A useful description of the job ahead of him and the problems it poses:
Romney, after all, managed to secure the nomination only by
strenuously avoiding friction with the base. On every major issue, he
aligned himself with the party’s Obama-era orthodoxy, and when he
attacked his GOP opponents, he made sure to do it from their right.
This, of course, was in response to conservatives’ built-in suspicions
about whether he really is one of them. So far, he’s given them what
they want, at least in terms of policy positions. But they’re watching him closely,
looking to see if he sells them out to appeal to the middle of the
electorate against Obama – and ready to raise hell if he does.
This is producing some awkwardness already, like when Romney said
that he wouldn’t go out of his way to get rid of the Lilly Ledbetter
Fair Pay Act (what general election voters like to hear) but refused to
say whether he would have signed it as president (thus avoiding a
position that would put him directly at odds with the base). The overall
effect was to reinforce the image of Romney as spineless. Expect to see
more of this straddling in the months ahead. Romney faces more pressure
than previous GOP nominees to keep his party’s base happy, but he also
seems to recognize that fully embracing its agenda will be suicide in
the fall.
