Mitt Romney is often his own worst enemy

The Salt Lake Tribune ^ | 1-11/08 | RB Scott

[1Old Pro]

If there were only 3 candidates, Mclame, Rootie or romney who would you vote for?

[Manic_Episode]

That’s a painful question and I can only really say with any certainty is definitely not Rudy, but the best I can give on the other two is it’s too hard to think about and I hope it doesn’t come to that.

[Graybeard58]

Write in Fred Thompson.

[Diamond]

A RINO nut, like his father.

"...He would rhapsodize about the '64 GOP convention in San Francisco when his proud father rose indignantly and stalked out, a visually arresting slap at the heavy-handed soldiers of the radical right..."

"...At long last, will the moderate independent thinker who was an early supporter of the nonpartisan Concord Coalition [gag] that promoted fiscally sound and socially responsible public policies , the real Mitt Romney, finally stand-up?"
[sound and visual effects mine]

Cordially,

[NavVet]

I agree.

[Manic_Episode]

I’m leaning that way but haven’t fully committed....yet...if it comes to that.....but probably maybe.

[1Old Pro]

I hope it doesn’t come to that.

Hope gave us 8 years of Bill Clintoon.

[Manic_Episode]

"Hope gave us 8 years of Bill Clintoon."

=============================

Okay, now I'm fully committed. Thanks for the help.

[Diamond]

***EDIT***

"...At long last, will the moderate independent thinker who was an early supporter of the nonpartisan Concord Coalition [gag] that promoted fiscally sound and socially responsible public policies, [PUKE!] the real Mitt Romney, finally stand-up?"
[sound and visual effects mine]

[Utah Binger]

Oh, so Huckabee is perfect. Ha! You make me laugh so hard I almost peeed my pants.

Now that bears repeating.

Huckleberry the perfect one causes Saundra to lose it. Too much cocoa this morning?

LOL

[esarlls3]

Cain, Ham, and the whole negro race have been cursed with a black skin, the mark of Cain, so they can be identified as a caste apart, a people with whom the other descendants of Adam should not intermarry.” Apostle Bruce R. McConkie (1915 – 1985): - Apostle Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, p. 114

I will point out that Bruce R. McConkie was not an Apostle when he wrote the book Mormon Doctrine. Further, the book is not a Church publication and thus not sanctioned as a correct reflection of the doctrine of the LDS Church.

The LDS Church has stated

The Book of Mormon attests that God invites “all to come unto him and partake of his goodness; and he denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; . . . and all are alike unto God” (2 Nephi 26:33). In our present day the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles have stated that all human beings are created in the image of God and that each is a beloved spirit son or daughter of Deity (“The Family: A Proclamation to the World,” 23 Sept. 1995, published in Ensign, Nov. 1995, 102).

More recently, LDS Church President Gordon B. Hinckley rebuked those with racist attitudes in April 2006 (link):

I remind you that no [person] who makes disparaging remarks concerning those of another race can consider himself a true disciple of Christ. Nor can he consider himself to be in harmony with the teachings of the Church of Christ. How can any man holding the Melchizedek Priesthood arrogantly assume that he is eligible for the priesthood whereas another who lives a righteous life but whose skin is of a different color is ineligible?

Let us all recognize that each of us is a son or daughter of our Father in Heaven, who loves all of His children.

There is no basis for racial hatred among the [membership] of this Church. If any within the sound of my voice is inclined to indulge in this, then let him go before the Lord and ask for forgiveness and be no more involved in such.

---

Returning to the subject of the article, the complaints here are exactly why Romney is not at the top of my list. Glenn Beck recently tried to humanize Romney during a recent interview:

GLENN: You know, Mitt, I alienate almost every person that is ever on this program that is running for office because I'm honest and in hopes that I don't do that with you, let me ask an honest question. One of the things about Barack Obama that people like is that he admits mistakes, he has mistakes, people look at him and say he's an awful lot like me. If I were running a company, I would want you to be the CEO, no questions asked because you are never going to make a mistake. You are so good and so well put together. I mean, look at your hair, man. You piss me off. What is it about Mitt Romney where there is a struggle? Where is the struggle in your life?

GOVERNOR ROMNEY: Well, you know, everybody has struggles and not everybody sees what they are. I think probably the greatest challenge that we've had in our life is of a personal nature when my wife and sweetheart got diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1998 and that continues to be something that we work with and that we battle. We don't show that. We don't describe that to voters.

Well, that's good. Having a family member struggle with a disease is a trial I wouldn't wish on anyone. But Glenn is looking for something more personal:

GLENN: What is the thing, Mitt, that you have struggled with that you have overcome? What is the thing that you -- what is the part of you that, you know, you're like, if I could change one thing, it would be this?

GOVERNOR ROMNEY: Oh, gosh, Glenn. There's so many things I'd like to change, you know, and I think everybody feels the same way. There are, without question there are folks, so many more people I'd like to be able to help that I'm not able to help. There are times when I'm more selfish than I ought to be. You know, I must admit I'd rather spend time with my family than anybody else and so a lot of friends wonder why I don't spend more time with them. But look, and did I have challenges as a kid, yeah. Yeah, there are some things I did as a kid I'm not proud of. But I really don't think it's helpful if you are running for President to stand up and talk about those kind of problems because I think it opens up the door to kids to say, oh, if the guy who's running for President or is President, if he did that, well, then I can do it, too.

GLENN: Right. I'm not looking to --

GOVERNOR ROMNEY: I'm willing to say what George Bush said which is when I was young and irresponsible, I was young and irresponsible. And I got in trouble now and then and people have heard about some of those times and yet I don't really dwell on those because I don't think it's a good thing for our kids to hear.

GLENN: I'm not asking you to come out with some skeleton in the closet. What I'm saying to you is you are so put together. People describe it as slick. I don't. I think you're well put together. You're a guy who I want running my company, but what they don't see is they don't see the human side. They don't see the struggle side. They don't see, man, I have had to conquer these things. And I'm not asking for a revelation.

GOVERNOR ROMNEY: Well, Glenn, you'll have to help me a bit but, you know, when I went to school, when I went to Brigham Young University, I went there and worked in school and then I moved back east and got into Harvard and I figured I'm going to flunk out of this place; I can't possibly make it. And I worked harder, sitting down in the library studying than probably any other student in the school because I was afraid I was going to flunk out. And I worked real hard and I did well, but I did it by working hard and, you know, then I came out of school and I went, got my first job and I again worked really darn hard because I wanted to do well there and I was able to do well but, you know, you don't do well and become the head of the company unless your daddy owns it, and my daddy didn't own this company. I had no connection with the company. I didn't inherit any money. I worked real hard and found myself able to get to the top of the company and then I started a business of my own and was able to build it to be successful. Then I went on to the Olympics and, boy, they were in trouble. I mean, talk about a struggle. I couldn't sleep for the first couple of weeks there very well because I was just terrified. I got used to the terror as time went on and we were able to turn the games around. So I've been in a number of settings that have been in trouble and the only answer I've got is that I do my best to work hard, to put my faith in my family and my creator, work as hard as I can. And by the way, I don't always succeed. I ran against Ted Kennedy. I got trounced by the big guy. And it wasn't easy getting beat by Ted Kennedy. You know, for about six months Ann and I -- well, we weren't depressed clinically but we felt pretty darn low and, you know, it's just the nature of life. You have some successes and failures. In business I had some failures.

GLENN: All right.

GOVERNOR ROMNEY: I had some things I did that didn't work out and, you know, you learn from that and you move on. But I don't know that there's anybody who's lived a particularly charmed life but I think you learn from your failures as much as anything and I'm planning on unfortunately more than a couple of failures in my future.

I don't think Mitt ever understood what Glenn was asking for. It seems Romney's idea of a struggle is finding a way to generate a quarterly report that will inspire people to invest in your company.

My preferences remain:

• Hunter (+best on issues, +consistent record, -can't run a campaign)
• Thompson (+good on issues, =learning to campaign?, -CFR)
• Romney (+good on issues [today, must trust changes from past], +good campaign, +great speaker, -past positions, -pandering)

  ---

• McCain (acceptable on some issues, wrong on some important issues, legislative experience)
• Huckabee (acceptable on some issues, wrong on some important issues)

  ---

• Giuliani (acceptable on some issues, wrong on some important issues)
• Paul (acceptable on some issues, wrong on some important issues)

[greyfoxx39]

Do you REALLY believe that if Mitt and Obama are the nominees that the hair-splitting points you raise are going to be even mentioned by the press, much less accepted?

THAT is my point. LDS past racism is NOT going to be left out of the general election if Mitt is nominated. I understand it's hard for some to accept this, but politics is not softball.

[dmw]

Hey! Where’s my ping? Put me on the anti-liberal ping list please. : )

[colorcountry]

You got it. It is a cabal, as one poster calls it. But I’ll add you regardless.

[Domandred]

Mr. Romney an apostle of your church made the following statement. Do you agree with it?

"Forget everything that I have said, or what President Brigham Young or George Q. Cannon or whomsoever has said in days past that is contrary to the present revelation. We spoke with a limited understanding and without the light and knowledge that now has come into the world. We get our truth and our light line upon line and precept upon precept. We have now had added a new flood of intelligence and light on this particular subject, and it erases all the darkness and all the views and all the thoughts of the past. They don’t matter any more." - Bruce R McConkie about the 1978 Revelation.

[JRochelle]

I didn't inherit any money.

Golly gee, another Mitt lie. He had a trust fund. Is that not inheriting money?

Lies, they come so easily for Mitt!

[napscoordinator]

I really think that Independents are his worst enemy. He basically got ripped off on New Hampshire because the Independents went with McCain to screw the election and now in Michigan it might happen again. When you have Republicans voting like Wyoming the reddest state in the union short of Utah than he wins. I no doubt believe if the states ONLY held closed elections Romney would be in extremely great shape. He still would have come in second in Iowa because Huckster really played his religion on his sleeve very well.

[MHGinTN]

"... he set his flacks to parsing and spinning." Wow, have we ever been witness to that campaign strategy! What is more insidious and sleazy to my mind is the way Romney is exploiting the divide between Mormonism and Conservative Chrisitanity in order to try and squelch opposition to him on the grounds of his Mormonism beliefs. If it's a pre-emptive strike meant to prevent the media 'sycophancy for democrats' from exploiting the heresies in mormonism, why is it being so exploited in the primaries?...

I'm left to conclude that his sleazy intention is to buy his way into the nomination by having his minions cry 'bigotry' and 'mormon basher' so the opposition to him because of his cultish beliefs will be squelched resulting in no one left to vote for except the liberal democrat candidate ... and he knows we Conservative Chrisitians will not vote for abortion pushers.

[fieldmarshaldj]

The comment about old singles reveals the world-class a$$hole that Joe Isuzu Romney truly is.

[BlueMoose]

Salt Lake Tribune.... This say it all.