'Fortunate Son' Mitt Romney protested in favor of Vietnam draft, then dodged

[jeremy]

You missed the irony in a pro-draft a*****e not wanting to get drafted.

Huh...

I guess I just fail to see the difference in Not Serving and Not Being Drafted...

 

[jeremy]

The hawk designation. There is no irony here. That word is misused more often than not.

You are right, is Hypocrisy a better fit...

 

[level.eleven]

You are right, is Hypocrisy a better fit...

Yes, it would appear as if Mitt is a hypocrite.

 

[Kick]

I've never served. If I was drafted, I would go. However, having never served, I do not feel that I have earned the right to ridicule others for not serving, regardless of the circumstances.

 

[hornadylnl]

I've never served. If I was drafted, I would go. However, having never served, I do not feel that I have earned the right to ridicule others for not serving, regardless of the circumstances.

This is true also but I have every right to call out a draft dodger when he tells me I must go.

 

[rambone]

I've never served. If I was drafted, I would go. However, having never served, I do not feel that I have earned the right to ridicule others for not serving, regardless of the circumstances.

The draft that Mitt supported violated the rights of 1.7 Million Americans. I feel for those people more than poor Mitt who is rightly being ridiculed.

 

[jeremy]

The draft that Mitt supported violated the rights of 1.7 Million Americans. I feel for those people more than poor Mitt who is rightly being ridiculed.

Really....

How many of those Draftees had signed up willingly?!

 

[ArmedProgrammer]

Rambone - THanks for taking my comments in the light that they were intended. Whether Romney or Gingrich deserve the "chickenhawk" label, I leave to each person to figure out. I just wanted to make sure that the reality of the situation was understood. And that the misleading parts in some of the links didn't get accepted as the truth - when I knew better.

Props to you sir, for not taking it personally! It was certainly not intended that way.

 

[rambone]

 

[rambone]

Did Romney's French palace not have a toilet? Or is he full of excrement?

Mitt Romney Reportedly Lived in a 'Palace' During Mission Days

The former Massachusetts governor recounted his time in Paris after facing charges of being out of touch when he offered a $10,000 bet to fellow GOP candidate Rick Perry during a presidential debate Saturday. He said that, of the places he stayed in France, “I don’t recall any of them having a refrigerator. We shopped before every meal.”

He also said the toilet was a hole in the ground with a bucket, and the missionaries bought a hose and “stuck it on the sink” for a shower.

But Anderson said the mansion had not only a fridge but also a washer-dryer, as well as a chef called Pardo and a house boy who prepared lunch and dinner five days a week. “I never saw anything like it in another private home at that time,” he said.

Jean Caussé, a Mormon who met Romney during his time in the southwestern city of Bordeaux, said he would be “astonished” if the former Massachusetts governor’s account of his time in France was accurate.

“I don’t see why he would have lived in conditions like that for two years when it was far from the general case,” Caussé said.

Mitt Romney 'lived in a Mormon palace with chef and houseboy' during 1960s France mission

It was multimillionaire Mitt Romney’s attempt to portray himself as an ordinary guy to Americans, with tales of living a slumdog’s life in France.But a different picture emerged today of the GOP presidential candidate’s life while serving as a Mormon missionary abroad in the 1960s.
Mr Romney reportedly spent most of 1968 at a Parisian ‘palace for rich people’, which was staffed by a Spanish chef and a houseboy.
‘It was a house built by and for rich people,’ Richard Anderson, 70, Kaysville, Utah, told the Daily Telegraph. ‘I would describe it as a palace.’
Mr Anderson is the son of the Mormon mission president when the former Massachusetts governor stayed during his missionary placement abroad.
The revelations come after last week Mr Romney recalled spending two and half years knocking on doors and defecating into a bucket.
Jean Caussé, 72, met Mr Romney in Bordeaux and told the Daily Telegraph he ‘never knew’ missionaries who ever did such a thing.

Romney & Gingrich: The Draft Dodgers That Want to Send Your Kids to War

 

[lashicoN]

The fact you are bagging on someone for Not serving the Country...

The way I read it, he was giving Mutt hell for his support of sending other people to fight, when he wasn't willing to fight, and now, he's still barking about going to war...sending more of our military into yet another hellhole he would have never gone to.

 

[ArmedProgrammer]

Again, Rambone, I tell you - AS ONE WHO HAS BEEN THERE, that it is NOT ONLY POSSIBLE but ENTIRELY BELIEVABLE - that Romney lived in the squallid conditions that he described for part of the time AND lived in the palatial conditions that Anderson describes, at different times in his mission. I have shown you how, and WHY it's believable. NO missionary spends their entire time in the mission home. I'm sure he didn't either.

From what I've read Mitt didn't say that he spent the entire 2 1/2 years in squallor. He said that he had SEEN it during his 2 1/2 year stint. have you ever been overseas for any reason, Rambone? Out of your element? Away from the life that you are used to? If so, then you understand! These things get BURNED into your memory. For Romney - who I agree was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, I have no doubt that some of the squallid things he saw and lived through were BURNED into his mind too! Disagree with him on policy or no, he is human....

And I do this as someone who will NOT be voting for Romney in the primary. Without question.

And you still have no interest in the truth.

Consider this and read it well. Romney was driving the car when Anderson's mother was killed in an accident in France. By all accounts he was not at fault. Read the details.
Consider the FACTS.

Survivors recall tragic car crash in France with Romney at the wheel - The Boston Globe

I am NOT a Mitt Romney fan. I disagree, as you do, with some of the positions he has taken. I think that there are better candidates out there right now. But you do yourself no credit, sir, when you insist on putting out lies and hate when I have explained the TRUTH above. And I will not let you get by with spewing hate and vitriolic lies. You sir, should be better than that. I am frankly disappointed. I had thought better of you.

Did Mitt in a bucket? I don't know! I wasn't there holding it for him! But I know this: when I served in Tokyo - the Mission President (and the Assistants - as Romney was for a time), lived in a very nice area of Shinjuku, Tokyo - in a very nice home, with apartments for the missionaries right next door. And I know of other mission homes where the apartments are in the basement of the mission home and it is a VERY UPSCALE PLACE. And some of the apartments I lived (in Nagano, Takasaki, Mito and Shin-Koiwa) were ok, and some of them were pretty squallid. So is it plausible? YES. ABSOLUTELY.

You would do far better, sir, to disagree with his policies and actions. Engaging in a smear and hate campaign merely smacks of desperation. And ignorance. And prejudice. And fear.

 

[steveh_131]

You would do far better, sir, to disagree with his policies and actions. Engaging in a smear and hate campaign merely smacks of desperation. And ignorance. And prejudice. And fear.

That's what he's doing. He's disagreeing with his policies regarding war. Nobody cares if this yahoo took a dump in a bucket decades ago.

I do care, however, if he was doing it from a foreign country after protesting in favor of forcing young men to sacrifice their lives in a jungle across the globe, and then running like hell when his turn came up.

And now he wants to do it again from the safety of the oval office?

His actions show me just how little he cares for the lives of the peon soldiers that would occupy his Risk board.

 

[ArmedProgrammer]

Steve -
I do NOT disagree with you re: the main point of this thread. Read POST #30. THAT is what I am responding to - POST #30 is Rambone willfully ignoring the facts after they have clearly been presented to him. How many times do I have to say it? I agree that Romney was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. To pretend otherwise is foolhardy. And like others of his generation and background - he went to college and not to the war. And yet counter protested those who protested the war. For those who have a problem with him doing that - I say GREAT! That's a completely fair disagreement. And a TOTALLY reasonable point - as is yours!

But post #30, in light of all of the evidence presented is intellectually vacant. It's like me learning that Rambone worked on a dairy farm where they often use artificial insemination to impregnate the cows. And then writing in a post here something like this:

Rambone performs sex act on farm animals!

It is an intellectually and morally bankrupt tactic.
Hopefully that illustrates what's bugging me a little better. I have NO disagreement with your point of view at all!

If Rambone (in post #30) had just put the picture of Newt and Romney and the bit about them dodging the draft and sending your kids to war, I would have agreed with the point and wouldn't have bothered to comment.

 

[steveh_131]

It is an intellectually and morally bankrupt tactic.
Hopefully that illustrates what's bugging me a little better. I have NO disagreement with your point of view at all!

I agree with you; that is a really stupid tactic. But I don't agree that Rambone is doing that here. He isn't simply speculating about how things were, he provided sources confirming it. Maybe they're wrong, who knows.

 

[ArmedProgrammer]

Fair enough, sir. It's probably the fact that I have lived the life of a missionary and know how that stuff goes, that makes it plausible, and entirely probable. (And it pisses me off to see it twisted and spun in the name of politics.)

It must be kind of like how a Vietnam vet feels listening to a reporter talk about the war from back in the States. (I don't know - I wasn't born until '66) The reporter has no clue of the situation on the ground in country. Yet they insist on spinning it their way. And that's GOT to frustrate the heck out of the guy who was there.

Again - if you want to call Gingrich and Romney "chickenhawks" there's plenty of evidence to support the claim. No disagreement from me there. People have to weigh that with all of the other factors when deciding how to vote. And they will.

 

[iChokePeople]

Am I ignorant because I really, sincerely don't give even the tiniest tidbit of rat excrement about how he lived as a missionary (or college student, or...)? I know, beyond a reasonable doubt, that he's lived a different life than I have and has no idea what it's like to be a normal person -- just like the rest of the candidates. I know if his mouth's moving, there's a fair chance that not everything coming out is what we, before Clinton, would have called "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth", and at least some of it is flat-out lies -- just like every other politician. I can't imagine a scenario in which I'd vote for him... but I still just absolutely could.not.care.less how he lived for six months or two years UNLESS it had been while voluntarily serving his country. That would earn him points with me. This? Seriously, let me add this to the long list of things about which I absolutely do not give a flying ****. And even as a veteran, I'm not as offended about the REAL issues presented here as some are, though I at least GET that part.

ETA: The ONLY effect any of this has on me is to make me wonder why other candidates even bother with it. You don't have anything better to sling than whether he's lived a silver spoon life? I strongly prefer people who explain to me why they are the best (better...) candidate, not just waste time with irrelevant smears about the others. I like "the others are good, but here's why I'm better", rather than, "he sucks even more than I do..."

 

[Pocketman]

While in general, I take issue with those "connected" individuals who avoided Vietnam service, I don't fault Romney personally. I do however dislike the hypocrisy of defending war and then avoiding service. His detractors will certainly make an issue of this.

Romney's religion and service to his church are of no bearing, IMO. For what it's worth, I served with several Mormons (1968-1972) who had been on missions prior to joining the military. Romney had his opportunities to serve.

Mr. Romney comes across as a "used car salesman" politician. From my perspective, Mitt Romney is dancing the populist quick step and therefore compromises principles for the sake of getting elected.

 

[CarmelHP]

A couple of points:

If Romney said that he doesn't remember ever staying anywhere with a refrigerator, then he is lying, assuming the other report of him staying at a palatial mansion in France is true.

The sign Romney is holding "Speak Out, Don't Sit-In" hardly sounds like a ringing endorsement of the draft.

It is not hypocritical to defend your country's moral basis for fighting a war while not volunteering to so yourself. Defending a country's involvement in a particular war is not, in itself, support for either that war or war as a matter of resolving conflict. It merely reflects disagreement that others that contend that such involvement is morally wrong, illicit, or illegal.

BTW, I don't support Romney and will be unhappy if he is the nominee.

 

[EvilBlackGun]

A bit of elucidation: Romney's primitive French toilet.

In many parts of France the standard method of dumping-&-wiping is thus: There is a hole in the floor/ground, often surrounded by ceramic tile of the basest kind, sloping to the hole. A male will relieve himself by standing on the tile and peeing into (or towards) said hole. To relive oneself of Number Two, one utilizes the two "posts" which are actually "ceramic foot-steps" raised slightly above the rest of the tile implement. The hole in the tile is arranged so as to be properly aligned with the foot-prints that it allows a correct plop after the bombs-away is affected. One must bring their own wipers to the action. These "squares" are often very public. No-one stands around to observe the action, AFAIK. It will be noticed that male trousers are baggy-legged in these parts of Europe, to allow the clothes to stay un-involved in the transaction; conversely, females seldom wear under-gear. From time to time that center hole was used to pump out the "fertilizer." I dug a few of these latrines in 'Nam, but we didn't have tile, or foot-prints, or females. We called them "trench-latrines" or "field-latrines." PostScript: The best job I've ever had involved crapping in a bucket: head-end crew on a locomotive. I was knocking out $1100 per week, in 1979. I was seldom at home. EBG