Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican presidential candidate this year, has a fortune in the neighborhood of $200 million. He earned most of it as a successful venture capitalist, but evidently he has never been hard up for money. His father was an automobile executive and later the governor of Michigan. Mitt grew up in comfort in a swanky suburb of Detroit.

For all these reasons, his Democratic detractors insist, he is not fit to become president of the United States. He would be unable to “relate” to the hundreds of millions of American citizens who are worth less than he, perhaps  most of whom struggle to make ends meet financially.  

Since when do Americans invariably elect as president  someone who is just like them financially? Was Franklin D. Roosevelt, scion of a wealthy family and living on his Hyde Park estate, just like the people who voted for him? What about John F. Kennedy, whose father was one of the richest men in the world and parceled out much of his fortune to each of his children while they were still young? What about Lyndon Johnson, a wealthy rancher and owner of lucrative broadcasting properties? What about Jimmy Carter, a prosperous peanut farmer?  For that matter, what about Barack Obama, who probably is worth millions as a best-selling author?

By the time someone gains enough recognition to be considered a plausible candidate for president of the United States, he is likely to have enjoyed a comfortable life. We elect such people because we want successful, proven leaders.  Joe Sixpack is a swell guy, a great companion at a ballgame or a tavern, but we don’t want to elect him -- or anyone similar to him-- as president, precisely because he is not yet a proven achiever.  

One can make the argument, if one isn’t a Democratic apparatchik, that anyone who earns $200 million in a free economy probably can relate better to the average Joe than someone who has not earned a ton of money.  Ours is largely a consumer economy, which means that if you want to score big bucks you have to know a hell of a lot about what Joe wants and needs. Romney earned the bulk of his money by revitalizing consumer-oriented companies, such as Domino’s Pizza, Sealy Corp. and Sports Authority.  He also spent four years as the governor of one of the most populous states, where he was  forced to keep a finger on the public pulse.  

Why is it that Romney, with his $200 million, should be brushed aside while Warren Buffett, who is worth about two hundred times as much as Romney, seems to have been tapped by President Obama as the principal arbiter of the nation’s tax policy? By the way, Buffett’s company, Berkshire Hathaway, owes the Internal Revenue Service a billion dollars in taxes going back a decade.  Can you relate to that?

There is no question that some of the men who became president of the United States rose from humble origins. Abe Lincoln comes quickly to mind. But I cannot think of any who could have been considered average Americans by the time they took office.

If you want an example of that, you  have to turn to Europe, during the first half of the previous century. There was a failed artist from Austria, chronically unemployed, who considered himself lucky when he got to spend his nights in a flophouse. He could really relate to the people, however, and the people could really relate to him. He became the leader of one of Austria’s neighboring countries, and as events unfolded he became the leader of Austria as well, along with a whole lot of other European countries.

Frankly, I would prefer Mitt Romney