Obama Diagnoses Romney: He’s Suffering From ‘Romnesia’

By Igor Volsky/Think Progress

President Obama unveiled a new line of attack against Mitt Romney during a campaign stop at George Mason University Friday, arguing that the GOP presidential candidate — who has changed his views on key policy issues — suffers from Romnesia, a condition that causes one to forget their past statements and beliefs.

“[H]e’s changing up so much – backtracking and sidestepping. We’ve gotta name this condition that he’s going through, I think it’s called ‘Romnesia,’” Obama announced, referring to Romney’s efforts to abandon the positions he held in the Republican primary in order to appeal to more moderate voters during the general election:

OBAMA: Now, I’m not a medical doctor but I do want to go over some of the symptoms with you because I want to make sure nobody else catches it.

If you say you’re for equal pay for equal work, but you keep refusing to say whether or not you’d sign a bill that protects equal pay for equal work – you might have Romnesia. If you say women should have access to contraceptive care, but you support legislation that would let your employer deny you contraceptive care – you might have a case of Romnesia. If you say you’ll protect a woman’s right to choose, but you stand up at a primary debate and said that you’d be “delighted” to sign a law outlawing that right to choose in all cases – man, you’ve definitely got Romnesia. [...]

And if you come down with a case of Romnesia, and you can’t seem to remember the policies that are still on your website, or the promises you’ve made over the six years you’ve been running for President, here’s the good news: Obamacare covers pre-existing conditions.

We can fix you up. We’ve got a cure. We can make you well, Virginia. This is a curable disease.

Watch it:

Romney embraced suddenly centrist positions in the days leading up to the presidential debates. For instance, he told the Des Moines Register’s editorial board that “There’s no legislation with regards to abortion that I’m familiar with that would become part of my agenda” — despite calling for measures that would defund Planned Parenthood — falsely insisted that his 20 percent-across-the-board tax cut plan was “not going to provide a tax break to high-income taxpayers,” and threw out his “self deportation” rhetoric in favor of an immigration policy that would allow young undocumented immigrations who benefited from Obama’s deferred action program, to stay in the country.

As one Romney surrogate explained after the first presidential debate, “[T]he Republican, the conservative candidate in the primary, is always going to lean right and come back to the centerfor the general, the opposite for the Democrat.” “We strong conservatives understand that. There are a lot of undecideds in this country…we want those votes too. So, this is campaign strategy.”