Mitt Romney today addressed the NAACP and drew almost 20 seconds of boos when he promised to repeal Obamacare. “I’m going to eliminate every non-essential, expensive program I can find, that includes Obamacare, and I’m going to work to reform and save,” Romney said, before the boos began. 18 seconds later he interrupted them, going off-script, claiming that Obamacare repeal will create jobs. Which, of course, is ludicrous, as most of Obamacare, aka the Affordable Care Act, has yet to be implemented, and unemployment was a problem before Obama.
“You know, there was a survey of the Chamber of Commerce — they carried out a survey of their members, about 1,500 surveyed, and they asked them what effect Obamacare would have on their plans, and three-quarters of them said it made them less likely to hire people,” Romney told the audience to stop them from booing. “So I say, again, that if our priority is jobs, and that’s my priority, that’s something I’d change and replace.”
Romney them went on to describe many aspects of Obamacare he said he would implement after he repeals Obamacare.
Steve Benen at MaddowBlog notes:
I’ve been following NAACP conventions for quite a while now, and I can’t recall ever hearing such a lengthy, sustained booing. (The rest of the speech received polite applause, but the booing was obviously the most notable development of the morning.)
The wonk in me feels compelled to mention that Romney’s argument wasn’t even coherent on its face — he said he wants to kill the Affordable Care Act to reduce the deficit, which is absurd since killing the Affordable Care Act would increase the deficit.
But I think it’s probably safe to say that’s not why Romney was booed. In fact, this was entirely predictable — the far-right Republican presidential candidate spoke to the NAACP and effectively proclaimed, “Vote for me and I’ll make sure 7 million African Americans lose their health insurance.”
What kind of campaign pitch is that? For crying out loud, of course Romney got booed. At the risk of being overly cynical, I can’t help but wonder if Romney did this on purpose precisely sohe would be booed.
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