If there’s such as a thing as a backhanded endorsement, the Des Moines Register gave a major one to Mitt Romney this weekend. After glossing over some of the justifiable concerns that conservatives have about Romney, the paper piled on the praise for Romneycare and gushed over the candidate’s willingness to compromise with Democrats:
While other Republican candidates are content to bash the president’s health reform law without offering meaningful reforms of their own, Romney has defended the principal goal of the Massachusetts health care legislation, which was to ensure that all residents there had access to health care. …
This ability to see the merits of tough issues from something other than a knee-jerk, ideological perspective suggests that Mitt Romney would be willing to bridge the political divide in Washington. Americans are desperate for the Republicans and Democrats to work together. His record of ignoring partisan labels to pass important legislation when he was governor of Massachusetts suggests he is capable of making that happen.
These aren’t exactly arguments that conservative caucus-goers will find persuasive. Romney’s Massachusetts health care reform is perpetually toxic with Republican voters, and they aren’t likely to be impressed by his “carefully nuanced position on abortion over the years,” either.
It’s no wonder Nate Silver found that Republicans endorsed by the Des Moines Register tend to do worse on average than predicted by the polls:
On average, across the eight races, the candidate receiving the endorsement of the Des Moines Register has outperformed the polls by a statistically insignificant 3-point margin. The four Republican candidates in the sample, meanwhile, have on average done slightly worse than polling would have projected, although the difference is nowhere close to being statistically significant.
The Register’s endorsement is better suited for the general election than for the Republican primaries. It isn’t likely to help Romney in the caucuses, and it may even drag him down a bit with conservative voters — though probably not enough to matter.
Any endorsement by any individual, group or media outlet viewed as "establishment" will hurt Romney.
I disagree. I don't think this will swing the vote decisively in Romney's favor, but I don't think it hurts him either. And I'm not sure I interpreted the endorsement as "piling on the praise for Romneycare." There is only one paragraph out of 14 on the issue, and it is fairly low at the ninth paragraph. I haven't seen the paper version, but that's probably after the jump. There is also another sentence in the 12th paragraph. I would hardly call a paragraph-and-a-half "piling on the praise," as Alana makes it sound like the whole endorsement is about the health care bill. And sure, the endorsement "glosses over" Romney's weaknesses, but so what? It's an endorsement. That's what it's supposed to do. It wouldn't be much of an endorsement if it was highly critical from start to finish. As for "gushing" over Romney's ability to compromise with Democrats, is that a bad thing? There's a difference between compromising and capitulating. Every president has to work with the other side unless he has control of both houses of Congress, including a supermajority in the Senate. Since a GOP president would certainly have to get at least some Democratic support for his policies (Republicans aren't going to pick up 13 seats in 2012 and probably not by 2014 either), this seems like a good skill. And at any rate, there is a whopping two paragraphs (the seventh and 12th) about this, when they really could have written an entire column or two about it. Also, the endorsement lauds Romney for having "smart, well-reasoned alternatives" to the Democratic positions that he disagrees with. The paper isn't complimenting him on his ability to adopt Democratic positions. It's complimenting him for actually coming up with realistic alternatives instead of just reflexively criticizing the other side and/or putting forth ridiculous ideas that have no chance of passing and/or working. Overall, I though the endorsement was both written and reasoned well. Essentially, the Des Moines Register argues that Romney would be the best president of any of the nominees, and then it lays out compelling reasons why ("Sobriety, wisdom and judgment" is the theme of the endorsement). Again, this might not help Romney much, but I can't see how it hurts him.