Earlier this week, I referred to Mitt Romney as "Emperor Romney" in a post...
...and an interview he gave with Bret Baier on Tuesday made me think that this nickname might actually be pretty appropriate:
Bret Baier Interview with Mitt Romney 11/29/11
As you can see, during the interview, Romney bristles and is visibly agitated at some of Baier's questions, and apparently he complained to Baier afterwards:
As you can see, during the interview, Romney bristles and is visibly agitated at some of Baier's questions, and apparently he complained to Baier afterwards:
POLITICO | Maggie Haberman | Bret Baier: Mitt Romney called questions 'uncalled for'
...Baier, who has generally gotten kudos during the cycle for his approach to the GOP candidates in interviews and at a Fox News debate he took part in moderating, said that Romney had made clear after the interview he wasn't pleased with some of the questions.
"I think Gov. Romney didn't like the way the interview went," Baier said, adding that Romney told him he thought it was "overly aggressive" at points during their "walk-and-talk" after the interview, and that Romney emerged from his holding area to stress the point later.
Baier said Romney told him some of the questions were "uncalled for."
Here's Baier talking about the interview, and Romney's reaction, on O'Reilly Factor last night:
Memo to Emperor Romney: it's an election, not a coronation, and the peasants want answers about your positions on the important issues. Whether you want to admit it or not, you have flip-flopped more than once, people have legitimate concerns about Romneycare and if you want votes from us little peons, you are going to have to answer questions about some of this stuff.
More from Erick Erickson:
...If you haven’t seen the Bret Baier interview with Mitt Romney it is now abundantly apparent why Mitt Romney will not sit in the middle chair and take tough questions from the roundtable — his skin is as thin as Barack Obama’s.
...And suddenly Mitt Romney thinks it is uncalled for to ask him why he has changed his position on so many issues so often around the time he begins a quest for a different political office?! If reasonable questions from a Fox News reporter are “uncalled for” and “unusual,” there may not be big boy pants big enough to hold Mitt Romney and his tears once the mainstream media starts asking him the questions he has so far done his level best to avoid.
I think what we are seeing is that Mitt Romney did not truly get vetted in 2008. Remember, Giuliani was in first place and the media fixated him until he started to collapse. Then McCain and Romney both started rising and the media was so orgasmic over McCain as the comeback kid they ignored Romney until just as they were turning their gaze to Romney a guy named Huckabee took off like a rocket. It became all Huckabee all the time.
From Allahpundit at Hot Air:
...[I]f there’s any criticism to be made of Baier’s questioning, I think that’s it — not that the questions were “uncalled for” but that they were a little too called for because they cut right to the heart of conservatives’ concerns about Romney. He’s been asked this stuff a thousand times on the trail. But the repetition is inevitable and even necessary when he’s stuck at 25 percent in the polls with Iowa 34 days away. There’s a reason for that, and Baier’s giving him a chance to address it. Another example:
BAIER: Like the “Union Leader,” your critics charge that you make decisions based on political expediency and not core conviction. You have been on the both sides of some issues, and there’s videotape of you going back years, speaking about different issues, climate change, abortion, immigration, gay rights.How can voters trust what they hear from you today is what you will believe if you win the White House?
That’s a perfect distillation of the right’s objection to Romney. How is he not supposed to ask about it? How is Romney not expecting it? What was he expecting from this interview?
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