I have a legitimate question after watching the three presidential debates: What moral standard should we hold our presidential candidates to? Governor Mitt Romney seems not to believe in the Ten Commandments of the Old Testament because he sure breaks the ninth commandment (Thou Shalt Not Bear False Witness) a lot.
Now I am sure everyone in the world has broken that commandment at some point in their life and people have come to expect it of politicians and used cars salesmen but Mitt Romney seems to distort the truth daily. His campaign staff has to continually retract or reword his statements after the fact.
And I am sure some will say that President Obama has lied in not keeping all of his campaign promises of 2008. But in the third presidential debate, Politifact.com gave Romney two "Pants on Fire" for tall tales that he told about Obama's so-called "apology tour" and stating that the US Military is losing its superiority.
The candidates themselves would rather say "malarkey, untrue, not factual, big whopper". I guess it is the ultimate insult to use the "L" word, but I am a blogger, not a politician so I can say it: Romney is a liar.
I'm not talking about candidate Romney from the 1990s or even the 2000s. I don't have to go back that far to see contradictions in his positions. What is disturbing is that he talks from two sides of his mouth in the same debate. For example, Romney 103 (from debate number three) accused the President of hurting our nation's good standing in the world by "leading from behind" and then said he agreed with President Obama's policies on Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, and Libya. So in other words, his cynical talking points don't match his newly stated support for the current administration's foreign affairs actions.
Romney also said in the debate last night that he would create 12 millions jobs (never explaining how) and later said that government does not create jobs. Well, which is it?
When the Governor talked about Iran and Syria being allies and Syria relying on Iran geographically as a means to get to the sea, I was impressed because it really sounded like he knew what he was taking about. After the debate I found out on Facebook via someone showing a map that what he said was factually incorrect. Was it a lie or an embellishment? I don't know anymore.
Romney 101, you know the impressive winner of debate number one, said his tax plan would not cut taxes for the wealthy yet he has called for a 20% across the board reduction in revenues. He has said he will close loopholes to balance the math, yet will not tell us which ones. He also claimed he did not get a tax break for moving factories overseas via Bain Capital and that maybe he should fire his accountant. Maybe he should because he either lied about that or is misinformed.
Romney 102 claimed he balanced the budget as governor in Massachusetts. Also untrue. He actually had a huge debt when he left office. Debate number two was very interesting in that it was the first time I remember seeing a candidate get caught in a lie trying to catch another candidate in a lie. I guess Romney assumes Obama is as dishonest as he is or otherwise he would not have questioned his statement about saying "acts of terror" in the Rose Garden the day after the 9/11/12 attack of the US Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.
I believe that Libya exchange so rattled Romney that he dropped the issue in the next debate, I am sure causing great consternation to the neo-cons.
The thing that bothered me most about Romney 103 was that his demeanor seemed to change from the first two debates. Romney 101 and 102 was like a tiger stalking and attacking President Obama on his weakest issue: the economy. Debate two ended with Romney limping out of the hall after being exposed as uninformed after the exchange in which moderator Candy Crowley backed up President Obama's Rose Garden statement on Libya. He also left himself wide open in his closing remarks about serving the 100% to allow President Obama to bring up Mr. Romney's statements about the 47% of the population he insulted at a private fundraiser in May, 2012.
Debate three showed a more docile Mitt Romney. The tiger became the "cowardly lion" as he refused to confront the President's foreign policies and in fact agreed with many of Obama's principles. I'm not sure what Romney's strategy was: maybe not to screw up, maybe to appeal to women, maybe to not look like a bully. Whatever it was, it seemed similar to Obama's non-strategy in the first debate that clearly did not work. It made Romney look weak and perhaps made viewers wonder what happened to Romney 101. It just seemed like another incarnation or chameleon at work.
Many have said Romney acted like at bully in the first two debates. Well, that makes sense because he was accused of bullying in prep school when he and a mob held down a gay kid and cut his hair. And remember, the cowardly lion was a bully before he found his courage. Bullies go after the weak (the economy issue in debate number 1) and run away from the strong (Obama's foreign policies wins).
What bothers me the most is that a major American political party would nominate a serial liar like Romney. Politicians in the past have lied and got caught, even impeached for it (think Bill Clinton.) But Romney is the first politician that I have seen that lies routinely and never apologizes or even acknowledges that he has done it. In fact, he accused his opponent of lying or distorting his record. He lies about his lies. I'm not sure how dumb and misinformed Romney thinks the American electorate is, but I find it insulting. Doesn't he know about video tapes and instant fact checking?
Whatever, the reason for Romney's lies, be it compartmentalizing, believing the ends justifies the means, doing whatever it takes to get elected, it goes against everything I was taught growing up and seems immoral to me. Have we as a nation become so cynical that we don't care about nominating a serial liar to run for President? That's not the America I know.
If the Ten Commandments came from God, the ninth one could be interpreted to mean to lie is a sin. And if it is a sin, there is also a Bible verse that says: "Be sure your sin shall find you out."
Character does count. George W. Bush's policies did, in my eyes, a lot of damage to our country. But at least you knew where he stood on the issues. He had convictions. Governor Mitt Romney is an enigma, changing every day like a leaf blowing in the wind. To me, it makes him untrustworthy and not deserving of the highest office of our great land. Let's hope Romney's sins find him out before the election and not after it.
