Well, hey, he’ll likely drop that in the general!

Mitt Romney as you know is a native of Michigan. Another of that state’s native sons was the late, great Russell Kirk, author of the seminal book The Conservative Mind. One of Dr. Kirk’s principal themes involved the essential difference between principle and ideology. Conservatism as Dr. Kirk regarded it required the former and abhorred the latter.

It is impossible to imagine that any serious Republican would label Mr. Romney an ideologue. The man believes in praxis: what works, is. But does he in fact lack principle? Is he really a pure utilitarian? The answer to this question depends on what one means by the verb “to work” in “what works, is.” The original utilitarian John Stuart Mill, if I am not mistaken, defined what “worked” in vaguely amoral terms: his metric was ill-defined. Mr. Romney’s metric is hardly ill-defined. Yes, it is true: there remain legitimate doubts about Mr. Romney and abortion; about Mr. Romney and the Second Amendment; about Mr. Romney and the homosexual lobby—but on all three counts the doubts lie in Mr. Romney’s practice. Does anyone really doubt Mr. Romney’s deep and abiding commitment to the health of the traditional American family? Does anyone doubt his commitment to a strong defense or to a strong national economy? To you and me, abortion and homosexuality are about the family; but to Mr. Romney in Massachusetts in 1994 and 2002, abortion was a decided issue, a dead letter, which he could not do anything to change even if he wanted to. Homosexuality seemed a human-rights issue: we’re not going to have the sheriff send deputies to arrest you because you’re cohabitating with someone of the same sex (yes, I know that that is not really the issue any longer, but 1994 was closer to the time when that actually was this issue). To be effective as senator, governor or anything else, one must choose one’s battles. Mr. Romney chose battles he thought he might win. Though his choice of battles at the time might have been flawed in retrospect, he did not have the benefit of retrospect at the time. To choose battles wisely is a critical leadership trait, not a character flaw.

Regarding Mr. Romney and the Second Amendment, it seems to me that he just does not quite get it—ironic, since the gun culture runs pretty deep in Utah, but he’s from Michigan after all. You know, he’s wrong on guns, but then so are most Americans today to one degree or another (we as a nation have forgotten the very good, deeply historically rooted reasons our Founders demanded a heavily armed citizenry—where laws in some states prevent one from bearing arms in church, leaving the assembled congregation unnecessarily defenseless, we have badly lost our way—and Mr. Romney is no exception to this unfortunate trend). At least Mr. Romney is listening. The right to bear arms is not a core principle to him. If he “flip-flops” on it, this is just a disparaging way of acknowledging that he has listened, learned, and adapted his position, from a position palatable to Massachusetts to a more robust position acceptable to middle America. But his changes of position are too convenient, you say? Well, maybe; but a candidate who really tries to listen to the voters whose vote he wants is perforce going to have “convenient” changes of position. To offer the voters what they seem to want is sometimes a good thing not a bad. It becomes a bad thing when a candidate compromises his core principles, or when he lacks core principles. I do not think that either is true of Mr. Romney.

What I think interesting is that, when Mr. Romney asks us to judge him not by what he said in 1994 or 2002 but rather by what he actually did as governor, some of us ignore the request. Why do we do this? If he requested the opposite, that we judge him not by what he did but by what he said, then we would laugh him right off the platform. Though Mr. Romney’s words do change to suit the audience, one finds remarkably little inconsistency in Mr. Romney’s actions in any of the phases of his life, going all the way back to high school. The fact is, we know what kind of president he would be, because we know what kind of governor he was, and what kind of leader, businessman and father he was before that. Rhetoric aside, Mr. Romney’s record stacks up pretty well.

This comment is long enough, so I’ll leave it here, though clearly much more could be written. This comment is also very rebuttable, as I am aware. An enthusiastic Romney supporter, I do not wish to conceal my preferred candidate’s imperfections, which are substantial. But I do feel that Mr. Romney is one of the best candidates for the presidency the U.S. has seen in a long time, all things considered. All candidates speak of taming the federal budget, but if Mr. Romney cannot do it, then it cannot be done. Principle and praxis, sans ideology, are a powerful combination. They are the combination Mr. Romney brings.

Thanks for the platform. By the way, I think your preferred candidate Ron Paul excellent. His sole flaw I think is pretty obvious, has been repeatedly discussed and does not need review by me here. However, Duncan Hunter (not the topic of this article) gets my vote when the primaries reach my state; and if he’s out of the race at that time, then my vote goes to Mitt Romney, with relish.