Mitt’s new flip-flop is out of this world

The Boston Herald ^ | 05/02/2007 | Jessica Heslam

[JohnSheppard]

Already under scrutiny for shifting positions on key issues and his Mormon faith, presidential hopeful Mitt Romney has made a bizarre new flip flop - saying on national TV his favorite novel is Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard’s “Battlefield Earth.”

The former Massachusetts governor told Fox News his favorite book was the Bible but his favorite novel was the science fiction tome “Battlefield Earth.”

“Actually, the one by L. Ron Hubbard,” Romney said when asked to name his favorite novel. “I’m not in favor of his religion by any means, but he wrote a book called ‘Battlefield Earth’ that was a very fun science fiction book.”

The Mark Twain novel “Huckleberry Finn” tops the book list on Romney’s My Space page. “Battlefield Earth” isn’t on the list.

Romney spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom said: “Battlefield Earth is pretty good science fiction. It’s about Earth being ruled by an alien race, sort of the way the Democrats are running Congress.”

But Stephen Prothero, head of Boston University’s religion department and the author of “Religious Literacy,” noted Romney’s Mormonism could be a stumbling block with some voters.

“Mormonism sounds like a science fiction fantasy to some Americans,” Prothero said.

[Rick.Donaldson]

that’s a “flip flop”??? He likes a book. In fact, L. Ron Hubbard wrote several SF books, and most of them were good. Battlefield Earth was about 800 pages if I remember rightly and well done.