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A MAN IS MORE THAN HIS BIO LINE. I think Karen Tumulty gets this exactly right:
That same USA Today story had a poll in which 24% of those surveyed said they wouldn't vote for a Mormon. By comparison, only 11% felt that way about a woman candidate and 5% about a black. That's the bad news for Romney. The good news is that descriptions of his top two opponents in the Republican primary got even greater resistance: 42% wouldn't vote for a 72-year-old candidate and 30% wouldn't vote for one who was married three times. Romney argues--and he's right I think--that these kinds of descriptions don't mean much in polls unless there are real people attached to them. He says, for instance, that most Republicans in 1980 probably would have told a pollster they wouldn't vote for a divorced actor.I'm 100% certain that when New Hampshire residents enter their polling boths a bit under a year from now, there will be no ballot choice marked "A Mormon." Instead, there'll be this guy Mitt Romney, and folks will have to decide whether they like him. The obsession with biography is a fairly pernicious one for political handicappers. I remember the polls in 2003 that read out candidate histories and tried to prove that Wesley Clark was by far the strongest entrant in the Democratic field. In the polls, that turned out to be true. In the election, not so much. Now, Multiple Choice Mitt will have some 'splaining to do about actual positions, such as the ones he articulates below. But I think the Mormon issue will be much more marginal than most are predicting.--Ezra Klein
