The American Family Association's Bryan Fischer, who spearheaded the charge to oust openly-gay adviser Richard Grenell from the Romney campaign, has an important question for Mitt Romney.
The question is -- if you can't stand up to me, how are you going to stand up to the Russians, the Chinese, the North Koreans?
Fischer: Let me ask you this question, people have raised this question, if Mitt Romney can be pushed around, intimidated, coerced, coopted by a conservative radio talk show host in Middle America, then how is he going to stand up to the Chinese? How is he going to stand up to Putin? How is he going to stand up to North Korea if he can be pushed around by a yokel like me? I don’t think Romney is realizing the doubts that this begins to raise about his leadership. I don’t think for one minute that Mitt Romney did not want this guy gone; he wanted this guy gone because there was not one word of defense, not a peep, from the Romney camp to defend him. They just went absolutely stone cold silent, they put a bag over Grenell’s head, they even asked him to organize this phone conference and they didn’t even let him speak at the conference that he organized.
If you read this very carefully, you may get the impression that this was Fischer's intent all along. To challenge Romney on an issue he knew he would win, and then mock him for it.
His motives are anyone's guess, but I think it would be naive to assume this has nothing to do with Romney's Mormon faith. Lunatic fundamentalists such as Fischer do not believe Mormons are "real" Christians, and it's possible, while not publicly admissible, that he would rather see President Obama serve four more years than a Mormon become president.
The almost jubilant recognition that Romney is a weak politician casts doubt on the sincerity of the outrage over Grenell, as if that was just a sideshow.