When Mitt Romney spoke yesterday to the GOP in New Hampshire he began by addressing one of the stumbling blocks to his dubious conservative credentials: health care, in particular the Massachusetts law he signed in 2006 and which closely resembles the new federal law.
The way he tried to drive his 2012 campaign bus around this pothole was to say that Massachusetts "was a unique situation" and he didn't think his program could be applied elsewhere. He added that if nominated and elected he would dump "Obamacare." The speech was more slippery than slick, much like the roads in New Hampshire on Sunday.
I was born in Massachusetts and now have two daughters living there. As a state it is generally liberal, but is more sensible than liberal in its politics. I would also say it is a civilized state in that it is cultured, well organized, and has strong traditions going back to America's founding.
One of its early citizens, Ralph Waldo Emerson, was one of our founding thinkers and in one of his more obscure essays, he asked, "Why cannot the best civilization be extended over the whole country?" He acknowledged that much of the country at the time of his question (1862) was uncivilized, at least the part gradually losing its grip on slavery.
America is at a critical point in the effort to continue the progress towards becoming civilized, and the issue of health care for all our citizens happens to be the road we are traveling. Needless to say, Mitt Romney did not dare to use the word civilized to describe his health care plan, but the fact is that is exactly what it is and what it was when he signed it into law at a glamorous ceremony in historic Faneuil Hall in Boston.
Faneuil Hall is known as "The Cradle of Liberty," where Sam Adams rallied the citizens of Massachusetts to resist British rule and where great issues of the day have been debated, including slavery. Romney knew full well that by choosing to sign his health care law in that setting he was adding to the tradition of a civilized culture with ideals of justice and fairness. That he wants now to deny that historic fact and side with what Emerson called "the less civilized portion that menaces the existence of our country" must trouble his sleep, or at least it should.
President Obama may lose the 2012 election because of his effort to bring uniform and civilized health care to America, and he knew full well that might be the case when he undertook the task. This election cycle will be centered on that issue and as a country we will be measured by just how civilized we have the strength and courage to be.