Since losing the election, Mitt Romney has visited Disneyland, a movie theater, a gas station, and the White House, where he had white turkey chili and some kind of conversation with President Obama on Thursday. He’s done some other stuff too but, according to a sort of sad Washington Post report, none of it has been notable. Friends and advisers told the paper that Romney has mostly been hanging around his place in La Jolla, California, “pecking away at his iPad,” riding his bike around town, and “wondering what if.” But he’s not bitter — just “disappointed.”
“He’s not a poor loser,” said John Miller, a meatpacking magnate who co-chaired Romney’s finance committee and owns the beach house next door. “He’s not crying on anybody’s shoulders. He’s not blaming anybody. . . . He’s doing a lot of personal introspection about the whole process — and I’m not even sure that’s healthy. There’s nothing you can do about it now.”
Still, it sounds a little depressing over at the Romney’s. Work on the infamous car elevator (and other less ludicrous-sounding renovations) has not yet begun, Ann has been “crying in private,” and the family ordered Thanksgiving dinner from Boston Market “because there were too many kids running around the house to bother with cooking a feast.”
Of course, Romney is also trying to figure out what to do with the rest of his life. Unsurprisingly, he’s said to be considering a return to the business world or “something in the charitable realm or with the Mormon Church.” He might also be interested in writing a book based on his campaign trail diary. Also unsurprisingly, Romney does not intend to run for office again — nor does he have any interest in “helping the Republican Party rebuild and rebrand itself.” It’s convenient for everyone involved, since the Republican Party’s “rebranding” effort so far seems to consist solely of distancing itself from Mitt Romney.
