Ann Romney Hurts More Than Helps

You know how sometimes in life you try to avoid going down certain paths only to realize that it may be unavoidable. I find myself at one of those places and Ann Romney should really place her hands over her ears and begin to yell very loudly.

“Queen Ann”, as some have dubbed her acted upon that nickname once again this week when she publicly chastised members of the right-wing media for criticizing her husband Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

“Stop it. This is hard. You want to try it? Get in the ring,” she said. “This is hard and, you know, it’s an important thing that we’re doing right now and it’s an important election and it is time for all Americans to realize how significant this election is and how lucky we are to have someone with Mitt’s qualifications and experience and know-how to be able to have the opportunity to run this country.”

The friendly fire that has come from conservative stalwarts like Peggy Noonan, David Brooks, and Bill O'Reilly hasn't exactly been undeserved, Romney just came off of one the most brutal weeks a candidate has ever had including a botched presser that unfairly criticized President Obama for the tragic killings of 4 U.S. diplomats at the nation's embassy in Cairo, Egypt by Islamic protesters, to a secretly recorded video of Romney at a fundraiser last May saying “his job is not to worry about the 47% of the people who won't vote for him”.

Republican pundits are just being honest about the Romney campaign up until this point, and if they wanted to continue with the truth telling portion of the program they would also come out and say that the Mitt's better half is not helping.

Ann Romney was once thought to be her husband's strongest surrogate yet in the matter of a couple of months that notion has become less and less true.

People, the American people in particular don't like whiners and yet that sounds exactly like what Mrs. Romney is doing when she offers up her “Stop It” defense of her husband. Yes Ann, running for President is hard and the criticism is sometimes unbearable, you know what else is hard and may sometimes seem unbearable, being President.

Mrs. Romney has also been on record as saying that her husband has been “demonized” by critics as “being heartless”. First of all Mitt has given us plenty of examples this election season as to why one would come to that conclusion “I like being able to fire people” and “If you're looking to go to college borrow money from your parents” and my favorite “ If you want free stuff vote for the other guy”. Secondly, ask The First Lady about dealing with a spouse who is demonized on a daily basis by idiot birthers and Tea Party zealots who see a black socialist occupying 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (see Dinesh D'Souza ridiculous, train wreck of a movie for proof).

At the Republican National Convention Ann was charged with the task of humanizing her husband and making him more likeable, particular with female voters. Now granted that was a Herculean type effort for any one given Mitt's stiffness as a campaigner and the miles wide gap between he and the President with female voters.

However Ann, once again didn't help matters by offering up a lot of generalities and not a lot of specifics when it came to her husband and his prospective female policies. At one point Mrs. Romney gave us all an “Oprah” type yell of “I love you women” which almost matched Mitt's equally awkward “The trees are the right height”.

Look I understand that campaigning is difficult and the toll that it can take on family members can be stressful, Ann Romney said as much after going through the meat grinder back in 2008, also the idea that a candidate's family should be free from criticism is one that should be generally followed.

As I said earlier though sometimes paths in life are unavoidable. 

Romney Just Doesn't Get It

Has there ever been a worse Presidential candidate than Mitt Romney? Has there ever been a more out of touch, unsympathetic plutocrat?

Romney's comments to wealthy donors of his at a Boca Raton fundraiser last May once again reinforced the narrative that Montgomery Burns is a living and breathing human being.

“There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what...

“Our message of low taxes doesn’t connect...so my job is is not to worry about those people. I’ll never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives. What I have to do is convince the five to 10 percent in the center that are independents, that are thoughtful....”

Romney, who has never experienced a minute of struggle from the time that he entered into the world has put his inability to relate to us common folk on full display time and time again. There was the incident where he insulted a supporters home baked cookies, he challenged Rick Perry to a $10,000 bet (like it's chump change), and he reminded us that his wife drives a couple of cadillacs.

The comments in Florida four months ago aren't surprising, as a matter of fact it's sort of Romney taking it to the next level. The guy pretty much says word for word that he isn't worried about 47% of the nation.

Romney like most in his party really believes that we have become a country of “makers” and “takers”, that there is no such thing as people falling on hard times through no fault of their own and that a life on public assistance is somehow a goal that is to be desired.

While professional politicians in the GOP are backing away from Mitt as fast as they can because they need swing voters, (a huge chunk of which belongs to the 47% that Romney slammed to keep their jobs,) the talking imbeciles in the base are cheering Romney on.

The Holy Triumvirate of conservative clowns Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, and Donald Trump have all said in their own way that Romney should not back down from the comments, and that this is a discussion that the country needs to have. If you are unemployed and struggling to put food on your family's table, there can't be anything more galling than having three filthy rich windbags advising another windbag to continue to disparage you.

It makes me ponder what would happen if Mitt Romney were to somehow pull of the miraculous and get himself elected in November, what would the outcome be like for the truly less fortunate?

Would poor children go without nutrition because of Romney and his tag team partner Paul Ryan and their lustful desire to do away with food stamps? These are children who barely get a decent school lunch already again thanks to budget cuts mostly championed by the GOP.

Would the unemployed, people who have desperately been looking for work but have been stymied, not because of failed economic policies of President Obama, but by petulant obstruction on the part of John Boehner and Eric Cantor, be told no more unemployment checks? You now must feed your family through the kindness of strangers.

Remember the days of George W. Bush touting compassionate conservatism, that now seems like a million years ago.

Romney because of his insulated life spent in the lap of luxury doesn't get why the peasants sometimes needs assistance. That alone is a good enough reason to be disqualified from being leader of the free world.

Desperation For Mitt Romney

Shameless thy name is Willard Mitt Romney. Look, I understand the desire of the former Massachusetts Governor to be the 44^th President of the United States, but there are lines that a Presidential candidate simply should not cross.

On Tuesday night Romney and his campaign made a desperate, disrespectful and dangerous move by criticizing President Obama and his administration over the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi that killed the U.S. Ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stephens and three of his staff members.

"I'm outraged by the attacks on American diplomatic missions in Libya and Egypt and by the death of an American consulate worker in Benghazi," Romney said in the statement. "It's disgraceful that the Obama Administration's first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks."

Romney, who is still feeling the effects of not receiving a bounce in the polls from his party's convention in Tampa and the criticism he has received from all corners for not mentioning the war in Afghanistan in his acceptance speech is trying to use this incident to score cheap political points. The problem with calling this play just like with most of Romney's gameplan is that this criticism is based on factual inaccuracies.

The response from the Obama Administration that Romney referenced did not even come from the Obama Administration, but from the United States embassy in Cairo, that statement also came a full 6 hours before any demonstrations or the tragic killings of the four U.S. Diplomats.

The statement put out by the Embassy was in response to a despicable anti-Islam movie that has surfaced on the web made by a group of filmmakers in Southern California. The Embassy could clearly see the writing on the wall in terms of what was coming, from protests to possible violence and tried to get out in front of it for their own lives and safety. The tone deafness shown by Romney and his team in not understanding this is as mind numbing as it can get.

What does it also say that Romney couldn't even stick to the agreement made by both candidates that they would not campaign or issue any statements on the September 11^th anniversary. The press got wind of Romney's thoughts on the subject at 10:25 p.m. Eastern time. Why let what you perceive to be an political opportunity loose it freshness?

President Obama said Wednesday night that Governor Romney “has a tendency to shoot first and aim later”, that's what happens when you find yourself losing an election that some pundits say you should be winning and when you find yourself fighting on terrain you have no business fighting on.

Romney and his running mate Paul Ryan have no personal military experience and no foreign policy experience as career politicians. Zero, zilch, nada, something that until 2012 was sacrilegious for the Grand Old Party, but with the lack of a legitimate candidate being willing to run coupled with their burning desire to defeat Obama the right was willing to forgive such a grievance.

What they have found is a party standard bearer who is all over the map when it comes to our standing with the world and the countries we have to work with.

In the span of a couple of months Mitt Romney has insulted the English on their handling of the Summer Olympics, insulted the Palestinians over their economy, talks tough to China despite that nation being owed two billion dollars by the United States and still calls Russia our number one geopolitical foe.

Whether Barack Obama can calm the waters in the Middle East and bring about the peace that a lot of us hoped for with the Arab Spring, he stands a better chance in doing that with Mitt Romney waiting a day, a week, or possibly even a month when all of the facts are in to begin backseat driving.

The American People would benefit from it as well.