Captain's Quarters -

Ruth Marcus takes a spin at the flip-flop of a Massachussetts politician on an important national issue. No, it's not John Kerry, but Mitt Romney, and she sets the stage by recalling an interview Romney did with Washington Post reporters two years previously:

Precisely two years ago, Mitt Romney, then the governor of Massachusetts but already eyeing a 2008 presidential bid, sat in the coffee shop of a Washington hotel, doing his best not to explain his views on abortion.

Romney was speaking to a few of us from The Post, and my colleague Dan Balz noted the similarity between Romney's expressed views on abortion rights and the stance of another Massachusetts politician, Sen. John F. Kerry: Both men said they were personally opposed to abortion but did not support making it illegal.

From there, Romney proceeded to expound one of the odder positions I've heard in years of listening to politicians talk about a subject most would prefer to avoid: "I can tell you what my position is, and it's in a very narrowly defined sphere, as candidate for governor and as governor of Massachusetts," he said. "What I said to people was that I personally did not favor abortion, that I am personally pro-life. However, as governor I would not change the laws of the commonwealth relating to abortion.

"Now I don't try and put a bow around that and say what does that mean you are -- does that mean you're pro-life or pro-choice, because that whole package -- meaning I'm personally pro-life but I won't change the laws, you could describe that as -- well, I don't think you can describe it in one hyphenated word."

Well, he's describing it in one hyphenated word these days: pro-life. Conservatives have questioned his commitment to this position for all the same reasons Marcus does in this article. When running for political office in the 1990s and as late as 2002 when he won election as Governor of Massachussetts, Romney positioned himself as a de facto pro-choice candidate. At times he did so explicitly, promising never to change access to abortions once in office.

Romney now says he was in the middle of a transition on abortion in 2005. He came to believe that life begins at conception and that abortion was wrong except in cases of rape, incest, and when the mother's life is in physical danger. That aligns nicely with the mainstream of the pro-life movement, perhaps a bit too nicely for the conservatives who vote in the primary. They have a sensitivity to people who evolve on this issue, especially when they evolve at the precise moment for maximum political benefit.

Marcus makes this point rather well, and includes Romney's shift on gays in the military and his odd explanation for his Tsongas vote in 1992. However, it seems a little odd that conservatives would take Ruth Marcus' advice on the authenticity of pro-life sentiments among the candidates. She sounds a bit like a woman scorned in this column, and I wonder if she would be anywhere this cynical had the evolution of Mitt Romney been reversed. If Romney had been pro-life as a governor of Utah and then decided to run as a pro-choice Republican for the presidency, would she be hailing his progress as a liberated candidate -- or would she be scolding him for his inconsistency?

Inconsistency has to be considered in evaluating the candidates as the primary season progresses through 2007, but we have to be careful not to create a purity standard that none can meet. One of the purposes of the pro-life conservatives in engaging the political process is to win converts, just as it is with any political movement. It seems more than passingly strange to pursue conversions and then to persecute the converted -- and that seems to be what a few conservatives have done with Romney. If all that conservatives value is consistency, then let me introduce you to President Rudy Giuliani -- or President Dennis Kucinich.

This is one of the reasons that Newt Gingrich called the extended primary race this cycle an "absurdity". Mitt has been in the race for a little over a month, and we're already chewing over all the inconsistencies in his record. We don't need a full year of this to understand Mitt Romney or any of the candidates. Instead, these early commitments will do nothing but allow both parties to rip all of their most viable candidates to shreds as their supporters do their best to kneecap their opponents. In the end, both major-party nominees will come to the general election as damaged as any candidates have been in long memory.