Hey GOP, Stop Bashing Mitt Romney

Democrats are supposed to be the party with "a shortage of loyalty and an abundance of self-loathing," but in the wake of Mitt Romney's defeat, Republicans appear to be getting in on the act, chief Romney strategist Stuart Stevens writes in the Washington Post. Republicans are rushing to dump on a candidate who came fairly close to winning. "I appreciate that Mitt Romney was never a favorite of DC's green-room crowd or, frankly, of many politicians," he writes. "Nobody liked Romney except voters."

After contributing to three campaigns, "I know enough to know that we weren't brilliant because Florida went our way in 2000 or enough Ohioans stuck with us in 2004," Stevens writes. "Nor are we idiots because we came a little more than 320,000 votes short of winning the electoral college in 2012. Losing is just losing." The GOP has problems, but that's no reason to throw out its every position—or "to show disrespect for a good man who fought hard for values we admire." Read the full column here. (More Mitt Romney stories.)