Category: Mitt Romney

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Boston Church Mitt Romney Politics

Did Mitt Romney Force A Mother To Give Up Her Baby?

From Yahoo News:

Mitt Romney’s Mormon faith, long considered a potential issue in his presidential campaign, came under scrutiny this week whenVanity Fair published excerpts from an upcoming book that delves into Mitt’s history as a lay leader in the church. The Real Romney, authored by Boston Globe reporters Michael Kranish and Scott Helman, suggests that Mitt once threatened a single mother with excommunication if she didn’t give her soon-to-be-born baby up for adoption — an account the Republican frontrunner denies. Here, a brief guide to this unsettling story:

In the early 1980s, Romney was serving as bishop of a Mormon congregation near Boston. Peggie Hayes, a 23-year-old divorced single mother, became pregnant with her second child. Knowing she needed help, Romney arranged for Hayes to get odd jobs from other church members. But as bishop, Romney also bore the responsibility of briefing Hayes on church doctrine. As quoted in the book, she claims he showed up at her apartment and encouraged her to give her baby to the church’s adoption agency. According to Hayes, Romney said: “This is what the church wants you to do, and if you don’t, then you could be excommunicated.”

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Mitt Romney Newt Gingrich Politics South Carolina

Romney Holds Small Lead Over Gingrich In South Carolina

With just days to go before the South Caroina prmary begins, new polling shows some good news for Gingrich and some bad news for Romney, as conservative Republicans still questions the moderate record of Mitt Romney.

The former Massachusetts governor’s lead is so small in the Palmetto State that he’s essentially tied with Newt Gingrich, according to a poll conducted for The Augusta Chronicle by InsiderAdvantage/Majority Opinion Research. Romney’s 23 percent and Gingrich’s 21 percent fall within the 3.6 percent margin of error. Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, who came in second in the Iowa caucuses is in third place in South Carolina with 14 percent, while Texas Congressman Ron Paul, the runner-up in New Hampshire, is effectively tied with him at 13 percent.

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Barack Obama Mitt Romney Politics Republican Tax break tax cuts United States White House

President Obama To Offer Tax Breaks To Companies Bringing Jobs Back Home

Report from the The Wall Street Journal

President Barack Obama said he will propose new tax incentives to encourage businesses to “bring jobs home,” a move that could sharpen differences with Republicans in an election year.

Mr. Obama also said Wednesday he would suggest eliminating “tax breaks for companies that move jobs overseas.” Administration officials said details won’t be released until the president issues his proposed budget next month.

In past years, most of the administration’s plans to limit tax breaks for multinationals have stalled amid opposition from businesses and Republicans. Tax experts said the proposals could include new investment subsidies such as more-generous depreciation, lower tax rates for income derived from innovation produced in the U.S. or expanded breaks for domestic research or manufacturing.

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Mitt Romney Politics Ronald Reagan

Joe Biden on Mitt Romney – He Has No Idea Of The Broken Bargain

In a twenty minutes conference call to New Hampshire Democrats on Tuesday, Vice President Joe Biden and the Obama Administration amplified the 2012 presidential campaign.

Taking direct aim at the Republican frontrunner, Mr. Biden said that Romney’s “I like being able to fire people” comment – although it may have been taken out of context – shows how out of touch Republicans are with the struggles of the working class America.

He thinks it’s more important for the stockholders and the shareholders and the investors and the venture capital guys to do well [than] for those employees to be part of the bargain,” he said.

“We inherited a broken bargain. A deal our parents didn’t have to face. Middle-class folks, if you gave them an even chance, they got to share in the benefits they helped to produce for this country. That bargain was broken during the Bush years and we were determined to fix it.

“Listen to Mitt Romney. He has no idea the bargain even exists, let alone is broken. How else can you say the best way to fix the financial crisis is by letting it all go down to the bottom?”

Greed. It has been the underlining and unmentioned trait of the rich in this country for centuries. And for centuries, because of the negative stigma of greed, a stigma the rich didn’t want to be associated with, working class America felt as though they were part of the solution and shared in the profits they helped create.

Then something happened about thirty years ago. With the election of Ronald Reagan, the me first you never attitude was born and the decline of middle class America begun.

Today, after the Bush presidency, that attitude is in full view for all to see. Greed is no longer considered a negative word, in fact, it is a trait Americans are judged by. It is the dividing line that separates the two political parties, as Republicans believe giving everything to the rich is the only way the middle class would survive while Democrats on the other hand believe that all Americans should have a fair shot at the American dream.

The 2012 election is about a choice that couldn’t be any clearer. Do we re-elect a president who believes that every American must have equal opportunities to make their American dream a reality, or do we elect someone who agrees with the Ronald Reagan and George Bush philosophy that taking from the poor and giving to the rich is all that matters?

With one candidate’s policies we can once again return to a system where the American dream is possible. With the alternative, we can continue the nightmare that Reagan and Bush started.

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Citizens United Mitt Romney Newt Gingrich Politics presidential Republican Rick Santorum South Carolina

Apres-Primary Musings: Mitt Can’t Conquer the Mountain

We are not impressed.

If Mitt Romney can’t muster over 40% of the vote in a backyard state against a field of sub-par candidates with extreme positions on the issues, then he’s not ready yet for his curtain call. Yes, it certainly was a good day for Romney, but not as good as his victory speech would indicate.

He’ll win the nomination, but two things are abundantly clear. The first is that Romney still hasn’t galvanized his party as a candidate, and the second is that Republican enthusiasm is turning out to be somewhat of a myth.

Let’s get to the numbers.

Here’s what I said would happen (left) and here’s what actually happened (right):

Romney      38%        39.4%

Paul            19%        22.8%

Huntsman   16%       16.8%

Gingrich      11%         9.4%

Santorum    10%         9.3%

Roemer         3%         0.4%

Perry             1%          0.7%

As in Iowa, not bad. I seem to have underestimated Ron Paul’s reliable support and overestimated Buddy Roemer’s, but I don’t think I was alone.

If present reports are true, all the candidates are moving on to South Carolina where the PAC-men will be gobbling up money and air time in their quest for Romney’s scraps. This will be Citizens United writ not on the main stage, but as regional summer stock theater. Millions of dollars that otherwise could be spent on more significant pursuits will be sucked down the rabbit hole of ego and vanity. That’s the new democracy at work, and we’d all better get used to it because when the campaign moves to Broadway in the fall, there’s going to be an ad war like no other.

South Carolina is the last stand for Huntsman, Santorum and Perry to be sure unless any of them pull wild upsets and finish in the top 3, and above 20%. Gingrich could stay in if he’s in the top 3 because he now has PAC money and Paul and his minions will stick around for the duration. Romney can claim the nomination with a dominant performance, over 40%, but 30% will be enough to make him inevitable.

Follow the march to the south at facebook.com/WhereDemocracyLives.

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Elections Mitt Romney Politics Rick Santorum

The Polling Report: Special New Hampshire Edition

You can just call me the Hammer, because I nailed the Iowa results almost perfectly. Of course now I will suffer for my obvious act of hubris, but I don’t believe that will come in New Hampshire.

This primary has an odd air about it because the overwhelming sentiment is that Mitt Romney will win, but it won’t matter much. The fun will come later in the month in South Carolina and Florida.

So let’s get to the polling and analysis. The latest RealClearPolitics average shows Romney with a large lead over, in this order, Ron Paul, Jon Huntsman, Rick Santorum, and Newt Gingrich. Here are the specifics from the latest PPP Poll. Santorum has not received a major bounce out of Iowa because he’s far too conservative for New Hampshire and he’s professed some ideas that haven’t sat well with pragmatic New Englanders, like his diatribes against gay marriage. He’s also, well, Rick Santorum, who has some well-publicized issues stemming from when he was a Pennsylvania Senator and those came to light once the press started snooping around.

Ron Paul has his reliable legions who will support him throughout the primary season, so it’s no surprise that he’s in second place. This primary is make-or-break for Jon Hunstman, and I expect that he’ll drop out of the race when he finishes a distant third. Newt will stay in through at least Florida as a pain-in-the-side for Romney now that he’s received a huge infusion of money, and Rick Perry will also drop out after South Carolina when he finishes fourth in a conservative state he otherwise could win. If he wasn’t such a terrible debater, that is.

The only drama I see in New Hampshire is Mitt’s vote percentage. He must, in my estimation, receive above 40% of the vote in New Hampshire in order to meet expectations. If he falls below that threshold, it will be a major embarrassment for him and it will expose him as the second choice to everyone else in the field. It won’t really matter what the other candidates poll. The pressure is on Mitt. If he gets above 47%, then he shows obvious strength with the people who will decide the 2012 race, moderates and independent voters, and will be seen as the presumptive nominee. Having said that, the latest polls show Mitt actually losing some support according to the tracking polls. He began the weekend at around 42%, but has dropped to 33% in the Suffolk/7News Tracking survey released on Monday.

At this point in the race, we need to face some facts: Santorum, Gingrich and Perry are damaged goods and are just saying the most outlandish things in a last-ditch effort to appeal to the far right. Paul isn’t even popular with Republicans, for heaven’s sake, Huntsman never received his bump (and he won’t in South Carolina) and is seen as the other Mormon in the race. That’s America: two, three or four Protestants of any denomination, no problem, but room for only one Mormon.

Leaders of the conservative movement have recently been stepping up their efforts to find an alternative to Mitt, and it looks like the early winner is Santorum. I think they should find a true conservative who’s not in the race, vet them for all of their transgressions and run them as a candidate outside the primaries. That’s their best chance at having a conservative who can be elected. I’ve always thought that there would be a third party candidate in this election and that they would come from the right. This might be the time to start that movement.

The last big issue is the Super-PAC money entering this race from all sides. It’s enabling the field, minus Huntsman, to buy ads in South Carolina that will probably blanket the state for the next two weeks. Most of it will be aimed at Romney, and I’m sure we’ll hear more about how he likes to fire people and how many employees lost their jobs because of Bain Capital.

And now for the stick-out-my-neck-for-the-guillotine moment: Prediction for Tuesday.

Romney 38% Paul 19% Huntsman 16% Gingrich 11% Santorum 10% Roemer 3% Perry 1%

Mitt gets enough to claim a win, but falls short of the 40% threshold. Huntsman leaves the race gracefully, Santorum, Gingrich and Perry move on to the south to make their final stands. Perry leaves after South Carolina and perhaps Santorum does too. Newt stays around because he loves to hear himself talk.

Mother Jones has a Fantasy Primary Predictor here if you’d like to play.

For more, please visit: facebook.com/WhereDemocracyLives

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Mitt Romney Politics

Mitt Romney – I Like Firing People

No matter how much he tries, Willard Romney will never be able to hide who he really is. He often boast about living his life in the private sector, and based on what we know about his time at Bain Capital, there are a lot of Americans who lost their jobs because of Willard’s actions.

Today, Willard made a statement that brought a certain unease to the working middle class. “I like being able to fire people who provide services to me,” Romney was heard saying, as he addressed the Chamber of Commerce.

For context, Romney was talking about the freedom of “firing” or chosing one insurance provider over another based on his preference. But the firing statement should never be used when it’s coming from a man who built his personal wealth acquiring smaller business and shipping Americans jobs overseas for cheaper labor. And such a statement should never be used when coming from a man who holds the dubious distinction of being number 47 (out of 50) in job creation when he was governor of the state of Massachusetts.

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Elections Mitt Romney Politics Tax taxes

Mitt Romney’s Plan Will Raise Your Taxes

Unless you’re earning over $1 million a year that is, then you will see your taxes cut by as much as $146,000 a year. But for the middle class Americans struggling to make ends meet, prepare to pay more in taxes if Mitt Romney becomes your president.

The non-partisan Tax Policy Center analyzed Mitt Romney’s tax proposals and, according to the Wall Street Journal, “concluded that Mr. Romney’s plan would reduce taxes significantly for high-income earners (by 6.9% or $146,000 for households making more than $1 million), and increase federal deficits by $180 billion in 2015 compared to current tax levels.”

And despite Romney’s claims, his plan would also raise taxes slightly for low-income families.

Associated Press: “Households making between $50,000 and $75,000 would get small tax cuts, averaging 2.2 percent, or about $250, the study said. People making more than $1 million would get tax cuts averaging 15 percent, or about $146,000.”

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Elections Mitt Romney Politics

Mitt Romney – Only Rich People Should Run For Office

The shocking claim came from the Republican frontrunner in Sunday’s debate.

Mitt Romney, born into wealth and is one of the top five richest people to run for president has a message for you poor folks – if you’re not as rich as he is, then forget about running for office. That honor is only reserved for his kind – the filthy rich!

Romney said his father, Michigan Governor George Romney, had told him, “Mitt, never get involved in politics if you have to win an election to pay a mortgage.”

“If you find yourself in a position when you can serve, why you ought to have a responsibility to do so if you think you can make a difference,” he recalled his father telling him. “Also, don’t get in politics if your kids are still young because it might turn their heads.”

A few seconds later, he bragged about his run against Teddy Kennedy.

“I was happy he had to take a mortgage out on his house to ultimately defeat me,” he said.

It’s amazing the things that bring him joy.

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Mitt Romney MSNBC Newt Gingrich Politics Republican republican debate Rick Santorum

Republican Debate – A Record Flip Flop For Romney – Video

A Republican debate happened yesterday and Romney stood above the fighting fray, walking away with little or no real attacks on him or his record.

A Republican debate happened today, and things were much different, as Romney took swings from Rick Santorum and Jon Huntsman.

But Newt Gingrich took to the floor with one clear goal in mind. He wanted the audience to know the truth about Romney and his SuperPAC’s attempts to derail his candidacy with negative ads. Romney had previously said that he knew nothing about the actions of the PAC, or who they were. But today, he flip-flopped on that claim too.

Watch below, as Romney claimed he hadn’t seen any of the ads Gingrich was talking about, only to turn around and perfectly describe the ads he didn’t see.

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Iowa Mitt Romney Newt Gingrich Politics Republican Rick Santorum

Republican Debate – To Romney’s Delight, The Losers Attacked Each Other

With the Iowa primaries over and Mitt Romney crowned the winner by an apparent technicality, the expectation was that his fellow competitors would use whatever avenue they had available to show why they are more deserving of the Republican nomination. That perfect avenue presented itself last night in yet another Republican debate, but the other five Iowa primary losers on stage were more satisfied with fighting each other, instead of distinguishing themselves from Willard.

The former Massachusetts governor was subject to the first attack of the night but that early fire was quickly overshadowed by testy exchanges between Ron Paul, Rick Santorum, and Newt Gingrich.

It’s been more than three weeks since the Republican presidential candidates have been on stage together. The last time they gathered,

Gingrich led in the polls and Michele Bachmann was still in the race.

It was a different scenario at Saturday night’s debate, sponsored by ABC News and Yahoo News.

Romney, who virtually tied Santorum in the Iowa caucuses and holds a double-digit lead in the New Hampshire polls, was expected to be a target.

He wasn’t.

There was one early attack.

Meanwhile, Romney stood idle by with a smile on his face.

How dumb was this strategy to attack each other instead of the leader? After the debate, one of ABC’s political analysis observed that Ron Paul was on the attack – going after Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich – but did not lay one finger on the leader Mitt Willard Romney. This insight led to the conclusion that Paul was like a puppet on a string. “I’m sure if you rip open Paul’s shirt,” he said, “you’ll see one of Mitt’s sons at the control.”

If you are trying to win your party’s nomination, but are too scared to use a debate to point out Romney’s non-existent record, then you have no business running for the most powerful office in the nation.

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Iowa Iowa caucuses Mitt Romney Politics Republican Rick Santorum

Did Mitt Romney Get 20 Extra Iowa Votes He Didn’t Earn?

One of the actual vote counters in Iowa’s Republican primary election last Tuesday has come forward, arguing that Mitt Romney got an extra 20 votes he wasn’t supposed to get.

Edward True, 28, of Moulton, said he helped count the votes and jotted the results down on a piece of paper to post to his Facebook page. He said when he checked to make sure the Republican Party of Iowa got the count right, he said he was shocked to find they hadn’t.

“When Mitt Romney won Iowa by eight votes and I’ve got a 20-vote discrepancy here, that right there says Rick Santorum won Iowa,” True said. “Not Mitt Romney.”

True said at his 53-person caucus at the Garrett Memorial Library, Romney received two votes. According to the Iowa Republican Party’s website, True’s precinct cast 22 votes for Romney.

“This is huge,” True said. “It essentially changes who won.”

Romney was called the winner of the Iowa primary by 8 votes. If Mr. True is correct, it means that Rick Santorum won by 12 votes.

And the circus continues!

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