by Tumbleweed on Wed Jan 30, 2008 7:34 am
Hello tinglott. Welcome.
I don't see Mitt quite the way you do I guess.
#1. Does that unsurpassed ethics include hiring illegal aliens?
#2. Where did Mitt get war experience? What branch did he serve in? Romney earned a draft deferral by going to France for a two-year missionary tour with the Mormon Church. As such, he was able to avoid military service in Vietnam.
#3. I suppose his web site paints a pretty picture but the fair citizens of Mass might disagree on what he did for them. If under funding programs means budget experience, he's your man. Here is a good example of what he did for school funding.
Romney's proposed budget for fiscal 2004 included a slight increase in K-12 school spending -- $25.4 million, or less than 1 percent. But the actual budget approved by the Legislature and signed by Romney cut K-12 school spending by $181.6 million, or 4 percent. The story is simpler for higher education: Romney proposed a cut of $100 million, or about 10 percent, and the final budget reduced it $112 million, or 11 percent.
#4. What does thinking outside the box, and think standing on his feet mean?
#5. Romney began talking about giving troopers the power to make arrests on immigration charges earlier in 2006, but he didn't sign an agreement with the federal government - a necessary condition for that authority to be granted - until Dec. 13 of that year. Romney was scheduled to leave office Jan. 4, 2007. Democrat Deval Patrick, who had won the race to succeed Romney, had already said the program was a "bad idea" because troopers were busy enough as it was.
Sure enough, Patrick rescinded the agreement within his first week in office so troopers could "focus on enforcing Massachusetts laws." The policy never had a chance to take effect, because those troopers chosen to carry it out hadn't yet begun a required six-week training course.
#6. Honesty? He begged voters to accept him as an embracer of abortion rights. "I believe that abortion should be safe and legal," he said. He staked his credentials on his mother, Lenore. He said she ran for the Senate in 1970 on an abortion-rights platform, inspired by the death of her son-in-law's teenage sister from an illegal abortion. "My mother and my family have been committed to the belief that we can believe as we want, but we will not force our beliefs on others on that matter. And you will not see me wavering on that," he said.
In June 2005, former Globe columnist Eileen McNamara challenged Romney's assertion of his mother's pro-choice position. Two longtime Romney family friends and political supporters -- former governor William Milliken and former Republican National Committee co-chairwoman Elly Peterson -- told McNamara they could not recall Lenore Romney speaking out publicly for abortion. If she had, it would have represented a dramatic change of heart and break with the Mormon Church. Peterson, who worked on Lenore Romney's campaign, said, "If it happened, I'd remember it. It didn't and I don't." Milliken, who served as George Romney's lieutenant governor, also expressed skepticism.
#7. Good fund raisers don't necessarily make good presidents.
#8. His religious affiliation may hurt him as much as help him. Their are a lot of folks who view the Mormon religion as a cult.