[Vision2020] I Know Why The Caged Bird Shrieks

[Art Deco]

[image: Campaign Stops - Strong Opinions on the 2012
Election]<http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/>
September 19, 2012, 8:14 pmI Know Why The Caged Bird ShrieksBy CHARLES M.
BLOW <http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/author/charles-m-blow/>

"When people show you who they are believe them; the first time."

That comes from the inimitable Maya Angelou (via the equally inimitable
Oprah). And I agree.

So I'm inclined to take Mitt Romney at his
word<http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/09/full-transcript-mitt-romney-secret-video#mouse>when
he disparages nearly half the country to a roomful of wealthy donors
on a secretly recorded
tape<http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/09/watch-full-secret-video-private-romney-fundraiser>
.

As I'm sure you know by now, Romney said that the 47 percent of Americans
who pay no income taxes are people 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.

He also said:

My job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them that
they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.

There is no amount of backtracking and truth bending that can make this
right. It's just wrong. It's not just the patently false implication that
half the country is parasitic. It's not just the bleak view that they
wallow in victimization. It is also his utter dismissal of this group: "my
job is not to worry about those people."

Those people? Those miserable peasants scrounging around the castle
entrance? Those lay-abouts with mouths open for a spoonful of rich folks'
bounty? Those fate-forsaken unwashed with dirty hands outstretched for help
unearned? Those ingrates who bring in a pittance but reap a premium?

Only a man who has never looked up from the pit of poverty could look down
his nose with such scorn.

At the event Romney also said:

By the way, both my dad and Ann's dad did quite well in their life, but
when they came to the end of their lives, and, and passed along
inheritances to Ann and to me, we both decided to give it all away. So, I
had inherited nothing. Everything that Ann and I have we earned the
old-fashioned way, and that's by hard work.

Can this man truly be so blind as to believe that being the son of an auto
executive and governor played no role in his development and access to
opportunity? Can he truly believe that having a family with the means to
send him to a prestigious boarding school and then on to some of the best
colleges in the country had nothing to do with them and everything to do
with him? Can he truly be willfully ignorant enough to not acknowledge the
huddled masses at the bottom of the hill just because he started his climb
half way up?

Now the Romney campaign is in full damage control mode, feverishly trying
to convince Americans that they didn't hear what they heard, that there was
some confusion. Romney first said that his comments were "not elegantly
stated," then he tried to pivot to an argument against the redistribution
of wealth<http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/your-world-cavuto/index.html#/v/1847787266001/romney-redistribution-does-not-get-people-back-to-work/?playlist_id=86929>,
saying he believed in an America where "government steps in to help those
in need." He continued, "we're a compassionate people."

Those in need? Would those be the ones "who believe that they are victims,"
the ones who it's not your job to "worry about," the ones who you'll never
be able to persuade to "take personal responsibility and care for their
lives"?

Romney's feeble explanations reek of insincerity and desperation.

And I think I know why: he's terrified.

Romney is trapped by a desperate desire for legitimacy. He is a square - in
more ways than one - trying to squeeze himself into the conservative circle
of trust.

In so doing, he says all the right things the wrong way. His facts are off.
His timing is off. His pitch is off. He's just off. Try as he may, he just
doesn't fit in. But he's now so lost in his thirst for high office that he
has also lost himself. Co-opted convictions will always betray you.

Romney, whose economic plan is titled "Believe in America," demonstrated
with brutal efficiency that he doesn't in fact believe in America.

I once wrote<http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/19/focus-people/>the
following:

I have no personal gripe with Romney. I don't believe him to be an evil
man. Quite the opposite: he appears to be a loving husband and father.
Besides, evil requires conviction, which Romney lacks. But he is a
dangerous man. Unprincipled ambition always is. Infinite malleability is
its own vice because it's infinitely corruptible by others of ignoble
intentions.

But Romney's taped comments open the door to doubt. I'm no longer confident
in the basic goodness of his constitution.

One doesn't have to operate with great malice to do great harm. The absence
of empathy and understanding are sufficient. In fact, a man convinced of
his virtue even in the midst of his vice is the worst kind of man.

Mitt Romney keeps showing America who he is. When will we start to believe
him?

-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
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