Monday, March 12, 2012

True Grits



"Mornin' Alabama! How y'all doin' today!? One thing's fo' sho', I need y'all's vote! Lordy bee, I been skootin' around so much I'm tired-er than a racoon at a garbage dump! I tell ya, I've been busier than a caterpillar at a toe-countin' contest!"

No, that's not Mitt Romney talking. It's his new alter-ego, Mr. Cheesy Grits. Romney, in his desperate, last minute attempt to win the Alabama and Mississippi primaries, has been trying to sound more Southern than Foghorn Leghorn. Nothing's more painful to watch than the uber-stiff, fake and uncomfortable Romney trying to connect with regular folk. Because the truth is, with Mitt Romney, there is no truth.

At a Dixie rally last week he told the crowd "I am learning to say y’all, and I like grits and things...strange things are happening to me." Strange for sure. But what's strange is that Romney thinks the way to win voters in the South is to turn them all into inarticulate, soul-food-eatin' caricatures. Perhaps a more effective strategy might've been to say, "Now I don't know a thing about fixing grits, and I'm not going to pretend I do. I'll leave that to Rick and Newt. But I'll tell you one thing, I know an awful lot about fixing the economy and creating jobs. That's why I deserve your vote."

But that won't ever happen on the Romney campaign trail, because that would require the candidate to sound like a real human being rather than a fork-tongued automaton who wouldn't know honesty and sincerity if it hit 'em in the neckbone.

Romney is the "severely conservative" candidate with more flip-flops than a Birkenstock store. From abortion, immigration and taxes to gay marriage, health care and the environment...from the way he talks to the food he claims to eat...with Mitt Romney it's what you see is, well, we have no idea what you get."

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