Romney Then – A Bully | Romney Now – Doesn’t Care About the Poor and Likes Firing People

It’s all coming together. We’re slowly beginning to see who the real Mitt Romney is, as reports surfaced today exposing a young Mitt Romney bullying his classmates back in high school. And it makes perfect sense that the kid who bullied, mocked, laughed at and even held down another student and forcibly cut that student’s hair, would grow up to be the man who said he doesn’t care about the poor, that he liked firing people and he enjoys taking jobs away from Americans, closing down companies and shipping those jobs overseas.

Yes, it’s all coming together now.

Mitt Romney offered a qualified apology for his behavior as a high school student, without specifically saying whether a report that he bullied a student thought by his classmates to be gay was accurate.

“Back in high school I did some dumb things and if anybody was hurt by that or offended by that I apologize,” Romney told FOX radio host Brian Kilmeade Thursday. “If I did stupid things, I’m afraid I’ve got to say sorry for it.”

Romney, 65, noted he graduated from high school nearly five decades ago, and said, “I’m quite a different guy now.” He admitted “I participated in a lot of hijinks and pranks in high school and some of them might have gone too far, and I apologize.”

Five classmates described to the Washington Post on record an incident in which Romney, then a high school senior, teased and ultimately assaulted a student, John Lauber. According to their account, Romney mocked the student’s long blond hair, recalling that he once said, “He can’t look like that. That’s wrong. Just look at him!” before joining classmates in chasing him, pinning him to the ground and cutting his hair as Lauber screamed for help.

“I certainly don’t believe that I thought the fellow was homosexual,” Romney told Kilmeade. “That was the furthest thing from our minds back in the 1960s.

[TPM]