Marathon Pundit: Another flip: NY Daily News endorsed Obama in '08, with Mitt now

There is more Mittmentum to report on this morning. The New York Daily News, which endorsed Barack Obama in 2008, is backing Mitt Romney this time around.

The centerpieces of Romney’s plan call for spending restraint and rewriting the Internal Revenue code to lower rates by 20%. He would make up much of the lost revenue by eliminating deductions and loopholes that have made the tax system a thicket of strangling complexities. On its own, paring the personal and corporate rules to the basics would catalyze business and consumer spending.

Romney has pledged that, as a group, the wealthy will bear no less a share of the burden than they do now, while individuals lower down would enjoy breaks. Many contest as mathematically impossible the Republican’s ability to cut rates and balance the books through tax reform. He disputes the points but, in an encouraging show of pragmatism, he has made clear that moving the nation toward balance may require sacrificing the size of his rate cut.

Romney’s energy plan calls for reemphasizing oil and natural gas production, in a shift away from Obama’s tilt toward trying to develop wind and solar into workable alternatives.

His proposal for Medicare would permit future retirees to choose between tried-and-true health care and private insurance to produce savings through competition. It took political bravery even to broach such concepts, and they are well worth exploring.