Some journalists might use the term "parsing," here, but not us. We’re bold that way. We came across a little item today that further reinforces our view that former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney is a lying sack who will say anything to get elected president of the United States.
The latest flap is this: In defending his church — the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — from charges of official racism, Romney asserted in a speech that he saw his father march with Dr. Martin Luther King. (The LDS church would not allow blacks to join the priesthood until 1978, well after the civil rights era and only after a supposed revelation from God to the church’s prophet.)
It turns out, neither thing Romney said is true. Former Michigan Gov. George Romney didn’t march "with" King, in the sense that he was in the same march as the civil rights leader. And Romney didn’t "see" the event, in the sense that he was there to witness it.
Ergo, lying sack.
This piece on Alternet delves into the details, including the parsing, weasely justification that Romney later attempted to put on his mendacity. (Parsing seems to be a Romney pasttime, as anybody who saw his recent appearance on Meet the Press quickly learned. If you missed it, you can access the video here.)
An actual Romney quote: "I’m an English literature major. When we say I saw the Patriots win the World Series, it doesn’t necessarily mean you were there."
Actually, Mitt, it does. Or at least that’s the clear implication. Or at least it would be, since the Patriots can’t win the World Series unless they started playing baseball instead of football, where they compete in this thing we call the "Superbowl."
Romney presents himself as a man of faith and strong conviction, but it seems he’s had at least two stances of almost everything. Try to nail him down on something, and he turns into Jell-O. And we all know how hard it is to nail Jell-O. (Yes, we tried it once. It’s hard.)
But this does raise a key question, speaking of faith and values: Don’t Mormons oppose lying? And even if Mormons don’t (we happen to know they do, by the way), don’t Republicans hate parsing, equivocating, weasels? Anybody thinking of voting for Romney needs to remember one thing: You have no idea who in the hell this guy really is, and that’s a pretty damn big gamble.