Romney is taking up the media’s favorite narrative: That guy with the southern accent is a moron. Unlike the smooth northern elitist, of course. You should totally vote for him and his many, often-conflicting positions.

A low and cheap blow, in other words. And one a more shameless candidate like Barack Obama would use to his advantage.

Which is what worries me most about Romney: His antics work against Republicans who are ineffective at rebutting his idiocy and sheer lies. But Obama is a Chicago politician, who’ll throw it back twice as hard — with the media’s help, of course.

Something else we’re learning about Romney: He’s thin-skinned. He did just fine in debates when he was barely challenged. But last night the punches started flying and he looked like a desperate deer in headlights. At one point he even whined to Anderson Cooper about people beating up on him. Another trait that doesn’t bode well in the general.

One more note: Team Romney actually spliced-up footage to make it seem as if it all came from last night. Erick Erickson, who’s featured in the video, notes:

Romney had to do this to distract from this being the first debate where he bled. But I think the story is going to be that Romney’s team spliced up and edited the footage to convey the impression that this was all about last night’s debate to push the narrative that Perry flubbed yet again.

After all, Perry’s performance last night was good for him and Romney knows what’s going to happen if Perry rebounds. He cannot afford for that to happen. He knows, like we do, that he has never gotten above 25.0% in the Real Clear Politics polling average since November of 2010.

Romney is shameless yet desperately flails under attack. Not attractive in a nominee.