“You can’t hide from the truth because the truth is all there is” – Moloko

An anti-Romney ad produced by the Obama SuperPac, Priorities USA has caused unintended turmoil in the Romney camp. The video, criticized by some as being “vicious,” profiles a victim of Romney/Bain layoffs who lost his family’s health insurance. His wife became ill and without insurance, didn’t tell her family for fear of the costs. By the time they had diagnosed her cancer, it had already progressed to stage four. She died within 22 days.

Here’s the video:

Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul addressed the ad in a way that makes conservatives wish she’d just kept her mouth shut. She said that if the laid-off steelworker lived in Massachusetts and had Romneycare, he would have had health care.

SAUL: To that point, you know, if people had been in Massachusetts under Governor Romney’s health care plan, they would have had health care. There are a lot of people losing their jobs and their health care in President Obama’s economy.

Here’s the video:

If this were a normal election year, touting a candidate’s accomplishments would be considered a good thing, but this is not a normal election year. We are in Bizarro election. From the GOP side, this election is not about accomplishments. It’s not about credentials. It’s simply about being the opposite of the sitting President of the United States. If Obama were to claim the that the sky was blue, the Romney camp would be forced to argue that it’s yellow. Romneycare, Romney’s number one achievement in an otherwise dubious single term as Governor of Massachusetts, is far too close to Obama’s signature piece of legislation, the Affordable Care Act, which was actually based on Romney’s plan. Until Wednesday, any mere mention of Romneycare was off-limits in conservative punditry, and that’s where Saul screwed up. She went off message. She told the truth and this year, the truth, whether it be about job creation, tax policy, Romney’s pro-choice history or Romneycare, is off-limits.

In just 18 words, Saul has forced the GOP punditry to address Romneycare, and this, in the opinions of some, could cost them the election. Ann Coulter called for her firing. Rush Limbaugh was even more gloomy and doomy, saying, “”That’s a potential gold mine for the Obamaites, because they can say, ‘Well, yeah, and Romneycare’s the foundation for our plan, Obamacare,’ which they are already out there saying.”

Here are the videos:

If the Romney campaign’s single strategy is to back peddle from its candidate’s past and from the truth, they have far bigger problems than 18 words uttered by a spokeswoman.

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