Mitt Romney, man of mystery

As Massachusetts governor, Mitt Romney introduced universal health care with an individual mandate. The program was successful. But he's been running away from it ever since to placate the Republican right in his bid for the presidency.

Time's Joe Klein sums it up nicely:

"Romney remains a mystery to me: He's smart, he was a good governor, he's essentially a responsible moderate-conservative...but he has made an utter fool of himself flip-flopping and fudging--and taking wildly stupid positions (against the START treaty, for example) on issues about which he knows little or nothing. It almost seems a personality disorder. In this case, his efforts to distance himself from his own, essentially successful program, are particularly pathetic. If the man had the tiniest smidgeon of courage, he would make a conservative argument in favor of universal health care ... But no. Instead we get the embarrassing spectacle of an intelligent man acting like a semi-coherent jerk."