Romney Symptomatic of Republican
Problems
By
STAR PARKER
Founder & PRESIDENT
COALITION ON URBAN RENEWAL & EDUCATION
It's doubtful that
anyone needs any more reasons to explain why Americans are fed up
with politics as usual. Nevertheless, Republican presidential
candidate Mitt Romney has given us one more.
Apparently when
Romney said, "I saw my father march with Martin Luther King," in his
much publicized "Faith in America" speech, this was not exactly
true.
It appears that not
only did Romney not see this, but there is serious doubt whether his
father ever indeed did march with Dr. King.
Romney now says that
he meant this "figuratively."
According to the
former Massachusetts governor, "If you look at the literature or the
dictionary the term 'saw' includes being aware of in the sense I
have described. It is a figure of speech...."
We haven't seen a
politician parse a sentence like this since Bill Clinton dissected
the meaning of the verb "is" and explained that it was Monica who
had sex with him and not the other way around.
The next sentence in
the speech following the King claim was, "I saw my parents provide
compassionate care to others, in personal ways nearby...." Also
figuratively?
The Detroit Free
Press says that it has no record of Romney's father, onetime
Michigan Governor George Romney, ever marching with King. According
to the Free Press, when Dr. King marched in Detroit, their archives
show that Romney's father did not participate because he said his
religion prohibited him from public appearances on Sunday.
How ironic that
Romney chose to insert this apparent whopper in his "Faith in
America" speech. Perhaps the governor's idea of faith is what
Groucho Marx had in mind with his line, "Who are you going to
believe, me or your own eyes."
This kind of
casualness with the truth is what has alienated good citizens across
the country from the elites who are running our political machinery.
The Pew Research
Center reports as their No. 1 public opinion story of 2007 the "sour
mood of the public." A Gallup poll just out puts the number of
Americans who "are satisfied with the way things are going in the
U.S." at 27 percent.
This dissatisfaction
carries over into low approval ratings for the president and even
lower ratings for the Congress.
Americans are unhappy
with the status quo and hence the surprise showings of candidates
like Barack Obama, Mike Huckabee, and Ron Paul. They're sick of
detached, elitist, power-hungry candidates whose personal agenda is
something other than genuine concern for people and clear and honest
principles.
In a recent Pew
survey, only 34 percent agreed with the statement "Most elected
officials care what people like me think." Twenty years ago in 1987,
47 percent agreed with this statement.
The bad news for
Republicans is that prevailing disillusionment is disproportionately
toward and within their party.
According to Pew,
33percent now identify as Democrats, up 2 points from 31 percent
five years ago.
Twenty five percent
now identify as Republicans, down 5 points from five years ago.
In addition to this,
17 percent of independents now lean Democratic, up 6 points from
five years ago and 11% of independents now lean Republican, down one
point from five years ago.
This overall shift in
sentiment toward the Democratic Party, however, reflects
disillusionment with Republicans rather than enthusiasm for
Democrats. The current favorability rating for the Democratic Party
is at 54percent, exactly where it was after President Bush's victory
in 2004. However, the current favorability rating for the Republican
Party is 41 percent, down 11 points from 52 percent over the same
period.
The point is that
Americans have not suddenly fallen back in love with the liberals.
They have fallen out
of love with a Republican Party that was supposed to be carrying the
banner of traditional values and limited government, whom they no
longer trust to do so.
When Reagan ran
against the entrenched political establishment in 1980, the
sentiment toward him was similar to what we hear today about Mike
Huckabee. How could this guy -- a class B actor, former
sportscaster, with a bachelor's degree from Eureka College in
Illinois -- be running for President of the United States?
But Reagan had been
traveling and speaking around the country for years. He knew the
country and he knew its people. When he ran against government and
the establishment, these folks felt he was representing them.
But now Republicans
have become a detached ruling elite like the Democrats that Reagan
ran against. And they have alienated a chunk of the grass roots
within their own party, and independents that Reagan had wooed in.
Republicans can win
back the hearts and minds of Americans. But they have to get real
and get honest. Unlike the former governor of Massachusetts.
---------------------------------
Star Parker is president of the
Coalition on Urban Renewal & Education and author of the new book
White Ghetto: How Middle Class America Reflects Inner City Decay.
Prior to her involvement in social
activism, Star Parker was a single welfare mother in Los Angeles,
California. After receiving Christ, Star returned to college,
received a BS degree in marketing and launched an urban Christian
magazine. The 1992 Los Angeles riots destroyed her business, yet
served as a springboard for her focus on faith and market-based
alternatives to empower the lives of the poor.
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