Charlie Gibson: Governor Romney’s system has mandates in Massachusetts, although you backed away from mandates on a national basis.
Mitt Romney: No, no, I like mandates. The mandates work.
As Bill Kristol points out, the problem is that Romney still believes this to be true. Is a Republican managerial progressive better than a Democractic managerial progressive? Bill answers that what we really need right now doesn't come from either of those two options:
Indeed, what Republican primary voters sense is that a technocratic and managerial mindset could prove an obstacle to coming to grips with the situation we face. If the problem is a liberty-encroaching unlimited government, we don’t need that government to run more efficiently. If the problem is a suffocating nanny state, we don’t need better organization of the nannies. If we have an opportunity to revitalize citizenship, we need leaders who view us not as clients to be managed or consumers to be served, but as self-governing citizens who would fare better without an overbearing and overweening government. If we are sick of being managed by liberal technocrats, we’re not going to be thrilled merely to replace their rule with that of moderately conservative technocrats.
Mitt Romney likes mandates. Conservatives—especially in light of Obamacare—don’t. Conservatives like liberty.
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