favorite philosopher Eric Hoffer called the intense insularity of the True Believer.
“Passionate hatred,” he wrote, “can give meaning and purpose to an empty life. Thus people haunted by the purposelessness of their lives try to find a new content not only by dedicating themselves to a holy cause but also by nursing a fanatical grievance.”
In imparting his philosophy to other country club True Believers, Romney is on his own mission, oblivious to the 47 percent and more who struggle in lives not cushioned by wealth and privilege in a world where survival, not tax avoidance, is a daily concern.
MORE.