Headlines

Paul Begala

Damn, that Mitt Romney’s a bully

One can draw a straight line from the young man who pinned down a terrified teenager and walked a blind man into a closed door, to the adult who put the family dog in a kennel and strapped it to the roof of the car, to the businessman who laid off hundreds of people, cancelled their health benefits, and paid himself millions while their company went bankrupt. And the line continues: the governor who slashed education and raised fees on the middle class, and the possible president who would use his power to cut taxes on his fellow millionaires while pushing for the gradual demise of traditional Medicare.

Then there is the aura of someone who acts as if the rules don’t apply to him. The Post reported that the abused boy was ultimately expelled from Cranbrook—for smoking a cigarette. Really. The victim got expelled for smoking a cigarette, but Mitt faced no sanctions for maliciously victimizing a vulnerable student and a teacher. It’s good to be a prince. Maybe that’s why Romney felt entitled to take a $10 million bailout for Bain, but opposed President Obama’s bailout of the auto industry. He thinks there’s one set of rules for the privileged, and another for the rest of us.

Read the Article

Blowback

Note from Hot Air management: This section is for comments from Hot Air's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that Hot Air management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment just because we let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with our terms of use may lose their posting privilege.

Trackbacks/Pings

Trackback URL

Comments

Do you not suppose, Mr. Begala, that the voters might conclude that Obama is more of a bully than Romney, based on things like this?:http://hotair.com/archives/2012/05/11/putting-the-bully-into-the-bully-pulpit/

radjah shelduck on May 12, 2012 at 8:35 AM

The victim got expelled for smoking a cigarette, but Mitt faced no sanctions for maliciously victimizing a vulnerable student and a teacher. It’s good to be a prince.

For crying out loud–applying 2012 “bullying” restrictions to 1965 conduct? My grandfather in the Midwest was still referring to blacks as boys and n*ggers until he died in the early 1970s. Much of what we now find objectionable was generational. Heck, one of the funny things about Mad Men is to watch for those instances in which you stop to think, “Wow, I can’t believe what we used to be like.”

Begala is an a**hole.

BuckeyeSam on May 12, 2012 at 8:39 AM

Who gives a damn what this hack says about anything? Even his own side doesn’t give a rat’s azz what he thinks.

Thomas More on May 12, 2012 at 8:41 AM

They really go way out of there way to justify their hatred of Republicans, don’t they?

Count to 10 on May 12, 2012 at 8:42 AM

And that Bill Clinton you used to work for Begala, was and is a sexual predator.

Wethal on May 12, 2012 at 8:47 AM

They really go way out of there way to justify their hatred of Republicans, don’t they?

Count to 10 on May 12, 2012 at 8:42 AM

I’m getting more the impression, they seem a little desperate here grasping at straws and trying to get any meme going before the Fall. I don’t think they like their chances.

hawkdriver on May 12, 2012 at 8:49 AM

Begala would have been reduced to a quivering puddle of goo on a daily basis at Saint Mary’s Girls High School. Sheesh!

Naturally Curly on May 12, 2012 at 8:51 AM

Paul Begala: crapweasel

Valkyriepundit on May 12, 2012 at 8:54 AM

And that Bill Clinton you used to work for Begala, was and is a sexual predator.

Wethal on May 12, 2012 at 8:47 AM

Well said; I forgot about that.

radjah shelduck on May 12, 2012 at 8:57 AM

I find it hard to believe that people who were teenagers in the 50′s and 60′s think that pinning someone down and cutting their hair was such an awful thing in that era. Take it from an old guy who was there, that was pretty tame stuff in comparison to some of the things that went on then

oldernwiser on May 12, 2012 at 8:58 AM

Gee Begala, that’s an awful lot of conclusions to draw from an article that’s already been discredited, about a nearly 50-year old disputed event that some of the alleged “witnesses” were not even present for, and which the now long-dead “victim” never even bothered to mention to his own family members.

But here are a few more conclusions that you could have drawn from the article (were you not such a hyper-partisan douchebag): that Mitt Romney, even as a high school student, commanded respect from his fellow students, that he was decisive, that he displayed natural leadership abilities, that he took initiative and followed through on his plans, etc.

Now compare and contrast Mitt’s youth to Obama’s: Mitt was an excellent student and dedicated church-goer with lots of friends; Obama was a self-professed pothead with few friends, skipping classes to get wasted, reading books about Malcolm X and searching out other Marxists with whom he could discuss all the many ways in which the raaaaacist U.S. conspired to oppress minorities like himself.

Hmmmmm, I wonder which one of those guys would make a better president?

AZCoyote on May 12, 2012 at 9:00 AM

An awful lot of defense in that post for someone so sure the story has been discredited.

Amazing the hoops you’ll all jump through defending the squish.

freshface on May 12, 2012 at 9:12 AM

Wow. What an idiot.

Paul-Cincy on May 12, 2012 at 9:14 AM

So… how bad will the loss for Obama be since they’re running so hard on these distractions? Will it be a Carter-esque drubbing?

Punchenko on May 12, 2012 at 9:17 AM

Amazing the hoops you’ll all jump through defending the squish.

freshface on May 12, 2012 at 9:12 AM

But nothing like the pretzels the feminazis twist themselves into defending sexual predator Bill Clinton.

Wethal on May 12, 2012 at 9:23 AM

freshface on May 12, 2012 at 9:12 AM

I shoved and assaulted a girl, ate a dog, and forced Obamacare on America, Signed Barry Obama.

CW on May 12, 2012 at 9:26 AM

I wonder–where does using drones stack up in this anti-bullying world…..

CW on May 12, 2012 at 9:26 AM

My senior class in the 70′s was the first one at my high school that dropped a tradition of giving “swirlies” to the sophomore boys. A swirly involves holding someone upside-down and lowering their head into a flushing toilet.

I guess we didn’t want to run around with scissors.

WhatNot on May 12, 2012 at 9:29 AM

freshface on May 12, 2012 at 9:12 AM

..speaking of Hawkdriver’s “straw-graspers”, yet another troll and another example of Pee Wee Hermanesque Ju-Jitsu.

The War Planner on May 12, 2012 at 9:29 AM

D*mn, that Paul Begala is a vacuous hack and dweeb extrordinaire.

Let’s take a more critical eye towards the number of Americans who have lost jobs and homes and who are dependent on food stamps; the number of businesses lost or barely holding on; the waste of tax-payer dollars for failed “energy” boondoggles; the trade deficit, etc. The straight line of failure began with the “Hawaiian” slacker who misspent his youth pursuing booze and drugs. The straight line of failure continues to this day. We have a cavalier adolescent partying in the WH.

onlineanalyst on May 12, 2012 at 9:37 AM

An awful lot of defense in that post for someone so sure the story has been discredited.

Amazing the hoops you’ll all jump through defending the squish.

freshface on May 12, 2012 at 9:12 AM

LOL. I wasn’t so much defending it as pointing out that one can choose to see whatever one wants to see in the 50-year old story about a high school incident that may or may not be true. The story is so irrelevant that it doesn’t really need defending.

The only relevant fact is that Obama has been a failure as president. Even Bill Clinton is willing to admit that much. Why won’t you?

AZCoyote on May 12, 2012 at 9:39 AM

Just remember, folks, “history” began with the anointing of Buh-rock, and the norms of typical teenage hijinks in the ’50′s and ’60′s must be reframed to fit today’s narrative.

onlineanalyst on May 12, 2012 at 9:42 AM

Even the Daily Beast readers are shredding him.

Quisp on May 12, 2012 at 9:54 AM

Further illustration of the scripted collusion between the DNC and their pimps at the Washington Post and similar Liberal “news” rags. No less orchestrated than Barbara Walters anxiously waiting her turn to pimp the Fluke on the View, alas.

viking01 on May 12, 2012 at 9:56 AM

If liberals had their way, Romney would be tried 45 years later for assault and battery over a haircut, while weed and cocaine would be legalized and Obama extolled as a trailblazer for standing up for his cocaine use, like he was Rosa Parks or something.

The Count on May 12, 2012 at 9:59 AM

I’ll bet several of Billy Clintoon’s female campaign workers would have settled for a mere unscheduled haircut than forcibly submit to Slicks uncontrollable mating urges.

viking01 on May 12, 2012 at 10:05 AM

I was watching liberal geek who couldn’t beat up a 85 year old librarian Chris Hayes’ MSNBC Saturday morning coffee roundtable of similar, and they played news footage from 1965 that identified homosexuals as having a mental disease. Even they didn’t see the irony of holding an 18 year old then to 2012 standards while psychiatrists of 1965 tried to “cure” them.

Marcus on May 12, 2012 at 10:08 AM

In his own words Obama says he spent the last 2 years of high school not studying and in a dope and alcohol induced haze. His lack of discipline and maturity has continued into his presidency where the only demonstrable skill is perpetually campaigning. No doubt troubling oneself with economic policy is boring and to be avoided at all costs.

Obama has evolved. Alcohol and drugs have been replaced with golf, campaigning and enjoying the magnificent benefits of high office.

I’ll take the disciplined joint LLM-MBA 3.7 GPA graduate who is an extremely industrious and capable private and public sector executive who may have engaged in one act of bullying as a teenager.

Basilsbest on May 12, 2012 at 10:22 AM

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journalism/2012/05/11/Washington-Post-Romney-Bullying-Profile-Contradicted-By-Automobile-Magazine

For anybody who missed it (including you, not-so-fresh), this article contains some very interesting quotes from Romney’s high school friends — the very same ones named in the WaPo hit piece.

Even the ones who don’t plan to vote for Romney say he’s a smart, likeable person, of great integrity, who would be a good president.

AZCoyote on May 12, 2012 at 10:26 AM

This from the natural truth:
Now, for the record, this Wall Street Journal article doesn’t directly link this oppo research firm to the Obama campaign. It could, theoretically, be one of the other presidential campaigns running against Mitt Romney—maybe Ron Paul or the Rainbow/Green Party. But given that President Obama has already attacked Mr. VanderSloot publicly—it’s pretty obvious who’s paying the bills.

So for all of you upset by Mitt Romney’s “bullying” half a century ago—what’s your reaction to President Obama’s bullying of private citizens today? Or maybe you think it’s OK for the President of the United States to attack private citizens and hire people to investigate them?

How is this anything other than bullying? Only the difference here is that American citizens are being bullied by their own president.

For anyone who thinks he shouldn’t vote, just watch this traitor in office. Do something he doesn’t agree with and it could be you he is trying to destroy!

Bambi on May 12, 2012 at 10:31 AM

Then there is the aura of someone who acts as if the rules don’t apply to him

You sure you aren’t talking about Obama, Paul? Heck, most of Obama’s administration could be defined by the above sentence.

You are a hack!

Ditkaca on May 12, 2012 at 10:37 AM

The Post article briefly mentions Dearth, but not to the degree–or to the effect–in the Auto Mag article, which quotes Dearth extensively:

“With his powerful father, ‘He could have been an arrogant, stuck-up, snotty little brat,’ says Dearth. ‘But he was a great guy — an all-American kid with a great sense of humor, very self-effacing.’ And although it’s been documented that Romney played a teenage prank or two — including once impersonating a police officer in order to scare some female friends — Dearth remembers Mitt as the most straitlaced kid in the neighborhood. ‘Those of us who tested the boundaries in high school still marvel at the self-discipline he displayed,’ Dearth continues. ‘With a father who was then governor, Mitt knew where the line was and never crossed it. I think it was a sign of his deep respect for his dad and the way he was brought up. I often tell people he has more integrity than anyone I know. And I was raised a Unitarian.’”

This is from the article that AZ Coyote referenced. Thanks for sharing that.

Bambi on May 12, 2012 at 10:39 AM

Team Obama is engaging in the dumbest, stupidest, lamest, most ham-handed and incompetent attempt at character assassination I’ve seen in a long time. If this is the best they’ve got it will almost certainly backfire among independents. And it will help rally Republicans behind Romney.

Stupid is as stupid does.

And it’s a wonder someone still pays Begala to write write and make noise with his yapper.

farsighted on May 12, 2012 at 11:07 AM