After that there was a flurry of papers that picked sides. The Washington Post seemed to be a bit happier about picking Obama. While they mentioned disappointments as well as successes during the President's first term, they still couched their endorsement in terms of "not Romney." Consider:
The sad answer is there is no way to know what Mr. Romney really believes. His unguarded expression of contempt for 47 percent of the population seems as sincere as anything else we’ve heard, but that’s only conjecture. At times he has advocated a muscular, John McCain-style foreign policy, but in the final presidential debate he positioned himself as a dove. Before he passionately supported a fetus’s right to life, he supported a woman’s right to abortion. His swings have been dramatic on gay rights, gun rights, health care, climate change and immigration. His ugly embrace of “self-deportation” during the Republican primary campaign, and his demolition of a primary opponent, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, for having left open a door of opportunity for illegal-immigrant children, bespeaks a willingness to say just about anything to win. Every politician changes his mind sometimes; you’d worry if not. But rarely has a politician gotten so far with only one evident immutable belief: his conviction in his own fitness for higher office.
That's not exactly a ringing endorsement for Obama as much as it smacks of the mandate against Romney.
Yesterday, I read that Bloomberg and The Economist have now also come in line with camp Obama. This is the group that was supposed to be clearly Romney home game advantage: the business world. And yet, their endorsements of Obama are really, once again, concerns about Romney's sharp turn to the right, and his "flip flopping."
By contrast, The NY Post endorsed has Romney. There rationale is very much a criticism of Obama as well as a support of Romney's plans for the next four years. This is closer to what I would have expected.
There is something else that lives in the middle. I would like to call it "Or else" politics. In this line of thinking, we should all endorse Romney because he can work with the other side. Obama, they say, tried to work with the other side and it didn't work. The Republican fillerbusters brought government to its knees. A Romney presidency with a Democratic House and Senate, however, would still get stuff done. The final analysis? Democrats are nicer. So in "Or Else" politics, you should vote for Romney so that the Republicans don't wreck the joint. Several papers have expressed concern, but go on to endorse Romney after
... offering some half-hearted support for Romneynomics, but mainly asserting that Mr. Romney would be able to work with Democrats in a way that Mr. Obama has not been able to work with Republicans. Why? Well, the paper claims — as many of those making this argument do — that, in office, Mr. Romney would be far more centrist than anything he has said in the campaign would indicate. (And the notion that he has been lying all along is supposed to be a point in his favor?) But mostly it just takes it for granted that Democrats would be more reasonable.
Wow. Did I read that right?
Help! Our government is being held hostage!
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