Netflix has released its much-anticipated documentary “Mitt,” an inside look at the presidential campaigns of Mitt Romney. Critics and viewers seem to like the movie, emphasizing that Mormon filmmaker Greg Whiteley depicted a more relaxed and caring candidate than the Mitt Romney we saw in debates and TV ads.
“Mitt” allows me to introduce one of my favorite counterfactual scenarios: Suppose Romney, the first Mormon to be a major party presidential nominee, had won the White House? Would the Utah-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have welcomed his ascendancy? Or dreaded it, for subjecting a difficult-to-fathom religion — one recent Mormon church president called his flock a “peculiar people” — to unwelcome scrutiny?
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