Last updated on July 17th, 2023 at 06:03 pm
The sign of an altruist is having concern for the welfare of others that transcends religious dogma or the need for recompense whether it is material or spiritual. Politicians are not necessarily altruists, but they are supposed to show concern for the welfare of others as part of their jobs and it is natural they celebrate their successes when their actions benefit constituents and the country. Republicans have little to celebrate because they have done nothing for the greater good of the country or the people, but they are notorious for taking credit for Democratic legislation that the people benefit from in spite of their vehement opposition before and accusations of failure after the legislation proved successful.
Willard Romney has assailed President Obama’s handling of the economy because it has been successful, and has traveled around the country asserting that the economy is worse today than when the President took office. Romney has demeaned the President for bailing out the automobile industry for three years, and over the weekend his senior adviser, Eric Fehrnstrom, said that President Obama’s decision to bailout Chrysler and General Motors was actually Romney’s idea. Willard has said over and over again President Obama has no economic success, but Fehrnstrom said “The only economic success that President Obama has had is because he followed Mitt Romney’s advice,” and that the bailout “is exactly what Mitt Romney told them to do.” Now, Romney and his campaign are pathological liars, but claiming credit for something he has derided for three years is the height of hypocrisy and informs a character flaw of epic proportion; but what else is new?
This fantasy that the auto bailout was Romney’s idea is beyond lunacy in light of the intense criticism he leveled at the President just a couple of months ago when he said “the president tells us that without his intervention things in Detroit would be worse. I believe that without his intervention things there would be better.” In 2008, Romney said, “IF General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the American automotive industry goodbye,” and in 2012 he argued that “Obama should have let the free market work and allowed GM and Chrysler to go through a managed bankruptcy” which is what he now claims the President did with the bailout that is not remotely what a managed bankruptcy entails. A managed bankruptcy is more akin to a Chapter 11 bankruptcy that involves reorganization of a debtor’s business affairs and assets but it does not include a bailout by the government that Romney assailed as “crony capitalism on a grand scale.”
Romney is renowned for lying and flip-flopping on every issue for political expediency, but this latest claim is mindboggling. The simple fact that the President bet on American workers and saved or created jobs and the auto industry is indisputable and why General Motors and Chrysler still exist and are posting some of the most profitable quarters in their history. If, as Romney contended from 2008 through last week that the President did follow his advice, the American auto industry and millions of jobs it supports would not exist and GM and Chrysler’s creditors would be left holding the bag. However, the industry is thriving and it is only because the President ignored advice and criticism from vulture capitalists like Romney who has a record of bankrupting businesses and destroying or outsourcing jobs to profit himself and his wealthy investor friends.
Forget for a second that Willard Romney is a dirt-bag, and consider President Obama’s reason for bailing out the auto industry. The President may not be an acclaimed business mind, but he is an altruist that displays concern for the welfare of the American people and the economy. Instead of letting Detroit fail, he was able to get labor to make concessions to preserve their own jobs as well as the health of a leaner, more efficient industry. In fact, the entire bailout showed that for the good of the economy, the industry, and their jobs, Americans are willing to compromise and make concessions that define what America is capable of when all parties are working for the same goal. Contrast that process with Romney’s tenure at Bain Capital where investor profits trump a company’s health and Americans’ jobs, and one begins to understand why Willard advocated letting Detroit go bankrupt so wealthy investors like himself could leverage the auto industry into failure and millions of unemployed Americans. It is why Romney may be an adept vulture capitalist, but he will never look out for Americans’ jobs and a healthy economy that sustains a vibrant middle class because doing so will not enrich Willard Romney.
It is little wonder why the more Americans learn about Romney, the more they dislike him. No-one likes a pathological liar, and even worse, no-one likes a person who takes credit for another’s accomplishments. It is especially despicable that Romney has been unrelenting in criticizing the President’s decision to save the auto industry for over three years, and now claims the President followed his advice. What is next for Romney? Is he going to take credit for killing Osama bin Laden or the President’s stimulus package that created millions of jobs? Last week Romney said the President made the economy worse than when he came into office, and that his economic agenda has been a total failure, but now he says the President’s ‘only’ economic success was because he followed Romney’s advice? It makes one wonder if Willard is suffering from a mental dysfunction or is just a pathetic loser who happened to make a ton of money destroying jobs and American businesses.
Romney is a miscreant that must think the American people are memory challenged and stupid. How else can he spend three years criticizing the automobile industry bailout as a failure and then claim it was a success that was his idea all along? Americans are not stupid, and neither are Democrats who will replay Romney’s three year bailout criticism alongside his contention that it was his brilliant idea all along so the entire country will see Willard for what he really is; a liar, a hypocrite, and as bad for struggling businesses as he is for America.
Born in the South, raised in the Mid-West and California for a well-rounded view of America; it doesn't look good.
Former minister, lifelong musician, Mahayana Zen-Buddhist.
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