Silver lining on Romney's clouded campaign

Despite the missteps and terrible headlines and campaign infighting afflicting the Mitt Romney campaign, he can at least take comfort in the fact that outside spending favors him by a big margin and Republican voter suppression efforts remain robust.

Mitt Romney's 'devastating' videotape

The Republicans want to talk about unemployment. Let's accommodate them.

The Republicans want to talk about unemployment. Let's accommodate them.
"The Republicans have no credibility on deficits. The Republicans have no credibility on national security. For decades, both have been all but ceded as Republican strengths, despite plenty of evidence that they shouldn't be. On those issues, Democrats have often played on the Republican home field, to the detriment of everyone. The Republicans would like for the same dynamic to pertain on the economy and unemployment. At the end of last week, while President Obama was enjoying the early indications of what we now know is a substantial post-Convention bounce, Republicans rejoiced at the release of a lousy jobs report. They were sure that would deflate what they deluded themselves into believing was but a temporary Obama polling bubble. It's the economy, stupid—Republicans rejoiced. And it is the economy. And unemployment still will be one of the key issues in this election, up and down the ballot. But not in the way Republicans think.

President Obama and the Democrats have tried to pass jobs bills. The Republicans killed the American Jobs Act. The Republicans killed the jobs bill that would have repaired our badly crumbling national infrastructure. The Republicans killed the jobs bill that would have given tax cuts to small businesses that create jobs. They're even holding up a bill specifically designed to create jobs for military veterans. The Republicans don't care about creating jobs. Republicans do care about playing politics over jobs, obstructing bills that would actually create jobs so they can exploit the lack of jobs for political gain."

The Post-Truth Campaign: Mitt Romney Tells 530 Lies in 30 Weeks

The Post-Truth Campaign: Mitt Romney Tells 530 Lies in 30 Weeks
"While the sheer number of Romney's lies are indeed unprecedented for a presidential campaign, his fact-free campaigning is simply the logical continuation of a trend that started in the George W. Bush administration, when Republicans literally walled themselves from reality."

A Good Ole Boys’ Family Feud - In These Times

A Good Ole Boys’ Family Feud - In These Times
"What we’re witnessing, as Louis Nayman writes in the latest issue of In These Times, are the last, bitter stages of the GOP’s “Southern strategy”: appealing to the anger that white voters feel toward America’s growing religious and racial diversity. That strategy has created a solid South for the Republicans—and turned out the base in big numbers—since Richard Nixon. It will continue to do so for another decade or two. But that won’t be enough to win national elections. Live by the sword, die by the sword."

Romney's definition of middle class raises eyebrows

What Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney don't want seniors to know

What Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney don't want seniors to know
"Unfortunately for them, they also apparently believe that a lot of seniors just aren't paying attention this election, and will believe their lies about what they plan to do. Which is, of course, to start making seniors pay more once they repeal Obamacare.The Center for American Progress shows how much current and future retirees would be paying under Romney/Ryan."

The Top Five Reasons Why Mitt Romney Won't Release More Tax Returns

Liars Don't Lead, They Mislead

Liars Don't Lead, They Mislead
"Romney pollster Neil Newhouse stated, "Fact checkers come to this with their own sets of thoughts and beliefs, and we're not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact checkers." In a representative democracy, facts do matter, and checking the facts is how we hold our representatives accountable. Romney and Ryan have based their campaign on smoke and mirrors, sleight of hand, political prestidigitation, lies and deceit.

Liars don't lead; they mislead."

Mitt Romney's Libya mistake

The Bain Way: Let the States Pick Up the Tab on National Debt?

The Bain Way: Let the States Pick Up the Tab on National Debt?
"Romney has had one major business experience - founding and running a private equity firm called Bain Capital, something very different than his father, who ran a car company. In the past several weeks there have been two detailed investigative stories on how he ran his private equity firm, and there has been much discussion in the media on how he ran his business differently than others: It has been dubbed, "The Bain Way"."

Florida Supervisors Of Elections Speak Out Against New Voter Purge

Florida Supervisors Of Elections Speak Out Against New Voter Purge: As Gov. Rick Scott (R-FL) and his Secretary of State continue their Ahab-like attempts to revive their failed voter purge, a bipartisan chorus of local elections supervisors are expressing frustration and concern about the cost and timing of the effort. Wednesday, the Scott administration reached a partial settlement with civil rights groups who had objected [...]/p

Romney’s Energy Adviser Complains About His Company’s High Taxes, But It Pays Just 2.2 Percent

Romney’s Energy Adviser Complains About His Company’s High Taxes, But It Pays Just 2.2 Percent: In a congressional hearing Thursday, Continental CEO and Romney’s chief energy adviser Harold Hamm asked to preserve the oil industry’s billions in tax breaks, although his company pays little in federal taxes. The oil firm has earned more than $1.8 billion profit over five years by dominating the oil shale boom in North Dakota. In [...]/p

Moody's Threat to Downgrade US Debt is Political, Not Fiscal | Common Dreams

Moody's Threat to Downgrade US Debt is Political, Not Fiscal | Common Dreams
"Moody's threat this week to downgrade the US government's credit rating says a whole lot more about the credit rating agency than it does about the US debt situation. It is really a way of telling the world that Moody's is making a political statement, rather than an assessment of risk for investors who want actual information about US Treasury securities. This is really an embarrassment for Moody's – since they are supposed to be evaluating risk – although most of the media didn't seem to notice."

7 Mitt Romney Statements As Idiotic as His Libya Response | Alternet

7 Mitt Romney Statements As Idiotic as His Libya Response | Alternet
"In a presidential campaign stretching for months, if not years, it is easy to forget Romney's earlier unfiltered pronouncements or just to dismiss them as gaffes. But the overall pattern is unmistakable: Romney lives in a world where his values are not the same as ordinary people and where he hides behind conservative principles regardless of their impact or harm.

What follows is a quick collection of videos clips, some assembled by other websites, which underscore that Romney’s intemperate and bellicose comments in response to the Libya crisis are hardly unique, but are consistent with views that are not appropriate for the world’s most powerful political leader."

Foreign policy tone deafness becomes liability for Romney

Mitt Romney's insensitivity to diplomatic and geopolitical circumstances and propensity for intemperate statements, demonstrated most recently in his inappropriately political response to Tuesday's attacks on U.S. missions in Egypt and Libya, have turned even members of his own party against him.

6 Right-Wing Zealots (or Groups of Zealots) That Would Blow Up the World for Political Gain | Alternet

6 Right-Wing Zealots (or Groups of Zealots) That Would Blow Up the World for Political Gain | Alternet
"As for Romney, his antics on Tuesday and Wednesday may well be the end of his campaign. With even many of his Republican supporters  running away from him  as if he were on fire, the media establishment judged that the candidate had inserted his foot directly into his mouth in a very serious way. It was a desperate attempt to shift the dynamics of the race – a Hail-Mary pass by a candidate looking at a 7-point deficit in Gallup's tracking poll – and it didn't work."

PERRspectives: Romney Fails the Commander-in-Chief Test. Again.

PERRspectives: Romney Fails the Commander-in-Chief Test. Again.
"If there were any lingering doubts about Mitt Romney's unfitness to serve as Commander-in-Chief, his shameful response to the killings of four Americans at a U.S. consulate in Libya should have put them to rest. Romney didn't know the facts. He didn't know the timeline of events. He didn't know who was responsible for the embassy breaches in Cairo and Benghazi. Yet even beforeAmericans had learned of and could mourn their deaths, Governor Romney used their murdered countrymen to slander the President of the United States. When the proverbial 3 A.M. phone call came, Romney let it go to voice mail, where his pre-recorded message called the President "disgraceful" and charged that Obama "sympathize[d] with those who waged the attacks."

Of course, it shouldn't have taken this appalling episode for Mitt Romney to disqualify himself in the eyes of so many. He long ago proved he lacks the judgment, temperament and steadfastness needed to guide the United States during times of crisis.

Consider, in no particular order, the following examples:"

Romney's foreign policy team is jam-packed with neo-conservative smirkers

Romney's foreign policy team is jam-packed with neo-conservative smirkers
"Most telling in that realm are Romney's choices for advisers in such matters, knuckle-dragging ultrahawks.

The roster is packed with George W. Bush retreads. Ari Berman took a look at them a few months ago and found:"

Romney Has Found a New Way to Lie!

Mitt Romney has figured out a new way to lie. In an interview on Sunday with NBC, watched by millions of people - Romney said that there are a number of things he likes with Obamacare - including a guarantee that health insurers can't deny healthcare to people with pre-existing conditions - and reforms that allow children to stay on their parents' health plans until the age of 26. So the man who first created Obamneycare in Massachusetts, and then disavowed it when he ran for President, now supports it again. Or he did for a few hours, until his campaign told Buzz Feed that Romney actually opposes all provisions of Obamacare and instead believes that the corporate-run "free market" will find a way to cover those with pre-existing conditions. In other words, Romney wants to roll-back Obamacare. So the Romney Big Lie strategy works like this - go on Meet the Press, where a lot of moderate, undecided voters will be watching - and lie about your position on protecting people with pre-existing conditions. Try to assure the independents that you won't let health insurers act like death panels toward children with pre-existing conditions. And then, after the show is off the air - immediately backtrack - and issue a "correction" to your base, a group of right-wing crazies who are perfectly OK with letting health insurance companies discriminate against sick children again. I've said it before - I'll say it again - the only way Mitt Romney can win this election is by lying. And now he's coming up with ever more clever ways to do so.