Dear Commons Community,

On the eve of the first presidential debate tomorrow night, New York Times‘ columnist, David Brooks, provides advice to Mitt Romney to salvage his candidacy.   Here is an excerpt of what Brooks thinks Romney should say:

“I’m a nonideological guy running in an ideological age, and I’ve been pretending to be more of an ideologue than I really am. I’m a sophisticated guy running in a populist moment. I’ve ended up dumbing myself down.

It hasn’t even worked. I’m behind. So I’ve decided to run the last month of this campaign as myself.

The next president is going to face some wicked problems. The first is the “fiscal cliff.” The next president is going to have to forge a grand compromise on the budget. President Obama has tried and failed to do this over the past four years. There’s no reason to think he’d do any better over the next four.

He’s failed, first, because he’s just not a very good negotiator. Obama spent the last campaign promising to be postpartisan and then in his first weeks in office, in the fullness of his victory, he shut down all cooperation with Republicans and killed any hope of bipartisan cooperation….

The second reason there’s been no budget compromise is that Republicans have been too rigid, refusing to put revenue on the table. I’ve been part of the problem. But, globally, the nations that successfully trim debt have raised $1 in new revenue for every $3 in spending cuts. I will bring Republicans around to that position. There’s no way President Obama can do that.”

Brooks provides excellent advice to Romney but it will not be enough to turn the tide against President Obama.  Too little too late!

Tony