They've published three articles, the first two highlighting different themes from the "stolen" (meaning recorded without permission) tape. The FIRST has Romney talking about the 47% of Americans who pay no income taxes and thus are unlikely to vote for him. The SECOND is about Mideast peace. The THIRD, just out, has the entire, uncut, 49-minute tape.

And HERE is Romney defending what was recorded.

This is exactly the kind of data that Doctor Fate will see as totally supportable while his opposites on the left consider it utterly damning. As an independent I find myself less disturbed than many but not unaffected. Regarding the 47%: Romney almost but not quite says that he essentially has nothing to offer Americans other than tax breaks. He essentially (but not quite) says that if you can't see yourself benefiting directly from his tax plans you'd have no reason to vote for him. That's very strange. I can see other reasons to support him - or think I can. Am I deluding myself? Is it ALL about tax cuts?

Regarding the Palestinians, I'm sure Rickyp will go through the roof. He has some reason to, especially since Romney's assessment is utterly without nuance. The question is, with or without nuance, is it realistic? Maybe so. I hope not, but maybe so. It's a debatable issue. Strangely enough, what really bothers me (but apparently no one else) is that he thinks Syria borders the West Bank. The WB borders only Jordan and Israel. I think that's a fairly serious factual error that betrays a long-term lack of interest in Mideast affairs. (Though it may be that he's just bad with borders.)

Anyway... I post because this footage will surely appear in pro-Obama ads. Romney, between this stuff and some other stuff, can be made to look very elitist, insensitive, and worse. He's basically saying that half of Americans are un-American - that they have no shred of the classic American virtues. That's hard medicine. It does not sound good.

Romney better hope that he was right - that NO ONE not paying income taxes was going to vote for him. Because if any were before, they're unlikely to by election day, when the ads based on this vid have run a million times.

We already knew he was an elitist, but one has to wonder how smart he is. Maybe that is not the right way to characterize it, but Romney does seem to want to oversimplify complex issues. First of all, if 47% of the country is composed of victims, moochers, people who don't pay taxes and are going to vote for Obama, well, you're not going to win the election. You can't lose 47% of the electorate and expect to win the rest. You can appeal to that 47% based on social issues, you can appeal to them that your economic policies will help them make more money, you can appeal that your economic policies are fair even if they don't help people who are not making much money. Does Romney not understand that Obama has problems with white working class-men with high school educations? Just because someone does not pay federal income tax does not mean that they are dependent on the government. There are a lot of working poor, some of whom work more than one job. It is just inaccurate and slanderous to say that half of america does not have a good work ethic and wants to get government hand-outs.

Why even have such a negative view towards peace between Israel and thePalestinians? Surely he realizes that if he is perceived as being pro-Isreal, the chances of peace go down to zero. It is not as if Isreal as has been perfect, either.

Yes, Romney seems to lack a nuanced view of the world. We recently had GW Bush who saw things in a simplified way, in black and white terms. How did that work out for us?

I'm just wondering how many posters on Redscape are part of the 53%.

Does a gov't pension that I worked for 20 years qualify as being on the dole?

A substantial chunk of this 47% would have to be retired people, there's no toher way that the numbers could add up. Interesting that Romney chooses to label the grey vote in this manner...

Of course, a more interesting question would be whether Romney himself falls into the 53%. Didn't almost all of the tax he paid come in the form of capital gains rather than income taxes ?

2/3 pay payroll taxes that add up to 15 percent (when you include the employers contribution) and as Sass stated a good number are retirees. Of course two of Romney's major voting blocs are the elderly and white working-class workers Romney's big mistake was to use an actual percentage--if he had used vague numbers it wouldn't even be an issue And as for his own taxes, he stated in a primary debate that under an opponent's plan that eliminated capital gains taxes he wouldn't have paid any tax the past two years

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/opinion/mitt-romney-class-warrior.html?hp

For whatever reason I kinda like Romney. With Obama's illegal war policies I've actually been seriously considering voting for Romney because I certainly can't vote for a war criminal!

But this bit is just beyond the pale. It's not his job to worry about the 47% of people who don't pay taxes. How can anyone vote for a guy who thinks that? The POTUS is the president of all Americans. Could he have just been saying what the $50,000 a plate donors wanted to hear? Maybe, but what does he believe? Who knows what Romney believes? What an ass.

Jill Stein 2012! Our generation's Ralph Nader!!

geojanes wrote:It's not his job to worry about the 47% of people who don't pay taxes. How can anyone vote for a guy who thinks that? The POTUS is the president of all Americans.

Your NYT editorial echoes this sentiment, maybe, saying: "It is not his job, he said, as a candidate nor apparently as president if he is elected, 'to worry about those people.' "

Gotta' be careful here. From the Mother Jones unedited transcript, bolding from Mother Jones, underlining and parenthetical italicizations from me:

Audience member: For the last three years, all everybody's been told is, "Don't worry, we'll take care of you." How are you going to do it, in two months before the elections (setting the scene: Romney before attaining office, not after), to convince everybody you've got to take care of yourself?

Romney: There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe that 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. That that's an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote (Romney's talking about campaign strategy, not governing once elected) for this president no matter what. And I mean, the president starts off with 48, 49, 48—he starts off with a huge number. These are people who pay no income tax. Forty-seven percent of Americans pay no income tax. So our message (as a campaign) of low taxes doesn't connect. And he'll be out there talking about tax cuts for the rich. I mean that's what they sell every four years. And so my job is (present tense) not to worry about those people—I'll never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives. (To the contrary, during the campaign...) What I have to do is convince the 5 to 10 percent in the center that are independents that are thoughtful, that look at voting one way or the other depending upon in some cases emotion, whether they like the guy or not, what it looks like. I mean, when you ask those people…we do all these polls—I find it amazing—we poll all these people, see where you stand on the polls, but 45 percent of the people will go with a Republican, and 48 or 4…

[Recording stops.]

Bottom line: if you want to, it's easy enough to construe Romney's disinterest in the 47% as being limited to the campaign season. He's not anywhere saying with any clarity that he'd be uncaring about them as Prez. The NYT seems to recognize this because they felt compelled to include "nor apparently as president if he is elected" in their accusation. It's "apparent" only if you are inclined to want see it. Otherwise it can only be inferred, construed, or extrapolated.

You're perfectly within your rights to listen to the audio and draw your own conclusions about what's in Romney's heart. By all means, be an amateur psychologist - it's your duty as a voter. But if this were a court of law, and we were to apply strict and literal modes of interpretation to the words he spoke, we could not support a conclusion like the one you and the NYT seem to reach.

To repeat: Gotta' be careful here. I'm not saying Romney is innocent. I'm merely urging very close and objective scrutiny of the facts before reaching such a strong and final conclusion.

As for me, as an amateur psychologist, I interpret the video as adding support to the suspicion that Romney is. as a person, uncaring about half of Americans. That suspicion, however, is countered by lots of stories about Mitt doing good works. On the other hand, nearly all those good works were done for fellow Mormons. There seems to be little doubt Mitt's a "good Mormon" in that sense. That means very little to me, however.

So I'm inclined to agree with you, Geojanes. This vid makes me less likely to vote for Mitt. But remember two things: 1) the vid is not proof positive of anything, and 2) if it ain't Mitt it's Barack, who also is less than perfect.

The problem for Romney is that he is simply spewing a conservtive myth. For someone who is supposed to be a good business man yu'd think he'd at least get to tthe bottom of the numbers.
He complains that 47% don't pay federal income tax, and yet doesn't acknowlledge that the number went up because of the tax deductions brought in by the Bush tax cuts. Cuts his party still support. Or does Mitt intend to get rid of those? .
Hmmm.
He also makes the nonsensical arguement that a dollar taxed for one reason (payroll taxes) is somehow diffferent then one taxed for income. Most people paying pay roll taxes pay taxes at the same rate Mitt does on his income.

The larger truth, however — which Journal editorialists almost never note — is that payroll taxes now account for fully 36 percent of federal revenue (up from 16 percent in 1960), versus 47 percent for incomes taxes (roughly in line with the 44 percent they represented in 1960). When you count the employer side contributions — which, as noted, economists say effectively come out of wages — most Americans now pay more in payroll taxes than in income taxes

.
Matt Miller Washington Post Sep 19

I think Mitt has crystalized the arguement about taxation. And his arguements that he'll change the tax rates, and tax deductions become very important . But he's unwilling to actually share those details... Maybe he'll give a speech to donors somewhere and someone will video tape that so voters can make an informed decision.
Why do a small percentage of people pay most of the income tax? They have all the money.

purple

Regarding the Palestinians, I'm sure Rickyp will go through the roof. He has some reason to

Not really. I think his view point is somewhat realistic. The solution in the region is only to be reached by the two countries. And the solution won't be arrived at until the unequal relationship changes.
Right now, Israel abuses their position of power in two ways. They arrnage local resources to primarily benefit israel (see water resources) and they continue to expand their settlements into Palestine...
If the US could do anything to change Israels actions on either of these, it would contribute to movement to a solution.... But other than that the US doesn't have the influence or power to force a solution. And if thats what Mitt is on about, he's largely right.... Except of course, he blames only Palestinians...
And this is , mostly from ignorance which you illustrate with his sense of geography and which you could also include his earlier comments about "cultural differences".

How about the irony of Romney paying a lower percentage of taxes (13.9 percent) than most of the 47 percent pay in payroll taxes (15 percent) Purple, there was also the interview w Romney where he said he was not concerned about the poor, they were taken care of (Romney was trying to emphasize his concern for the middle-class).

freeman2 wrote:Purple, there was also...

But I earlier wrote...

Purple wrote:Romney, between this stuff and some other stuff, can be made to look very elitist, insensitive, and worse.

geojanes wrote:http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/opinion/mitt-romney-class-warrior.html?hp

For whatever reason I kinda like Romney. With Obama's illegal war policies I've actually been seriously considering voting for Romney because I certainly can't vote for a war criminal!

But this bit is just beyond the pale. It's not his job to worry about the 47% of people who don't pay taxes.

With all due respect, that's not what he said.

He was talking about those with a predisposition to not vote for him and how he cannot focus his efforts on them.

Purple wrote:This is exactly the kind of data that Doctor Fate will see as totally supportable while his opposites on the left consider it utterly damning. As an independent I find myself less disturbed than many but not unaffected. Regarding the 47%: Romney almost but not quite says that he essentially has nothing to offer Americans other than tax breaks. He essentially (but not quite) says that if you can't see yourself benefiting directly from his tax plans you'd have no reason to vote for him. That's very strange. I can see other reasons to support him - or think I can. Am I deluding myself? Is it ALL about tax cuts?

Two points.

1. That is not what he said. Is it reasonable to tape a snippet from an answer at a fundraiser and extrapolate his entire fiscal policy from it? Apparently some here think it is.

2. Will everyone benefit from a growing economy? I think so. What I can promise you is that if we continue the growth-restrictive policies of this Administration, along with is promises to "invest" in virtually every liberal dream, we will go broke. Well, okay, maybe we won't but our grandchildren will.

Interesting: "snippet" may be quite the accurate term. http://legalinsurrection.com/2012/09/cr ... her-jones/