COMMENTARY | If you watched the GOP debate in Las Vegas, you definitely got the impression that Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts, is the candidate to beat. All the others were beating on him all night.
Fortunately he handled himself fairly well. Unfortunately, he gave his opponents more ammunition to use against him, particularly around "Romneycare," the Massachusetts health care plan that some believe (including former White House advisor David Axelrod) was the blueprint for President Barack Obama's federal one.
Sen. Rick Santorum did not hesitate to criticism Romney. When he finally got his first opportunity to speak, Santorum quickly turned the question he was asked (about Romney's ideas on jobs) into an attack on Romney's credibility on health care.
"The final point I would make to Governor Romney, you just don't have credibility, Mitt, when it comes to repealing Obamacare," Santorum said. "Your plan was the basis for Obamacare. Your consultants helped Obama craft Obamacare. And to say that you're going to repeal it, you just -- you have no track record on that that -- that we can trust you that you're going to do that."
Romney has a stock answer. He's walking the thin line between pride for his signature law's accomplishments in Massachusetts (and despite the critics, Romneycare has worked fairly well, and pretty much as intended) and the derision most of the GOP faithful have for anything that smacks of government run health care (Medicare and Medicaid excluded, of course).
Romney's saying what's good for Massachusetts isn't good for the nation. "And at the time, by the way, I crafted the plan, in the last campaign (2008), I was asked, is this something that you would have the whole nation do? And I said, no, this is something that was crafted for Massachusetts," Romney said. "It would be wrong to adopt this as a nation."
Putting aside the question of why if it's good for one state, it wouldn't be for the rest, it's a difficult argument. Romney's counting on everyone forgetting that in 2007 he once stated, "If Massachusetts succeeds in implementing it (health care reform), then that will be a model for the nation." He's also hoping we'll forget he was proud to take credit for being the inspiration for Obamacare. In April 2010, long before anyone was officially running for president, Romney told an audience in New Hampshire that Democrats called Republicans the "party of no", but Obama gave him credit for his new health care plan. "He's (Obama) saying that I was the guy that came up with the idea for what he did," Romney boasted. "If ever again somewhere down the road I would be debating him, I would be happy to take credit for his accomplishment."
There's a good chance Romney will get to do exactly that. But he has to stop making it easy for his opponents to attack him. To say nothing of what Obama will do with Romney's contradictions, if he gets that far.
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