Mitt Romney, The Great Mentioner, And The Future

Writing in today's Boston Globe, Jeff Jacoby notes that with cover stories in both The Weekly Standard and National Review, Governor Romney "has certainly attracted the Great Mentioner's notice. With the first '08 primaries still 30 months away, that's not a bad start."

So what about this Romney fellow? He's a very interesting candidate, and I blogged a little about him in this post below just a few days ago. The Weekly Standard article, by Terry Eastland, was over 6,000 words long and devoted much of that space to Romney's LDS (Mormon) religion. The National Review article is just as comprehensive; it is available here, but apparently only to subscribers, unless I'm missing something. (Side note: If you're a conservative and spend a fair amount of time on line, I think the $21.95 annual on-line subscription fee for National Review is well worth it.)

The one negative blip on this positive screen, so far, has been an unfortunate statement by Michael Murphy, who is described as "Romney's political strategist." Answering questions on Romney's position on abortion, Murphy said ''He's been a prolife Mormon faking it as prochoice friendly."

Whoops. Murphy has since said he didn't really mean that statement in the way he certainly seems to have meant it. Romney already had work to do to convince GOP primary voters that they can take his statements on the abortion issue seriously; now it will be even harder. It seems to me that Murphy may have to be dismissed as well.

But enough about all that. What about the candidate himself? I happened to surf my way to C-SPAN Friday night and caught a speech Romney was giving to a Republican group in (where else?) New Hampshire. I had never seen the man speak before.

I was mesmerized. Romney is telegenic and articulate (although he needs to learn to slow down just a little). He has the command of detail that Bill Clinton used to display, without Clinton's cloying mock sincerity. He is funny. He seems very, very smart. He is comfortable with himself and self-effacing. He is conservative.

I started to imagine Romney debating Hillary Clinton on national TV and my heart rate picked up just a little. I said to my wife, "Hey, sweetheart, I really like George Allen too, but we might really have something here."

I still think so. Check this candidate out. He's pretty exciting.