Mitt Romney's campaign juggernaut gets off to a sluggish start To go with the geographical symmetry, Mr Romney's speech writers had also furnished him with a great line for occasion, which had been loaded into the autocue and heavily trailed by his staff: "Hold on a little longer," Mr Romney intoned, with a pause, "A better America begins tonight." In the event, about three hundred supporters turned up to a hotel ballroom where a cover-band tried their best to raise the tempo before Mr Romney and took to the stage against the back-drop of tightly packed supporters who were whipped into excitement like the "studio audience" they really were. Recalling her decision to ask her husband to run again after a punishing 2008 loss to John McCain - Mrs Romney said she had asked him one simple question about what he could do for America - ""Can you fix it?," and he said "yes" - and that's all I needed to know." Mr Romney was left to look strangely uncomfortable as he listened adoringly to this vote of confidence from his own wife in his powers to rebuild American economic confidence and put some zip into an economy whose still-sluggish recovery offers his best chance of winning. And so began the speech - which was not covered live by the US television networks - that Mr Romney's aides had hoped would provide a fulcrum moment and opportunity to broadcast his "I can fix it" message to a wider audience. He tried his hand at communicating empathy for the "single mom who feels heartbroken when she has to explain to her kids that she needs to take a second job" and "for every grandparent who can't afford the gas to visit his or her grandchildren," but sincerity is not, of itself, a guarantee of success. And so, after 15 minutes or so of delivering his lines, Mr Romney departed the stage having not so much launched a campaign juggernaut, as the political equivalent of a family saloon: a neat, practical, vehicle that may yet get him to his final destination, but is never going to set pulses racing.