Mitt Romney is a coward

Coward. (Darren Hauck/Reuters) Take a minute and think carefully of all the public figures you've disliked throughout your life. File through all the politicians, entertainers, sports figures, and the like. Assuming you are a somewhat reasonable, normal person, you probably have strong opinions some of these folks. Perhaps you reached the point of hating one or two of them. Now, if you can, try and mentally assemble all the people you never liked on a thermometer, with those you can probably tolerate at the bottom and those who make your blood boil at the very top. Take a mental picture of that person. Now bring it forward to the front of your mind. Do you see Mitt Romney?

It is well understood that Democrats do not like Mitt Romney's policies. In fact, our leading politicians will go out of their way, as we Democrats are wont to do, to praise Mitt Romney's character. We practice the rather high minded view that our disagreement with him and his party is not personal, but purely a matter of phiolosophical and political differences. We think it is impolite to call Mitt Romney "weird." That it is unseemly to ask questions about his church or the things taught from its pulpits. We cannot attack the character of his family or his associates. We think ourselves better than this sort of thing, content in being able to look at ourselves in the morning for not having gone done the road Republicans often do not hesitate to travel. Speaking for myself, however, my perception of Mitt Romney has almost nothing to do with his policies, most of which are standard nutcase Republican fare. There are plenty of other Republicans who parrot the same talking points as Mitt Romney, but they don't get up to the top of my thermometer. I even find Limbaugh a mere bufoon. But there is so much about Mitt Romney that makes me detest him more than any public figure I've known in my life. In my mind he's the worst kind of person that should be involved in politics. It basically comes down to this: Mitt Romney has spent his entire life preying on the weak and defenseless, always from a position of complete safety for himself. In other words, he's a coward.

His propensity for lying is well known. His lack of any central convictions about anything other than his own ambitions well documented. As he's run for the highest office in the land, we are now getting enough stories about his life that allow us to examine it as a whole. Consider his willingness in his youth to engage in violent hazing with a gang of similary privliged ruffians against a defenseless outsider. Consider his callous mistreatment of his own household pets. Think back about the episode when Romney talked about how illegal immigrants ended up maintaining his lawn and his open hostility toward them today. Consider how harshly he has treated his own employees when money was at stake. Look at how he has treated his fellow competitors for the Republican nomination. In every case, Romney has always attacked the weak with particular viciousness. In every case, Romney has kept his distance, doing it all from the comfort of an office tower or lordly estate. Do you think Mitt Romney would personally deliver a pink slip to a steelworker? Would he personally walk up to a gardner and fire him to his face? Would he attack a gay person without a pack of toughs behind him? He offers $10,000 bets to people who don't have $10,000 to bet. He braggs about the joy he takes in firing people. Worse thing about it is, he does it in a way that makes it appear that he truly believes that he's doing you a favor. "Pranks and hijinks," he says. "Politics aren't bean bags," he says. An overbearing gorilla calls a woman a slut over the airwaves and his response is "not the sort of words I'd have chosen." The man is a coward. He won't confront the strong and forces himself on the weak. His entire life, that's all he's done. You can't find one instance where Mitt Romney actually stood up and fought for someone other than himself. Find a case where Mitt Romney put himself at risk on someone else's behalf. Look and see if you can find a single case where Mitt Romney sacrificed something for someone else's benefit. You can't because he doesn't.

No, Mitt Romney is not a patriot. No, Mitt Romney is not a great guy. No, Mitt Romney isn't a wonderful guy in private. Mitt Romney is an self-indulgent, egomaniacal, sociopathic coward.

There are plenty of reasons to vote against Mitt Romney even if he agreed with us on policy. He isn't the kind of person who should be in public life, except perhaps as a "heel" character on pro wrestling. People like him should peak in high school and then go learn their life lessons through hard knocks in obscurity. Had it not been for Romney's wealth and pedigree, that is exactly what would have happened. Perhaps it is rather low brow to want a public leader who actually has a heart and a moral compass that aims true. Who laughs without ulterior motive. Who doesn't think legal entities are the same thing as human beings. But if there are voters who vote against Mitt Romney because they just can't stand him, that's fine with me. I'm right there with them.