Mitt Romney 2012: A Failure to Launch

By all measures, Mitt Romney is letting the 2012 presidential election slip from his grasp. His campaign has never really gotten off the ground.

Let’s examine how and why by looking at three critical campaign factors – money, message and, most importantly, Mitt.

Throughout the summer months, Americans were treated to stories about how the Romney Campaign was out-raising Obama to the tune of tens of millions of dollars. Yet, in late September, the Romney Campaign finds itself some $30 million dollars behind Obama in actual campaign cash despite Obama spending tens of millions on television during the summer.

Turns out, those $50,000 checks Mitt was collecting from millionaires don’t have the same impact of millions of Obama donors who give $25 or $50 or $100 multiple times. Most of the money Mitt collected went to party committees that can only spend the money to help him in certain ways. Right now, that money isn’t doing him any good and by the time it can be put to use in the field to get out the vote for Election Day, it may well be too late.

As it turns out, traipsing around the nation cavorting with millionaires for months on end instead of actually campaigning is the least of Romney’s troubles. More importantly than the money story is the message, or lack thereof, from Romney’s campaign.

The few specifics that Mitt Romney has told voters about how he would govern and the policies he would pursue as president are not impressive to those who are listening. He has refused to lay out specific plans on almost every major issue that the voters care about in this election. He has flip-flopped on major issues including education and healthcare.

And when he does talk specifics, the voters tune out. It seems that the majority of Americans just don’t believe that right wing policies that divide the nation by class, income, race, sexual orientation and any other qualifier imaginable are the right policies for the nation. The voters, polls make clear, are also highly suspicious of economic policies reminiscent of those of George W. Bush – the same policies that got us into the economic mess in the first place.

The voters seem to understand and fully accept Bill Clinton’s message delivered at the Democratic National Convention: "Don’t double down on trickle down." Ever since the democratic convention, this race, which had been stable for most of the last year, seems to have broken open, in the president’s favor. Romney’s muddled message is a complete failure. He thought he could quietly waltz into the White House on the backs of voters supposedly disillusioned with Barack Obama. It’s not working out that way.

Finally, there’s the man himself…and this is without a doubt the biggest reason why Mitt Romney’s campaign is the true failure that it is. Mitt Romney is the worst candidate for president in a generation. He simply doesn’t have what it takes. His instincts are poor, his policies are misguided and his elitist attitude is clearly unacceptable to the majority of Americans, including many who not too long ago would have been open to casting a vote in his favor.

This is a man who has spent his entire adult life preparing for this moment. This is a man who can complete the most complex financial deals. This is a man who is capable of concocting the most complicated schemes to invest his millions abroad to legally avoid paying U.S. taxes. This is a man who built a billion dollar venture capital firm. This is a man who was elected as a republican governor in what is arguably the most liberal state in the union. This is a man who has based his entire campaign on his qualification as a successful businessman. This is a man who has spent the last five years running for President of the United States.

You'd think by now he would know what he was doing. But it has become painfully clear that the voters are quickly coming to the conclusion that he is unprepared for this particular job.

His efforts to project strength and proficiency in foreign affairs have turned into unmitigated disasters. His campaign would have been better off without his stumbling across the world stage in July. Chevy Chase didn’t cause as many international incidents on his last European Vacation.

If that didn’t prove he was unfit to lead America on the world stage, then his shameless attempt to seize political advantage in the wake of the terrorist assassination of an American Ambassador and staff in Libya when events on the ground were still coming to light surely does.

Mitt Romney is simply unprepared to be the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the United States. He is a bumbling fool, a blithering idiot when it comes to foreign policy. As a former aide to Senator John McCain proclaimed recently, Mitt Romney is “not ready for prime time.”

Of course, his foibles are not limited to foreign stages. Voters were treated recently to a video of Mitt Romney denigrating half of America at a $50,000 a person fundraiser in Boca Raton. His claim that 47 percent of us are victims dependent on government who are unwilling to take responsibility for our lives was likely the final straw for many voters who may not have been sold on a second term for Barack Obama, but who clearly do not believe that Mitt Romney is qualified to be given his first.

So what does all this add up to? We were led to believe that Mitt Romney was an intelligent, effective, efficient CEO ready to take charge of all that ails us as a nation and fix it. Turns out, the fairytale doesn’t end that way.

His campaign is amateurish and plagued by missteps, gaffes and all sorts of mistakes. It was referred to by Reagan speech writer Peggy Noonan as “a rolling calamity.”

His policies are wrong…period. The American people now see that and are rejecting the hard-right Tea Party platform. His ability to conduct himself with the seriousness and poise demanded of a candidate for president is clearly lacking.

If this effective, efficient, experienced CEO can’t manage a billion dollar campaign, how can we expect him to govern a nation as complex and diverse as ours?

Mitt: you’re unfit for high office. You’re simply not ready. And it shows.

By the way, welcome to Pennsylvania.