Mitt Romney has never made a secret of the fact that he’s not a huge fan of Donald Trump. Even when they attempted to play nice following Trump’s 2016 election win, Romney’s heart never really seemed into it—and his face sort of gave him away.
In a new op-ed for The Atlantic, the Utah senator and one-time presidential candidate made it very clear that he’s afraid to witness what might happen to our country if Trump does decide to make another run at the Oval Office (as he’s been relentlessly teasing and hinting).
The way Romney sees it, “More and more, we are a nation in denial.”
Romney writes that such vital topics as climate change, inflation, global warming, immigration, and—perhaps most importantly—the January 6th insurrection are being ignored by many voters who see them as political minefields as opposed to the potentially catastrophic issues they really are.
As Romney writes:
What accounts for the blithe dismissal of potentially cataclysmic threats? The left thinks the right is at fault for ignoring climate change and the attacks on our political system. The right thinks the left is the problem for ignoring illegal immigration and the national debt. But wishful thinking happens across the political spectrum. More and more, we are a nation in denial.
“Wishful thinking” is one way to describe it; self-delusion may be another. For Romney, the one way to wake the country up so that we can all finally see that we’re tumbling quickly into turmoil—and unite together to prevent—is via a crisis on the scale of Pearl Harbor or 9/11. “A crisis can shake the public consciousness,” Romney writes, “But a crisis may come too late for a course correction that can prevent tragedy. The only cure for wishful thinking is leadership.” Unfortunately, he doesn’t see Biden as that leader, and believes that Trump: Round 2 would surely spell disaster:
President Joe Biden is a genuinely good man, but he has yet been unable to break through our national malady of denial, deceit, and distrust. A return of Donald Trump would feed the sickness, probably rendering it incurable. Congress is particularly disappointing: Our elected officials put a finger in the wind more frequently than they show backbone against it. Too often, Washington demonstrates the maxim that for evil to thrive only requires good men to do nothing.
Without naming names, Romney believes there are several people who are up to the task. Now we just have to wait and see if they realize it and will be compelled to run for the highest office in the land. “While we wait,” Romney says, “leadership must come from fathers and mothers, teachers and nurses, priests and rabbis, businessmen and businesswomen, journalists and pundits.”
(Via The Atlantic)