Did Mitt Romney Get Booed at NAACP Convention on Purpose?

Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney went to the NAACP convention to engage the black community, or at least that’s what his people said beforehand:

“Mitt Romney is committed to competing in the black community despite the odds,” said Romney senior adviser Tara Wall in an email. “If elected by a majority this November, President Romney will be a leader to all. Speaking to members of the nation’s oldest civil rights organization and establishing a dialogue with black voters, communicating his record of achievement and solutions for fixing a broken system of unfulfilled promises is paramount.”

But instead of meaningfully engaging the black community, Romney was booed for telling the NAACP crowd that he’d abolish Obamacare.

Now why would Romney bring up Obamacare among a crowd that probably knows more uninsured people than any other demographic? Politicians usually focus on what they have in common when speaking to crowds, not their differences. So why didn’t Romney focus on entrepreneurship or values instead of focusing on something as divisive as the Affordable Care Act? Well, some are insinuating that Romney needled the mostly black crowd as a dog whistle to the right wing.

“That moment where the Obamacare line – he had this little, kind of, George W. Bush smirk on his face,” said York Times reporter Hugo Lindgren during an episode of MSNBC’s Now with Alex Wagner. “He kind of new he was going to get – he kind of wanted it. And he sort of enjoyed it a little bit.”

“He wants to be able to say, ‘hey, I can go talk to people who I don’t agree with. I can get booed and I can be reasonable,’” said columnist David Corn before the speech. “I can tell them what I think in a polite, respectful way. I can take their criticisms and just show them that I care about what they think.”

So what do you think? Do you think Romney got booed on purpose?

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