I Owe Mitt an Apology

Presumptive nominee Mitt Romney is seemingly fixated on apologies. He’s obsessed with apologies like Bristol Palin is obsessed with teen abstinence—like BP is obsessed with clean energy—Marcus Bachmann with curing homosexual men …

Mitt’s book is titled “No Apology.” He’s convinced the problem with Obama is that he apologizes for America. Because Mitt is so engrossed by apologies—he sees apologies that aren’t there.

Adam Zyglis / Buffalo News (click to view more cartoons by Zyglis)

Mitt, he’ll tell you, doesn’t apologize for America. But he’s had to apologize for himself plenty. Aside from all the recent gaffes and gauche statements that managed to incense America’s closest allies in Europe, earning him the nickname “Mitt the Twit,” Mitt’s ever-changing policy positions are, for all intents and purposes, apologies. It’s saying his previous stance on, say, women’s health, was wrong. For example: when Mitt said abortion should be legal because a close family friend had died from an illegal abortion. He’s now saying he’s righting (ahem) his stance on the issue and declaring his vigil for his family friend to be over. He’s saying his crowning achievement as governor of a state, Obamacare, nee Romneycare, is now a plague on humanity and must be repealed.

A man who “retroactively retired” as CEO of Bain Capital can effortlessly adjust his positions. For a candidate who’s disgusted by apologies in his opponents—who hurls the accusation of apology as if it were a disqualifying offense to all that is wholesome—he sure walks back from, amends and revises the stuff he says a lot.

So since apologies are so important to Mr. Romney, I’d like to offer mine. I’ve said on numerous occasions (some of them broadcasted) that Mitt has been running for president for 20 years. I figured somewhere around 1992, Mitt, having witnessed his father’s failed run for president and his mother’s failed run for Senate, was watching the first Baby Boomer president (Bill Clinton) being sent to the White House. It was then he resolved that he, too, was going to run for president.

Now if that were true and his planning began the year Pope John Paul issued an apology for the Inquisition’s banning Galileo, Mitt would have made some different choices. His business practices would have been, candidly, more patriotic.

He wouldn’t have laid-off American workers, outsourcing jobs overseas, and then expect those same American workers to vote for him. He would have built something, instead of destroying corporations and getting rich off the charcoal. If Mitt Romney had been planning to run for president for 20 years, he would have anticipated releasing his tax returns (his father pioneered the practice) and made sure everything on there was something he could be proud of; returns he would happily release to the public.

So I was wrong. Mitt hasn’t been running for president for 20 years. He made money in a way that’s legal but now is embarrassed (think apologetic) about how little he’s paid in taxes, or what he’s made off his investments to show his tax returns to voters. He’s taken advantage of tons of loopholes, parking his money in foreign bank accounts. With his business record, he’d be a controversial presidential appointee, let alone a presidential candidate himself. Sure it’s legal. But it’s not ethical. Not for public service. Especially not for the most powerful position in the country.

So, Mitt, I’m sorry. I had been saying something about you that just wasn’t true. You haven’t been running for president for two decades. You haven’t been paying attention to what would play best to get yourself sworn into office.

You’ve been paying attention to your money.

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© Copyright 2012 TinaDupuy.com, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Tina Dupuy is an award-winning writer and the editor-in-chief of SoapBlox. Tina can be reached at tinadupuy@yahoo.com.