Mitt Romney
I'm a very happy guy. Life has been very, very kind to me. I'm a man of faith and family and have amassed a great fortune, too. And now I have an opportunity to be something I'm not sure I ever thought I could be: president of the United States. I really do look like an American president: I have great hair and the kind of background -- governor, businessman, civic-minded philanthropist -- that has propelled others into the White House.
I know I wasn't the first, second, third, fourth, or fifth choice of my party, but they'll get over it. And I know I can seem a bit awkward, stiff, and tone deaf on the campaign trail. But I'm getting better at it. And I have two things going for me: The economy sucks now, and it will continue to suck in November.
Whether or not I have a vision and a plan to get the country moving again is another matter. But I'm honest enough with myself (privately) to wonder. The party I represent really is out of control. Like the president, I'm also a balancer, not an ideologue; I really do know that to fix the economy and our other slow bleeds requires both serious spending cuts and tax increases. I may have worked at the upper reaches of high finance and the private-equity world, but I'm smart enough to know that. I also know that I'll need help from the Democrats and a different way of operating across the aisle. My real problem is that I don't know whether I have the courage and the will to defy my own party, which frankly has lost its soul and its mind. My campaign rhetoric, commitments, and promises are going to put me further behind the eight ball. But then again; I'm really not all that worried. Even if I don't win in November, I'm still going to be a very happy guy with a wonderful wife and great kids. I'll still have my faith and a lot of money, too.
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