He picked the fight on contraception himself when he ripped President Obama’s plan to require employers, including Catholic institutions, to offer coverage for contraception in health insurance plans. Apparently, it had slipped his mind that he did something comparable in 2005, when he was governor.
As for abortion, his evolving position - from favoring abortion rights, to straddling the fence, to staunchly antiabortion - has had people scratching their heads for years. Now it has burst into national view, as he tries to fend off the challenge of Rick Santorum, a darling of the antiabortion movement.
It’s easy to recall the Mitt Romney of the 1994 US Senate campaign, the one who fervently declared his belief in the right to choose. He spoke back then of a never-named relative who had had an abortion, and of his mother’s principled defense of abortion, when she unsuccessfully ran for US Senate in 1970.
But he changed his mind years ago. By the time he left the governor’s office, he was denying that he had ever been for abortion rights, and he insists that his will be a “prolife presidency.’’
Even messier is his evolution on contraception. As governor, Romney vetoed a measure that would have required hospitals, including Catholic ones, to offer emergency contraception, then later said the believed in his “hearts of hearts’’ that rape victims should have access to such a pill if they wanted it. He is paying the price now for that unscripted moment of sincerity. Both Santorum and Newt Gingrich have attacked him for supporting a policy they view as being akin to abortion.
Romney has to be frustrated that his longstanding effort to manage this issue is faltering so badly. After all, he began his high-profile march to the right on these issues years ago. But no matter how far right he runs, his opponents declare that he hasn’t gone far enough.
He shouldn’t be surprised. One consequence of spending six years seeking the presidency is that every statement has been resurrected, every decision placed under the microscope. Burying the past is impossible. Not that Romney doesn’t keep trying.
