Not a moderate, at all

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To the Editor:

Regarding your recommendations [Election 2012: Recommendations to Voters, October 31] per the November 6 election. By the time this letter is published we will know who won the election. I am confident that the winner will be the president. In all cases, however, I would like to comment on the endorsement of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan.

Regardless of the editor’s opinions of the president and his leadership (or the editor’s opinions professing a lack thereof), it is astonishing how uninformed his assessment of the Republican ticket came to be. In conclusion, they describe Mitt Romney as, “a dependable moderate, a pragmatist, and a grownup, whose first order of business … will be to cut through the hopeless partisan snarl in Washington.”

I have to ask — in addition to pointing out that “dependable”, “pragmatic”, and “grownup” describe the president to a T — what is moderate about Mitt Romney’s positions on abortion, gun control, environmental regulations, financial regulations, national defense, immigration reform, health care reform, his choice of Paul Ryan as a running mate, and many of the other choices Mitt Romney chose? To describe Mitt Romney as a moderate, or a pragmatist, displays a startlingly lack of fluency with his committed positions as they are in reality.

Regardless of who has won, I hope the editor comes to realize that however well-intentioned and honest his endorsement was, his grasp of widely publicized policy positions, easily discovered on the tickets’ own websites and splashed all over America every day in the news, on the radio and TV, and across dinner tables and coffee shops in America was unfortunate and utterly confused.

Should your paper actually discuss prospective policy in future endorsements, it is hoped that the paper contrasts the stated positions of the candidates and forms a conclusion readers may consider rather than make gross mischaracterizations based on perception.

Dean Rosenthal

Edgartown