Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Earlier this week, Willard "Mittens" Romney was asked to admonish the actions of his Arizona campaign co-chairman, Secretary of State Ken Bennett, for embarrassing the state of Arizona by delving into the fringe Birther movement.
To my knowledge, Mittens has not publicly admonished the actions of Ken Bennett. I have not seen any public statement. The failure to object is to condone and to ratify the actions of Ken Bennett.
It gets worse. Also this week, the Romney campaign is promoting a fundraising event with the race-baiting Birther King himself, Donald Trump. Mitt Romney to supporters: Dine with Donald Trump - The Washington Post:
The Romney camp is offering supporters a chance to “Dine with The Donald,” according to a new fundraising missive.
“Donate today and you are eligible for a chance to win: Airport transportation in the Trump vehicle;” a “stay at the Trump International Hotel & Tower New York;” a chance to “tour the Celebrity Apprentice Boardroom;” and an opportunity to “dine with Donald Trump and Mitt Romney,” reads the message on the Romney campaign Web site.
An image on the site tells visitors to “donate $3 and you are entered for a chance to win” — although, as the fine print notes, as with any such campaign offer, no purchase is necessary to enter or win a prize.
In addition, Trump is hosting a Romney fundraiser next Tuesday night at the Trump Hotel in Las Vegas. Former House speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), who dropped out of the race last month, is also expected to attend, according to spokesman R.C. Hammond.
Trump has embraced the “birther” conspiracy theory that Obama was not born in the United States.
Just this week, Trump tweeted: “I wonder if @BarackObama ever applied to Occidental, Columbia or Harvard as a foreign student. When can we see his applications? What do they say about his place of birth.”
So, just how excited are Romney and Trump to be campaigning together? Well, at least one member of the duo seems enthused about the upcoming event.
“As a counter to the Obama-George Clooney event, Mitt Romney has yet again called upon Mr. Trump to provide a little bit of excitement and star power for supporters of Gov. Romney. ... Donald Trump has been the single most significant surrogate for Governor Romney and has pledged his continued assistance to ensure that Obama is limited to being a one-term president,” Trump’s top political aide, Michael Cohen, told ABC News.
The Donald is relishing being in the spotlight again of the sycophant media villagers. Mitt Romney embraces Donald Trump, who celebrates by going full birther (again):
[T]he Donald has been fully incorporated into Team Mitt. It's a bit like Gordon Gekko pairing up with Paris Hilton, but no matter. Contribute to Mitt, and win a dinner date with the awkward pair! Let's just watch the carnage, shall we?
[...] The Donald—who plans to host a lunch or dinner for the presumptive GOP nominee and some of his lucky supporters at one of the Trump properties in Manhattan—launched into a furious disquisition concerning Obama’s place of birth.“Look, it’s very simple,” said Trump, who has spent the past 13 months questioning Obama’s constitutional eligibility to occupy the White House (and only doubled down with his stubborn skepticism after Obama produced a long-form birth certificate, certifying he was born on Aug. 4, 1961, in Hawaii, and then hilariously roasted him at the 2011 White House Correspondents Dinner. “A book publisher came out three days ago and said that in his written synopsis of his book,” Trump went on, “he said he was born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia. His mother never spent a day in the hospital.”
Well, if a book publisher said it, all bets are off! Never mind that the person who wrote the thing admitted it was an error as soon as that little story "broke," that just proves she's in on the conspiracy, or something.
Even while they're freshly promoting this Mitt-Trump pairing, the Romney campaign is having to no-comment Trump's newest looniness:
Mitt Romney's campaign declined to say Friday if it was appropriate for the presumptive Republican nominee to use Donald Trump as a top surrogate as the reality television host continues to insist President Obama was not born in the United States. [...][T]he campaign would not respond to repeated requests about whether it was appropriate for Romney to campaign with The Apprentice host. Romney has two major fundraisers planned with Trump in the next month. The first, on Tuesday, is at Trump's Las Vegas hotel and will also feature an appearance by former presidential candidate Newt Gingrich. The campaign is also raffling off a dinner with Trump and Romney in New York later in June.
Sheesh. You know you've got a really hot endorsement on your hands when your official campaign position on it is "now, let us never speak of this again."
There are three possible explanations as I see it. First, Mittens is entirely politically tone-deaf to his actions, something which he has regulalry demonstrated on the campaign trail. He lacks the capacity to see that embracing the race-baiting Donald Trump for a fundraiser in the same week that his Arizona campaign co-chair was villified by the national news media is a problem. That lack of self-awareness is a serious problem.
Second, Mittens has not yet secured enough delegates to clinch the GOP nomination and his credentials as a conservative with the conservative base of the GOP are still in doubt. So Mittens is still pandering to the Birthers-Birchers-Secessionists of the GOP, and is playing to their basest prejudices and fears.
Third, and most troubling, Mittens has adopted the long-standing GOP "Southern Strategy" of race-baiting for the general election, and this embrace of Birtherism is not a bug but a feature of his general election campaign. Get ready for the ugliest race-baiting campaign in American history.
In any event, Willard "Mittens" Romney has demonstrated, once again, that he lacks the character and judgment to serve as president of the United States. It's not too late for Republicans to choose someone else.
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