Salon: The birthday Mitt Romney wants you to forget (Massachusetts healthcare reform, 4/12/06)

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Monday, Apr 11, 2011 20:30 ET
War Room
The birthday Mitt Romney wants you to forget
By Steve Kornacki

http://www.salon.com/news/mitt_romney/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2011/04/11/romney_healthcare_massachusetts



Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney signs a healthcare reform bill for Massachusetts at Faneuil Hall in Boston April 12, 2006. Sen. Edward Kennedy (second from right) looks on.

When he signed Massachusetts' universal healthcare law five years ago on Tuesday, Mitt Romney professed to be unconcerned with the potential political implications.

"I have no way of knowing whether it's going to be a help or hindrance down the road," he declared.

This was, of course, total malarkey. From almost exactly the moment the 2004 elections -- in which he'd invested massive time, energy and money in an effort to revive his state's Republican Party and create a more cooperative legislature -- ended in a sweeping defeat for his team, Romney had all but abandoned his day job as governor and dedicated himself to pursuing the 2008 GOP presidential nomination. He was done playing to Bay State voters; it was time to move to the right and to posture for the GOP's national electorate.

You'd never know it today, but the healthcare law -- the one exception to Romney's post-'04 gubernatorial disengagement -- was part of this strategy. The April 12, 2006, signing ceremony at Faneuil Hall was designed to be his national coming out. Here was Romney's moment to lay claim to a Big Achievement that would make him worthy of representing his party on the national stage -- the application of conservative principles to address an enormous social problem.

[Blue_Tires]

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