Willard Romney has his work cut out for him. He and his new BFF, Paul Ryan, are doing all they can to create an image of his new running mate as someone who knows his way around private sector jobs (like driving a Weinermobile… once?), and is somehow a government outsider who really didn’t want to hold office, but just couldn’t help himself.

Wrong on both counts.

Via the L.A. Times:

Romney sought to blunt any conflict between his selection of Washington veteran Ryan and his previous — and untrue — criticism of Obama as never holding a nongovernment job, and therefore failing to understand the economy.

Ryan’s “career ambition was not to go to Washington. That is not what he wanted to do,” Romney said in Mooresville, N.C. “But he became concerned about what was happening in the country…”  [...]

Ryan’s history suggests otherwise. He majored in political science in college, began interning for a Wisconsin senator’s Washington office while in college, and has spent most of his adult life working in the nation’s capital. He did move back to Wisconsin for two years to work in his family’s business before he ran for Congress in 1998.

Starting Monday, the Republicans plan to campaign separately. Romney will head to Florida without Ryan, whose Medicare proposal could cause problems among the state’s large senior population. [...]

… Ryan said on “60 Minutes” “Our point is we need to preserve their benefits, because government made promises to them that they’ve organized their retirements around. In order to make sure we can do that, you must reform it for those of us who are younger.”

Please note:

1. When Ryan ran for Congress in 1998, he showed his true colors.
2. For “those of us who are younger,” Medicare would cost a whole lot more.