The Numbers Cruncher Who Promises Change

Mitt Romney Tries Presenting Himself as the Sensible Option among the Republican Presidential Candidates.

Mitt Romney recently beat the campaign drum — more quietly than one usually expects from American politicians — when he visited the Vermeer farm machinery company in the pretty little Iowa town of Pella.

A group of 14 local businesspeople, including window and lamp manufacturers and insurance agents, were seated at the tables. They wore name tags identifying themselves by first name: Bob, Diane, Dennis and they listened as Mitt Romney promised to reduce their paperwork, lower capital gains and other business taxes and take a tougher stance in the battle against rival China. Romney said that the United States would negotiate with anyone, but the playing fields had to be level. He went on to accuse China of stealing U.S. patents while at the same time blocking U.S. imports.

But that’s just polemics, and the crowd in shirtsleeves wanted more than just words. They wanted to know how Romney intends to break the vicious economic cycle America is in: An atmosphere of uncertainty prevents consumers from buying more than just the bare necessities and businesses hesitate to hire new workers because demand for their products is low. The vicious cycle continues as consumers pinch pennies, thereby weakening demand even further. The candidate admitted that he could offer no panacea, but emphasized that he had 25 years experience in the business world that gave him practical and not just theoretical insights into how the economy worked. He said that he had saved failing businesses from bankruptcy and in many cases succeeded in turning them completely around. The “turnaround” has become the standard message in Romney’s speeches. He hints that what he did for one business, he could do for the entire nation.

Manager and Mormon

He founded Bain Capital in 1984, an investment firm that specialized in breaking up conglomerates into smaller businesses, some of which then flourished while the rest failed. He saved the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City from disgrace when his Mormon brethren quickly put him in charge to rectify the chaos that reigned. As Governor of the liberal state of Massachusetts, Romney introduced the mandatory health insurance plan for workers that became the blueprint for Obama’s healthcare reform package.

But the 64-year-old lacks Obama’s charisma. He speaks too rapidly, often swallowing syllables piecemeal. He got snickers from a group of jobless people in Florida a few weeks ago when he claimed that he was also looking for a job — in the Oval Office. The joke flopped. Generally speaking, the man from the right side of the tracks comes off as grotesque and clumsy when making small talk with voters. He’s a numbers cruncher, not a people person. He lost his 2008 bid for the candidacy to John McCain because McCain better understood the prevailing mood: The desire for a radical break from the George W. Bush era.

But now he sees an opportunity. The 2012 election will be all about the economy, and there he holds pretty good cards. “Wouldn’t it be nice if people in Washington actually spent a part of their career working in the real economy?” the multimillionaire asked. That jab was aimed not only at Obama, but also at Rick Perry, the latecomer who overtook everyone else in the field of conservatives and now leads the opinion polls.

Perry was the son of a Texas sharecropper and former Air Force pilot before he entered politics, originally as a Democrat, switching to the Republican Party in 1989. Perry inherited the Texas governorship when George W. Bush became president in 2000 and was reelected three times since then. In the eyes of the tea party movement, he is tough on the “Washington establishment.” Romney advised Perry to stop scaring people with his warnings. On one side, the ideologue; on the other side, the Wall Street mover and shaker — that’s this contest in a nutshell. Romney summed it up during his speech in Pella by saying that his specialty was problem solving.