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You are here: Home / Past Elections / Election 2012 / Mitt Romney, High School Bully

Mitt Romney, High School Bully

by Soonergrunt|  May 10, 201211:44 am| 310 Comments

This post is in: Election 2012, Gay Rights are Human Rights, Assholes, Decline and Fall, Fucked-up-edness, Romney of the Uncanny Valley, Sociopaths

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Romney was involved in a pretty horrifying bullying incident in high school:

John Lauber, a soft-spoken new student one year behind Romney, was perpetually teased for his nonconformity and presumed homosexuality. Now he was walking around the all-boys school with bleached-blond hair that draped over one eye, and Romney wasn’t having it.

“He can’t look like that. That’s wrong. Just look at him!” an incensed Romney told Matthew Friedemann, his close friend in the Stevens Hall dorm, according to Friedemann’s recollection. Mitt, the teenaged son of Michigan Gov. George Romney, kept complaining about Lauber’s look, Friedemann recalled.

A few days later, Friedemann entered Stevens Hall off the school’s collegiate quad to find Romney marching out of his own room ahead of a prep school posse shouting about their plan to cut Lauber’s hair. Friedemann followed them to a nearby room where they came upon Lauber, tackled him and pinned him to the ground. As Lauber, his eyes filling with tears, screamed for help, Romney repeatedly clipped his hair with a pair of scissors.

The incident was recalled similarly by five students, who gave their accounts independently of one another. Four of them — Friedemann, now a dentist; Phillip Maxwell, a lawyer; Thomas Buford, a retired prosecutor; and David Seed, a retired principal — spoke on the record. Another former student who witnessed the incident asked not to be named. The men have differing political affiliations, although they mostly lean Democratic. Buford volunteered for Barack Obama’s campaign in 2008. Seed, a registered independent, has served as a Republican county chairman in Michigan. All of them said that politics in no way colored their recollections.

“It happened very quickly, and to this day it troubles me,” said Buford, the school’s wrestling champion, who said he joined Romney in restraining Lauber. Buford subsequently apologized to Lauber, who was “terrified,” he said. “What a senseless, stupid, idiotic thing to do.”

As disturbing as that is, I’m not ready to condemn a man for something he did as a stupid teenager.  The world would be a very lonely place indeed were that to be my way of doing things.  That said, Rmoney’s handling of this report is telling:

“Back in high school I did some dumb things and if anybody was hurt by that or offended by that I apologize,” Romney told FOX radio host Brian Kilmeade Thursday. “If I did stupid things, I’m afraid I’ve got to say sorry for it.” (italics mine)

And of course, the world famous “If anybody was hurt or offended, I apologize.”

These responses today are almost as disturbing to me in the man who wishes to be our President, as the actions of the teenaged Mitt Romney were back before I was born.  Those actions are of a piece with other things in his life that we know about, and that is concerning.  What I find most disturbing about all of this is his apparent lack of any sense of responsibility to others or to even himself as a Christian to acknowledge his role and his place in the world and how he deals with and affects other people.  That his attitude about this incident is roughly the same as his attitude about the workers of the various companies he destroyed during his tenure at Bain Capital, and is similar to his attitude towards anyone he deals with–“I like being able to fire the people who work for me”– are indicators to me of a deeply morally flawed human being, and certainly one not fit to lead a great nation.

 

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Reader Interactions

310Comments

  1. 1.

    Surreal American

    May 10, 2012 at 11:46 am

    Yeah, but did young Mitt eat dog during prep school?*

    *Obligatory snark disclaimer.

  2. 2.

    S. cerevisiae

    May 10, 2012 at 11:47 am

    Why does this not surprise me?

  3. 3.

    redshirt

    May 10, 2012 at 11:49 am

    Super nice Obama – who seems like he’d be awesome to have a beer with VS. Rich prick boss and bully everyone hates, and has never had a beer.

    Hmm. Spin away, MSM. Tell us about Ann and Tagg some more.

  4. 4.

    Forum Transmitted Disease

    May 10, 2012 at 11:49 am

    Mitt really missed his life’s calling. He should have been a cop.

  5. 5.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 11:49 am

    But the important question is: would you want to have a beer with Romney today?

  6. 6.

    Calouste

    May 10, 2012 at 11:51 am

    Somehow I think we haven’t heard the last of this yet. Do we think a bully only bullied once during his entire school career?

  7. 7.

    Matthew Reid Krell

    May 10, 2012 at 11:51 am

    I just don’t care about “Romney the Juvenile Delinquent.” But I agree, “Romney the Sociopath of Today” is pretty damn disturbing.

  8. 8.

    JPL

    May 10, 2012 at 11:51 am

    Mitt was 18 at the time and after graduation he went to college and then he went to France. Let’s ask Raven where he was at 18 during the same time frame.
    How many could forget holding a classmate and cutting his hair while he screamed. Really, would you forget that? That says more about Mitt than anything else.

  9. 9.

    Bob2

    May 10, 2012 at 11:51 am

    @different-church-lady:
    Would Romney be caught dead in a photo-op clearing away weeds and stuff on a ranch?

    How about ruining every business you ever touch?

  10. 10.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 11:51 am

    @redshirt:

    Rich prick boss and bully everyone hates.

    Wrong: there’s plenty of people in the world who are drawn to picks and bullies. Especially in corporate circles.

  11. 11.

    Robin G.

    May 10, 2012 at 11:52 am

    When I first spied the story, my immediate reaction was, “Come on, with all the things to discuss about Romney, are we really going to get into high school bullshit?”

    Then I read the incident. It’s stomach-turning. This isn’t simple bullying, it’s a degrading, horrific kind of assault from which the victim never recovers, and from which the offender should never be excused. The people who were interviewed had the appropriate reaction: shame and sorrow, even all these years later, knowing it’s one of those things they can never take back. It’s bad enough that Romney did it — but then to issue a non-apology apology? The cherry on the shit sundae. I can’t.

  12. 12.

    amk

    May 10, 2012 at 11:52 am

    why should this soulless liar’s teen “pranks” get a pass when anything about Obama, including shite that happened even before he was born, are game ?

    Typical lefty mushiness.

  13. 13.

    JPL

    May 10, 2012 at 11:53 am

    @Calouste: My comment at 8 mentions how Mitt didn’t recall. It could be because this was such a minor nit in his mind. I think you are right.

  14. 14.

    Steve

    May 10, 2012 at 11:54 am

    I accept that kids do bad stuff because they don’t know any better. I was guilty of some mild bullying myself in grade-school days – nothing nearly as bad as what’s described here, mind you. But I still remember it acutely and feel ashamed of it to this day. I think that’s how normal people are supposed to feel. To me, Romney’s reaction today is a lot more troubling than what he actually did.

  15. 15.

    BGinCHI

    May 10, 2012 at 11:54 am

    Wait, a rich kid at a prep school bullied someone?

    GTFO!

    This kind of vetting is a distraction. All you have to do is look at the bully standing right in front of you. It’s just that now he does it with wealth and position.

    This is all feature. Having a bug would mean having a personality.

  16. 16.

    Legalize

    May 10, 2012 at 11:54 am

    Of course I have to apologize (even though I’m not sorry for cutting the sissy’s hair). I’m running for office for Pete’s sake!

  17. 17.

    jlow

    May 10, 2012 at 11:55 am

    @Forum Transmitted Disease: Better yet he should have been Commandant Eric Lassard.

  18. 18.

    Tractarian

    May 10, 2012 at 11:55 am

    Why didn’t anyone VET MITT?!??!?!?!111LOLZ

  19. 19.

    Martin

    May 10, 2012 at 11:55 am

    You know, there’s a dozen+ Amish men in Ohio being tried for hate crimes for doing exactly this.

  20. 20.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 11:56 am

    @different-church-lady:

    No, and for what it’s worth, I never wanted to have a beer with Bush II.

  21. 21.

    BGinCHI

    May 10, 2012 at 11:57 am

    @Martin: The Amish are just Mormons without pyramid schemes.

  22. 22.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 11:57 am

    @Steve: That’s my point exactly.

  23. 23.

    Egg Berry

    May 10, 2012 at 11:57 am

    @BGinCHI: or cars, or electricity.

  24. 24.

    dmsilev

    May 10, 2012 at 11:58 am

    You forgot this lovely bit:

    “I certainly don’t believe that I thought the fellow was homosexual. That was the furthest thing from our minds back in the 1960s.”

    Is this man human?

  25. 25.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 11:58 am

    @Martin:

    They must not be Republicans…

  26. 26.

    middlewest

    May 10, 2012 at 11:59 am

    Mormons are such NICE PEOPLE. I get told this all the time, so it must be true.

  27. 27.

    Linda Featheringill

    May 10, 2012 at 12:00 pm

    @Calouste:

    Somehow I think we haven’t heard the last of this yet. Do we think a bully only bullied once during his entire school career?

    He certainly had the technique down pat for that exhibition. Had a lot of practice, perhaps?

  28. 28.

    Trentrunner

    May 10, 2012 at 12:00 pm

    I like John Cole’s working hypothesis that explains the complex crosscurrents and unseen undertows of today’s political landscape:

    Republicans are assholes. All of them.

  29. 29.

    Spaghetti Lee

    May 10, 2012 at 12:01 pm

    @dmsilev:

    I love this. “Gay people didn’t exist until somewhere in the 70’s! If they’d all just stayed in the closet we could have all gotten along! Why’d they have to go and ruin it?”

  30. 30.

    gbear

    May 10, 2012 at 12:01 pm

    @Legalize:

    Of course I have to apologize…I’m running for office for Pete’s sake!

    At least he’s not running with scissors.

  31. 31.

    Noonan

    May 10, 2012 at 12:02 pm

    The It Gets Better project is all about providing hope to kids who have to deal with a bully like Romney.

  32. 32.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 12:02 pm

    The problem with being a sociopath is that you have to build a mental rolodex of appropriate responses to any given situation. A plurality of sociopaths are adept at this. Ted Bundy for example, was very gifted in this regard. He could even come across as likable. It didn’t hurt that he had a sky-high IQ.

    Mitt Romney’s problem is not so much that he’s a sociopath (that’s more our problem, than his) but that he’s simply not exceptionally bright. His rolodex is sparse, which leads to responses like the one he gave.

    Hey Mitt: The appropriate response would have been “I did some hurtful things when I was a teenager. I am deeply sorry for the pain I caused Mr. Laubner, and for the poor example I set for my peers at the time. It was foolish and wrong for me to bully him.”

    Mitt’s problem is further compounded by the fact that he seems to choose his campaign advisers the same way a CEO chooses their lackeys. He’s not interested in putting together a dynamic team. He’s singularly interested in affirmation of his prowess (classic narcissistic sociopath, BTW) so he surrounds himself with “yes men”.

    His response comes as no surprise to me.

  33. 33.

    Tractarian

    May 10, 2012 at 12:03 pm

    @Matthew Reid Krell:

    I just don’t care about “Romney the Juvenile Delinquent.” But I agree, “Romney the Sociopath of Today” is pretty damn disturbing.

    Seriously, I agree 100% with this sentiment… but I’m thinking the ever-wise and prudent American electorate might not.

    In fact, this story could have legs. It crystallizes Romney’s hostility toward gays and “non-conformists” in general (whether that hostility is, in fact, real, matters not).

    And there’s a pattern emerging. Mitt does something bad (hazes a gay student, negligently kills a dog, passes health care reform), half-heartedly apologizes for it years later, and tries to pivot back to jobs and the economy.

    At some point, voters going to realize that Mitt’s doing wayyyy too much apologizing for someone who wants to be at the helm of the ship of state.

  34. 34.

    gelfling545

    May 10, 2012 at 12:03 pm

    “He can’t look like that. That’s wrong. Just look at him!”

    Isn’t that the guiding philosophy of the Republican party? That if you look to gay, too dark, too poor, too different you have no rights?

  35. 35.

    Warren Terra

    May 10, 2012 at 12:03 pm

    The story makes it very clear that Romney was a consistent and enthusiastic bully not only of this one long-haired oddball but of many students and even teachers at the school. The whole piece is dripping with the same sense of entitlement, kicking down, and sucking up we see in Romney’s entire life.

    Also note that in high school Romney was an undistinguished athlete but was a cheerleader for the football team. Because the last football cheerleader President worked out so well.

  36. 36.

    Kay

    May 10, 2012 at 12:03 pm

    “It happened very quickly, and to this day it troubles me,” said Buford, the school’s wrestling champion, who said he joined Romney in restraining Lauber. Buford subsequently apologized to Lauber, who was “terrified,” he said. “What a senseless, stupid, idiotic thing to do.”

    Romney would be fine if he had responded like that. It’s just example number X where he won’t step up. We saw it in the debates several times, where he stood there like a potted plant and missed an opportunity to really distinguish himself from that weak-ass field, the gay soldier booing, etc. It’s not in him to do what this person did naturally and easily.

  37. 37.

    David Hunt

    May 10, 2012 at 12:04 pm

    @JPL:

    How many could forget holding a classmate and cutting his hair while he screamed. Really, would you forget that? That says more about Mitt than anything else.

    Hmmm. I Assumed that he was simply lying about remembering it. Given how often and shamelessly he lies, that seems like the safe bet. However another possibility occurs. Maybe he really doesn’t remember this because such an incident doesn’t stand out as unusual in the type of activities that he participated in while in high school.

    …Nope. The incident stood out too prominently in the minds of his classmates for it too have been common. It’s just another everyday common occurrence of Mitt Romney shamelessly lying.

  38. 38.

    JPL

    May 10, 2012 at 12:05 pm

    @Tractarian: Decent reporting is seldom seen these days. Plus remember the golden rule, IOKIYR

  39. 39.

    DFS

    May 10, 2012 at 12:05 pm

    @middlewest: Lemme think back. In my ward, I grew up alongside…at least two flagrant adulterers who abandoned their families, a corrupt cop, a gun-nut asshole who packed a concealed weapon in Sunday school, and two wife-beaters that I know of. Plus the son of one of the wife-beaters, whose behavior on his wedding night led his wife to instantly flee back to her parents.

    Also a number of genuine saints. For better and worse, Mormons are just people.

  40. 40.

    Jewish Steel

    May 10, 2012 at 12:05 pm

    @dmsilev: Oh, as far as what was on his mind, I can believe him here.

    Before and after his missionary deferment, Romney also received nearly three years of deferments for his academic studies.

  41. 41.

    caroln de lurking

    May 10, 2012 at 12:05 pm

    The child is father to the man.

  42. 42.

    Egg Berry

    May 10, 2012 at 12:06 pm

    @Kay: For that matter, a few Boehner crying moments from the Mittbot might do him some good – show his ‘human’ side. I don’t think he has that service pack, though.

  43. 43.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:06 pm

    @Warren Terra:

    Also because the last CEO President worked out so well.

  44. 44.

    scav

    May 10, 2012 at 12:07 pm

    Still, The Teen Mittster as a frustrated wanna-be member of the fashion police, focusing especially on hairstyles? This one’s got him coming and going.

  45. 45.

    General Stuck

    May 10, 2012 at 12:07 pm

    This is Mitt Romney, the same Mitt Romney who recently stated when asked if he regretted leaving his dog strapped to the roof of his car, answered that ‘yes, if I had known it would become such a big deal’

    And as a side note, reading some winger responses on Obama’s coming out for gay marriage, the ones with a brain cell or two seemed panicked that Barack has pulled a 11 dimensional chess move of their asses, all over again.

    Rick Moran

    The issue of gay marriage has been brought to the fore by Obama to distract America from his horrible economic record. In this respect, the GOP is playing right into his hands. Obama has energized his base by re-stating his 1996 position in support of gay marriage, while solidifying his hold on an important Democratic party constituency whose influence far exceeds its numbers. But hasn’t he energzied gay marriage opponents too? Yes, but the issue is a wedge mostly in states he doesn’t have a chance of winning anyway. In some important swing states – New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Virginia, and Florida – he may have bought himself more votes than he will lose. That might matter a lot if, as expected, those states, and others, are extremely close on election night.

    Colonel Mustard

    Yet Obama couches his cynical ploy in the form of righteousness, bravery and hope. He’s just feeding opiates to the masses.

    While it is above my abilities to forecast what all this means for the election, and how it will play out in the final vote on election day. I am happy that Obama did what he did, and did it now before the election. Come what may, it draws a clear distinction between liberals and conservatives on matters of human decency and equality, and I always love the smell of wingnut fear in the morning.

  46. 46.

    VigilanteMark

    May 10, 2012 at 12:08 pm

    Let’s spend a moment thinking about how John Lauber might feel right now, if he were still alive (the article says he died in 2004). I agree with #11: this is the kind of incident that’s permanently scarring. And now, he sees the man who bullied him so fiercely being nominated for President of the United States? How unfair must our world seem to him? Probably about as unfair as it IS.

  47. 47.

    JCT

    May 10, 2012 at 12:09 pm

    And bullying in a pack like this is the classic mark of a COWARD. And that is what Mitt Romney is, and always has been. As noted above, his “apology” is also cowardly, what a surprise.

    It is his identity.

    And cue the wingnut wurlitzer to chime in about how this doesn’t matter. And to them it doesn’t, they LOVE bullies (Limbaugh, etc)

  48. 48.

    Gin & Tonic

    May 10, 2012 at 12:09 pm

    @dmsilev: I went to an all-boys high school a few years (not many) later than Mitt. Being or not being or suspected of being or thinking about being “a faggot” was *paramount*. He’s obviously lying.

  49. 49.

    yopd1

    May 10, 2012 at 12:10 pm

    This is the classic Non-Apology Apology

  50. 50.

    SatanicPanic

    May 10, 2012 at 12:11 pm

    @Steve: I did a few things too and feel terrible about them now. There’s no way he doesn’t remember this, or if he doesn’t then he’s a horrible person. So, Mitt Romney, liar or terrible person. Most likely both.

  51. 51.

    Zach

    May 10, 2012 at 12:11 pm

    OK now Obama’s running circles round Romney with respect to opposition research. I believe the best thing Romney’s dug out so far is, “Obama ate dog meat; he says so in his book.”

    Annoying that the Post article repeatedly calls this a prank when, if it were to happen today, it’d be grounds for Assault II and False Imprisonment charges at the least… without getting into new-fangled bullying & hate-crime law.

  52. 52.

    Steve in DC

    May 10, 2012 at 12:11 pm

    I’m not overly worried about boys being violent little shits to each other. Getting in fights and scrapes is part of growing up. There were various groups of jocks, skaters, punks, goths, and nerds when I went to school. Most of them were forever mocking, fighting, making life miserable for the other groups.

    But this story just sounds odd. I could see something along the lines of “yeah he shoved a nerd into a locker” or “yeah he beat the crap out of one of the shady kids” something like that. But the entire “he can’t look like that, that’s just wrong” and giving someone a hair cut. I… I don’t even know what that is.

    The only times I recall something remotely like that were girls freaking out over how someone looked and acting like that.

    It’s just a really odd reaction. Far more bizarre than just beating the tar out of the kid.

  53. 53.

    Tractarian

    May 10, 2012 at 12:11 pm

    I heard the gay kid reported the hazing but Governor George Romney got the prosecutor to drop the charges against Mitt!

    Quid pro quo! Corruption! What else is Mitt hiding?

    (Sorry, couldn’t help myself.)

  54. 54.

    Cris (without an H)

    May 10, 2012 at 12:11 pm

    @Calouste: Do we think a bully only bullied once during his entire school career?

    Like Soonergrunt says, I can look past a bullying incident, or even a history of bullying, if the bully grew up and learned to regret who he once was. Lots of us were assholes in high school. Lots of us grew up.

    What bugs me is the style of bullying we’re talking about here. Some bullies are mean underachievers who prey on weaker kids to make themselves feel tough. Other bullies are Beautiful People, part of the informal school aristocracy, who use intimidation and cruelty to enforce the prevailing norms on kids who are different.

    The latter is a deeply ingrained feature of prep school culture. It goes hand in hand with the mentality these kids grow up with: that they’re special, superior, destined to lead and forever immune to consequences.

    We already had a president who came from that bullshit culture. I don’t want any more.

  55. 55.

    Forum Transmitted Disease

    May 10, 2012 at 12:12 pm

    How many could forget holding a classmate and cutting his hair while he screamed. Really, would you forget that? That says more about Mitt than anything else.

    Oh, he didn’t forget. I’m sure the issue is that he came while doing it, and doesn’t want to dwell on the firm thighs of his victim, or the young man’s gratifying screams as Mitt ravaged him – lest the ghost of Joseph Smith come down from Planet Orlando and make Mitt’s pee-pee fall off.

  56. 56.

    burnspbesq

    May 10, 2012 at 12:12 pm

    For the small group of people who are politically engaged on a regular basis, this doesn’t tell us anything about Romney that we hadn’t figured out long ago.

    It’s hard for me to see this as damaging Romney’s standing with low-info voters. It can easily be spun as nothing more than preppies being preppies, unfortunate, but hey, who among us didn’t do stupid shit when we were that age.

    If you want to be outraged about something, be outraged about this.

    http://harpers.org/archive/2012/05/hbc-90008612

    Or this.

    http://law.shu.edu/ProgramsCenters/PublicIntGovServ/policyresearch/upload/no-hearing-habeas.pdf

  57. 57.

    Gin & Tonic

    May 10, 2012 at 12:13 pm

    @dmsilev: Well, probably moderated for word choice.

    I went to an all-boys high school a few (not many) years after Mitt, and sexual preference or perceived sexual preference — whether you were or could be or suspected of being gay (or the preferred high school term at the time, starting with f) was *paramount*. He is quite obviously lying, which I understand is nothing new.

  58. 58.

    beergoggles

    May 10, 2012 at 12:13 pm

    Further proof that bullies just get worse when they grow up unless someone nips their bullying in the bud and gives them several good whacks upside the head..

  59. 59.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 12:13 pm

    There where personal things about Bush jr that have bothered me a great deal, but he never struck me as sadistic the way this hazing incident strikes me about Romney…

  60. 60.

    Ash Can

    May 10, 2012 at 12:14 pm

    We all do stupid shit when we’re young. Sometimes it’s very stupid shit. And “young adult” qualifies as young too, no matter what the law says about the age of majority.

    HOWEVER, one of life’s greatest underrated axioms is, “context is everything.” If this incident had surfaced against the backdrop of Romney having a solid civil/human rights record as an elected official, or being a forceful voice against bullying in general, or just simply demonstrating day after day that he’s a decent, empathetic mensch of a person, then it would appear much less important than it does. (And his apology would most assuredly have been worded much differently than it was.) But such was not the case. As it is, it’s just another piece of a jigsaw puzzle that, fully assembled, depicts Mitt as nothing but a schmuck. Our collective response to it is…a lack of surprise.

    Think up any mean, venal, demeaning, petty, dickish thing anyone could do. Then think of Romney doing it. It’s not too hard, is it? And how many of these things has he been caught doing?

    The pattern is clear. And this incident does nothing but contribute to it and reinforce it.

  61. 61.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:14 pm

    @Zach:

    “Obama ate dog meat; he says so in his book.”

    I wonder how much they paid private investigators to dig that one up…

  62. 62.

    WaterGirl

    May 10, 2012 at 12:15 pm

    @JPL: You know what I can’t wait to see? I just know Mittens has told the hair cutting incident as another “funny story”, just like he used to talk about Shamus on the roof of the car as a funny story. I cannot wait to see someone come forward to say that Mittens was yucking it up about the haircut incident later in life.

    And then the obvious lie that he can’t recall the incident will really come back to bite him.

    I would never have been involved in a bullying incident like that, but I imagine there are good people today who just might have been bullies in the past. But for that to be true, I think those good people have to regret the pain they caused other people.

    Sadly, I am more and more convinced that Romney does have some sociopathic tendencies, one of which appears to be a total lack of empathy. This story will hurt him because it is part of a pattern, and it’s not a pretty one.

    I am repulsed by the hair cutting story, I am furiously angry that in that strict school, Romney got off scott free while the kid that was bullied later got kicked out for smoking a cigarette. It’s the story of Romney’s life: one set of rules for me (and other rich people) and another set of rules for the people who don’t matter.

  63. 63.

    Brian R.

    May 10, 2012 at 12:15 pm

    It must be wonderful to be a Log Cabin Republican in a week in which the “bad guy” says you deserve to be treated like an actual human and have the right to get married to the person you love, while the “good guy” you’re cheering for is revealed to be the asshole who bullied you in high school.

  64. 64.

    burnspbesq

    May 10, 2012 at 12:16 pm

    @Forum Transmitted Disease:

    I’m sure the issue is that he came while doing it, and doesn’t want to dwell on the firm thighs of his victim, or the young man’s gratifying screams as Mitt ravaged him – lest the ghost of Joseph Smith come down from Planet Orlando and make Mitt’s pee-pee fall off.

    I suppose it would be deeply silly of me to wonder whether there is any factual basis for this outlandish fantasy of yours.

    The incident is bad enough as it is. What do you gain by making shit up?

  65. 65.

    The Bearded Blogger

    May 10, 2012 at 12:17 pm

    1) Romney looks like an enormous asshole in that picture.

    2) With apologies to DougJ: “I’m the school bully, the classroom cheat…”

  66. 66.

    flukebucket

    May 10, 2012 at 12:17 pm

    Can somebody tell me exactly what Obama’s horrible economic record is? I know that is not exactly on topic but if you compare the previous administrations economic record with this administrations economic record who wins? It was Rick Moran’s comment highlighted by General Stuck that made me wonder. I always hear about how awful Obama has been on the economy and I just don’t see it.

  67. 67.

    eemom

    May 10, 2012 at 12:18 pm

    As disturbing as that is, I’m not ready to condemn a man for something he did as a stupid teenager.

    In the abstract, of course, that’s a valid point — like if you were talking about vandalism or something. The kind of reckless immaturity that people do grow out of.

    Brutal cruelty, however, is something else. What he did demonstrates a profound ugliness of character of the kind that doesn’t change — indeed, more likely gets worse — as a person gets older. IMO.

  68. 68.

    JCT

    May 10, 2012 at 12:19 pm

    @flukebucket: You know, if you keep looking for Republicans to make factual statements about Obama or his record you will go insane. Consider the source.

  69. 69.

    Mark S.

    May 10, 2012 at 12:19 pm

    @Warren Terra:

    The story makes it very clear that Romney was a consistent and enthusiastic bully not only of this one long-haired oddball but of many students and even teachers at the school.

    Yeah, I’ve now read several of these “Mitt the Merry Prankster” stories, and almost all of them sound more mean-spirited rather than playful or funny. It’s like he really gets off on making people squirm.

    I felt the same reaction that I got when I read about the nicknames Bush II gave to his underlings. It’s one thing if your friend comes up with a slightly deprecating nickname for you. It’s another if your boss does.

    Both Bush and Romney come across as self-entitled pricks who never had to struggle for anything in their lives.

  70. 70.

    HeartlandLiberal

    May 10, 2012 at 12:19 pm

    Re: Romney’s response, once again we have evidence the man is a pathological liar.

    A teenage male DOES NOT FORGET an incident like that. It is the sort of emotion driven episode that burns itself into the memory.

    For Rmoney to say he does not remember the episode is just the lying sociopath in him speaking. Again.

  71. 71.

    Steve in DC

    May 10, 2012 at 12:19 pm

    @Ash Can

    It’s not even that it was a dickish thing to do, or that it was stupid. It’s that it’s an odd fucking thing to do even within the context of dickish things to do. Tons of people beat up kids, stuff people in lockers, jump people after school. There is a whole laundry list of this stuff and by in large it really is stupid kids being stupid.

    But saying “he can’t look like that” and then cutting his hair, is just odd. That’s not a normal reaction.

    It’s just like strapping a dog on top of a car. It’s just so out there you have to question what is going on in his head.

  72. 72.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:19 pm

    @flukebucket:

    In the real world Obama wins. In the alternate universe inhabited by Fox “News” and talk radio personalities, Obama caused the recession while Bush was President.

  73. 73.

    elisabeth

    May 10, 2012 at 12:20 pm

    Jonathan Chait has a good take on this. I’m on my phone so can’t link to it.

  74. 74.

    cintibud

    May 10, 2012 at 12:20 pm

    I can’t believe the shoddy programming of the 2012Romenybot. The “Sincere” insincere apology module has been standard for quite some time. “W” would have told us how this was part of the sinful path he used to trod before finding Jesus and tell us how he had grown.

  75. 75.

    eemom

    May 10, 2012 at 12:20 pm

    @celticdragonchick:

    There where personal things about Bush jr that have bothered me a great deal, but he never struck me as sadistic the way this hazing incident strikes me about Romney…

    Bingo. That is exactly what I mean.

  76. 76.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:22 pm

    @eemom:

    Bush Jr. supposedly tortured animals when he was kid.

  77. 77.

    David in NY

    May 10, 2012 at 12:22 pm

    My parents were offered money from a distant relative to send me to Cranbrook if they wanted, ca. 1960. I remember visiting the school with them but not knowing this was what it was about. They, knowing me, and knowing places like that, decided against it, and I went to a pretty ordinary public school. Thank god. I never realized what the place was really like — would have hated it.

  78. 78.

    What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us? (formerly MarkJ)

    May 10, 2012 at 12:24 pm

    Apparently all the FREEEEDOOOOMMM! Mitt wants to unleash on America does not extend to wearing your hair the way you want.

  79. 79.

    elisabeth

    May 10, 2012 at 12:25 pm

    @elisabeth:

    Link:

    http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2012/05/content-of-romneys-character.html

  80. 80.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 12:25 pm

    @eemom: While I agree somewhat, I think even that I could forgive him this, were his response different. Many teenagers are mean and dumb. A lot of them grow out of it as adults.

    His “apology” however, drives the nail in this. He basically said “I don’t give a fuck, but it’s annoying that you people want to bring it up.”

    If he’d sincerely apologized, I actually would have had a bit more respect for him than I do now.

    But the non-apology sets the act in stone, at least for me. The man has no scruples. Clearly, it demonstrates that Adult Romney does not find anything wrong with what Teenage Romney did.

  81. 81.

    EconWatcher

    May 10, 2012 at 12:26 pm

    @David in NY:

    Cranbrook is the most beautiful high school I’ve ever seen, though. I went to a (much humbler) high school near there. In appearance, it’s like something out of a story book.

  82. 82.

    OGLiberal

    May 10, 2012 at 12:26 pm

    From what I’ve read about him, George Romney seemed to be a decent, reasonable guy. Of course, he’d be considered a liberal these days. (actually, I think they tried to brand him as one back in the 60s, back when liberal Republicans actually existed) How did his son turn out this way?

  83. 83.

    Martin

    May 10, 2012 at 12:26 pm

    Mitt had a perfect opportunity here to build something of a narrative balance to Obama. Without getting into the gay issue, he could have admitted to his past behavior as he did (without quantifying it, as he also did) and then pivoted into being a champion against school bullying. Most people would have forgiven the past sin by him taking that up as a genuine cause, and it’s a cause he could take up without taking any position on gays or anything else. It’s a pure win for him, and it’s a pure win for him against the very demographic that Obama scored points with yesterday. It could have been a positive social issue for him and served as a firewall against any future digging into his bullying, but he let that go. Yeah, the Taliban would have excoriated him for taking the position, but they, and not him, would be the ones looking like assholes. It’d only make him look better. That’s a serious rookie move.

  84. 84.

    pk

    May 10, 2012 at 12:26 pm

    He bullied a kid in high school, he put his dog on top of the car, he cut thousands of jobs without any apparent guilt and he likes to fire people. It’s a pattern and the man is a ghoul. It wouldn’t surprise me if he pulled wings off of butterflies when he was in Kindergarten?

  85. 85.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:27 pm

    As young kid I was often a victim of bullying (family moved around a lot, I was the new kid).* So, I have zero sympathy for Romney (this just confirms his asshole credentials).

    * By the eighth grade, I was over 6′ tall, so the bullying stopped…

  86. 86.

    Martin

    May 10, 2012 at 12:28 pm

    @OGLiberal:

    How did his son turn out this way?

    I get the sense that George worked for it, and Mitt did not. Mitt never had to be empathetic – he could afford to be an asshole. Most of us can’t. I suspect George couldn’t either.

  87. 87.

    redshirt

    May 10, 2012 at 12:28 pm

    @What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us? (formerly MarkJ): Get rid of those sideburns, Mattingly!

  88. 88.

    ricky

    May 10, 2012 at 12:28 pm

    This is clearly the most devastating political revelation since the Aqua Buddha abduction.

    I will enjoy this playing out on all three nightly MSNBC Newsdramas tonight. I’ll have a tub of hot buttered grasshopper ready to crunch on.

  89. 89.

    Forum Transmitted Disease

    May 10, 2012 at 12:29 pm

    The incident is bad enough as it is. What do you gain by making shit up?

    @burnspbesq: Ahhh, the Ballon Juice Douche Of Comity weighs in.

    The Republicans make shit up all the time. I’m just, in my own little way, returning the favor.

    I don’t have time for compromise, or to be nice to people who want me dead. So go fuck yourself, you rapist enabler.

  90. 90.

    The Bearded Blogger

    May 10, 2012 at 12:29 pm

    @Steve in DC: : Mitt Romney has the personality of a corporation.

    @gaz I know what you mean… I keep thinking about the thing from the perspective of the bullied kid, being pinned down and so on…

    @Brian R.: Nah… they’re cognitive dissonance grand masters at this point, the mozarts of this discipline

  91. 91.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:29 pm

    @Martin:

    He won’t be allowed to be a champion against school bullying. His base sees anti bullying campaigns as pro-gay.

  92. 92.

    Lurking Canadian

    May 10, 2012 at 12:30 pm

    @flukebucket: Can somebody tell me exactly what Obama’s horrible economic record

    His record is “horrible” because he wasn’t able to wave a magic wand and fix the wreckage left by Bush fils within ten minutes of his inauguration.

    Therefore, everything from minute eleven on is on him.

  93. 93.

    quannlace

    May 10, 2012 at 12:30 pm

    Funny, after reading that, I remembered that recent trip of his to Nascar. When he tried to trade some regular-guy banter with a crew about the rain poncho’s they were wearing. Trying to joke around? It just sounded like mean-spirited mocking.

  94. 94.

    Xecky Gilchrist

    May 10, 2012 at 12:30 pm

    “He can’t look like that. That’s wrong. Just look at him!”

    This is nearly verbatim from the BYU student dress and grooming code.

  95. 95.

    JGabriel

    May 10, 2012 at 12:30 pm

    __
    __
    WaPo:

    Lauber paused, then responded, “It was horrible.” He went on to explain how frightened he was during the incident, and acknowledged to Seed, “It’s something I have thought about a lot since then.”
    __
    […]
    __
    He kept his hair blond until he died, said his sister Chris. “He never stopped bleaching it.”

    Something that strikes one about this is Lauber’s courage. He was clearly traumatized by Romney’s attack. Lots of people would have never died their hair like that again, cringing at the memory.

    Instead, Lauber started bleaching his hair again at some point after he left Romney’s orbit at Cranbrook, and never stopped. In protest, because he wasn’t going to let Romney’s assault tell him how to act for the rest of his life? Or maybe because it was a statement of identity too integral to Lauber’s conception of himself to avoid? I don’t know. Maybe both, maybe other reasons. Lauber said he thought about the attack a lot; I’d guess that means that each time he re-bleached his hair, he had to relive the pangs of humiliation and fear experienced that day. I would submit that takes a kind of courage.

    .

  96. 96.

    Egg Berry

    May 10, 2012 at 12:31 pm

    How did his son turn out this way?

    Going to Cranbrook obviously didn’t help.

  97. 97.

    redshirt

    May 10, 2012 at 12:31 pm

    @rlrr: I moved every year till 10th grade, sometimes twice a year. I was ALWAYS the new kid in school, but I was also very big. And so I figured out I could gain instant popularity by identifying then beating up the school’s bully, which I did on many different occasions.

    I’ve long wondered though: Did that make me a bully? I beat the snot out of some of those guys.

  98. 98.

    RossInDetroit

    May 10, 2012 at 12:32 pm

    @EconWatcher:

    Cranbrook is the most beautiful high school I’ve ever seen, though. I went to a (much humbler) high school near there. In appearance, it’s like something out of a story book.

    It is gorgeous. That reminds me I have to get moving. I have to hit Groves and Seaholm high schools this afternoon. Not too shabby either, but Cranbrook is like a palace by comparison.

  99. 99.

    quannlace

    May 10, 2012 at 12:32 pm

    AHHHH! I just saw that photo from his prep school days. Pure Eddie Haskell. “Gosh, Mrs. Cleaver. I didn’t think about whether the kid was gay or not. Wallace and I…”

  100. 100.

    pk

    May 10, 2012 at 12:32 pm

    And in all the talk of bullying the gay kid, the prank on the nearly blind teacher will be forgotten.

  101. 101.

    JPL

    May 10, 2012 at 12:32 pm

    @WaterGirl: When I read the story earlier, it literally made me sick. Mitt campaigns orating about the President being a nice but is in over his head. He makes it sound like a being nice is an illness.

  102. 102.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 10, 2012 at 12:33 pm

    Maybe one of those production outfits that make all the dumb conservative movies can make a hagiographical movie called “Good Hair Hunting” that makes us stand up and cheer for the prep school kid forced to follow in his businessman father’s footsteps when he just wants to be a beautician and cut hair.

  103. 103.

    Zach

    May 10, 2012 at 12:34 pm

    I wonder whether the other anecdote about Mitt impersonating a police officer and sneaking up on his friends and their even-less-suspecting dates while they made out on some Lovers’ Lane is possibly more politically toxic. This scene has been replicated in countless horror movies except in that it ends in murder rather than an awkward period in which you drive back to school with the guy who ruined your night.

  104. 104.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:34 pm

    @redshirt:

    I got tall before most of my peers. A glare was all it took for me to make someone back off. I’m not sure how things would have been different if I was smaller…

  105. 105.

    The Bearded Blogger

    May 10, 2012 at 12:35 pm

    @flukebucket: The Bush recession is being blamed on Obama

    @eemom: Sociopathy only gets worse with age

    @cintibud: That would mean admitting to be wrong. Corporations don’t do that. Mitt has the personality of a corporation.

    @pk: I think a very effective commercial or short fil for Obama would be a look at Obama and Romney at different ages.. while Obama was helping people as a community organizer, Romney was screwing people out of jobs, etc…

  106. 106.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 10, 2012 at 12:36 pm

    @OGLiberal: I think about that, too. I always think it’s like the disparity between Poppy (who wasn’t as decent as George) and Dumbya (who in some small ways wasn’t quite as bad as Willard). I think it’s not uncommon for self-made people like George Romney to want to give their kids, especially their sons in that generation, everything, and they wind up with pathologically entitled pricks. Meg Whitman’s kids apparently think they invented e-commerce. Born in the locker room as champagne was being poured on their parents’ heads and think they hit the game-winning grand slam. Also too, I’ve read that in the Romneys’ circles, young Willard was seen as the Mormon JFK as far back as his undergrad days.

  107. 107.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 12:36 pm

    @Robin G.:

    “Come on, with all the things to discuss about Romney, are we really going to get into high school bullshit?” Then I read the incident. It’s stomach-turning. This isn’t simple bullying…”

    The tricky part about this one is that we live in a political infotainment world where every single event in a politician’s life is supposed to be indicative of character, to the point where ridiculous trivialities feed the buzzbeast to the point of absurdity.

    But here we have an incident that is a true indicator of basic character. Yet even people like you and I, who recognize it for what it is, have a hard time believing it simply because of all the times wolf has been cried before.

    This may not disqualify Romney from the presidency. But it certainly does indicate that he’s fundamentally a shit, and probably not even a fully reformed shit. The dog on top of the car thing indicated he was a shit in little, trivial ways. This indicates he’s a shit in big, significant ways.

  108. 108.

    Steve in DC

    May 10, 2012 at 12:37 pm

    @redshirt

    I don’t think beating people up makes you a bully. There is a difference between fighting, perfectly normal behavior, and stalking and abusing people.

    I was a skater in highschool and played rugby. Since rugby was far too dangerous for the school to support it the team was a county one. We didn’t get along with the prim and proper jocks on the football team. Spent most of the four years beating the shit out of each other at any possible chance. Was it bullying, nope. It was more just being stupid.

  109. 109.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 12:37 pm

    @eemom:

    Brutal cruelty, however, is something else. What he did demonstrates a profound ugliness of character of the kind that doesn’t change—indeed, more likely gets worse—as a person gets older. IMO.

    Yes. What changes as the person grows into adulthood is that this particular character pathology gets expressed in different ways (if not, the person ends up in jail, because what happend here was a criminal assault).

    In the case of Romney, he now says he “likes to fire people”, and diplays profound indifference to suffering and mistreatment of others (dog on roof…victims of his schemes at Bain Capital…”creative destruction”). I wonder if he does not qualify as a genuine sociopath on some level.

  110. 110.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:38 pm

    The tricky part about this one is that we live in a political infotainment world where every single event in a politician’s life is supposed to be indicative of character, to the point where ridiculous trivialities feed the buzzbeast to the point of absurdity.

    Except George W. Bush. His past was apparently off limits.

  111. 111.

    WaterGirl

    May 10, 2012 at 12:38 pm

    Hockey moms are so yesterday. Next poll: people who have been bullied. I predict 95% for Obama, 5% for Mittens.

  112. 112.

    WereBear

    May 10, 2012 at 12:39 pm

    @JCT: And cue the wingnut wurlitzer to chime in about how this doesn’t matter. And to them it doesn’t, they LOVE bullies (Limbaugh, etc)

    That’s what I thought, too: that this is exactly the way the Republican mindset is now. Mitt going “hey, that’s coloring outside the lines” and terrifying the outlier while making him conform; jeezum crow, they love that stuff.

  113. 113.

    quannlace

    May 10, 2012 at 12:40 pm

    The more I learn about Romney, the more he reminds me of Greg Stillson from the novel, “The Dead Zone.” A sociopathic character running for President.

    Life imitating Art

  114. 114.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 12:40 pm

    @gbear:

    At least he’s not running with scissors.

    …yet.

  115. 115.

    Laertes

    May 10, 2012 at 12:42 pm

    Here’s Erickson: “Let’s leave out the fact that the kid who got his haircut was subsequently thrown out of school for smoking one cigarette, but we’re to believe that the assailants of his hair, witnessed by many, were ignored.”

    I was struck by that detail too. I read it as “Governor Romney’s entitled-prick son can get away with anything, but unpopular kids get no slack at an elite prep school” rather than “all those witnesses are lying” but that’s Erickson for you. If he wasn’t reflexively sympathetic to bullies, he wouldn’t be a Republican in the first place.

  116. 116.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 12:43 pm

    @rlrr:

    Bush actually owned up to his drinking and partying past and did not try to play off some bullshit conditional non apology. I at least can respect that, if not much else about the man.

    Romney seems to have zero self awareness or even the remotest trace of human empathy.

  117. 117.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 12:44 pm

    @Tractarian:

    …negligently kills a dog…

    I don’t think the dog actually died from being on the roof.

  118. 118.

    gogol's wife

    May 10, 2012 at 12:45 pm

    @EconWatcher:

    It was designed by Saarinen. ETA: Oops, I guess that’s a different Cranbrook, the Academy of Arts. Sorry.

  119. 119.

    SatanicPanic

    May 10, 2012 at 12:45 pm

    @celticdragonchick: I definitely get the sociopath vibe from him. Sociopaths are different from your garden variety jerk in that they’re so weird and not in a good way.

  120. 120.

    RossInDetroit

    May 10, 2012 at 12:46 pm

    I’d be surprised if there wasn’t some disciplinary action for the bullying. People spend a boatload of cash sending their kids to Cranbrook, and it’s not so they can have a nonstandard coiffure imposed on them by another student. There had to be repercussions.

  121. 121.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 12:47 pm

    @JCT:

    And cue the wingnut wurlitzer to chime in about how this doesn’t matter. And to them it doesn’t, they LOVE bullies (Limbaugh, etc)

    Shoving the little queer on the floor and giving him a real man haircut is something they would heartily approve of. That is what good, solid ‘Merican young men do: enforce ‘Merican class and gender rules on the rest of us.

  122. 122.

    WaterGirl

    May 10, 2012 at 12:47 pm

    @JGabriel: Good for Lauber; you’re right that it seems he had a lot of guts. I find myself wondering how John Lauber died in 2004. That seems pretty young. I hope he died in a way that seems clearly unrelated to emotional distress of any kind.

  123. 123.

    ricky

    May 10, 2012 at 12:47 pm

    It was important for the WaPo to let us know the victim was soft spoken. Helps balance the image of him as a smoker.

    And thank heavens Cranberry Prep teaches all their grads those memory techniques.

  124. 124.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:49 pm

    @celticdragonchick:

    And Bush was given a pass because of this. I bet it would be different for a Democrat.

  125. 125.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 12:49 pm

    @SatanicPanic:

    Exactly.

  126. 126.

    shortstop

    May 10, 2012 at 12:50 pm

    @celticdragonchick: I can’t remember the details now, but several kids who went to high school with Dubya did accuse him of being a bully and leading other groups of kids in deriding and harassing classmates. He was described as having a real mean streak.

  127. 127.

    ricky

    May 10, 2012 at 12:50 pm

    @different-church-lady: Unfortunately we will never hear either Seamus or Lauber’s sides to these stories. Coincidence or cover-up?

  128. 128.

    karen

    May 10, 2012 at 12:50 pm

    Somehow it doesn’t surprise me that everyone remembered it except for Mittens and I’ll tell you why. With the others who recalled it, they’ve probably been decent people for most of their lives. No one is perfect and everyone has their dick moments but they probably have been good people for the majority for their lives. Mittens probably doesn’t remember because it meant NOTHING to him. It’s probably not the worse thing he’s ever done. He’s not a sadist but he has no empathy period. Therefore, of course he forgot it because it didn’t resonate with him.

    Mittens could be driving and run over and kill a child tomorrow and the only thing that would matter to him is how it would effect his election prospects because again, no empathy.

  129. 129.

    NancyDarling

    May 10, 2012 at 12:51 pm

    I haven’t had time to read this thread, so I don’t know if any lawyers have weighed in. From a lawyer (I think)at ATblog there’s this:

    “Bullying is bad, but that little passage describes: Kidnapping, False Imprisonment, Assault, Battery and likely Terroristic Threatening.

    Those really go beyond “childish indiscretions” and bullying.

    That guy was a monster.”

  130. 130.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 12:52 pm

    @The Bearded Blogger:

    @Steve in DC: : Mitt Romney has the personality of a corporation.

    I believe today’s internets have been won.

  131. 131.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:52 pm

    @NancyDarling:

    That guy was a monster.

    IOKIYAR

  132. 132.

    WaterGirl

    May 10, 2012 at 12:53 pm

    @JPL: I can’t even listen to Mitt, so I have no idea what he campaigns about. BUt if you had asked me yesterday if it would be possible for me to think less of Mitt than I already do, I would have said no. There is something very not right about Mitt Romney.

  133. 133.

    Brachiator

    May 10, 2012 at 12:54 pm

    Romney was involved in a pretty horrifying bullying incident in high school

    I detest Romney. But this is a non-story that cannot be salvaged by any amount of armchair psychology trying to connect the dots from TeenMitt to the adult Romneybot 5000.

  134. 134.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 12:54 pm

    @redshirt:

    Did that make me a bully?

    I think that makes you Batman.

  135. 135.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 12:55 pm

    @rlrr:

    That depends. Ted Kennedy knew how to tie one on and the press (and most of the public) wrote it off as eccentricity. Some personalities can get away with drinking etc and some cannot. I am not sure that party really has anything to do with it. Priviliged class affiliation does affect this however.

    Perversly, that is actually working against Romney here. He looks more and more like a the rich kid from hell that you wish had fallen off the cruise ship a’la Captains Courageous and then was never found by the fishing boat…

  136. 136.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 12:56 pm

    @celticdragonchick:

    I guess I missed the Ted Kennedy Administration… ;)

  137. 137.

    JGabriel

    May 10, 2012 at 12:56 pm

    @RossInDetroit:

    I’d be surprised if there wasn’t some disciplinary action for the bullying. … There had to be repercussions.

    According to WaPo, there were no repercussions:

    Friedemann entered Stevens Hall off the school’s collegiate quad to find Romney marching out of his own room ahead of a prep school posse shouting about their plan to cut Lauber’s hair. Friedemann followed them to a nearby room where they came upon Lauber, tackled him and pinned him to the ground. As Lauber, his eyes filling with tears, screamed for help, Romney repeatedly clipped his hair with a pair of scissors.
    __
    […]
    __
    Friedemann, guilt ridden, made a point of not talking about it with his friend and waited to see what form of discipline would befall Romney at the famously strict institution. Nothing happened.

    As Friedemann was one of the participants who helped hold Lauber down, I would guess he’d know.

    .

  138. 138.

    EconWatcher

    May 10, 2012 at 12:58 pm

    @JGabriel:

    Mitt was the sitting Governor’s son. Of course there were no repercussions. And Mitt would have understood that. It’s an important part of understanding the story.

  139. 139.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 1:03 pm

    @Brachiator:

    My wife took a class in criminalistics last year (she is a forensic biology major). What I kearned from her was that sadism in children and young adults is a huge red flag factor for pathological behavior as an adult. Yes, that includes mistreatment of animals and peers.

    I do not think this one can be waved away or laughed off. It was not garden variety class based social bullying, or a school yard fistfight. He organized and led a pack of other young men to attack, restrain and ritually humiliate another young man in a such a way with obvious sexual overtones.

    More to the point, he cannot even directly apologize for it decades later.

  140. 140.

    shortstop

    May 10, 2012 at 1:04 pm

    @EconWatcher: I think JGabriel understands the story. He/she was just answering Ross’s question.

    @WaterGirl: Liver cancer.

  141. 141.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 1:04 pm

    @rlrr:

    So did Ted…lol :)

  142. 142.

    Chinn Romney

    May 10, 2012 at 1:06 pm

    Fools! You’re missing the point. This stuff is gold with the base. Gold.

  143. 143.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 1:06 pm

    @celticdragonchick:

    More to the point, he cannot even directly apologize for it remember it, supposedly, decades later.

    The fix is in.

  144. 144.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 1:06 pm

    @Chinn Romney: He can’t win with 27%.

  145. 145.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 1:08 pm

    @different-church-lady:

    It depends on who counts the votes…

  146. 146.

    NancyDarling

    May 10, 2012 at 1:08 pm

    I haven’t had time to read this thread, so I don’t know if any lawyers have weighed in. From a lawyer (I think)at ATblog there’s this:

    Bullying is bad, but that little passage describes: Kidnapping, False Imprisonment, Assault, Battery and likely Terroristic Threatening. Those really go beyond “childish indiscretions” and bullying. That guy was a monster.”

  147. 147.

    Argive

    May 10, 2012 at 1:09 pm

    Hey, this must be how Republicans felt during 2004. Y’know, when they portrayed Kerry as an out-of-touch elitist snob with no morals who speaks French.

  148. 148.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 1:10 pm

    @Argive:

    “Kerry actually killed a guy…”
    — Fox “News”

  149. 149.

    Alex S.

    May 10, 2012 at 1:11 pm

    The young Mitt Romney lacked some Burkean humility.

  150. 150.

    Monala

    May 10, 2012 at 1:13 pm

    Contrast this with the memories of Obama’s childhood friends, starting at about the 3:30 mark:

  151. 151.

    Chinn Romney

    May 10, 2012 at 1:13 pm

    @different-church-lady:

    rr has part of it. The other thing to consider is that the base remembers stuff like this. That so-called center will have changed their collective mind so many times on so many other issues that this ceases to exist with them. I’m almost serious when I say this, alas.

  152. 152.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 1:13 pm

    @Alex S.:

    “When it comes to humility, I’m the greatest.”
    — Mitt Romney

  153. 153.

    aimai

    May 10, 2012 at 1:13 pm

    @Steve in DC:
    Really? I don’t know the last time I ever saw a bunch of nerds or goths take down a jock and cut his hair. Or even muss it. This “everybody does it” shtick is just bizarre. No, everybody does not take turns bullying everybody else. Social outcasts, except on Glee, do not ever get to suddenly run the world while they are in highschool. Sometimes they survive, move away, and write hollywood scripts. But that happens later.

    aimai

  154. 154.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 1:14 pm

    @Brachiator:

    I detest Romney. But this is a non-story that cannot be salvaged by any amount of armchair psychology trying to connect the dots from TeenMitt to the adult Romneybot 5000.

    Bullshit. If nothing else, the way he responded when confronted about is ABSOLUTELY indicative of character.

    Had he not responded the way he did, but actually issued an apology, I’d agree. But that’s not what happened.

    ETA: To clarify, in his response he issued a non-apology. Adult Romney doesn’t find anything wrong with what Teenage Romney did. It’s Romney that connected the dots.

  155. 155.

    LanceThruster

    May 10, 2012 at 1:15 pm

    Did the story mention whether he drove around with the kid tied to the roof?

  156. 156.

    the Conster

    May 10, 2012 at 1:15 pm

    @elisabeth:

    My favorite from the comments to Chait’s article:

    Romney is the grown version of Johnny from Karate Kid, and if elected would most likely fill his cabinet with his Cobra Kai teammates. He’ll confront Pelosi over an attempt to save food stamps: “You just couldn’t leave well enough alone, could you, little twerp? Well now you’re gonna pay!”

    Plus the picture of Malfoy FTW.

  157. 157.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    May 10, 2012 at 1:17 pm

    @JGabriel:

    Friedemann, guilt ridden, made a point of not talking about it with his friend and waited to see what form of discipline would befall Romney at the famously strict institution. Nothing happened.

    __
    So 1 Friedemann Unit = never ?

  158. 158.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 1:18 pm

    @NancyDarling: Yup, the left attempting to overplay the hand again. “Hey, I got three 5’s here… maybe if I whine loud enough people will believe I’ve got a full house!”

  159. 159.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 1:21 pm

    @aimai:

    I don’t know the last time I ever saw a bunch of nerds or goths take down a jock and cut his hair. Or even muss it. This “everybody does it” shtick is just bizarre. No, everybody does not take turns bullying everybody else.

    Generation gap. This stuff was par for the course in the 60s and 70s. Today parents and administrators don’t put up with it, and kids don’t seem as interested in it. We’ve moved on from the Lord of the Flies mindset.

  160. 160.

    SiubhanDuinne

    May 10, 2012 at 1:23 pm

    @eemom:

    Dubya famously branded his fraternity brothers with a red hot coat hanger as part of hazing.

  161. 161.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 1:23 pm

    @NancyDarling:

    I haven’t had time to read this thread, so I don’t know if any lawyers have weighed in. From a lawyer (I think)at ATblog there’s this:

    It doesn’t matter a bit what some theoretical criminal charges would have or would have not been. Not at all. It’s a non-starter. It’s mental masturbation – arguing a hypothetical that has no bearing on Mitt’s running for office.

    Even were he to have been criminally liable, there’s a little thing called “statute of limitations”

    You are barking up the wrong tree.

  162. 162.

    Keith

    May 10, 2012 at 1:24 pm

    This sounds so much like the duct-tape-to-butt-cheeks confession from The Breakfast Club…minus the actual remorse.

  163. 163.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 1:24 pm

    @shortstop:

    with Dubya did accuse him of being a bully and leading other groups of kids in deriding and harassing classmates. He was described as having a real mean streak.

    Dubya has a habit of verbal power plays with people. It seems to be how he sizes up somebody as according to how they react to his carefully couched verbal aggression.

    An interesting anecdote from Dubya’s college time makes for a counter point to Romney’s actions:

    Lanny Davis, who knew George W. Bush in college, offered this recollection in 2005 of the future president, which contrasts sharply with Romney’s mentality:

    A few of us were in the common room one night. It was 1965, I believe — my junior year, his sophomore. We were making our usual sarcastic commentaries on those who walked by us. A little nasty perhaps, but always with a touch of humor. On this occasion, however, someone we all believed to be gay walked by, although the word we used in those days was “queer.” Someone, I’m sorry to say, snidely used that word as he walked by.

    George heard it and, most uncharacteristically, snapped: “Shut up.” Then he said, in words I can remember almost verbatim: “Why don’t you try walking in his shoes for a while and see how it feels before you make a comment like that?”

    ***************************

    That does go to my own personal feeling that Bush simply did not have the sort of personal, sadistic antipathy for easy social targets the way Romney seems to have. Bush was willing to use gays(in the abstract) as political hay. I will not forget or forgive that. I also balance that with the graceful and admirable way he greeted a post op transgendered woman he had known as a male at Yale…and I cannot imagine Romney being able to do that.

  164. 164.

    Ronzoni Rigatoni

    May 10, 2012 at 1:29 pm

    @WaterGirl: “It’s the story of Romney’s life: one set of rules for me (and other rich people) and another set of rules for the people who don’t matter.”
    Back in the day when I actually believed in “law enforcement,” I wrote a series of penalties against a couple of airlines for a series of import violations. My “superiors” disqualified the penalties against the major airline, but allowed the penalties for the exact same violations for the smaller regional airline. Their excuse: “Rules are meant for the little guy.” Yep. At that point I vowed never to be a “little guy,” and I wasn’t. For the next 18 years I was a “union bully.”

  165. 165.

    maya

    May 10, 2012 at 1:31 pm

    Yeah, but Obama is making good Merkin Xtians wear frilly undies and lipstick and mascara. And that’s just the men. Xtian women will now have to wear cargo pants.

  166. 166.

    JPL

    May 10, 2012 at 1:31 pm

    @celticdragonchick: Romney couldn’t stand up to the woman who wanted the President charged with treason.

    BTW..have the log cabin republicans commented on this yet?

  167. 167.

    amk

    May 10, 2012 at 1:31 pm

    @HeartlandLiberal: Exactly. It’s amazing how the fucking press is willing to give this deep character flaw even at this stage. The fucker lies and sez he never remembered such an incident implying it didn’t happen and then comes with his nonpology.

  168. 168.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    May 10, 2012 at 1:33 pm

    everyone is missing the irony of a Mormon screaming about someone else looking and acting weird.

  169. 169.

    Genghis

    May 10, 2012 at 1:33 pm

    @Robin G.:

    Yes. I had a bully apologize to me a few years after high school. I thought he was going to jump me again and threaten to cut my hair as he had when we were at school. His apology was heartfelt and complete and I don’t hold any grudges.

    A few years earlier in another city, my younger brother was held down for a haircut by his gym class – led by the instructor. They cut one side of his hair and left him to try to even it up.

    IF THE STORY IS TRUE, Romney should apologize to the victim’s face. I don’t need to see coverage of it, but he needs to do it, whether the victim accepts the apology or not.

    Best…H

  170. 170.

    shortstop

    May 10, 2012 at 1:34 pm

    @celticdragonchick: That anecdote has been held up as a puzzling contrast to Bush’s usual MO of leading others in mocking and verbally bullying other kids. In fact, some have suggested that the point of that incident–which, IIRC, occurred minutes after Bush had viciously derogated some other hapless classmate–was not to protect the “queer” but to reestablish his dominance as the tribal leader who decides who and how to bully.

  171. 171.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 1:37 pm

    @Genghis:

    IF THE STORY IS TRUE, Romney should apologize to the victim’s face

    He’d have to find the cemetery and dig up the man’s grave to do that.

  172. 172.

    burnspbesq

    May 10, 2012 at 1:40 pm

    @Steve in DC:

    But saying “he can’t look like that” and then cutting his hair, is just odd.

    Not in the 1960s, it wasn’t. Long hair was a hot-button issue to an extent that I don’t think people who weren’t around at the time really understand.

  173. 173.

    celticdragonchick

    May 10, 2012 at 1:41 pm

    @shortstop:

    That may be true, and he does have a verbal bullying streak (again, I understand that it is partly to see if you will stand up to him. I had a college professor who did that. I was one of the few who regularly bit back in class).

  174. 174.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 1:41 pm

    @maya:

    Yeah, but Obama is making good Merkin Xtians wear frilly undies and lipstick and mascara. And that’s just the men. Xtian women will now have to wear cargo pants.

    I read your comment three times and I still can’t determine how this is a bad thing(tm)

    ETA: It strikes me as a character building exercise

  175. 175.

    Some Loser

    May 10, 2012 at 1:41 pm

    I truly loath bullies. I have no sympathy for them. I don’ t care if they haven’t bullied someone for years. That shit is evil. Tormenting people like that. I’m surprised anyone would try to excuse behavior like this especially here. Unfortunately, there will be no justice to the victim. Curious, no? Everybody forgets about the victim here so they can excuse the bullies.

  176. 176.

    flea

    May 10, 2012 at 1:41 pm

    And does anybody remember this oldie but goodie?

  177. 177.

    burnspbesq

    May 10, 2012 at 1:43 pm

    @Forum Transmitted Disease:

    The Republicans make shit up all the time. I’m just, in my own little way, returning the favor.

    So their lies justify yours. Riiiight.

    Aren’t we supposed to be better than them?

  178. 178.

    eemom

    May 10, 2012 at 1:43 pm

    @celticdragonchick:
    @shortstop:

    I had not heard either that anecdote or the other accounts of Bush being a bully. And certainly not that he tortured animals [shudder].

    I had, over the years since he’s been mercifully gone from the WH, mellowed a little in my hatred of him. But I mostly attribute that to (1) the worse and more despicable republican monsters that have been shoved in my face 24/7 since then, and (2) the movie “W” which did portray him as at least somewhat of a human being. So who knows.

  179. 179.

    danimal

    May 10, 2012 at 1:45 pm

    Nobody has noticed the irony? RMoney has, today, conducted a RMoney “Apology Tour.” This Apology Tour will, inevitably, lead to societal decline because apologies are NevilleChamberlinappeasement, shut up, that’s why.

    The end is near.

  180. 180.

    Citizen Alan

    May 10, 2012 at 1:45 pm

    @burnspbesq:

    I suppose it would be deeply silly of me to wonder whether there is any factual basis for this outlandish fantasy of yours.

    Seriously? You want to know whether he has any factual basis for his snarky insinuation that the Sadist Romney might have jizzed his pants while violently assaulting a young effeminate man? Perhaps because Linda Tripp kept his stained underwear in a ziplock bag for 40 years? Yeesh! I have a headache now from how hard my eyes just rolled.

    The incident is bad enough as it is. What do you gain by making shit up?

    Personal amusement? Recognition of the fact that many homophobes are driven to hate gays due to their own suppressed homosexual desires? The satisfaction of imputing sexual deviancy (in the form of sadistic, sexualized violence) on a Republican candidate who our useless media insists on depicting as Ward Cleaver? The off-chance that the rumor might take off and conservo-Christians who are already leery of Lord Romney will suspect that he is a closet-case on top of all his other deficiencies? That’s plenty of reason for me.

  181. 181.

    Brachiator

    May 10, 2012 at 1:48 pm

    @celticdragonchick:

    My wife took a class in criminalistics last year (she is a forensic biology major). What I kearned from her was that sadism in children and young adults is a huge red flag factor for pathological behavior as an adult. Yes, that includes mistreatment of animals and peers.

    Bullshit.

    This kind of thing pops up continually in the pop pyschology abuse of actual psychology. Yeah, I am aware of the regular, ongoing behavior seen in a small number of young children who wet themselves, are regularly sadistically cruel to small animals (not the same thing as bland “mistreatement of animals), and who start fires or have fascination with fire, etc. And, the critical difference is that the most dangerous of these individuals early on connect sexual pleasure with torture of animals. An example is the Kansas BTK killer.

    By his own admission, he says he developed fantasies about bondage, control and torture from an early age, while still in grade school. As he became sexual he dreamed of tying girls up and having his way with them. The Mouseketeer Annette Funicello was one of his favorite targets for imaginary bondage. He admits to having killed cats and dogs such as by hanging them as a youth. He learned he had to keep his developing inner world of bondage, torture and death a secret from everyone, and he did a good job of doing so.

    And that’s just part of a larger, and still little understood dynamic.

    Not the same fucking thing as a single incident by high school Mitt.

    Also, too, a lot of the assumptions of criminal profiling are not standing up to deeper scrutiny, but that’s another story.

    @gaz:

    Bullshit. If nothing else, the way he responded when confronted about is ABSOLUTELY indicative of character. Had he not responded the way he did, but actually issued an apology, I’d agree. But that’s not what happened.

    Or dumbass candidate Romney listened to the most cynical of his campaign advisors who suggested that an actual apology might make him appear both too culpable and too weak. The same kind of advice from attorneys to their clients about making statements that will enter the public record. “Never admit to anything, never apologize.”

    Bottom line is that no one knows, or will know, what the real Mittens (if there is such a thing) thinks about what high school Mitt did.

    Hate him or hold him responsible, as you will. But it still is not much more than empty rationalization.

    And I’m stil not voting for him. And there are a lot better reasons, and a lot deeper suggestions of Romney flaws.

    As always, your mileage may vary.

  182. 182.

    Some Loser

    May 10, 2012 at 1:48 pm

    @aimai: I think this is what pisses me off the most about this. This endless excuse making. “Everyone did this kind of thing when they were young.” What a shitty existence these assholes had. Bullying is not something that should be hand waved.

  183. 183.

    JC

    May 10, 2012 at 1:48 pm

    Well, as Sooner said, can’t hold people accountable for something they did 50 years ago.

    But Romney’s reaction today, is just another reminder of what a feckless, lying liar this guy is.

    It’s really amazing that anyone would vote for such a guy with obviously zero integrity. “All politicians lie”. Yes, we know, you have to say some things to please some people.

    But this guy?

    Everything about his campaign, how he campaigns, what he says, is absolutely without character, without value. A total cypher, a yawning hole of ambition, with no moral core underneath.

  184. 184.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 1:48 pm

    @eemom:

    And certainly not that he tortured animals [shudder].

    Start here…

  185. 185.

    ricky

    May 10, 2012 at 1:49 pm

    Something is wrong with this story.

    Nobody who exerts this kind of manly leadership lets his wife buy a string of dancing ponies with money that could be better spent on something more potent than squirrel guns.

    I’m betting Mitt put his friends up to this remebrance and paid handsomely for it. Notice the WaPo asked about and wrote about their political affiliation, not their sexual preference.

  186. 186.

    Interrobang

    May 10, 2012 at 1:51 pm

    The thing that strikes me most about this episode is that in Romney’s own mind, at that moment, he was the self-appointed arbiter and enforcer of what other people should look like, even at the expense of their own bodily integrity and autonomy. Considering that he just issued a notpology for what he did, and a lot of his political stances currently (such as being a forced-birther), that disturbs me a lot. He’s on record as believing that women should live according to his personal preferences, at the expense of their bodily integrity and autonomy.

    I’d be worried about electing a guy to high public office who thinks that he’s entitled to have you live according to his preferences, even if that means compromising your bodily autonomy and integrity, and will do anything, including use violence, to make sure it happens that way.

  187. 187.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 1:52 pm

    @gaz:

    He’d have to find the cemetery and dig up the man’s grave to do that.

    This is Mitt Romney we’re talking about: I would not be surprised to wake up tomorrow and read he did just that.

  188. 188.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 1:54 pm

    @different-church-lady:

    If he thought he would get some more votes…

  189. 189.

    HoneyBearKelly

    May 10, 2012 at 1:55 pm

    Kinda surprised WaPo printed this.

  190. 190.

    Citizen Alan

    May 10, 2012 at 1:55 pm

    @eemom:

    There where personal things about Bush jr that have bothered me a great deal, but he never struck me as sadistic the way this hazing incident strikes me about Romney…

    Bingo. That is exactly what I mean.

    Gotta disagree. Fucker killed small animals by sticking firecrackers up their butts and laughed about it. That explains perfectly well why he was capable of joking about executing Karla Fay Tucker.

  191. 191.

    shortstop

    May 10, 2012 at 1:55 pm

    @different-church-lady: Say, maybe Romney can posthumously baptize Lauber as a way of extending the laurel branch.

  192. 192.

    Mike in NC

    May 10, 2012 at 1:56 pm

    @karen:

    Mittens could be driving and run over and kill a child tomorrow and the only thing that would matter to him is how it would effect his election prospects because again, no empathy.

    But he’d be damn sure to have one of the servants polish the bumper.

  193. 193.

    eemom

    May 10, 2012 at 1:56 pm

    @Some Loser:

    I think you have said before that you are 19? Unless I have your nym mixed up with someone else. I remember it because I was so surprised — really thought you were older from the substance of your comments, which I mean a compliment.

    If I have that right, you are certainly closer to the issue of bullying than most of us here.

  194. 194.

    JPL

    May 10, 2012 at 1:57 pm

    @different-church-lady: Surely with Mitt’s influence he can have the guy baptized. That would teach em..

  195. 195.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 1:58 pm

    @shortstop:

    Say, maybe Romney can posthumously baptize Lauber as a way of extending the laurel branch.

    That is some Steve Schmit level GAMECHANGER!™ kinda genius you’re exhibiting there.

  196. 196.

    Bokonon

    May 10, 2012 at 1:58 pm

    I knew guys like this in boarding school. I hated their smugness, their sense of entitlement, and their dislike of anyone – ANYONE – who stepped outside of the accepted order of things.

    But one of the interesting things about these people is that while they were enforcers of social orthodoxy, and while relentlessly kissed up to power (and kicked down to those below them), they would also freely violate the rules of the school themselves. Granted, it helped having wealthy, powerful parents that could keep them from serious disciplinary violations. But as a matter of personal outlook, they clearly had no problem or discomfort with applying one set of rules for themselves and an entirely different compass for everyone else. That is the nature of privilege and power. And the unfairness of that is exactly the point.

    When these people would get busted for something like hazing an underclassman, their reaction was the same sort of smirky, false contriteness we are seeing from Romney – the “hey, sorry you were offended” act.

    So yeah … Romney is a type. He is a complete type.

  197. 197.

    shortstop

    May 10, 2012 at 2:01 pm

    @shortstop: Olive branch. Was writing about the Olympics on another blog at the same time. Arrrggh!

  198. 198.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 2:05 pm

    @different-church-lady:

    This is Mitt Romney we’re talking about: I would not be surprised to wake up tomorrow and read he did just that.

    LOL! Point taken, the man is a ghoul.

  199. 199.

    cckids

    May 10, 2012 at 2:06 pm

    @OGLiberal:

    From what I’ve read about him, George Romney seemed to be a decent, reasonable guy. Of course, he’d be considered a liberal these days. (actually, I think they tried to brand him as one back in the 60s, back when liberal Republicans actually existed) How did his son turn out this way?

    Maybe he fell into the trap so many of his generation, especially, did; believing that your kids will just pick up values & understanding of issues by osmosis, because you, yourself are doing the right thing. For most kids, they need some explanations earlier on, then it gets cemented in when they see you acting on your values.

  200. 200.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 2:08 pm

    @gaz: No, no, he wouldn’t do it because he was a ghoul. He’d do it because the code in the ROMNEYBOT 2012™ would trip over some bug that would erroneously set the “GOOD_IDEA” flag to TRUE.

  201. 201.

    amk

    May 10, 2012 at 2:08 pm

    @gaz: And probably baptize him too just to be sure ?

  202. 202.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 2:09 pm

    @cckids: Personally, I think it’s pretty natural for children to define themselves by taking an anti-stance to their parents most cherished values.

    That’s why if I ever have children, I’m gonna go full-metal-wingnut. That way my kids will turn out to be decent people. =)

    /snark

  203. 203.

    Ben Cisco

    May 10, 2012 at 2:11 pm

    @Martin:

    and then pivoted into being a champion against school bullying.

    Not as the REPUBLICAN nominee he couldn’t. Take a look at anti-bullying measures around the country, then take note of who’s bitching about them.

  204. 204.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 2:13 pm

    @Ben Cisco:

    Christian conservatives for the most part. I guess I missed the part in the Bible where Jesus tells us to “beat up the queers.”

  205. 205.

    JoyceH

    May 10, 2012 at 2:14 pm

    @gaz:

    IF THE STORY IS TRUE, Romney should apologize to the victim’s face.He’d have to find the cemetery and dig up the man’s grave to do that.

    And how unfortunate for the GOP that is! If the victim were still alive, they could pull a Cheney, and we’d be seeing the victim apologizing to Romney on national television.

  206. 206.

    rlrr

    May 10, 2012 at 2:14 pm

    @gaz:

    Hmmmm, my parents are wingnuts…

  207. 207.

    amk

    May 10, 2012 at 2:14 pm

    @Martin:

    serious rookie move.

    The guy has been running for president for eight years for godsake.

  208. 208.

    metricpenny

    May 10, 2012 at 2:16 pm

    The republicans really need to update their brand to GOPP — Group Of Pompous Pricks.

    Romney exemplifies the disconnect his type has with their religions. We’re santified and walk with God; however, we don’t have to exhibit that behavior to people who aren’t exactly like us in every way. Especially those people who have no chance of being exactly like us (white, male, clean shaven and financially well off).

  209. 209.

    LanceThruster

    May 10, 2012 at 2:16 pm

    @danimal: Yeah. The “I’m sorry but I will never apologize” guy just gets curiouser and curiouser.

  210. 210.

    LanceThruster

    May 10, 2012 at 2:19 pm

    @metricpenny: Good points. Reminds me of the types that conclude that ‘ugly’ lesbian girls just need to perty theyselves up so that Rmoney type bullies quit picking on them for their lack of attractiveness.

  211. 211.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 2:19 pm

    @JC: That’s not exactly what I was saying. You CAN and should hold someone accountable for the things they did.
    One need only look at the things that were said by the other sources for the story. The one guy still, to this day, feels horrible and sad about it.

    “It happened very quickly, and to this day it troubles me,” said Buford, the school’s wrestling champion, who said he joined Romney in restraining Lauber. Buford subsequently apologized to Lauber, who was “terrified,” he said. “What a senseless, stupid, idiotic thing to do.”

    I won’t condemn the man for something he did as a young person, but I do have real issues with somebody who, as Romney has been doing here, dodges the question by pretending to not remember, and issues a half-assed non-apology apology. If Romney had stood up and said “what I did to Jeff Lauber was wrong and cruel and I’m sorry about it and I’ve tried, in the years since to be a better man” then I’d be cool with it. Some people have said that Romney grew up quite a bit after this incident and they credit his wife, Ann. Fair enough, I suppose, but I’d know the man actually felt shame and remorse if he’d actually show shame and remorse.

  212. 212.

    Patricia Kayden

    May 10, 2012 at 2:21 pm

    Romneybot is having a bad week.

  213. 213.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 2:21 pm

    @LanceThruster: FWIW, I think the shaved head and combat boots “Tank Girl” look is pretty hawt… but then again, I’m a self-styled freak.

    I can’t rightly square the chick-mullet look though. Mullets are not attractive on ANYBODY.

  214. 214.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 2:22 pm

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Romneybot is having a bad week 8 years of running for president.

    FTFY

  215. 215.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 2:24 pm

    @Soonergrunt: cosigned

  216. 216.

    deep

    May 10, 2012 at 2:24 pm

    You gotta remember, Republicans love bullies. Most of them are bullies themselves and love it when their politicians and pundits legitimize their behavior.

  217. 217.

    gaz

    May 10, 2012 at 2:26 pm

    @rlrr: they sacrificed their values so you wouldn’t have to sacrifice yours. =)

  218. 218.

    The Other Bob

    May 10, 2012 at 2:29 pm

    Seed, a registered independent, has served as a Republican county chairman in Michigan.

    Michigan does not have party registration. This guy could not have been an independent.

  219. 219.

    WaterGirl

    May 10, 2012 at 2:30 pm

    @Ronzoni Rigatoni: I love my parents, though they are long gone, but I curse them for raising me to believe the world would be fair. It did not prepare me for reality.

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: Magic underwear: That’s just not right!

  220. 220.

    Some Loser

    May 10, 2012 at 2:35 pm

    @eemom: Thanks, but I’m not closer to the issue than anyone else here. I haven’t had to deal with a bully since I was in middle school. Lots of places down here have zero tolerance towards bullying even if you’re homosexual.

  221. 221.

    Bokonon

    May 10, 2012 at 2:36 pm

    Not apologizing when you are in the wrong, or when you get caught? Never admitting error? Saying the problem is all with your critics and the people weak enough to get offended? That is a continuation of bullying. And the height of privilege.

    For a good recent example, see Rush Limbaugh.

    The GOP seems to be addicted to this fake tough guy position. After all, one of the major planks of Romney’s stump speech attacks on Obama is that the President “travels the world apologizes for America.” Which is itself a big ol’ honking lie, but hey … who is counting, right? Romney is copping an attitude. Drawing a contrast. Telling everyone what kind of guy that he is.

  222. 222.

    mai naem

    May 10, 2012 at 2:36 pm

    I read this story early this morning. I don’t care for Romney but I have not thought of him as a total ahole until this. I happen to have a Mormon friend whose parents were in the same Mormon stake as Romney was when they lived in Boston and says Romney would have been considered a liberal Republican in those days. One of the things this friend said was that we would hear lots about Bain Capital(his dad has business dealings with Romney. Anyway this kind of influenced my thinking of Romney. I just kind of figured he was saying whatever he needed to say to get elected. But this has really changed my opinion of Romney. I was bullied as a kid and I just don’t think those kind of personalities change. Maybe, if you have some kind of life changing event or something but as a rule if you were an ahole as a teenager you are going to stay an ahole. There’s something really creepy about him not remembering restraining a gay guy and cutting off his bleached blond hair. I mean c’mon five other people remember it and you the ringleader don’t? A HOLE.

  223. 223.

    Mike G

    May 10, 2012 at 2:37 pm

    This will make Rmoney more popular among the Limbaugh crowd. Repukes exalt bullies and assholes — the working class cultural rightards live vicariously through the meanness of their heroes who do what the rightards wish they could get away with in their kiss-up, kick-down heirarchical lives.

    Rmoney is a classic example of what I call Klub Khristianity — arrogant jerks who think that because they’ve joined the ‘Christian’ club that they are better than everyone else, sanctified in all they say and do, and incapable of error; and introspection is for people who aren’t perfect like they are.

  224. 224.

    pseudonymous in nc

    May 10, 2012 at 2:40 pm

    Think about how often RMoney jokes about people getting fired. That’s a riot to him.

    So, yeah: creepy sociopath.

  225. 225.

    eemom

    May 10, 2012 at 2:41 pm

    @Some Loser:

    Well, you are closer to middle school than most of us….especially me, who rode there on a dinosaur back in the days when it was called “junior high school.” : )

  226. 226.

    amk

    May 10, 2012 at 2:44 pm

    Another point of wapo piece being missed is how mittbot & his klowns harassed a near-blind teacher and laughed their asses off about it. Fucking assholes all.

  227. 227.

    LanceThruster

    May 10, 2012 at 2:45 pm

    @gaz: I agreee. I’ve always felt you should strive to be comfortable in your own skin and your own look, and with any luck, you’ll find someone who likes that about you too.

  228. 228.

    WaterGirl

    May 10, 2012 at 2:46 pm

    @karen:

    Mittens could be driving and run over and kill a child tomorrow and the only thing that would matter to him is how it would effect his election prospects because again, no empathy.

    I’m running For office, for Pete’s sake, I can’t be running over children.

  229. 229.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 2:53 pm

    @WaterGirl:
    I’m running For office, for Pete’s sake, I can’t be running over children have children’s blood and guts on my bumper, grill, and fenders! Clean that off!

    There. FIFY

  230. 230.

    the fugitive uterus

    May 10, 2012 at 2:56 pm

    people say the whole “dog on car” thing is not a big deal. i found out about it last time he ran and it told me all i needed to know about the man. he is cruel. he may dote on his kids, but that’s because they belong to him. outsiders are inferior and don’t deserve respect or love.

  231. 231.

    geg6

    May 10, 2012 at 3:01 pm

    @Brian R.:

    IMHO, this comment wins the internet. Hands down.

  232. 232.

    ellie

    May 10, 2012 at 3:01 pm

    Every time I hear “Cranbrook,” I think of the rap battle in 8 Mile where Rabbit disses Clarence thusly:

    But i know something about you
    You went to Cranbrook that’s a private school
    What’s the matter dawg? You embarrassed?
    This guy’s a gangsta but his real name’s Clarence
    And Clarence lives at home with both parents
    And Clarence’s parents have a real good marriage
    This guy don’t wanna battle he shook
    Koz there aint no such thang as HALF WAY CROOKS!!
    He’s scared to death
    He’s scared to look in his fuckin yearbook fuck Cranbrook

    Yes, I’m 12 years old.

  233. 233.

    WaterGirl

    May 10, 2012 at 3:07 pm

    @Soonergrunt: You’re right. It’s all about what it looks like. I offer this as another alternative:

    I’m running for office, for Pete’s sake, I can’t be SEEN running over children.

  234. 234.

    Gretchen

    May 10, 2012 at 3:17 pm

    I’ve been waiting for this. Whenever the subject is Romney’s sense of humor, the answer is always the many pranks that occurred in his household. Pranks have a victim. Like the shortsighted teacher who Romney led to a door, pretended to open, and let him walk into it. There are no memories of his wit, his hilarious impersonations, it’s always “pranks”, and somebody always gets hurt. Hilarious.

  235. 235.

    geg6

    May 10, 2012 at 3:20 pm

    @aimai:

    Social outcasts, except on Glee, do not ever get to suddenly run the world while they are in highschool.

    I totally agree with your comment, aimai. Except that it happens even to students who aren’t social outcasts. Hell, it happened to me and, though I never thought I was popular or anything, I always knew I was welcome in any social cliques in high school. And it turns out, that most of my high school class thought I was one of the most popular. Mainly because I was friends with people from all the various groups and never identified as any particular one. But even I was bullied and I was, apparently, no social outcast. I simply cannot imagine how bad it would have been if I had been.

  236. 236.

    gwangung

    May 10, 2012 at 3:31 pm

    If Romney had stood up and said “what I did to Jeff Lauber was wrong and cruel and I’m sorry about it and I’ve tried, in the years since to be a better man” then I’d be cool with it. Some people have said that Romney grew up quite a bit after this incident and they credit his wife, Ann. Fair enough,

    Fair enough IF HE WOULD ACTUALLY SAY THIS.

    As it is, no, I don’t believe it. One bit.

  237. 237.

    liberal

    May 10, 2012 at 3:38 pm

    …or to even himself as a Christian…

    But Mormonism isn’t Christian.

    I don’t have a dog in that fight, as an agnostic with a partly Jewish background. But the fact is that Mormonism, while nearly Christian and Christian derived, simply is not Christian, because it doesn’t adhere to the Nicene Creed.

    Does that mean it’s a cult? No. Inferior to Christianity? No.

    But it isn’t Christian per se.

  238. 238.

    Bobby Thomson

    May 10, 2012 at 3:51 pm

    @liberal:

    I don’t have a dog in that fight, as an agnostic with a partly Jewish background. But the fact is that Mormonism, while nearly Christian and Christian derived, simply is not Christian, because it doesn’t adhere to the Nicene Creed.

    The Nicenes are dead and not the boss of all persons who consider themselves Christians. Plenty of protestant denominations today believe things that would have been considered heresy in the middle ages. Some explicitly reject dogma and creeds. I’ll just leave it at that.

  239. 239.

    gene108

    May 10, 2012 at 3:52 pm

    @Lurking Canadian:

    His record is “horrible” because he wasn’t able to wave a magic wand and fix the wreckage left by Bush fils within ten minutes of his inauguration.

    It can be argued the Obama Administration and the Democrats dropped the ball on the economy in 2009.

    Obama’s economic team grossly underestimated the severity of the recession they were in and the Democrats in the House and Senate weren’t introducing many or any bills directly targeting stimulating the economy in a big way, after the ARRA passed.

    I understand there’s Republican obstructionism and the need to control carbon emissions, regulate the financial markets and reform health care, but my fairly liberal mom told me in 2009, “why are they focusing on health care, when the economy is bad?”.

    There is a case to be made that an Administration and Congress focused more on stimulating the economy could’ve put us in a better position right now.

    Hindsight’s always perfect, but there are some valid criticisms to be made about Obama’s handling of the economy between “he’s a communist-Marxist-socialist-Muslim-usurper” and “things are better, despite mess Bush, Jr. left, so no questioning Obama’s economic record”.

  240. 240.

    FactPlus

    May 10, 2012 at 3:53 pm

    @Steve: An 18 year old is not a kid.

  241. 241.

    Sally Rakowski

    May 10, 2012 at 4:06 pm

    It must be wonderful to be a Log Cabin Republican in a week in which the “bad guy” says you deserve to be treated like an actual human and have the right to get married to the person you love, while the “good guy” you’re cheering for is revealed to be the asshole who bullied you in high school

    Obama bullied a girl in middle school. Shoved her, too.

    This is not news. It was in Dreams from My Father if anyone bothered to actually read it. It wasn’t worthy of mention and the Washington Post never followed up to check with the girl or any of his other middle school classmates because, really, who really gives a shit about something that happened nearly 40 years ago.

    Or wait, maybe WaPo does care about someone being an asshole in his youth. Just certain someone’s.

    But has Obama apologized to the girl for bullying and shoving her?

  242. 242.

    redshirt

    May 10, 2012 at 4:13 pm

    @different-church-lady: Yeah, that’s what I thought too. But, Batman’s kinda psycho as well. So….

  243. 243.

    Bokonon

    May 10, 2012 at 4:17 pm

    Hey Sally –

    False equivalence. And no … this isn’t about media bias.

    Thanks for playing.

  244. 244.

    Villago Delenda Est

    May 10, 2012 at 4:18 pm

    @rlrr:

    Well, yeah. Kerry actually set foot in a war zone, carried an M-16.

    OvenMitt was in Paris while John Kerry was in the shit in ‘Nam.

    Compare and contrast.

  245. 245.

    Some Loser

    May 10, 2012 at 4:19 pm

    @Sally Rakowski: I sure fucking hope so. If he never made amends, I’d lose a great deal of respect for him. Bullying is never okay. When you bullying someone, you are hurting them. She was a victim, and we don’t get to say that what happened doesn’t matter just because it was long ago. If you do, you have no right to call yourself liberal.

    Or are we going to ignore the victim again? Because that is the cause of my outrage. Bullying is a crime that leaves a victim, and we shouldn’t tolerate it. We should not let it go. The only person that can decide that it does not matter anymore is the victim.

  246. 246.

    Suffern ACE

    May 10, 2012 at 4:20 pm

    @JoyceH: You know, it is possible that the Victim has moved on, or at the very least is enjoying a modest life of not being dragged into a national campaign about something that happened in 1965. I honestly hope no one does go looking for him.

  247. 247.

    Ash Can

    May 10, 2012 at 4:27 pm

    @Sally Rakowski: Let me explain precisely what’s wrong with what you’re saying. What Obama did, given everything else about him, is an anomaly. What Romney did, given everything else about him, is completely within character and fits the pattern of his behavior. Mitt Romney is an objectionable individual who should not gain elected office because of his established pattern of behavior, not because of a single act of bullying taken in isolation.

    It’s reasonable to dismiss outliers, and it’s foolish to ignore patterns. You don’t make yourself look very good by arguing the way you do.

    (Edited for clarity)

  248. 248.

    Some Loser

    May 10, 2012 at 4:28 pm

    @Suffern ACE: The victim is dead.

  249. 249.

    Tractarian

    May 10, 2012 at 4:29 pm

    @different-church-lady:

    I don’t think the dog actually died from being on the roof.

    Thanks. I have to admit, all this time I thought the dog died during the drive, a la National Lampoon’s Vacation. I stand corrected.

    So…. if anyone was hurt or offended by my falsely accusing Mitt of canicide, I’m afraid I’ll have to apologize!

  250. 250.

    gene108

    May 10, 2012 at 4:35 pm

    @rlrr:

    And Bush was given a pass because of this. I bet it would be different for a Democrat.

    Obama admitted to snorting cocaine and smoking pot as a teenager, but the media hasn’t made an issue of it because he came clean and wrote about it as the youthful indiscretion it was, in his first book.

  251. 251.

    eemom

    May 10, 2012 at 4:38 pm

    @Sally Rakowski:

    Now I get it. You’re no firebagger, you’re a republican troll. Fuck off.

  252. 252.

    AA+ Bonds

    May 10, 2012 at 4:40 pm

    I doubt he’d have gotten this far if he didn’t have well-polished credentials as a fascist

  253. 253.

    AA+ Bonds

    May 10, 2012 at 4:40 pm

    Mitt Romney: a literal gay basher

    Physically assaulted a dude for Suspected Gay

  254. 254.

    eemom

    May 10, 2012 at 4:44 pm

    @Sally Rakowski:

    And of course, if Romney had written an autobio he totally would have included the incident we’ve been discussing. Because he’s just a come-clean kind of a guy, amirite?

    Seriously, fuck off.

  255. 255.

    Brachiator

    May 10, 2012 at 4:45 pm

    @Sally Rakowski:

    Obama bullied a girl in middle school. Shoved her, too.

    Middle school. Did he dip some girl’s ponytail into an ink well?

    This is beyond stupid.

  256. 256.

    schrodinger's cat

    May 10, 2012 at 4:47 pm

    This kind of behavior is alien to me. I went to an all girls school till the 10th grade. We rarely hit each other, sometimes there was shoving. We threw chalks or paper planes at one another. There was arguing and name-calling but almost no physical violence.
    We were physically active too, I mean we played a lot of games. This type of behavior would not have been tolerated at my school.

  257. 257.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 4:54 pm

    @Sally Rakowski: That’s right you stupid shit. He wrote about it in his own book, and owned up to it. Seems like he learned something there. Rmoney seems only to have learned to deny, obfuscate, and lie.
    please stay away from sharp objects. We don’t want you bleeding on the carpet.

  258. 258.

    rikyrah

    May 10, 2012 at 4:54 pm

    Willard’s daddy was GOVERNOR OF MICHIGAN.

    Yeah, sure, this kid thought he’d get a break if he reported it.

    What color is the sky in your world if you actually believe this.

    But, it confirms everything I ever remotely believed about Willard.

  259. 259.

    schrodinger's cat

    May 10, 2012 at 4:55 pm

    @schrodinger’s cat: Double comment, please delete.

  260. 260.

    WaterGirl

    May 10, 2012 at 4:57 pm

    @Ash Can: As I discovered earlier this week, this person is not sincere. Just a troll trying to control the conversation and waste our time. Not worth engaging with.

  261. 261.

    bootsy

    May 10, 2012 at 5:01 pm

    I’m sure this will be discussed in a new post, but you have to point out that Mitt apparently learned nothing, so that makes this childhood story relevant: Romney Battled LGBT Anti-Bully Commission As Governor

  262. 262.

    The Bobs

    May 10, 2012 at 5:02 pm

    Sorry if someone already made this point (260 comments!), but to me the telling part of this incident was that Mitt thought he needed several friends to help him assault a person who Mitt regarded as a weakling.

  263. 263.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 5:03 pm

    @schrodinger’s cat: Done

  264. 264.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 5:05 pm

    @The Bobs: This is the first I’ve seen that point, so good on you!

  265. 265.

    smintheus

    May 10, 2012 at 5:11 pm

    Saw more than my share of bullies in school, had nothing but contempt for them then as now. But the Latter Day Amnesiacs like Romney are truly pathetic.

  266. 266.

    smintheus

    May 10, 2012 at 5:13 pm

    @The Bobs: Classic bullying. I had to fend off bullies for 8 years in school, and almost all of them attacked me in gangs (usually without warning and from behind). Just demonstrates that bullies are cowards.

  267. 267.

    smintheus

    May 10, 2012 at 5:21 pm

    Haven’t seen anybody else point this out, and it’s significant. The bullying of Lauber was not the only such incident. The WaPo also records that Romney had a habit of mocking at least one of guy suspected of being gay; he’d interrupt the kid whenever he spoke in class and say something like “Atta girl!”

    In other words, Romney was a thoroughgoing bully. The attack on Lauber was not just an anomaly but part of a pattern of humiliating others.

  268. 268.

    The Bobs

    May 10, 2012 at 5:24 pm

    @smintheus: That doesn’t surprise me, but I was never bullied so I had no experience to draw on. Not sure why I wasn’t bullied, I’m definitely a nerd. Maybe it was just uncommon in the 60’s-70’s.

    The coward thing could do some damage.

  269. 269.

    schrodinger's cat

    May 10, 2012 at 5:27 pm

    @Soonergrunt: Thanks!

  270. 270.

    redshirt

    May 10, 2012 at 5:30 pm

    Is there a difference between bullying and hazing? To wit: I made the varsity soccer team as a Freshman – which was exceedingly rare – and as reward I took about a month of non-stop attacks by upper classmen. Rolled in a 40 foot rug and kicked; an upside down swirly; many, many punches.

    I fought back when I could, and must have passed whatever test was being given, cause it all stopped as soon as the season began.

    Different than bullying, right?

  271. 271.

    Ash Can

    May 10, 2012 at 5:30 pm

    @WaterGirl: Pie filter it is, then!

  272. 272.

    LanceThruster

    May 10, 2012 at 5:39 pm

    @The Bobs: Great observation on his need for “back-up” (and partly for the need for the audience he required to witness his bullying to provide the peer approval)

  273. 273.

    The Bearded Blogger

    May 10, 2012 at 5:40 pm

    @redshirt: Well, hazing accompanies social inclusion, bullying is part and parcel with social exclusion. The acts might coincide, but the intent is different

  274. 274.

    smintheus

    May 10, 2012 at 5:41 pm

    @redshirt: Your team-mates sound like a$$holes. I had non-team-mates attack me, but that was because they resented my success and wanted to injure me and end my season.

    Many varieties of bullying, but what they’re all about is humiliating a person/group who’ve been picked out as easy victims. The bullies want to feel better about themselves by lording it over others, by figuratively pushing somebody’s face into the mud. Above all they want their victims to fear them. But bullies are cowards as well as insecure, so they pick on people who they think are least able/likely to resist or, even worse, to respond by harming or humiliating them.

    Bullying can be a one-time thing if the victim is generally regarding as getting humiliated by bullies on a regular basis. Or it can be repeated and escalating harassment by one person or group over a long period, with no intended end point.

  275. 275.

    The Bearded Blogger

    May 10, 2012 at 5:42 pm

    @The Bobs:
    @LanceThruster:

    There’s cowardice there, and also diffusion of responsability through being part of a mob. Disgusting.

  276. 276.

    redshirt

    May 10, 2012 at 5:43 pm

    @The Bearded Blogger: Yeah. And I assumed this was part of the process, a time honored process. Certainly, no coach or teacher or any adult working for the school gave a damn.

    I did not pass it forward though, given my ultimate hatred of bullies.

  277. 277.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 5:44 pm

    @Sally Rakowski:

    Obama Bill Ayers bullied a girl in middle school. Shoved her, too. This is not news. It was in Dreams from My Father if anyone bothered to actually read it.

    Fixing that for you: a fine Balloon Juice Tradition™.

  278. 278.

    smintheus

    May 10, 2012 at 5:45 pm

    @The Bobs: Well, I’m talking about the ’70s. And I was bigger and more athletic than nearly all the kids who harassed me. Somehow I got a reputation as ‘the smart kid’ and that was that.

  279. 279.

    smintheus

    May 10, 2012 at 5:59 pm

    So is Mitt Romney like the weird Amish beard-cutting guy?

  280. 280.

    J.D. Rhoades

    May 10, 2012 at 6:04 pm

    Here’s the passage the wingnut troll references:

    There was one other child in my class, though, who reminded me of a different sort of pain. Her name was Coretta,and before my arrival she had been the only black person in our grade. She was plump and dark and didn’t seem to have many friends. From the first day, we avoided each other but watched from a distance, as if direct contact would only remind us more keenly of our isolation.
    Finally, during recess one hot, cloudless day, we found ourselves occupying the same corner of the playground. I
    don’t remember what we said to each other, but I remember that suddenly she was chasing me around the jungle gyms
    and swings. She was laughing brightly, and I teased her and dodged this way and that, until she finally caught me and
    we fell to the ground breathless. When I looked up, I saw a group of children, faceless before the glare of the sun,
    pointing down at us.
    “Coretta has a boyfriend! Coretta has a boyfriend!”
    The chants grew louder as a few more kids circled us.
    “She’s not my g-girlfriend,” I stammered. I looked to Coretta for some assistance, but she just stood there looking
    down at the ground. “Coretta’s got a boyfriend! Why don’t you kiss her, mister boyfriend?”
    “I’m not her boyfriend!” I shouted. I ran up to Coretta and gave her a slight shove; she staggered back and looked up
    at me, but still said nothing. “Leave me alone!” I shouted again. And suddenly Coretta was running, faster and faster,
    until she disappeared from sight. Appreciative laughs rose around me. Then the bell rang, and the teachers appeared to round us back into class.
    For the rest of the afternoon, I was haunted by the look on Coretta’s face just before she had started to run: her
    disappointment, and the accusation. I wanted to explain to her somehow that it had been nothing personal; I’d just
    never had a girlfriend before and saw no particular need to have one now. But I didn’t even know if that was true. I
    knew only that it was too late for explanations, that somehow I’d been tested and found wanting; and whenever I snuck a glance at Coretta’s desk, I would see her with her head bent over her work, appearing as if nothing had happened, pulled into herself and asking no favors.
    My act of betrayal bought me some room from the other children, and like Coretta, I was mostly left alone. I made a
    few friends, learned to speak less often in class, and managed to toss a wobbly football around. But from that day forward, a part of me felt trampled on, crushed, and I took refuge in the life that my grandparents led.

    Make your own decision as to whether that’s remotely the same as Mitt holding a kid down and cutting his hair against his will. Especially since Mitt was in high school and Obama was 10.

  281. 281.

    JenJen

    May 10, 2012 at 6:10 pm

    @ellie: That’s exactly what I was coming here to post. Cranbrook always makes me think of 8 Mile!!

  282. 282.

    Citizen_X

    May 10, 2012 at 6:33 pm

    Mission of Burma nailed this asshole years ago:

    The halls smell like piss
    The rooms are underlit
    Still it must be nice
    You’re such a perfect fit
    What’s that I hear?
    The sound of marching feet
    It has a strange allure,
    It has a strange
    allure

    (One of the members had gone to prep school, and had apparently dealt with people like this.)

  283. 283.

    Mrs. Tarquin Biscuitbarrel

    May 10, 2012 at 7:00 pm

    @Calouste:

    Mitt didn’t just bully once. He and his cronies cut off the hair of Berkeley students before the annual Big Game between Berkeley and Stanford, and painted their pates Stanford-red.

    Class.

  284. 284.

    Ksmiami

    May 10, 2012 at 7:06 pm

    @RossInDetroit: Yeahh but the kids are either smart International kids or rich mediocre ones –

  285. 285.

    LanceThruster

    May 10, 2012 at 7:08 pm

    As disturbing as that is, I’m not ready to condemn a man for something he did as a stupid teenager. The world would be a very lonely place indeed were that to be my way of doing things.

    I am glad you added that part. Sometimes the repercussions of mindless taunts have a positive effect. When I was in 5th or 6th grade in Catholic school, a really nice ginger-haired kid of French descent (accent and everything) named Alan D. was having his lunch alongside me. His mom had made him a peanut butter and banana sandwich. Me, being a smart4ss, kept saying to him, “I’ve never heard of such a thing!” He said, “My mom makes them for me.” “I’ve never heard of a peanut butter and banana sandwich.” By about the third or fourth time around he started to cry. I was just being goofy as I didn’t dislike the guy at all, I was just being a jerk for attention. Now I felt like a really loathsome jerk. I think (I hope) I apologized but he was already traumatized by crying in public. That encounter stuck with me as to how something I thought was so innocuous really, really hurt someone. I think it pretty much stopped me cold turkey picking on people for “fun” unless that sort of boyish banter had already been established with the person.

    Not only that…peanut butter and banana sandwiches taste awesome…and I am left with the sour taste in my mouth that I made some poor exchange student cry because I singled him out for being “different.”

    I’m truly sorry, Alan.

  286. 286.

    Mnemosyne

    May 10, 2012 at 7:10 pm

    @Sally Rakowski:

    But has Obama apologized to the girl for bullying and shoving her?

    You mean other than publishing a nationally bestselling book where he talks about how ashamed he is of the incident and how it haunts him to this day?

    I’m pretty sure apologies don’t get much more public than that.

  287. 287.

    LanceThruster

    May 10, 2012 at 7:12 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Yeah, people with consciences actually regret such incidents, not dismiss, downplay, or pretend not to remember them.

  288. 288.

    Realist

    May 10, 2012 at 7:21 pm

    I’m not ready to condemn a man for something he did as a stupid teenager.

    That rings a little hollow in a country that hands life sentences to 12 year old black kids.

  289. 289.

    LanceThruster

    May 10, 2012 at 7:29 pm

    @Forum Transmitted Disease: Ditto for his spawn.

  290. 290.

    Evolving Deep Southerner

    May 10, 2012 at 7:46 pm

    @ricky: Do what now? You lost me there, Ricky. Romney is ratfucking himself?

  291. 291.

    Evolving Deep Southerner

    May 10, 2012 at 7:59 pm

    My post back to Sally K got eated. Why? Was it because I mentioned a series of (verboten for the moment?) other trolls like otac, ola-kay oscopy-nay, or IdlePyrate in the response?

    DugJay, this is becoming a little too transparent.

  292. 292.

    lless

    May 10, 2012 at 8:19 pm

    You had me right down to the “great country” part. Rhetorically that was a step too far.

  293. 293.

    Kathy in St. Louis

    May 10, 2012 at 8:50 pm

    Makes me kinda sorta wonder what it was about this boy that bothered the young Romney, every hair in place, ironed jeans, chiseled looks Romney. What did he see in this young gay man that made him feel so threatened? Himself, maybe?

  294. 294.

    A Conservative Teacher

    May 10, 2012 at 9:37 pm

    In President Obama’s first memoir, “Dreams From My Father”, he recounts an incident which occurred while he was in middle school. When our president became the subject of taunts from his fellow classmates, he decided to shove a little girl named Coretta. As he recounts, he pushed and shoved this defenseless little girl until she was chased away while he and other boys laughed at her. Although he chronicles his feelings of regret in the book, he has never offered her an apology or apologized for this incident.

    What does this incident mean? Nothing. Nothing at all. People change- Romney himself admitted that the love of his wife and his missionary work overseas made him a better person. I’m sure Obama no longer eats dog and shoves around little girls. Obama also in his book admitted that he spent his high school years doing cocaine and smoking pot and goofing around- and that also means nothing today.

    On the other hand, we do know Obama’s record as President for the last 4 years, and we do know his recent adult history, and have a solid record of his actions over the last several years. Let’s vote on that.

  295. 295.

    mclaren

    May 10, 2012 at 9:40 pm

    Mitt Romney is a sociopath. Full stop. Period.

    Said it before, will say it again. The guy’s a high-functioning sociopath. End of story.

  296. 296.

    JGabriel

    May 10, 2012 at 10:08 pm

    A Conservative Teacher:

    In President Obama’s first memoir, “Dreams From My Father”, he recounts an incident which occurred while he was in middle school. When our president became the subject of taunts from his fellow classmates, he decided to shove a little girl named Coretta.

    Two things distinguish this from Romney’s story.

    1) President Obama was in middle-school, making him about 9 or 10 years old. Romney was 17 or 18, either legally an adult or on the verge of it. Now, normally, I’d still grant someone that young a fair amount of leeway — I’m not necessarily gonna hold drug usage or dumb opinions at 18 against a mature adult. But, maybe because of my own memories of being bullied/tormented as a kid, I’m a little harsher in my judgement of teenage bullies, particularly the privileged ones like Romney.

    2) As you properly note above, the incident with the little girl was recounted by President Obama himself. He took responsibility for it himself, and didn’t sugar-coat it. Romney’s story, on the other hand, was reported by others, and he claims, not very convincingly or credibly, to not remember his assault on Lauber. Furthermore, Romney’s “apology” was conditional and mealy-mouthed, “if my actions offended anyone …”

    There’s really little to no commonality between the incidents, especially in how Obama handled it versus Romney’s defensive reactions.

    .

  297. 297.

    JenJen

    May 10, 2012 at 10:14 pm

    It’s official. Mitt Romney really is Niedermeyer.

    @JGabriel: Yep. And also, Obama remembers the incident clearly, and he was just a little kid. Romney has no recollection, but weirdly seems to remember that no way was the victim a homosexual or anything.

    The fact that so many Cranbrook students have gone on the record to recount how vicious the assault was speaks volumes. How do you forget that, when you were the guy holding the scissors? And how can you laugh as the reporter recounts the story for you?

    Nice false equivalency fail by Conservative Teacher.

  298. 298.

    JGabriel

    May 10, 2012 at 10:14 pm

    A Conservative Teacher:

    Although [President Obama] chronicles his feelings of regret in the book, he has never offered her an apology or apologized for this incident.

    I’ll direct you to Mnemosyne for the response to that:

    You mean other than publishing a nationally bestselling book where he talks about how ashamed he is of the incident and how it haunts him to this day?
    __
    I’m pretty sure apologies don’t get much more public than that.

    .

  299. 299.

    JGabriel

    May 10, 2012 at 10:16 pm

    @JenJen: Heh. It seems so.

    .

  300. 300.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 10:26 pm

    @lless: shrug

  301. 301.

    JenJen

    May 10, 2012 at 10:28 pm

    @JGabriel:

    You mean other than publishing a nationally bestselling book where he talks about how ashamed he is of the incident and how it haunts him to this day? I’m pretty sure apologies don’t get much more public than that.

    Exactly. Don’t expect the nutters to grasp the difference, though! It’s beyond their comprehension. Instead of being shocked at this well-reported, well-sourced Romney at Cranbrook blockbuster, they’re desperately searching for the laziest possible “both sides do it” angle. It’s a defining characteristic of peabrains.

  302. 302.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 10:29 pm

    @A Conservative Teacher: Stupid, wrong, and half-assed, and addressed better elsewhere in the thread.
    Don’t you think that teachers should be capable of critical thought? Since you’ve never shown any capacity for that here, you are going to find a less demanding and less socially critical position than Teacher by which to feed yourself, yes?

  303. 303.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 10:30 pm

    @JenJen: They know the difference. They just don’t care. Their mission is to plant false equivalences, not to engage in honest discussion.

  304. 304.

    schrodinger's cat

    May 10, 2012 at 10:32 pm

    @JenJen: He remembers it alright, he is just pretending not to remember.

    or an even more disturbing explanation

    He has been involved in so many such bullying incidents that he does not remember this particular one.

  305. 305.

    JenJen

    May 10, 2012 at 10:33 pm

    @Soonergrunt: Sigh. I’ve been taught this lesson many times before in comments threads containing Republican idiots, but I keep forgetting the part about how they don’t care, and aren’t interested in any kind of intellectual debate or discussion.

    I really gotta give up on this “benefit of the doubt” thing I have.

  306. 306.

    JenJen

    May 10, 2012 at 10:39 pm

    @Sally Rakowski:

    This is not news. It was in Dreams from My Father if anyone bothered to actually read it.

    Ahh, the old, “Nobody read Obama’s stupid book” canard. Don’t pay any attention to that part where it sold over 4.5 million copies and is considered the best-selling political memoir of all time.

    You’re punching above your class, Sally.

    @schrodinger’s cat: You’re right twice.

  307. 307.

    Soonergrunt

    May 10, 2012 at 10:47 pm

    @schrodinger’s cat: Most likely a combination of the two. There’s no way in hell that these were the only incidents like this in his life.
    People say that He got more mature and became a better man after meeting his wife. Fair enough. That happened to me too. I realized that I was in love when I realized that she made me want to be a better man. She still does, but it didn’t happen overnight, and Ann Romney wasn’t with him every hour of every day.
    He remembers this. Hell, he may even feel shame for it, though I doubt it. That would require a level of empathy of which he’s never shown himself capable. And you can bet your ass there were others.

  308. 308.

    different-church-lady

    May 10, 2012 at 11:13 pm

    @A Conservative Teacher: Considering that the passage is directly quoted a few posts above yours, it makes it a bit hard for you and the rest of the Borg to spin things the way you’re trying to spin them.

    This has been an informative demonstration of how the conservative hive-mind works.

  309. 309.

    lizzy

    May 11, 2012 at 11:49 am

    I kept thinking I had seen this movie before and I finally remembered it – “The Emperor’s Club”. Maybe the story was based on Mitt Romney’s life. Snotty, mean kid that will do anything to get ahead in prep school goes on to continue same strategy in life.

  310. 310.

    Soonergrunt

    May 11, 2012 at 11:52 am

    I thought the movie we’d all seen before was the GW Bush administration.

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