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Romney’s denials about homophobic assault are despicable
NY ALTNEWS ^ | 05/10/2012 | Cliff Weathers

Posted on 05/10/2012 12:10:38 PM PDT by presidio9

There may be a good reason voters can’t get a good bead on Mitt Romney. And it may be because the real Romney has a troubled, sadistic history. High School classmates of Romney recall an incident that’s disturbing to its core. Romney, then a popular senior at the prestigious Cranbrook School in Michigan, disapproved of classmate John Lauber’s long, blond locks, which Romney allegedly took as a clue that Lauber was a homosexual. So Romney assembled a posse of bullies and held the boy down and brutally chopped off his hair.

“He can’t look like that. That’s wrong. Just look at him!” an incensed Romney told Matthew Friedemann, his close friend in the Stevens Hall dorm, according to Friedemann’s recollection. Mitt, the teenaged son of Michigan Gov. George Romney, kept complaining about Lauber’s look, Friedemann recalled.

A few days later, Friedemann entered Stevens Hall off the school’s collegiate quad to find Romney marching out of his own room ahead of a prep school posse shouting about their plan to cut Lauber’s hair. Friedemann followed them to a nearby room where they came upon Lauber, tackled him and pinned him to the ground. As Lauber, his eyes filling with tears, screamed for help, Romney repeatedly clipped his hair with a pair of scissors.

The incident was recalled similarly by five students, who gave their accounts independently of one another. Four of them — Friedemann, now a dentist; Phillip Maxwell, a lawyer; Thomas Buford, a retired prosecutor; and David Seed, a retired principal — spoke on the record. Another former student who witnessed the incident asked not to be named. The men have differing political affiliations, although they mostly lean Democratic. Buford volunteered for Barack Obama’s campaign in 2008. Seed, a registered independent, has served as a Republican county chairman in Michigan. All of them said that politics in no way colored their recollections.

Today, Romney’s actions would be considered a hate crime. The assault itself is a felony.

So is Mitt Romney sorry for his actions 47 years ago? Nope, unlike five of his classmates, the Republican presidential candidate has no recollection of assaulting Lauber. His campaign team put out this statement:

… the former Massachusetts governor has no recollection of the incident.

Why would Mitt Romney not remember straddling another boy and savagely cutting off his hair? Because the event meant nothing to Romney. Lauber was beneath his contempt. He wasn’t human to the young Romney.

But won’t voters find it disturbing is that five classmates vividly recall the event, but Romney doesn’t? Uh oh, time for shake the Romney Etch-A-Sketch…. Oh that brutal attack? It appears Mitt does remember assaulting Lauber, but…

I certainly don’t believe that I thought the fellow was homosexual. That was the furthest thing from our minds back in the 1960s.

And he still hasn’t apologized.

Also Romney is trying to claim that rampant homophobia didn’t exist in the 1960s? Perhaps that’s why it was so easy for homosexual men to come out back then. You better try again Mitt, you’re getting caught in yet another deep, disturbing lie.

Romney’s actions may be decades old, but they highlight a current problem among the Republican Party: Bullying is an acceptable form of punishment to quell dissent and non-conformity. From Ray Kelly’s spying on Muslims and brutal treatment of peaceful Occupy Wall Street voters to Rush Limbaugh’s labeling of independent women as “feminazis,” “sluts,” and “prostitutes,” the GOP has bcome vile, mean, and intolerant at its core.

Lauber died in 2004, so it is too late for Mitt Romney to apologize to him, but it doesn’t mean he shouldn’t apologize to the public for his actions. As a bullied child myself, I find Romney’s actions in 1965 to be beyond contempt. The emotional scars I bear from the bullying and assaults I had to endure during my teenage years still haunt me.I remember my attackers gleeful faces as they heckled and assaulted me. I remember the names they called me, I remember feeling the spit on my cheek, I remember the punches they threw, I remember the helplessness I felt. There are millions of people like me, we were the “retards,” the “fags,” the “geeks,” and the “losers.” You see, it doesn’t matter to us whether Lauber was gay or not. It also doesn’t matter that Romney didn’t attack him for being gay. What matters is that Lauber was physically assaulted for being different, for being subhuman, to being on a lower social stratus than a scion of wealth and affluence.

I have never received an apologies from the bullies that made my life hell. Today, one of them even denies the events ever happened. To me, this only heightens my contempt for bullies; when caught, they feel it’s acceptable for them to dismiss the event. It either didn’t occur or didn’t matter. My contempt for bullying has only grown because of this. And now, I have a new-found contempt for Mitt Romney, America’s lead bully. And his denying the significance of such an event is just as despicable as the assault.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2012electionbias; backstabberromney; benedictromney; bishopromney; dnctalkingpoints; gaystapotactics; homosexualagenda; lavendermafia; revisionisthistory; romney; romneytruthfile; romnney2012; samesexmarriage; smearcampaign; yellowjournalism; zogbyism
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To: RedMonqey

Since you have dropped the pretense of posting on a thread topic, and have gone totally personal I’ll respond with this summary, and see if you think that it is reasonable, or the “lies” of a “narrow minded bigot”.
You find this (below) spreading falsehoods? I call it sane and truthful.

There is very little difference between Romney and Obama’s actual records. Both supported abortion, gay rights, gun control, liberal judges, global warming, compulsory health insurance, individual mandates, government control over the economy, etc, in other words liberal progressive policies. And they both loathed Reagan, conservatism and the tea party.

Romney now swears he’s a Reagan conservative. He also claims that his brand of government controlled, government forced, mandated compulsory health insurance is a “free-market conservative solution.” He also still says that even if president, he would do nothing about gays in the military. You can bet that means he will do nothing to thwart the advancing gay agenda. He also still says today that man-made global warming is real and that government will eventually have to do something about it. There goes our free-economy. He also says that TARP, the bailouts, the stimulus spending, etc, were all good ideas and that more may be necessary. So he truly does believe that government control of the economy, picking winners and losers, etc, is a good thing. Crony capitalism. He never even mentions the constitution which doesn’t give the federal government the authority to do any of the above. Wonder why.

No Reaganite here, so guess that’s just another lie too.

And they now call me a troll too for simply stating the truth.


141 posted on 05/12/2012 3:47:39 PM PDT by ansel12 ( Not voting Romney?? Then double up on down ticket races and your participation this election.)
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To: presidio9

This so-called incident has been debunked. Shown to be nothing more than a screed built of fabrication, exaggeration, innuendo and political skulduggery.

This is only the beginning. During the summer and fall, as Obama’s re-elect numbers continue to be dismal, as I believe they will, no lie against Romney and other Republicans will go untold.


142 posted on 05/12/2012 5:59:41 PM PDT by citizen (Obama blames:arab spring,banks,big oil,bush,ceos,christians,coal,FNC,Jpn tsumani,T Party,wall st,you)
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To: Sirius Lee

OFGS


143 posted on 05/12/2012 6:02:22 PM PDT by altura (Looking for sanity in all the wrong places.)
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To: Yaelle

Why are you taking this article seriously?

It has been refuted by everyone. The family of the so-called victim denies it and resents that their (now dead) relative is being lied about for political purposes.

If you don’t like Romney, fine, but don’t start believing all the lies told about him by the left.

Make up your own lies.


144 posted on 05/12/2012 6:20:50 PM PDT by altura (Looking for sanity in all the wrong places.)
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To: altura

That was 2 days ago. The woman hadn’t refuted it yet.

Plus, Romney seems to have a bit of a mean streak in him. Period.


145 posted on 05/12/2012 8:16:11 PM PDT by Yaelle
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To: citizen; altura

It hasn’t been debunked or even close to that, but Romney has apologized for it.


146 posted on 05/12/2012 10:35:31 PM PDT by ansel12 ( Not voting Romney?? Then double up on down ticket races and your participation this election.)
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To: ansel12
See?

Now how difficult was that?

As a simple scanning of my previous posts, show I have a great deal of doubt about Romney's "Latter Day Conservatism" and we have alot more in common about Romney's commitment on the issues conservatives hold and wish advanced. One only has to view the U-tube clips of his Senate Race against Ted Kennedy to see his utter disdain for Reagan and "Reaganomics."

Zeroing in on his religion only divided us.

I would, as I guess you would too, support a movement in the GOP convention to rally around another candidate other than Romney.

So I suggest, for the sake of party unity for a better candidate, we call a truce.

Agreed?
147 posted on 05/13/2012 10:27:08 AM PDT by RedMonqey (Men who will not suffer to self govern, will suffer under the governance of lesser men.)
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To: RedMonqey

Truce about what, you merely need to reign in your posting actions and personalizing attacks on freepers.

Post 141 was a reasonable summary of where freerepublic should be in regards to Romney.


148 posted on 05/13/2012 10:37:16 AM PDT by ansel12 ( Not voting Romney?? Then double up on down ticket races and your participation this election.)
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To: RedMonqey

As far as your effort to limit discussion on Mitt Romney, you need to visit this post to JR at this link.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2883067/posts?page=266#266


149 posted on 05/13/2012 10:54:47 AM PDT by ansel12 ( Not voting Romney?? Then double up on down ticket races and your participation this election.)
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To: dfwgator
I might adapt the position of “Work for a Romney victory 2012, and a Romney defeat in 2016.”

Yes. The tea party folks will take him out in the GOP primary. Unless the threat of being taken out in the primary makes him govern right.

150 posted on 05/13/2012 11:06:18 AM PDT by Poincare (Reality is not a fool.)
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