Thread: Mitt Romney

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Ain't just me bud...



Heh...Rolling Stone stripped the story. Doesn't fit the narrative you know!

George Soros In A Panic Romney Can Win

A few months ago, he probably had reason to be nervous- Obamas lead was slowly but consistently diminishing. Quite a lot has changed since then.

George has just slung some loose change at three superPAC's incidentally:-
Soros donates $1.5 million to pro-Obama super PACs - The Washington Post

Originally Posted by Boon Mee

MSNBC Caught--Again--Twisting Video to Attack Romney

Oh my! Truly shocking.

Fox News saw a niche and made a billion dollars catering to it. MSNBC saw their success and makes half a billion dollars catering to the other extreme. Both of them are all about cheap to produce, talking head programming that puts bucks before the truth.

I am calling the election today on September 29th.

Obama will win this. The data is too solid in the states that now matter.

The debates will not change anything as they are carefully scripted and nothing new will come out of them be it good or bad.

Originally Posted by barbaro

The debates will not change anything as they are carefully scripted and nothing new will come out of them be it good or bad.

Yes they will, the debate will add even a bigger margin for Obama. Mitt cant talk without a script or he says things like he thinks airplane windows should open.

Originally Posted by aging one

Originally Posted by barbaro

The debates will not change anything as they are carefully scripted and nothing new will come out of them be it good or bad.

Yes they will, the debate will add even a bigger margin for Obama. Mitt cant talk without a script or he says things like he thinks airplane windows should open.

AO, the airplane window thing? It was a joke - OK? 'Ol Mitt says anything the least controversial and the liberal media is all over it.

btw, uh...which one of the two candidates cannot work w/out a teleprompter?

Originally Posted by Humbert

Originally Posted by Boon Mee

MSNBC Caught--Again--Twisting Video to Attack Romney

Oh my! Truly shocking.
Callin' BS on this one Bert.

Fox News doesn't doctor audio/ like NBC does.

Fox News saw a niche and made a billion dollars catering to it. MSNBC saw their success and makes half a billion dollars catering to the other extreme. Both of them are all about cheap to produce, talking head programming that puts bucks before the truth.

Calling bullshit on this one Bert.

fox doesn't doctor audio like MSNBC does...

^No? I'll be happy to direct you to Media Matters for America where you can find hundreds of examples.

Originally Posted by Humbert

^No? I'll be happy to direct you to Media Matters for America where you can find hundreds of examples.

Yes...we're sure of that.

Bottom line, Lamestream Media is so in the bag for Obama they will say and do anything to keep him in power. You see, if Romeny should win, their Narrative for the entire time they've been carrying water for Obama would be shown up as entirely false and they shown to be the fools they are for supporting an empty suit.

2%

what else is there to say

From Bill Buck

In a bit of political satire in Politico, Paul Ryan is now calling Mitt Romney “The Stench”, as in stench of defeat, and Team Romney refers to Paul Ryan as “Gilligan”. While it may be just humor, it has the air of hitting pretty close to the mark. Ryan and Romney don’t look too comfortable with each other these days.
Where is the bromance we saw in August?
Apparently the bloom is off that rose.
There is an old saying on the trail that you can’t spell campaign without “pain” – while not literally true the pain of the campaign was broadcast across Paul Ryan’s wincing face when Mitt Romney had a moment of unguarded honesty in Ohio.
Romney said, accurately, that President Obama had not raised taxes in the last four years. That moment of candor undercut the Romney/Ryan tickets messaging big time.
Team Romney quickly issued (another) so-called-correction on behalf of their presidential candidate.
But the video of Romney saying what is true and Ryan reacting to it cannot be rolled back with a blasted out email from the Romney Self Inflicted Wound Rapid Response Team.
Ryan, however, is not the only Republican to go rogue on his boss.
Perhaps the relationship began to unravel in a moment of Paul Ryan’s unguarded honesty when he called Romney’s words at a Florida fundraiser “inelegant” and “inarticulate”.
It’s not like Paul Ryan did not witness the Romney disaster of a primary campaign where every time he popped up in the polls he shot himself in the foot. With all the money he could need, Romney was unable to easily dispatch of a former speaker of the House who resigned in disgrace or a former senator that sat at one percent in the polls for over a year and was voted out of office in Pennsylvania by a landslide.
Is Paul Ryan so delusional that he thought he could fix the campaign?
The answer, apparently, is yes.
Ryan is part of a flotilla of Republicans abandoning the Romney ship in September.
In the history of Presidential campaigns it is unheard of for a campaign co-chair to leave the campaign seven weeks out to take a job in the private sector. But that is just what Romney co-chair, two-time vice presidential nominee runner-up and Minnesota Republican Tim Pawlenty did.
He left to take a job as a Wall Street lobbyist that he could have easily taken in November. By why defer the month and a half of extra money for a losing campaign?

As for the other runner-ups in the Romney veepstakes? They are starting their presidential campaigns with forays into Iowa. In September. Before the election.
Across the country candidates for the House and Senate have seen their internal polling. Mitt Romney is dragging them down with him.
In Massachusetts, Scott Brown who the GOP is counting on in the Senate, is running an ad for himself where President Obama says “good job” to him. He is literally embracing Romney’s opponent.
Across the border in Connecticut, Linda McMahon is likewise running away from the top of the GOP ticket.
But it is not just in blue states where Obama will easily win on November 6. It is a national phenomenon.
In Nevada , Virginia and Hawaii, candidates have all distanced themselves from Romney and his disparaging comments about the 47 percent.
Susana Martinez, the Republican Governor of New Mexico who spoke for Romney at the Republican National Convention, likewise sought to distance herself from Romney’s comments.
With friends like these, who needs enemies?
But the toughest words for Romney are coming from the Republican pundits that always knew Romney was not up to the task.
This parting of the ways is a huge strategic problem for Republicans. The Republican National Committee is sitting on tens of millions of dollars it can spend on television but it must be done in coordination with the Romney campaign and Senate and House candidates.
These “party building ads” do not work if they do more harm to the House and Senate candidates as Romney’s numbers nosedive.
The Super PACs have a similar problem. If they write off Romney then he loses more support and the job of lifting down ballot Republicans gets that much harder.
Romney is dragging every Republican down and House and Senate Republican operatives have conceded as much throughout the month of September.
The fact that it is September and the GOP is abandoning Mitt Romney in droves gives Democrats hope that what was unthinkable in the spring – an Obama reelection that increases seats in the Senate and a potential takeover of the House – may be within their reach.

I notice most of the far right posters in issues here have been pretty tight lipped of late. Seeing that the ship is sinking fast must hurt for all those on in the alternative reality of the right wing circus. More bad news from a right leaning source no less..

DENVER — Everybody watching this weekend’s Redskins game saw the ad featuring Mitt Romney saying it. In focus groups, pollsters only have to say “47 percent” for voters to know what they’re talking about. And lest anyone in Ohio or Florida or Virginia forget, President Obama reminds them at each of his campaign stops.

The remarks in question were, as most of the country now knows, uttered by Romney in May to wealthy donors at a private fundraiser, at which he said that 47 percent of Americans will support Obama’s reelection and are government freeloaders who pay no income taxes, see themselves as “victims” and can’t be persuaded to “take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”

In the two weeks since a surreptitious video of the remarks surfaced, they have pierced the national consciousness in a way that few blunders do. In the closing stretch of the presidential campaign, the moment has become a defining element of Romney’s candidacy.

And on Wednesday, the 47 percent issue is likely to come to the fore in an even more pronounced way, during the first presidential debate. Romney’s advisers — who acknowledge that the moment has hurt the Republican nominee among independent voters in battleground states — said he has rehearsed debate answers in which he argues that he is for “the 100 percent” and that his policy prescriptions would help the growing number of Americans under Obama’s presidency who are struggling to find work or living on food stamps.

“We wouldn’t be surprised, obviously, if that came up in the debate, and the governor’s prepared, obviously, to respond to that,” senior adviser Ed Gillespie told reporters Monday. “We believe the voters will see and appreciate the fact that what Governor Romney’s talking about would improve the quality of life for 100 percent of Americans.”

Ticking through a slew of economic statistics that make up the Republican indictment of Obama, Gillespie previewed Romney’s message: that he is running to help the 23 million Americans who are struggling to get jobs, the one in six who find themselves in poverty, the additional 15 million now relying on food stamps and the 50 percent of college graduates who can’t find employment.

But before Romney has a chance to say all that, his “47 percent” has already taken a toll, strategists in both parties said. The comments go to the heart of the way Obama is trying to define the race: not as a referendum on his stewardship of the economy, but as a choice between a president who fights for the middle class and a candidate who fights for the few.

“The Obama guys are pouring the coals on this on TV and driving it,” Republican strategist Alex Castellanos said. “You inform with reason, and you persuade with emotion. They’ve made the rational case that Romney’s policies would hurt the middle class, and this is the emotional counterpart.”

Castellanos, who advised Romney’s 2008 campaign but is not affiliated with his current one, said there is reason for the Republican’s team to be alarmed. “The only thing in politics that is worse than voters deciding that they don’t like you is when voters decide you don’t like them,” he said.

The Obama campaign has widely circulated a television ad that shows images of factory workers, veterans and families against audio of Romney’s 47 percent comments. The spot has a significant footprint, airing across each battleground state in nearly every local television market where the Obama campaign is doing any advertising. It is being shown not only during newscasts but also during such mainstream network programming as NFL games and “Saturday Night Live,” according to CMAG Kantar Media.

Romney’s comments about the 47 percent are weighing him down with voters, according to recent polls. Almost six in 10 voters nationally say that as president, he would do more to favor the wealthy than the middle class, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll released Monday. Specifically regarding the remarks, respondents to a Post-ABC poll from last week were displeased with Romney’s viewpoint: Fifty-four percent had an unfavorable impression of his comments, compared with 32 percent who had a favorable view.

Helped by Obama’s advertising effort, Romney’s 47 percent comments have had a shelf life beyond the damaging remarks he made earlier in the campaign, such as how he likes “being able to fire people who provide services to me,” or that he knows what it’s like to worry about getting a “pink slip,” or the $10,000 bet he once wagered during a debate.

This is in part because his remarks in the fundraiser video could not be dismissed as a gaffe. Longtime Democratic strategist Robert Shrum said many voters who recognize how awkward Romney can be at his rallies may have seen how fluent and comfortable he was at that fundraiser in Boca Raton, Fla., and concluded, “Wow, that really is the real Romney.”

“We could have a big debate about deficit reduction, and it doesn’t reach most people except for the headline. This is the kind of thing where the morning after, the week after, people get a cup of coffee, and they mention it to each other. It catches the popular imagination. And if Romney loses, it will become a benchmark and a hallmark of the campaign,” said Shrum, a top strategist on Al Gore’s and John Kerry’s presidential bids.

Romney’s brain trust understands this. Publicly, his advisers have said that the comments help crystallize a contrast in the two candidates’ governing philosophies: between what Romney sees as a society based on government dependence and one based on free enterprise.

Campaigning last week in Ohio, Romney repeatedly said that he was running to help all Americans — language that advisers said he is likely to reprise in the debate. “I think the president cares about the people of America; I care about all the people in America,” Romney said. “But I know how to help the people of America and make sure our future’s bright and prosperous for our kids and protect liberty, and he does not. I know what it takes.”

Privately, another Romney adviser said that there is “no question it’s had an impact.”

“I don’t think there’s any question it’s cut, and it’s best left alone. Trying to explain it is not helpful. The issue is how long does it hurt, and there is some minuscule but nonetheless hopeful sense that some is beginning to ebb,” said the adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to offer a candid assessment.

The adviser added, optimistically, that voters could give Romney the benefit of the doubt in the debate. “That’s the only time he has to adequately explain it, and people might actually pay attention to his answer,” the adviser said.

Romney’s ‘47 percent’ comments aren’t going away - The Washington Post

Mother Jones' list of questions for Obama to ask Romney during the debates regarding Romney's federal taxes. I'd like to hear the answers to these.

1. Your IRA retirement fund is worth as much as $100 million, but federal law limits IRA contributions to $30,000 a year. In light of this, how did you manage to sock away such a massive nest egg?

2. In 2010, your financial manager closed out your Swiss UBS bank account, essentially saying that your money had been invested there to hedge against the US dollar. Should your extensive holdings in offshore investments, such as the one in Switzerland, be read as a sign that you don't have much faith in American banks or the American economy?

3. Did you participate in the 2009 UBS amnesty program, in which thousands of Americans who were illegally avoiding taxes by parking cash in the Switzerland-based bank's accounts were allowed to come clean with the IRS without facing criminal penalties?

4. Gifts above $10 million are subject to a 35 percent tax. Describe how you were able to put $100 million into a trust fund for your children and grandchildren without paying any gift taxes on the money.

5. While working at Bain Capital, much of your compensation came in the form of something known as carried interest rather than ordinary income. The arrangement allowed you to avoid paying income taxes in the range of 35 percent, and instead pay capital gains taxes, which are 15 percent, a significant reduction. Why shouldn't the returns on the labor you put in to managing a private equity fund be taxed as ordinary income?

6. Your severance agreement with Bain Capital has paid you millions of dollars for the services you performed at Bain. Did you pay the Medicare tax on those amounts, and if not, why not?

7. Beginning in the 1990s, American companies started using a tax shelter known as "The Son of Boss," which ended up costing the federal government $6 billion. As head of the audit committee on Marriott International's board, you approved such a shelter, in which Marriott used fictional losses to lower its taxes. Why?

8. A Senate investigation has found that the use of tax havens costs the US treasury at least $100 billion a year and contributes significantly to the national debt. If you are elected, would you lead a crackdown on financial secrecy in places like the British Virgin Islands or the Cayman Islands, where Bain Capital has many of its investment funds?

9. You've said that one reason big American companies are doing well is that they know how to avoid taxes by moving their money offshore to tax havens. By doing this, however, big companies out-compete smaller businesses (which can't use tax havens) based on a factor that has nothing to do with real productivity. Given that the small businesses are often the innovators and job creators, do you view these tax avoidance strategies as beneficial or harmful to the US economy and the US treasury?

10. How does your support for the use of tax havens by US companies square with your pointed criticism of the 47 percent of Americans who don't pay income taxes?

11. In 2000, under your leadership, Bain Capital was involved in a deal in Italy in which your company reaped $1 billion in profits from a leveraged buyout. The investors in the deal believe they were ripped off, as does the Italian government, which was unable to tax the Bain profits thanks to the company's use of an offshore tax haven, which directed this windfall back to the US tax-free. Italy's financial crisis has been exacerbated by tax scofflaws and the failure of its citizens to pay taxes. Do you support a global crackdown on tax havens that would allow financially strapped countries to legally tax income produced within their borders?

11 Debate Questions for Romney on Taxes | Mother Jones

More signs the noose is tightening around Mitts neck...

Massachusetts Republican Senator Scott Brown, pressed this week as to whether he’s distancing himself from his party’s presidential nominee, avoided a direct answer, saying he and Mitt Romney are “two different people.”

“He’s out campaigning all over the country,” Brown said of Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, at an Oct. 1 debate against Democratic challenger Elizabeth Warren. “I’m running in Massachusetts.”

From Boston to Honolulu, Senate Republican candidates are putting some space between themselves and their nominee as President Barack Obama opens a lead in national and state polls.

In Connecticut, Linda McMahon stayed away from Sept. 30 fundraisers headlined by Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan. In Nevada, U.S. Representative Dean Heller skipped a chance to share the stage with Romney at a Sept. 21 rally at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. In a North Dakota television ad, Republican Senator Rick Berg says he’ll “serve as a check on Obama’s failed policies,” a phrase that skips past Election Day and Romney’s chances of winning.

Only one Republican in a competitive Senate race has aired a campaign ad in which he appears alongside Romney -- Indiana State Treasurer Richard Mourdock.

Most of the competitive Senate seats are outside the presidential battleground, meaning those races already were somewhat isolated from Romney’s campaign. That gap began to widen as congressional candidates condemned a secretly recorded video that surfaced Sept. 17 in which Romney told donors that 47 percent of Americans see themselves as “victims” who feel entitled to government aid.
Survival First

“People running in campaigns look out for their own survival first, and they have little to gain and much potentially to lose by embracing Romney,” said John Pitney , a political scientist and professor at Claremont McKenna College in Claremont, California.

Democrats with close races in Republican-leaning states are adopting similar strategies. Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill and West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin skipped the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina last month.

In North Dakota, both candidates are seeking to unhinge their messages -- and prospects -- from the top of their party’s ticket.

Former North Dakota attorney general Heidi Heitkamp, who is running against Berg, told the Associated Press in May that Obama “failed in the one test America had for him, which was to unite the country.”
‘Absolutely’ Didn’t Agree

Berg told The Washington Post on Sept. 20 that he “absolutely” didn’t agree with Romney’s assessment of 47 percent of Americans. “From my perspective, we need to help people up,” Berg said. “We need to lift them up, help them have the opportunity to succeed.”

Brian Walsh, the National Republican Senatorial Committee communications director, said the trend won’t prevent the party from working as a team if Romney is elected.

“The difference between the two parties is striking, while Democratic candidates want to talk about anything but their big government record, Republicans up-and-down the ticket are united around a message of lower taxes, reining-in wasteful spending, and rolling back government regulations that are hurting job growth,” he said.

“Of course there will always be occasions every presidential cycle where candidates disagree on certain issues,” Walsh said. Romney’s campaign didn’t respond to requests for comment.

In addition to Berg, Brown rejected Romney’s comments about government aid recipients, noting his mother once received public assistance.
Engaging Democrats

Of all the candidates, Brown has moved the furthest from Romney, at times crossing the partisan line and engaging the Democratic camp.

At this week’s debate, Brown said he was “honored to stand with the president and the White House” at a signing ceremony for legislation Brown sponsored to ban insider trading by members of Congress. A Brown campaign ad shows an image of the first-term Republican shaking hands with Obama at the ceremony as the Democratic president tells Brown “Good Job.” It ran more than 1,000 times between Aug. 26 and Sept. 24, according to New York-based Kantar Media’s CMAG, which tracks advertising.

Obama leads Romney in Massachusetts, while polls indicate the Senate race is close, with Warren, a Harvard University professor, narrowly edging Brown in some surveys. Sixty percent of likely Massachusetts voters prefer Obama, compared with 32 percent for Romney, according to a WBUR poll conducted Sept. 26- 28. The survey, based on telephone interviews with 504 likely voters, had a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percent.
McMahon Race

In Connecticut, McMahon rejected Romney’s comments about 47 percent of Americans, saying “the vast majority of those who rely on government are not in that situation because they want to be.” She is running against Democratic U.S. Representative Chris Murphy for the seat of retiring independent Senator Joe Lieberman.

Eli Zupnick, a spokesman for Murphy, said in a statement that McMahon’s decision not to attend the Ryan events showed she wanted to “run” from her party’s presidential ticket.

Murphy’s campaign also tried to use the Ryan fundraising visit to tie McMahon to the vice presidential nominee’s proposal to revamp Medicare, the government’s health-care program for the elderly.
Ryan Plan

Starting in 2023, Ryan’s plan would convert Medicare into a voucher program, offering seniors a fixed-dollar amount of support based on a competitive bidding process.

McMahon’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment.

Two days before Heller skipped Romney’s Las Vegas rally, he told reporters in Washington that he doesn’t “view the world the same way” as Romney when it comes to people who receive government assistance. Heller, who was appointed last year to fill a seat left open by Republican Senator John Ensign’s resignation, is in a competitive race against Democratic U.S. Representative Shelley Berkley.

In Obama’s home state of Hawaii, Republican Linda Lingle told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser Sept. 19 that she was “not responsible for the statements of Mitt Romney,” adding that she didn’t “agree with his characterization of all individuals who are receiving government assistance.”

Republicans in Close Senate Races Keep Romney at Distance - Businessweek

Originally Posted by S Landreth

It’s just about 1 month before the election and let’s see what Dim Mitt’s chances are for winning the election.

7.8%

114,000 JOBS CREATED IN SEPTEMBER, UNEMPLOYMENT FALLS TO 7.8 PERCENT

According to the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the economy created 114,000 jobs in September, with the unemployment rate falling to 7.8 percent. Analysts had expected about 110,000 jobs to be created. The private sector added 110,00 jobs, while the public sector ended a long slide by adding 10,000 jobs. July’s jobs number was revised up by 40,000 jobs, while August’s number was revised up by 46,000. The wider U-6 measure of underemployment was unchanged at 14.7 percent.


Not a chance: 114,000 Jobs Created In September, Unemployment Falls To 7.8 Percent

As I read that poll Romney's chances have improved considerably. He is now in double digits

Romney is more deluded than i originally thought........

Mr Romney said the US was missing "an historic opportunity to win new friends who share our values in the Middle East" and said there was "a longing for American leadership" in region.

BBC News - Mitt Romney: US foreign policy 'must change course'

Originally Posted by buriramboy

"a longing for American leadership"

Straight out of the Zionist playbook, from our favorite little Menschurian candidate.

Is Romney losing Vets? Well, one type of Vet was almost certainly written off by Fidogate- but the other type he has dome litlle but insult too.

An endorsement for Obama from a Vietnam Vet, and former Republican Senator from Sth Dakota for 22 years-


As a combat veteran of two tours in Vietnam with twenty-two years of service as a Republican member of the U.S. House and Senate, I endorse President Barack Obama for a second term as our Commander-in-Chief. Candidates publicly praise our service members, veterans and their families, but President Obama supports them in word and deed, anywhere and every time.

As a Vietnam vet, one of the reasons I support President Obama is because he has consistently shown he understands that our commitment to our servicemen and women may begin when they put on their uniform, but that it must never end.

This decision is not easy for any lifelong Republican. In 2008 I voted for Barack Obama, the first time I ever voted for a Democrat, because the Republican Party was drifting toward a dangerous path that put extreme party ideology above national interest. Mitt Romney heads a party remaining on that dangerous path, proving the emptiness of their praise as they abandon our service members, veterans and military families along the way.

What really set me off was Romney's reference to 47% of Americans to be written off -- including any veteran collecting disability like myself, as a post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) veteran.

..... , I find it offensive that Romney, Congressman Paul Ryan and their Republican Party are politicizing the death of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other brave Americans who lost their lives in Libya. Being Commander-in-Chief requires a resolve and steadiness that's immune to politics and fear


.... And as former member of the U.S. Senate Budget Committee, the Senate Finance Committee and Chairman of the then Commerce Committee, I came to know the federal budget in detail. I'm disappointed that just as our troops are returning home after a decade of war, Romney and Ryan might gut by up to 20 percent investments in the Department of Veterans Affairs -- and even suggest privatizing the veterans' health care. Again, they would short change our national security and the education, health care and employment benefits our veterans have earned and deserve just to cut taxes for the wealthiest Americans.

Let's be clear, Romney and Ryan would be disastrous for America's service members, veterans and military families. Public praise rings hollow when you fail to mention an ongoing war in accepting your party's nomination to be president, or veterans in a speech to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, a so-called jobs plan or in a budget that should be a blue print of our nation's values.
Larry Pressler: Republican Senator, Vietnam Veteran Endorses President Obama


Why did Mitt totally ignore Vets in his campaigning? Guilt complex perhaps, but it is unheard of for a Republican to give them such short shrift.

Originally Posted by sabang

Is Romney losing Vets?

Poll: 66 Percent Of Military Members Support Romney « CBS DC

The poll could be skewed a bit.

The Military Times conducted the poll through a secure email survey of military members subscribed to the newspaper.