Mitt Romney thinks it would be “helpful” if he were Latino
by David Pinar on Sep. 17, 2012, under Pol. & Govt.I try to not post more than one article every couple of days, to give the many other great bloggers here a chance, and also to not tilt the terrific community aspect of Tucson Citizen too much into politics – I’m certain that many, if not most, TC readers will be quite happy when this election is over and all the noise is behind us. But a number of videos of Mitt Romney speaking to the wealthy at private fundraisers surfaced today, and I think it’s important to point out who the real Mitt Romney is.
The first is Mitt joking to a wealthy, entirely white audience that his father, who was born in Mexico, was “unfortunately” not born to Mexican parents because if he were Latino he’d have a “better chance” of winning:
“My heritage, my dad as you probably know was the governor of Michigan and was the head of a car company. But he was born in Mexico, and, uh, had he been born of, uh, Mexican parents, I’d have a better shot at winning this. [Rich donors cracking up]
But he was unfortunately born to Americans living in Mexico. He lived there for a number of years. And, uh, uh, I say that jokingly, but it would be helpful to be, uh … Latino.”
Yeah Mitt, how unlucky you are your Dad was born to white, American parents in Mexico. Arizona and Texas, and some counties in California are the only jurisdictions outside the old Confederacy to fall under the preclearance requirement of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act because of their long history of discrimination against Latinos in registering to vote and and voting. Latino Americans had to work long and hard to overcome prejudice and take their rightful place in our society. And Mitt Romney thinks it’s cleaver to joke about being born Latino when he’s clearly insincere. I’m old enough to remember a sign at a gas station in northern Florida that said “Notice: We do not serve n**gers, cubans, porto ricans [sic] or mexicans”.
And then here’s Mitt Romney telling more rich donors that 47% of Americans will vote for Obama because they’re leeches on the government dole and pay no income taxes:
“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 the 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…These are people who pay no income tax. My job is is not to worry about those people. I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”
Romney’s statement was centered on the myth perpetuated by the Wall Street Journal that 47 percent of all Americans don’t pay federal taxes. But that number only applies to the federal income tax. Two-thirds of those people still pay federal Social Security and Medicare taxes. And all of them pay state & local sales taxes, utility excise taxes, and many more. And just because they don’t earn enough to pay federal income taxes doesn’t mean they’re all on food stamps, medicaid, or Section 8 housing. And the one-third that don’t pay any federal incomes taxes or Social Security or Medicare? They’re almost entirely retirees living on Social Security. And they earned that by paying plenty of income, Social Security and Medicare taxes before they retired. But Mitt doesn’t think it’s “his job” to worry about them. I have two words for Mitt Romney: one starts with an ‘f’ and ends in ‘k’, and the other word is ‘you’. But I can’t use those words in polite company. So I’ll just say what a pathetic, out of touch, elitist snob. As Obama campaign manager Jim Messina said:
It’s shocking that a candidate for President of the United States would go behind closed doors and declare to a group of wealthy donors that half the American people view themselves as ‘victims,’ entitled to handouts, and are unwilling to take ‘personal responsibility’ for their lives. It’s hard to serve as president for all Americans when you’ve disdainfully written off half the nation.
