Monday, March 12, 2007
My Soul & Mitt Romney [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
This appears on The Nation’s website:
One of Romney's biggest fans is the National Review's Kathryn Jean Lopez, a right-wing Catholic who opposes abortion with all of her soul. As I reported in the Nation last November, Lopez was given a private reception by Romney last October. The visit yielded a fawning blog post and a softball interview in which NR editors acknowledged that KLo "has some pro-Romney tendencies."
What the National Review failed to acknowledge was that Romney donated $10,000 to its in-house think tank, the National Review Institute, right before declaring his presidential candidacy.
Just a few quick facts, for the record: Romney's foundation gave $5,000 to the National Review Institute, a fact fully disclosed at the time. The other $5,000 that post refers to was from a group called Evangelicals for Mitt. The contributions were among others solicited by NRI to defray the costs of the NRO 10th Anniversary event it hosted.
But I can refer you to the New York Times for those facts.
Following his links, the “private reception” the Nation writer refers to was actually a drop-by the statehouse the morning after a Family Research Council event at a black evangelical Boston church I covered while in the hood for something else entirely (an event in Worchester honoring murdered journalist Steven Vincent). Romney spoke at the church. I did not interview him that ngiht. He was not in the statehouse when I was there the following morning. I did not interview him during that trip. The post the writer refers to was about seeing Ramesh Ponnuru's book in his office while walking through. Long-term Corner readers know I never pass up an opportunity to plug a friend's book. That post was at least as much about Ramesh as it was about Romney.
The “softball” interview came later. Softball? You read, you decide.
If my — or NRO/NR's — pro-life creds could be bought for $5,000, I suspect candidates would be whipping out their checkbooks much more frequently (I also suspect if I could be bought off — and easily — then to say that I oppose abortion with all my soul would be false). The contention that my view of Romney was somehow transformed in October because of the NRI donation is laughable, as any Google search or click on my NRO archive would suggest. My first friendly-to-Romney piece was posted in early February 2005 — as he was taking on Harvard on cloning.
Eyes wide open, in a piece in May of that year I noted:
Cynics will dismiss Romney's continued attempt to push back some of the more radical provisions of the Beacon Hill Brave New World effort as posturing to Republican 2008 primary voters. To anyone whose been watching the debate, however, Romney has proven to be one of the more clear-thinking and honest pols on this heated topic: Even if his position hasn't been ideal, he has made a valiant effort and shed some light on the opposition's endgame.
Maybe I was taken in too easily, or maybe he’s led on life in his latter days and maybe it’s genuine (I walked through the chronology and my read of it recently here).
Back in 2005 — long before that $5,000 — again, I was dismissing Mormon-problem concerns. In March 2005 I wrote about his leadership on religious freedom in Massachusetts. You get the idea. Anyone who’s been reading NRO knows it’s been the issues, stupid, that have moved me toward Romney — with full knowledge that the good comes with a bad history. Argue I’m stupid for buying it, but $5,000, while appreciated by NRI, does not buy you NR/NRO/K-Lo love. If a buy-off was the intention (it wasn't) … he's made better investments.
03/12 09:34 AM
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