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No Way, Mitt

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 28, 2007

All over the country, newspapers large and small customarily endorse candidates for public office, from the local town or city council right up to the White House. That's not news. But it is news when a paper publishes what amounts to a rare, perhaps even unique, anti-endorsement, and it is national news when the repudiated candidate is running for president.

On Sunday, The Concord Monitor drew international attention, including a report on the front page of The New York Times website, by publishing an editorial emphatically urging its readers not to vote for Mitt Romney in next month's Republican primary in New Hampshire.

"If you were building a Republican presidential candidate from a kit, imagine what pieces you might use: an athletic build, ramrod posture, Reaganesque hair, a charismatic speaking style and a crisp dark suit," the editorial began. "You'd add a beautiful wife and family, a wildly successful business career and just enough executive government experience. You'd pour in some old GOP bromides - spending cuts and lower taxes - plus some new positions for 2008: anti-immigrant rhetoric and a focus on faith."

So far, so good. But then came the stunner: "Add it all up and you get Mitt Romney, a disquieting figure who sure looks like the next president and most surely must be stopped."

The Concord Monitor has a circulation of less than 30,000, but because it is published in the state capital and because it has a well-earned reputation for excellence in the New England journalism community, its editorials may draw more attention than most, and so candidates for president routinely pay visits to the Monitor's editorial board, hoping to gain its endorsement.

This year, for example, the only presidential hopefuls of either party who as of this week have yet to meet with the editorial board are Republicans Rudolph Giuliani and Fred Thompson, neither of whom has devoted a great deal of campaign time to New Hampshire. Last week, on successive days, the Monitor editorial board interviewed Democrats Barack Obama, Bill Clinton (promoting his wife's candidacy) and, separately, Hillary Clinton.

But, as a former editor and publisher, I wonder about the importance of newspaper endorsements, and I believe that many of my colleagues wonder too, especially since readers sometimes regard them as proof of their favorite newspaper's arrogance. Mike Pride, though, thinks they're worth the risk of reader wrath.

"The candidates come to us because they want our endorsement," the Monitor's longtime editor (and former Tampa Tribune sportswriter), observed. "It's my belief that if our endorsements are important to the candidates, then they must matter."

But what about an anti-endorsement? Was this a first for the Monitor?

"Not really," Pride, a Clearwater native and University of South Florida graduate, explained. "When George W. Bush was running, we denounced him editorially for running what we called 'a virtual campaign.' We thought he owed the voters far more than he was giving them."

The Monitor's editorial board consists of the publisher, the executive editor, the managing editor, the editor of the editorial board and Pride, who not long ago gave up his role as executive editor to begin a transition period that will conclude with his retirement, probably next year. Felice Belman, who became executive editor several months ago, actually wrote the editorial.

The board was united in its decision to repudiate Romney's candidacy, Pride said. Although impressed by his ability to express his views forcefully ("he knows what he wants to say and he says it well," Pride noted in a telephone interview), it believed his views on critical issues too often shift for sheer political expediency.

"If you followed only his tenure as governor of Massachusetts, you might imagine Romney as a pragmatic moderate with liberal positions on numerous social issues and an ability to work well with Democrats," the editorial observed. "If you followed only his campaign for president, you'd swear he was a red-meat conservative, pandering to the religious right, whatever the cost. Pay attention to both, and you're left to wonder if there's anything at all at his core." The editorial added that when running for the U.S. Senate in 1994, Romney said he would be a stronger advocate of gay rights than his opponent, Sen. Ted Kennedy. Now, it continued, he emphasizes his opposition to gay marriage and adoption. He formerly said he wanted to make contraception more available and yet he vetoed a bill to sell it over-the-counter.

The old Romney assured voters he was pro-choice on abortion. "You will not see me wavering on that," he said in 1994, citing the tragedy of a relative's botched illegal abortion as his reason to favor keeping abortions safe and legal. These days, he routinely describes himself as pro-life.

Reaction to the editorial has been strong, and mixed, Pride said. One national commentator criticized the Monitor, saying publishing an anti-endorsement is not the proper role of a newspaper. But many readers have applauded it.

"They've been very supportive," Pride said.

Al Hutchison, a former Tribune editor who spent a large part of his career in New England, lives in retirement in Inverness.

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