President Obama’s performance in last week’s debate has been the subject of much discussion among pundits. However, the President may be content with the recent developments, as the weekend has seen a focus on Mitt Romney’s lies.
Romney has been attempting to reposition himself as a moderate, after a nine-month campaign as a right-wing candidate. His efforts have been unsuccessful, as his ‘Etch-a-Sketch’ has been shaken too vigorously.
Napoleon Bonaparte’s advice to “never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake” has been ignored by the Romney campaign. The Republican candidate has dug himself a deep hole, as evidenced by National Public Radio’s lead story, “Romney Goes On Offense, Pays For It In First Wave Of Fact Checks“.
The situation was exacerbated by the reaction of right-wing media outlets to the September job numbers, which showed a significant drop. Although President Obama had seen the figures prior to the debate, the incident has been interpreted as a shrewd move on his part.
The President was aware that if he had been too aggressive during the debate, he would have been seen as the ‘angry black man’. Therefore, he allowed the Republican media outlets to celebrate their victory for 36 hours, before they were forced to eat crow over the jobs number story. The President’s knowledge of how the media would react has enabled him to manipulate the situation to his advantage.
Mitt Romney’s performance in the first presidential debate has been widely scrutinised, with fact-checkers noting that he uttered 29 lies in just 37 minutes. This has led to the question of who won the debate: the sitting president, or the challenger who had been preparing since July?
The issue of Romney’s truthfulness has been a recurring one throughout the campaign, with the Maddow blog releasing its 37th edition of ‘Chronicling Mitt’s Mendacity‘ on Friday. In the past week alone, Romney has been found to have told 50 lies, with the total number of lies uttered since the campaign began in late 2011 standing at 767.
Such a figure is remarkable, and has led to the old joke that the tell-tale sign of a liar is when their mouth is moving. Politicians often ‘stretch’ the truth, but Romney’s lies are beyond the pale. With four weeks and two more debates to go, he could potentially hit 1,000 lies on the campaign trail.
This is particularly concerning given Romney’s long-standing role as a key leader in his church, the LDS Church, whose most sacred text, The Book of Mormon, is unequivocal in its condemnation of lying as an offence punishable by eternal damnation.
“In Section 63, in verse 17 of the Doctrine and Covenants of the Mormon Church we find this: ‘All liars, and whosoever loveth and and maketh a lie, and the whoremonger, and the sorcerer, shall have their part in that lake which burneth with fire and brimstone which is the second death,’” Bashir said. “And from the Book of Mormon to Nephi, Chapter 2, Verse 34 we find this: ‘Woe unto the liar, for he shall be thrust down to hell.’”
MSNBC’s Martin Bashir raised the issue of Mitt Romney’s propensity for lying months ago, dubbing the GOP leader “Mitt the Mendacious”. The question remains whether American voters will reward such behaviour on Election Day. The consensus appears to be that they will not, and President Obama is unlikely to offer any assistance to Romney in the upcoming debates.
(I have chronicled Mitt’s lies and this entire election campaign in a series of e-books condensed into the paperback and e-book “Billionaire Boys Election Freak Show” available on amazon.com and amazon.co.uk)
