On Friday’s “NewsHour” on PBS, New York Times columnist David Brooks had some suggestions for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign, particularly after his three-state loss last week in Missouri, Colorado and Minnesota to former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum.
“[M]itt Romney is not so great,” Brooks said. “And it’s his weakness, I think, as much as Rick Santorum’s strength that explains what happened, especially in a state like Colorado, where he did have a history and did compete.”
“And the core problem to me is not, ‘Is he conservative? Are his policies conservative enough?’ It’s not a policy problem, because their policies are all essentially similar. But it’s a personal problem. People know that, if Rick Santorum, if he was not running for president, he was in a room and you asked him about his positions, he would say exactly what he is saying. People do not believe that about Mitt Romney.”
Brooks said Romney should break with his talking points and show voters more what he is really thinking.
“It’s a sign of his weakness that people don’t know where he comes from,” he said. “He doesn’t talk about his past. And I think he should break the Mormon taboo and talk about it — talk about his past, talk about his family past. I think he needs to tell the country — and he sells himself as the turnaround artist. Well, what does that mean to most people? What community is he from? What business, what industry does he really know?”
“It sounds like he’s sort of a free agent floating out there. So people don’t know where this guy comes from. And he really hasn’t filled people in because he wants to be reticent about his own personal past. And I think that is a core problem that he has to address.”