Campaign Video: Romney Fakes Drive Through "Inner" Detroit

My Michigan, huh? It seems that Romney, no matter how hard he tries to present himself as a man of the people, keeps telegraphing how much he’s an elitist.

This new Romney web ad, “Growing Up,” involves Mitt taking us for a spin in the Motor City, establishing his roots there through his memories and his identification with the automobile and the auto industry … his Dad being the car company CEO, and all. (Do note, though, as much as he romanticizes the image of Detroit, he’s careful to always parse out he’s from “Michigan.”)

After driving us through a more suburban-looking neighborhood, knowingly peering out the window at “his Michigan,” watch what happens, though. Passing through a more urban and grittier set of houses, Romney decries the Obama Administration, it’s liberal policies, the mortgage crisis and the city’s hard times. Now, if you weren’t paying really close attention, the logic and flow of the tour would leave you thinking you saw these houses from Mitt’s car window. Breaking it down, however, you can see that the campaign inserted a video clip of the “more hurting” streets — Mitt never having driven there at all.

But then, maybe the point about elitism is the least of it. Some might say, instead, that the two sets of houses, with the image of the more inner-city looking “bad streets” and Romney bringing up liberals and Obama right then might actually code more for race.

Romney “Growing Up” video

UPDATE: Guess the wheels are falling off. DKos post shows that photo with Dad, supposedly in Detroit, actually taken at NY World’s Fair … and, that Chrysler he’s driving was made in Canada.