Somebody once asked Mohandas Gandhi what he thought of Western civilization. “It sounds like a great idea,” replied the famous mahatma. “It should definitely be tried!”
I could say the same thing about being fair to Mitt Romney. It’s worth a try.
What follows is not a plea for Mitt Romney. It’s a plea for fairness, as political clouds gather and the early lightning sparkles on the horizon. Some people simply cry out for justice when they find it lacking. My best friend is the only veteran of the North Korean Communist army that attacked South Korea in 1950 to defect from Communism, make it to America, become an American citizen and live the American dream. I met him at a student refugee camp in Vienna after he’d escaped from Hungary during its anti-Communist Freedom Fight of 1956. We put a team together that got him into America along with a scholarship in architecture at Syracuse University. He quickly became a football fan and a successful architect.
When Zang Gihong arrived in America in 1957 he thought “injustice” was the Soviet Red Army killing 35,000 Hungarians who merely wanted more personal and national freedom. Exactly one year later his sense of injustice included Notre Dame’s football team being allowed a second attempt to kick a field goal. That second try was successful; Syracuse lost! To this day my friend doesn’t apologize for the “long leap.” Injustice is injustice!
I’m one sheep that refuses to knuckle under to the manipulation of the shepherd. Take a look at the presidential sandbox as it sits right now. The feeling long blanketed the land that Mitt Romney wasn’t going to run again. The questions about that were quiet, and the answers were quiet. All of a sudden somebody noticed that, with no visible effort, Romney turns out to be leading the whole Republican pack, with especially strong numbers in the first two “presidential” states, Iowa and New Hampshire. All of a sudden you’d think we had some kind of emergency political 911 number and everybody was calling!
And what was the crisis? “Well! See here! This will never do!” Then came the incoming warheads of political destruction. Here’s the symphony now roiling the early GOP waters.
“Romney is the past. The GOP has to look to the future. This would make Romney’s third run!”
Variation No. 1: “Mitt is a good man. He would have made a good president. It’s too bad things broke the way they did.”
Variation No. 2: “Oh, Mitt will get a friendly welcome wherever Republicans congregate, but now it looks like he’s trying to make another run, and the party doesn’t even seem to be giving him the little honeymoon a warhorse deserves and usually gets. No; Mitt’s over and done with.”
Hold on. Opportunism has spoken. Sabotage has spoken. How about a word now for fairness?
When did a sleeping volcano ever sign a contract or make a pledge to keep on sleeping? I beg to battle with the “Mitt’s over and done with!” cadre. If Mitt were to try once more, that would be his third try, right? In baseball it’s three strikes and you’re out, not two strikes and the intention to swing again. Another candidate, also a Republican, made it on his third try. Does the name ring a bell – Ronald Reagan?
One thing I’ve noticed about all those rusty harpoons jabbing into Romney’s balloon is they each seem to have a favorite of their own whose ambitions would be extinguished by a Romney nomination! Every last one, and I’m not even taking notes.
Far more important is the fact that Mitt Romney turned out to have been right about a lot of big stuff in the debates with Obama, and Obama turned out to be flat-out wrong. Shame on all of us who’re giving too little weight to that! Remember the ridicule that hit Romney when he warned about Russia? And meanwhile Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was presenting Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov some kind of plaque that looked like a third-grade science project featuring a button that was supposed to say “Reset” in Russian? And all the queen’s horses and all the queen’s interpreters couldn’t get the Russian word right. Romney may not know how to spell the Russian word for “reset” in the Cyrillic alphabet, but hey, he got the important part right, and I’m confident he’d have been equally skilled at finding an interpreter who could have spelled the Russian word right in Russian!
This gang-rape of Romney’s chances pushes me closer to being a supporter. It’s funny; when the fourth-rate talent agent tries to convince producers “The people want new faces!” he’s shown the way to the elevator. But when the “political consultant” tries to pitch the same lame line he’s treated like the purveyor of great wisdom. Is it possible that Americans seeking entertainment want familiar faces while the political, military and economic sentinels of our nation’s well-being are seduced by all the new faces?
I’m eager to see the “new face” who would be a stronger candidate than one who definitely would have won the election of 2012 if Obama had been accurate where he erred and honest where he lied.
Media wishing to interview Barry Farber, please contact [email protected].
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