In the world of politics, being branded a brazen flip-flopper can be a death sentence. (See: Kerry, John.) Since Mitt Romney's recent emergence as a more moderate candidate — as opposed to the "severely conservative" posture he adopted for the GOP primaries — President Obama has been hammering him for being two-faced. And the Obama campaign received fresh ammunition today when a prominent Romney surrogate, former Sen. Norm Coleman of Minnesota, told a group of voters in the all-important swing state of Ohio that Roe v. Wade would not be overturned under a Romney administration. (Romney has previously said he would like to see the landmark decision reversed.) However, David Brooks at The New York Times says Romney's slipperiness on the issues may be precisely what a hyper-partisan Congress needs. Would Romney's flip-flopping make him a better president?
Yes. Flip-flopping leads to bipartisanship: Obama's second-term agenda would be instantly stalled by Republican House members who "still have more to fear from a primary challenge from the right," says Brooks. Romney, likely facing a Democratic Senate, would retain "the core lesson of this campaign: Conservatism loses; moderation wins." Romney's "shape-shifting nature would induce him to govern as a center-right moderate," and conservative members of the GOP would go along because "they wouldn't want to destroy a Republican president." As a result, if Romney wins, the country is "more likely to get bipartisan reform."
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