Romney, flip flopper or "severe conservative"?

President Clinton is urging the Obama campaign to label Romney a "severe conservative," as Romney recently described himself, rather than focusing as much on the flip-flopper label.  The thought is that Romney is going to redefine himself to the middle for the general election, and this preempts him from doing that.

I've always been concerned that Romney's flip-flop nature would help him in the general election.  I've heard more than one Democrat or Independent say that Romney wouldn't be that bad a President since we all know he's "really" a liberal who's just pretending to be a conservative.  The thing is, how do we know that Romney wasn't simply pretending to be a liberal all those years he was in Massachusetts?  After all, what better beard for someone who wants to rise in Massachusetts politics?

And ultimately, that's the great danger of a Romney presidency.  It's not entirely clear whether he'd govern as a liberal Democrat or a "severe conservative," as he oddly, and comically, put it.  And while President Obama hasn't always been as wedded to his convictions as we'd like, Romney makes Obama look downright mono-maniacal.


More here.