A Man of One Principle: Whatever It Takes to Get Elected
It is difficult but not impossible to conduct strictly honest business. What is true is that honesty is incompatible with the amassing of a large fortune.
— Mahatma Gandhi
WC has written before about The Mitt’s ongoing problem with the truth. Or even simple consistency. It’s increasingly apparent that The Mitt has only one principle that guides him: he is prepared to do and say whatever it takes to get elected. The truth doesn’t matter. The facts don’t matter. Consistency its irrelevant. All that matters to him is that he is elected president. WC truly believes The Mitt would sell his wife and children if he thought it would make him president of the United States.
WC has no way of knowing if The Mitt’s problem with the truth is a result of Ghandi’s aphorism. Certainly The Mitt became very wealthy through a fundamentally dishonest, if lawful, means: Bain Capital’s use of leveraged buyouts. Stealing balance sheet equity through LBOs is ethically dubious, at best.
But The Mitt’s willingness to do and say anything necessary to get himself elected goes far beyond being ethically dubious. What does the candidate actually stand for? What are his core principles? Other than getting elected?
WC has met members of the LDS church who have testified, under oath, that in their judgment it was okay for members of the church to lie to gentiles like WC because they were, in fact, gentiles. Elders of the LDS church have told WC that’s just not church doctrine. And WC is inclined to believe them. But it would explain so much about The Mitt.
Abortion. For it, then against it. Mandatory health insurance. For it, then against it. A fixed date for withdrawal from Afghanistan. He was against it and now he is for it. Military action against Iran? He’s for it and against it. Climate change is and isn’t happening, is and isn’t caused by humans. Carbon taxes are and aren’t a good idea. Sometimes WC gets dizzy as The Mitt switches positions to suit the moment.
He vetoed 800 bills from a Democratic Massachusetts legislature in his four years as governor – and spent his final year out of state boasting about them to right-wing audiences. But now he claims to be bipartisan.
The Mitt’s hair color is fake, and so is his tan.
He even flip-flops on flip-flopping.
Paul Waldman says,
As the end of this election approaches, it’s worth taking a step back and asking this question: In the entire history of the United States of America, from George Washington’s election in 1789 on down, has there been a single candidate as unmoored from ideological principle or belief as Mitt Romney? I’m not just throwing an insult here, I ask this question sincerely. Because I can’t think of any.
Andrew Sullivan says,
Romney is a chilling shape-shifter who played a far right candidate for nine months and Mr Rogers for one. Can you trust such a man in the Oval Office? How do we have any idea what he’d do? His refusal to provide the math on how his budget plans work, and his endorsement of Obama’s foreign policy the other night while retaining all the war-mongers for the Israeli right among his advisers, completes the picture.
Yes, he wants as badly as anyone in American history to be elected president. But what does he stand for? What are his core values? More importantly, how can anyone possibly know for certain?
Andrew Sullivan has raised some important points about Mitt’s stated faith commitment.
http://tinyurl.com/sullivanromneymormon
It’s noticeable that Mitt’s acknowledged faith commitment is not raised as an issue, apparently on the notion that one’s faith is a private matter, while wild assertions about Obama’s faith have roiled since they were first raised by the Hillary Clinton campaign. Her campaign’s charges about Rev. Wright and allegations about his “ties” to the Nation of Islam’s Elijah Muhammad and Louis Farrakhan were picked up by the GOP and never allowed to drop. (those “ties” were nothing more than they were all from Chicago) Added to those are the continual charges that he is “secretly Muslim.”
So the oddity is we have one candidate who, for half his life on this earth, believed that blacks were biblically cursed, until one day–poof!! presto chango!!–he no longer believed it because somebody in Salt Lake City claimed to have had a reverse revelation. Then, the other candidate is one who embodies in his very being the racial diversity that is widespread throughout the world, but it’s THIS GUY who is pilloried on racial grounds.
There’s more about Mitt’s Mormonism. “Mitt Romney & The Ghosts of Mormon History” by ex-Mormon Mikal Gilmore is in the October 25, 2012 issue of Rolling Stone. It’s the issue with Taylor Swift on the cover because of her “Red” album. In the Sullivan piece above, you’ll see the video embed of Tim Russert Qn’ing Mitt about the racial tenets of Mormonism, and Mitt’s oh-so-carefully-phrased response. This RS article points out that, while Mitt is of course the scion of his own dad, George Romney, who was truly bold in his civil rights commitment toward blacks, Mitt is also the scion of Parley Pratt who figured prominently in the introduction of that racist theological tenet in Mormonism. While Mitt claims in the Russert interview that he was a participant with his dad, I am unaware of any history on his part of civil rights demonstrating/marching with his dad or any other circumstance. In fact, you have pointed out, WC, in a previous blog post, about Mitt’s prep school confrontation during which he led bullies in an attack against their fellow student whom they suspected of being gay.
He seems to have no moral grounding at all despite the resort to references to his faith and church activity as some sort of proof of moral grounding. He reminds me of Nixon in that respect, who also tried to point to his mother’s (!!) Quakerism as some sort of indication of his moral grounding. But with Nixon, while one couldn’t trust him, he could be understood in terms of power as the center of his being–pursuit of power and the exercise of power. With Mitt, however, I get no sense that there is any center at all. If it is merely the attainment of this office for the sake of that accomplishment, then it seems he could go in any direction without any purpose other than whatever may be prevailing at the moment. He is that much more dangerous than Nixon in that respect.
Paul Eaglin
Fairbanks
paul2eaglin
October 29, 2012 at 9:18 am
WC, the LDS church elders were lying to you. They all believe they can lie in word and deed in order to promote their own religious agenda. Mitt is a Bishop in the Mormon Church.
Kate McLaughlin
October 29, 2012 at 9:35 am
One of the latest instances of his penchant for untruth as reflected in his campaign leadership style is the airing in Ohio of the ads regarding Jeep production in China. The auto industry in Ohio was saved due to Obama’s leadership. By airing those, the Romney campaign is trying to instill fear that American jobs are being lost to China. That is not happening; they’re increasing here in the USA, in Ohio, specifically. Chrysler has responded vehemently to state that it is increasing auto jobs in Ohio and that its survival and success due to the auto bailout has enabled Jeep to begin producing product in China. So there are no American jobs being lost to China. Its success and survival has enabled it to increase production elsewhere in the world at a cost that is favorable and at a customer price that is competitive.
I wonder if it occurs to the Romney campaign that the world is watching? Perhaps it doesn’t matter to them that he and his team are perceived as untruthful and untrustworthy. He would not be regarded as a leader and no other country would trust his administration.
Paul Eaglin
Fairbanks
paul2eaglin
October 30, 2012 at 10:11 am