Mitt Romney

The Whisper Was for Romney

davidswanson — Sat, 26 Jan 2008 15:00:27 -0500

Some of you may recall the powerful evidence in 2004 that George W. Bush was cheating in the debates by wearing an earpiece. The New York Times famously (well, at least somewhat famously) documented the evidence and then refused to print it because it might have had an effect on the election: http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2012

A few of you may be aware of the extensive evidence that Bush has worn an earpiece and been prompted with answers at speaking events for the past three years: http://democrats.com/earpiece

This background is reason to believe a candidate might cheat and that it is technologically feasible. It is also reason to believe the media would kill the story. It is not reason to know that Mitt Romney cheated in the MSNBC debate this week. But there are other good reasons to believe that he did.

In case you haven't heard about this at all, during the debate, Tim Russert asked Mitt Romney a question, then everyone watching heard a whispered voice say "he raised taxes." Then Romney answered the question by saying "I'm not going to raise taxes." Watch the short video clip: http://www.democrats.com/romney-cheats-with-an-earpiece

It looked like Romney was being prompted. I don't think anyone ever imagined that the noise in Romney's tiny hidden earpiece (assuming he had one) could have been so loud as to be heard on Romney's microphone without leaving the candidate writhing on the floor in pain. If that's what happened, I'm inclined to vote for the man. The theory is that somehow the transmission to Romney from his assistant got picked up. I don't know how this could have happened, and I doubt that Romney's assitant sat near an open-mic intended for audience questions. But I do know that Bush wore that box on his back in order to try to avoid something like this happening.

Now, Andrew Sullivan at the Atlantic has posted a comment from one of his readers, which I cannot confirm, that reads:
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/01/romney-whis...

"Some people have enhanced the first 'he raised taxes' whisper using audio technology and have discovered that there was actually more to it than just 'he raised taxes'. They've disconvered [sic] that more can be heard: 'He raised taxes, I'm not gonna...'. Listen to the full enhanced audio yourself. Go out and get a tape and enhance it yourself if you think this is wrong."

Clearly that needs to be investigated. But even without that, there is good reason to believe that Romney was prompted.

The leading you're-a-bunch-of-conspiracy-nuts explanation yesterday was that it was OBVIOUSLY one of Russert's staffers prompting HIM. But the whisper begins too early for that to make sense. And two NBC staffers, when they heard the whisper, and when they read comments about it from viewers on the MSNBC blog, Emailed a third staffer a blog post wondering what it was. The third staffer posted this and then later deleted it. If Russert was getting prompts through an earpiece, these people would probably have known it and not blogged it.

On the other hand, MSNBC's efforts to kill the story, including the deletion of the blog post and the readers' comments (which I suspect was directed by someone higher up) would fit with covering up Russert's cheating. And in one version of the MSNBC blogger's explanation for deleting the post, his colleagues never intended it to be posted. The timing and the wording of the prompt (especially if Sullivan's reader is right) do not make sense as a prompt for Russert. But probably only a threat to Russert's ego will motivate MSNBC to investigate Romney, so I'm happy to keep that possibility out there. Please tell all your friends it was a prompt for Russert, and call NBC to ask about it in those terms.

Sloppiness and possibly reflexive covering up do not tell us what is being covered up, but MSNBC originally gave Raw Story an explanation that explained nothing, saying Romney's microphone was not working. That's funny: during the whisper, Romney's lips aren't moving. What difference would it have made in any way for his microphone to have been working or not working?
http://rawstory.com/news/2007/MSNBC_blames_Romney_whisper_on_microphone_...

Next MSNBC posted a new blog post acknowledging that people wanted to know what happened but not offering any explanation.
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/01/25/609835.aspx

The post claimed that MSNBC did not know whose voice is heard whispering, and that MSNBC was reviewing tapes of each of the candidates in order to determine whether it was one of them. This would tend to suggest that MSNBC does not think it was one of their staffers in a control room, and does not think it was one of their staffers feeding ideas to Russert. (I'm still unable to find the readers' comments on this on the MSNBC blog, and if they were deleted the new post says nothing about restoring them.)

So, today the leading you're-a-bunch-of-paranoid-whackos position is, of course, NOT that it was obviously a prompt for Russert. Why? Because MSNBC says that's not what it was. Instead the leading position is something stranger than that, and it is the leading position because MSNBC says it's what happened.

Having ruled out the possibility that one of the other candidates was whispering to himself, MSNBC added an update to its blog post concluding that someone in the audience must have been whispering near an open mic. This is apparently based on nothing other than MSNBC's inability to come up with any other explanation, other than the obvious one. Nobody claims to be the whisperer. Nobody claims to know why a mic was open then and not at other times. There's no substance to the theory. It may, in fact, be true. But, for now, it's just a baseless theory, and a less probable one than that Romney was cheating.

MSNBC's position now reads like a report on an election result that varies wildly from the exit polls. Such a result (if in the United States, abroad the opposite would be true) clearly proves that the exit polls must have been wrong! How do you know? Why, by ruling out the possibility that the discrepency was caused by Huckabee whispering to himself.

In case shame takes over and the latest MSNBC conclusion gets purged, here it is:

"After reviewing the tapes, NBC determined that an open mic picked up a whisper from the audience. It is unclear who it is that says it, but it was not said by any of the candidates, was not heard in the hall and, more importantly, not heard by the candidates."

How do we know it was not heard by the candidates (not even the one who appears to hear it and repeat it)? Why, because MCNBC tells us so. And how can MSNBC possibly know that? At best (and, I doubt this is even true) they asked one or more of the candidates or their staff, and those candidates said they didn't hear it.

Romney Cheats With an Earpiece!

Bob Fertik — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 10:05:42 -0500

Well folks that's it for the Mittster - he was caught on tape with an earpiece! Listen for yourself as someone whispers "he raised taxes":

Call every radio and TV talk show you can and tell them to play this on the air! Let's expose Romney to the world as the fraud that he is. And when we're done with Romney, let's expose Bush too for wearing an earpiece at every debate, press conference and interview since 2004!

Update 1: MSNBC first blogged about the whisper (h/t The Shotgun Blog):

but then scrubbed its own damning blog:
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/01/24/607191.aspx

but here's the Google News link:

Why did MSNBC scrub the evidence of Romney's fraud? Email letters@msnbc.com

Update 2: This story is getting buzz on the blogs, including CrooksandLiars, Raw Story, Rolling Stone, Democratic Underground, Free Republic...

Update 3: Romney's blog defenders claim the whisper was in Tim Russert's ear, not Romney's, because Russert didn't mention "raising taxes" in his question. But that doesn't explain why Mitt Romney's immediate reply to Russert's question was to say, "I'm not gonna raise taxes" - before Russert specifically mentioned "raising taxes." Listen for yourself at CrooksAndLiars. Here's the transcript:

Russert: Governor Romney, you're a big fan of Ronald Reagan. Will you do for Social Security what Ronald Reagan did in 1983?
[Whisper]: He raised taxes
Romney: I'm not gonna raise taxes. What I'm gonna do...
Russert: Well Ronald Reagan raised the payroll tax and he raised the retirement age...
Romney: I'm not gonna raise taxes

Update 4: For those of you never heard about Bush's earpiece, here's the photo that broke the story:

As Dave Lindorff reported, The New York Times had a story ready to run a week before the 2004 election where a well-known NASA photo analyst was prepared to risk his professional reputation that there was something under Bush's jacket, but the Times killed the story to help Bush steal a second term. I have blogged about it repeatedly ever since.

Update 5: We now have an official explanation from MSNBC - blame the audience:

Domenico Montanaro, an NBC News political researcher, wrote on the network’s political blog, First Read: “After reviewing the tapes, NBC determined that an open mic[rophone] picked up a whisper from the audience.
.“It is unclear who it is that says it, but it was not said by any of the candidates, was not heard in the hall and, more importantly, not heard by the candidates.”

Is that the end of the story?

Mitt Romney is a dangerous man

dinamic — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 14:32:04 -0500

While we are focused on the democratic primaries we mustn't lose sight of the Republican front runners. Our candidate will be running against one of them. I find all the Republican candidates frightening for one reason or another. One of them wants us to keep our troops in Iraq until we "win" the war, even if it is another 10-20-100 years. Another wants to rewrite our Constitution to suit his notion of what God wants. A third candidate wants to keep cutting taxes for the richest among us, with no plan at all as to how we will pay the bills.

In this article Paul Campos states that "Mitt Romney is more dangerous than George Bush"! With Romney in office we would likely see the "Bush Doctrine" on the same "B12" shots that have done so much for sports. Here we find a brief outline of Romney's beliefs about presidential powers.

An example of this new argument is provided by Mitt Romney, in his response to a Boston Globe questionnaire regarding the limits of presidential power. Romney's basic position is that, given the supposedly existential threat posed by terrorism, there are almost no limits on what a president may do.

Romney either explicitly claims or strongly implies that, among other things, the president may spy on Americans without a warrant, even in the face of a statue that prohibits this; that he may attack other countries without congressional authorization; that he may ignore treaties ratified by the Senate; and that he may issue signing statements reserving the right to ignore laws enacted under his signature.

What justifies these extraordinary claims, which in effect would turn the presidency of the United States into something resembling a dictatorship? The answer, it turns out, is exactly the same one given by Schell: [Jonathan Schell's cold war book "The Fate of the Earth.] given the magnitude of the threat, "liberty" is something we can no longer afford. As Romney puts it, "our most basic civil liberty is the right to be kept alive." http://www.capitolhillblue.com/cont/node/4127

"I'm The NRA And I Vote" - But for Whom??

Bob Fertik — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 11:49:43 -0500

We've all seen the signs and bumper stickers - "I'm the NRA and I Vote."

But with the Republican Party in chaos, time the question must be asked: for whom??

Grandpa Fred is putting his last eggs in the basket of South Carolina gun owners, but gun owners aren't fools and they have no interest in backing a sure primary loser.

Their dilemma is expressed by F. Hewitt Grant, the grandfatherly president of Ellett Brothers gun manufacturing:

Grant has been wooed by three candidates: Thompson, Huckabee and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

He’s leaning toward Thompson, hasn’t completely ruled out Huckabee, and “laughed at” the overture from Giuliani, who as mayor backed a lawsuit against New York gun manufacturers that is still in litigation and remains an unforgivable sin among gun advocates.

“We’re in a world of hurt,” Grant says when he sizes up the Republican front-runner field.

McCain, who wandered off the pro-gun reservation in the late 1990s by supporting gun control but has now come back to the fold, “wavers” too much, says Grant.

As for Romney, who signed gun control legislation while governor, Grant playfully loads on the Southern drawl and simply says: “He’s from Massachusetts.”

But for gun owners looking past the primaries to the general election, Romney has appeal - if you can stop laughing at his hunting "prowess".

Devin Sweeney, a gun buyer from Inman, S.C., who attended the Ellett Brothers gun show, said he’s leaning toward Romney because he thinks he has the best shot of winning the White House in November.

He concedes that Romney’s record isn’t perfect, but notes the former governor did join the National Rifle Association and claims to be a hunter, albeit of mostly “small varmints.”

So how is the NRA telling its members to vote?

The rank and file has been left largely on their own because the NRA, itself, is struggling with how to manage a field filled with front-runners with tainted records.

The NRA weeks ago released a Democratic voter guide that made clear that New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson had the best record on gun issues.

But they have yet to offer a similar guide for the Republican field, even though all of the first primary states are home to significant numbers of Second Amendment activists.

“We are inching towards making some kind of determination,” said spokesman Andrew Arulanandam.

Translation: we're not betting our credibility on any of these losers!

I can't imagine gun owners will vote for Grandpa Fred, so they really have no choice except Huck, who leads in SC (caveat: Rasmussen shows a post-NH bounce for McCain) and who just passed Rudy as the national GOP frontrunner.

Dumond Ad Targets Huckabee - Is McCain Behind It?

Bob Fertik — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 12:28:18 -0500

Someone is trying to knock Mike Huckabee out of the race with this hard-hitting ad attacking Huckabee for freeing Wayne Dumond. Who's behind the ad and the web site huckabeefacts.com? The most obvious suspect is Mitt Romney, who lost his crucial (and expensive) Iowa lead to Huck. But like a good Agatha Christie novel, anyone in the GOP race could be behind this.

There's lots of great detective work at TPM Election Central.

wanderindiana thinks McCain's team did it:

The whois information posted by james upthread points to a service provider, 1and1, who has been used in the past by isupportjoe.com (a GOP-based Joe Lieberman site which never came to fruition, outed before it was operational), which had been registered in a netblock used by Becki Donatelli and other GOP types. Now, IIRC, a bunch of these folks were to be running John McCain's internet ops. Just speculation, by my money would be on McCain's camp.

Nickm adds another McCain connection:

Although the huckabeefacts.com domain was registered through 1and1.com, the server where the page resides is in Scottsdale, AZ, run by secureserver.net. One of the last hops to the server is through Phoenix. Hmmmmm...

Will the Corporate Media ask Mr. Straight Talk about it? Stay tuned...

Update 1:Arkansas Republican Keith Emis is taking credit:

Hello. This is Keith Emis. I organized the production of the attached video. Below is a statement regarding Mike Huckabee, Lois Davidson and Carol Sue Shields.
I saw Mrs. Davidson on CBS News last week talking about how Wayne Dumond murdered her daughter Carol Sue Shields. Shields was murdered because Mike Huckabee began pushing for Dumond's freedom when he became governor. Dumond was eventually released.
There is no doubt Mrs. Davidson has a powerful story to tell, but I wasn't sure she had an outlet to share it. I agreed with her that Mike Huckabee has no business being president.
I have always been a behind the scenes guy in Arkansas politics, working for Fay Boozman in 1998 and Senator Tim Hutchinson in 2002, so being out front on anything political is highly unusual for me, but this is different.
I contacted Mrs. Davidson and asked her if she would be willing to speak on camera about her daughter, her daughter's murderer, and the man who helped win his freedom. I got a camera crew to go with me to Missouri to Mrs. Davidson's home. We filmed a very kind lady who shouldn't have lost her daughter.
Mrs. Davidson's story is important. It's one that anyone voting in the Republican primaries should hear.
Sincerely,
Keith W. Emis

According to Arkansas Times edit Max Brantley, Emis isn't supporting any of the Republicans:

Emis, 29, grew up in Fayetteville and works in his family's Data Forms business in Greenland. He said he incurred no expenses, save gas and video tapes, and used friends as volunteer help, including one with video production experience. His uncle Donn Emis, a Fayetteville DJ, did the voiceover.
Emis said the stories about the Missouri victims "made him sad." He called Mrs. Davidson and asked if he could visit. She talked to him Sunday and he returned Tuesday and Wednesday to do the video. He declines to talk about politics, such as other disagreements he might have, if any, with Mike Huckabee. Emis comes from a part of the state where Huckabee has left many disaffected Republicans, however, on account of issues ranging from taxes to immigration. Emis wants to stick to Dumond.
"I am not supporting anyone in the presidential race," he said.
"It really made me sad. She's just a simple, nice woman [and a retired Wal-Mart employee]. Her daughter was murdered and it didn't have to happen. And it did happen because Mike Huckabee worked to get Wayne Dumond out of prisons."

We'll see if Emis' story holds up or if one of the candidates is secretly behind his work...

The Baptist v. The Mormon

Bob Fertik — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 10:02:06 -0500

AP reports,

Mike Huckabee, an ordained Southern Baptist minister, asks in an upcoming article, "Don't Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?"
The article, to be published in Sunday's New York Times Magazine, says Huckabee asked the question after saying he believes Mormonism is a religion but doesn't know much about it.

Huckabee is being coy - he certainly knows enough about Mormonism to cite some of its wackier theological positions that will make Baptists gasp.

Romney fired back by saying attacking his religion was "un-American."

But arresting millions of "tired, poor, huddled masses, yearning to breathe free" and sending them back is "American"?

And wasn't it just yesterday that Romney said he would not include any Muslims (like UN Ambassador Zalmay Khalizad) in his cabinet?

The Grand Old Party - isn't it simply Grand?

Here's a great spoof on Huckabee's message to Iowa:

Romney

douglassmyth — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 15:10:32 -0500

Romney: Echoes of Triumph of the Will

Mitt Romney said of John Edwards, "This baloney when he says there are two Americas. There is only ONE America!" His eyes flash blue fire as he proclaims this--at a parish house in New Hampshire.

With his clean-cut good looks and piercing blue eyes, Mitt Romney is the poster child for soft-focus right-wing politics. He sounds disturbing echoes of another era, another movement all wrapped in a reasonable, soft-spoken manner.

He stresses his five sons and his long marriage, in part to distinguish himself from Giuliani, but also to present himself as the model for a better America. In his appearances he gives a litany strangely reminiscent of a scene in Leni Reifenstahl's Triumph of the Will, saying that wherever he goes, he shares Americans' values whether in New Hampshire ("Yankee values"), Iowa ("heartland values"), or South Carolina, ("Southern values"). He explains, when talking of South Carolina, "I'm proud to have southern values, because they're American values." I wonder what that means.

Americans "…love work, the people in America love their maker…" Muslims don't, I suppose. "People in America love family." Other people hate them? "We love this country." And what, I wonder, do the Russians, or the Iraqis feel about their countries. "We" all have the same American values. In Triumph of the Will, Germans call out from the midst of the huge rally in Nuremburg, the equivalent of: "I'm from Saxony," "I'm from Bavaria," "I'm from Baden Baden," and so on, and then all proclaiming in unison "One Fuehrer! One Volk!"

So, what are these American values, according to Romney? To be really American, people ought to be married before they have kids. The 37% who do not, maybe they're not American? "We have to strengthen families!" He cites Moynihan and then points out that when Moynihan warned against the dissolution of society, he was talking about 25% of children among African-Americans born out of wedlock--and now, he says, it's 68%--among African Americans--45% among Hispanics, 25% in the rest of society.

Notable that he leads with African Americans, he with his so-white skin, a member of a religion which held that black people didn't have souls until the 1970's. "Marriage between a man and a woman is essential to the strength of society." This is interesting, too, since Mormons originally were polygamous, and splinter Mormon sects still are. "A family that's close enough to come together to have a meal together regularly." With all four wives? No, seriously, this is one of his formulae for making America better--make sure everyone gets married and has dinner with their children--as if the trend isn't radically in the opposite direction, as if couples working two jobs on different shifts are somehow not American. And the nice white people listening in the New Hampshire parish room are all nodding their heads, "Yes!"

Romney buys into the millennial American vision, having cited Ronald Reagan as his hero: "This is a unique nation." "The greatest land on earth," says Romney. Strengthening America, strengthening our families, strengthening our military and better managing government--turning his skills as the head of a firm that "turned firms around" to the federal government: these are his goals as President.

It is noticeable that the first item on his to-do list is to "defeat global Jihad," but it is also interesting that he says "not just militarily" all over the world, but by "helping the Muslims to figure out how they're going to get rid of the extreme…." He means extremists, but at least he doesn't use Giuliani's term, "Islamo-fascists."

Romney is soft-focus. Romney is smooth. Quite a contrast to the abrasive Mayor. But Mitt doesn't project warmth; he gives off the scent of cold, clear ice.

He's "optimistic for America," but I wonder, after he says this, what he sees as "America." Not those 68% of African Americans who've had children out of wedlock, not the 25% of "the rest of us."

He talks about Education as if the "Teachers Union" (there is more than one, but he doesn't seem to notice) is the only thing standing in the way of excellence. He likes the NCLB, likes the idea of testing, but he doesn't want the federal government to be directly involved; that's for the states: he worries that some "liberal President" will take hold of education and decide what should be taught. What, Liberal values, like diversity, like tolerance, like freedom of speech? How awful!

Romney has money--his own and a well-funded campaign--but perhaps his Mormonism will sink him. There are other factors that should tell against him in the primaries and the General Election: the fact that he was pro-choice and now is not; that he was for civil unions, but not gay marriage; that he governed a liberal state, not brilliantly; that his only real success was brokering a healthcare program he now claims and also disavows, since it's close to Hillary's proposed plan for the nation. In other words, Mitt Romney looks, at least, like everything he claims not to be: a political chameleon.

Seeing those steely blue eyes, though, you get the feeling that you saw someone like him before: in some grade B World War II movie; this person I remember was not one of the Americans; he was scary.

"Mitt Romneys' Flip Flopping Again

jjpberg — Sun, 12 Aug 2007 19:52:05 -0400

Mitt Romney is courting Americas' working class for votes. The same working class craftsmen that made Mitt his platinum, gold and silver spoon he was born with. I highly doubt if Mitt ever did a hard days' work in his life. Being the C.E.O. of one of your families companys' doesn't count. One week you are Richard Nixon opposing abortion the next week you are the Dixie Chicks' pro abortion in certain circumstances. Lose the "gelled" look that Pat Riley of the Miami heat, John Travolta and Michael Douglas used to wear. It's about 10 years out of style. That tough guy look like DeNiros look in "Taxi Driver" "Are you talking to me"? is really scary. Almost as scary as you (the one that hangs with Coulter who said John Edwars is using his sons death and his wifes cancer is horrific. Guess she needs the attention she never got when she was alledgedly growing uo!) being our President. You will lose terribly in the primaries and you don't have 1/10,000 of the intelligence that Barak Obama has on one finger nail. Their will be a woman president named Hillary who might be able to spare some time to teach you manners greasy. Yeah you claiming that you are similar to Ronald Regan is like Sen. Edward Kennedy being as similar to Barry Goldwater. By the way exactly what is a Mitt?

HOW 'BOUT THE USA?

davidswanson — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 19:54:57 -0400

By Rip Rense

Mitt the Mormon mannequinned his way into a New Hampshire diner, looking like a Dewar’s ad come to life, and began to hold forth at one of those sanitized Candidate Meets The People pop-in photo-ops. Events that became a cliché sometime around the discovery of language.

Ah, but Mitt was so elegant, so poised, so altar boy-polite, with his patter about “sorry to interrupt” and something about not expecting to have a politician ruin your lunch, etc.

(Har. Har.)

You know, it was one of those scenes where all the people stared, starry-eyed, at the Famous Politician with the (choose one) glinting teeth/hair plugs/thousand-dollar suit, or more recently, the hint of cleavage. And Katie Couric looks oh-so-grave as she brings you five seconds of it on the evening news.

But Mitt was ambushed by a pit-bull in the form of a high-mileage waitress with the average American name of Michele Griffin. Her teeth were not glinting. One of the front ones was missing.

Michele, it turns out, has three children: one with diabetes, one with Chron’s Disease, and one with Attention Deficit Disorder. She just returned to work after two years on disability for something probably related to having three children: one with diabetes, one with. . .

And she was not interested in unctuous patter and rehearsed political crap.

“I just want to say hi to all of you,” said Mitt The Mormon, and he looked just like Mike Mercury in the old “Supercar” puppet-animation show. “I don’t want to interrupt your lunch. Some folks were just planning on having lunch! Didn’t know a politician was going to come in an ruin your whole meal! This is a very famous place. I understand Adam Sandler has been here!”

Big yucks all around. Yup shucks I’m jess reg’lar Adam Sandler-lovin’ folk lahk you’all. . .

Then Mitt began carrying on about health care, and here is what he said (take a deep breath, it’s a run-on sentence of, um, Biblical proportion):

“I do believe that one of the greatest resources we have is what I’ll call ‘health care diplomacy,’ that the nations that are (sic) moderate Islamic states as well as African states that are in dire poverty can draw closer to America and recognize our values and our goodness as a nation, in part by our sharing with them the technology we have and the medicines we have and our know-how in the area of health care, and despite what Michael Moore said, we are the envy of the world when it comes to health care technology and capabilities, and we can reach out and help other nations, uh, we’ve done so---“

At this point, Michele, ma belle, spoke some words that go together well:

“Excuse me!” she shouted. “What about our nation? How ‘bout the USA? Come on!”

It should have been page one banner headlines, if newspapers were worth a damn anymore. WAITRESS TO CANDIDATE: HOW ‘BOUT THE USA?

Boy, did Michelle have a point. And it’s a point that points to what should be the pointed point of every 2008 campaign: take care of the country. Instead of spending, say, a trillion bucks on, oh, the murderous, oil-fueled occupation of Iraq---a place that wants the U.S. there as much as Trump wants Rosie. If ever there was a metaphor for what’s happening in the USA today, it’s what happened last week in Minnesota. Sky is falling? No. Bridges are.

What about our nation?

But here was Mitt carrying on dreamily about making Bin Laden and Al Qaeda and maybe Jerry Colonna start to love the USA after we start doling out free health care. . .to Islamic nations! Gadzooks! That’s Allah-t of your tax dollars. And aside from glassy-eyed delusions of free-penicillin-fueled choruses of “America The Beautiful” ringing out across Africa and the Middle East, why, Mitt also. . .lied.

I know that a politician telling lies will come as a shock, but. . .

Michael Moore never said that the USA does not have the best health care technology and capabilities in the world. He has said over and over that the USA has. . .the best health care and capabilities in the world. It’s just that it’s not available to people with no insurance, which is his point. But it’s popular to slam Michael Moore, of course. After all, he took sick U.S. citizens to Evil Cuba and got their teeth fixed and their drug prescriptions filled for free. The dirty commie traitor!

Mitt went on pushing warm and fuzzy demographic buttons---talking of “our values and goodness as a nation” and other feel-good junk that is not exactly borne out by Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,” rap music, death-metal, Lindsay Lohan, “American Idol,” heroin-addicted U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan, a scofflaw attorney general, religious right takeover of the government, and Dick Cheney.

But this plucky waitress caught Mitt flat-footed. Oh, he tried to recover, with almost as much flare as John Kerry, citing the health care plan he got “on track” while Governor of Massachusetts. Here it is:

Massachusetts residents making less than $54,000 have the “right to choose,” as Mitt said (slipping in that anti-big government ruse) from three insurance carriers. It all was some sleight-of-hand involving companies that had been subsidizing a hospital fund for the uninsured to the tune of about a billion bucks---instead using that money to help low-income people buy their own insurance.

I don’t know about you, but this doesn’t sound like much of a solution for those trying to raise families on $54,000 a year. That’s right, trying. You want a house and two cars and three kids? Try doing that on a fifty-four grand in Michele Griffin’s USA. Take away $10,000 a year for insurance (she does), and it gets about as dreamy a reality as bribing Islamic extremists with free MRI’s.

Mitt further told Michele that he doesn’t like the government to subsidize health care, which played well until another soul in Michele’s diner got brave enough to shout, “"Who's paying for the subsidies if it's not the government of Massachusetts?" Hmm. Mitt had no answer except a few more beads of sweat on his forehead and more pre-recorded spiel.

Okay, what was appalling here was not really the obfuscation and lying, since this is required of public servants, but how Romney played the tawdry “can I finish my statement?” game with this woman, when she dared to interrupt him during a discussion of “co-payments.” (A co-payment, if you don’t know, is money you spend to help your insurance company not provide insurance.)

Now, understand that Mitt stayed poised, polite, controlled, but make no mistake---this was a Mitt Fit.
"You know," he said, "if you'd like me to answer the question I will.” And. . .“Let me finish, if you will!”
A ticky-tack charge? No, it was tacky of Mitt. Here was a millionaire many times over, a strapping example of health and good genes, embarked on an effort to essentially rule the world, being irked by a chunky waitress with three sick kids who wants to know if a President Romney might help her. Yet the Mighty Mitt chided her for. . .interrupting him!
Didn't she have any manners?
Of course, Mitt has been pretty touchy lately, given that reporters keep asking him about a religion that says Jesus is going to set up headquarters in Atlanta, or something, and that has adherents who espouse polygamy. (Of course, that could give him some common ground with the Arabs!)
Mitt should have walked across the room, sat down with Michele---preferably away from the cameras---and heard her out. It would have been the compassionate, not to mention politically smart, thing to do.
But then, we’re talking about Mitt the Mormon. Mitt the Mannequin. Mitt the Mendacious.
Michael Moore for president!

Republican Candidates Catch "Mad Cowboy" Disease - and the Corporate Media Closes its Eyes

Bob Fertik — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 12:14:51 -0400

Republican candidates for President are saying the darndest things about the UN weapons inspectors who searched Iraq with a fine-toothed comb before Bush hastily pulled them out of Iraq just before unleashing his "shock and awe" attack on Baghdad on 3/19/03.

On the campaign trail, Mitt Romney repeatedly says Saddam Hussein never let those inspectors into Iraq:

Well, it's a setting that's almost a null set. Which is, if we knew that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, and if he had complied with the United Nations resolutions to allow IAEA inspectors into his country, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

Hello Mitt? Saddam did allow IAEA inspectors into his country, gave them unfettered access to everything including Presidential palaces, and they found nothing:

On March 7, 2003 Muhammed ElBarradei of the International Atomic Energy Agency told the world, “After three months of intrusive inspections, we have to date found no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of a nuclear weapons programme in Iraq.”

So where could Romney have gotten this lunatic idea? We don't have to look very far - he got it from the lunatic-in-chief himself:

The larger point is, and the fundamental question is, did Saddam Hussein have a weapons program? And the answer is, absolutely. And we gave him a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in. And, therefore, after a reasonable request, we decided to remove him from power, along with other nations, so as to make sure he was not a threat to the United States and our friends and allies in the region. I firmly believe the decisions we made will make America more secure and the world more peaceful.

Bush's statement was so insane that we created a petition at MadGeorge.us urging Bush to invoke the 25th Amendment (which allows a President to declare himself "incapacitated") and hand over his Presidential powers to Dick Cheney - just as Bush did on 6/29/02 when he had a colonoscopy. Thousands of sane Americans signed our petition.

Of course Bush's insane statement should have dominated the news for days, if not weeks or months. So why did the Washington Press Corpse and the Corporate Media completely ignore it? Because Karl Rove controls the Corporate Media, that's why.

When Saddam was deposed and "democracy" seemed possible in Iraq, many Americans were willing to overlook Bush's pre-war and post-war lies. But after 4 years, 3,500 US lives, and $400 billion - which are just the beginning of a 50-year occupation - Americans are no longer willing to buy Bush's lies.

It's time for the Corporate Media to take every statement about Iraq - from the Bush Administration and every Republican in office or running for office - and subject them to a lie-detector test.

While the various pre-war intelligence lies can be murky to those who are no immersed in all the details, the UN inspectors lie is clear and unambiguous.

If the Corporate Media can't challenge Mitt Romney and other Republicans who deny UN inspectors spent months in Iraq and found nothing, then it's time to put the Corporate Media out of business.

Update 1: Robert Parry has much more:

On Jan. 27, 2004, for example, Bush said, “We went to the United Nations, of course, and got an overwhelming resolution – 1441 – unanimous resolution, that said to Saddam, you must disclose and destroy your weapons programs, which obviously meant the world felt he had such programs. He chose defiance. It was his choice to make, and he did not let us in.”...

At a March 21, 2006, news conference, Bush again blamed the war on Hussein’s defiance of U.N. demands for unfettered inspections.

“I was hoping to solve this [Iraq] problem diplomatically,” Bush said. “The world said, ‘Disarm, disclose or face serious consequences.’ … We worked to make sure that Saddam Hussein heard the message of the world. And when he chose to deny the inspectors, when he chose not to disclose, then I had the difficult decision to make to remove him. And we did.”

Only two weeks ago, at a press conference on May 24, 2007, Bush offered a short-hand version, even inviting the journalists to remember the invented history.

“As you might remember back then, we tried the diplomatic route: [U.N. Resolution] 1441 was a unanimous vote in the Security Council that said disclose, disarm or face serious consequences. So the choice was his [Hussein’s] to make. And he made a choice that has subsequently caused him to lose his life.”

In the frequent repetition of this claim, Bush never acknowledges the fact that Hussein did comply with Resolution 1441 by declaring accurately that he had disposed of his WMD stockpiles and by permitting U.N. inspectors to examine any site of their choosing. [For more on Bush's Iraq War deceptions, see Consortiumnews.com’s “Bush’s Killer Talking Points.”]

Prominent Washington journalists have even repeated Bush’s lie as their own. For instance, in a July 2004 interview, ABC’s veteran newsman Ted Koppel used it to explain why he – Koppel – thought the invasion of Iraq was justified.

“It did not make logical sense that Saddam Hussein, whose armies had been defeated once before by the United States and the Coalition, would be prepared to lose control over his country if all he had to do was say, ‘All right, U.N., come on in, check it out,” Koppel told Amy Goodman, host of “Democracy Now.”

Of course, Hussein did tell the U.N. to “come on in, check it out.” But he did so in the real history, not in the faux reality that now governs Washington.