Mitt Romney, Panderbunny

Romney '08 is gearing up, as he remakes himself from a sexy liberal Republican to a sexy hard-core evangelical conservative. He's obviously given up on running for governor in '06. It's our job now to make sure to kill his political career now. He's going to spend the rest of his time in office denigrating and besmirching the reputation of Massachusetts for political points.

The Globe reports on the two latest developments. First, his campaign committee is sending out an intro-to-Mitt letter to GOP honchos showing off his newly packaged right-wing zealotry:

The letter offers carefully worded descriptions of some of Romney's positions to play up his conservatism. For example, it highlights his opposition to the ''human cloning" provision of the stem cell bill the Legislature recently approved, without noting that Romney himself supports research on surplus embryos from fertility clinics, which antiabortion groups oppose.
''Over the objections of Harvard University, Senator Ted Kennedy, and the Democrats in the Massachusetts Legislature, Governor Romney announced that he would veto any stem cell research legislation that authorizes human cloning," the letter states. The Legislature overturned Romney's veto, approving a law that bans reproductive cloning, or the creation of babies, but allows scientists to produce embryos for research.
The letter says Romney is pushing the Legislature to adopt tougher welfare rules, without saying that Massachusetts probably will be forced to make some changes once its federal waiver expires in October. It also cites Romney's support for an income tax cut, charter schools, the death penalty, and sex education that emphasizes abstinence.

Second, Romney dropped his support for the Travaligni compromise against same-sex marriage but for civil unions, jumping on the right-wing Massachusetts Family Institute all civil-rights-for-gays-is-wrong bandwagon:

Governor Mitt Romney yesterday endorsed a grass-roots effort to pass a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage in Massachusetts in 2008, abandoning his support for what he called a ''muddied" compromise measure that would also ban gay marriages but allow gays to enter into civil unions.

Romney, who is courting conservative voters for a possible presidential run in 2008, said the newly proposed ban would give voters a chance to consider a ''clean, straightforward, unambiguous amendment" that does not include civil unions.
''I'm concerned that the amendment currently under consideration by the Legislature is somewhat confused or muddied by the combination of two things: One is the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman, which I support, and the other is the requirement that there be civil unions in the Commonwealth, which is a provision I do not support," Romney told reporters after a group of same-sex marriage opponents unveiled the new proposed amendment in a separate press conference.