In the halcyon days of TV there was a game show, “To Tell The Truth,” in which contestants bluffed – even lied – their way through their résumés, claiming experiences and expertise they did not have. The object of the game was to fool the panel into voting for the bogus contestants, instead of the one who really was who (s)he claimed to be. This seems to be the strategy Mitt Romney (R-MA) is using to get to the White House.

Romney has falsely claimed to have been a hunter “pretty much all my life”; to have been “endorsed” by the National Rifle Association; to have “made it tougher for people with meth labs” when he was governor of MA; and to have seen his father march with Martin Luther King, Jr. (in a 1978 interview with the Boston Herald, Romney had also claimed, "My father and I marched with Martin Luther King Jr. through the streets of Detroit.")

The New York Times asks whether Romney has a “problem with blurring the truth”:

Some of the instances when Mr. Romney has tripped up on his facts show that he is prone to exaggeration, taking what is essentially a kernel of truth and stretching it to bolster his case. …

Indeed, with many of these instances, there has often been at least an element of his truth in his claims. But for a candidate who has featured his business background and made much of his propensity for careful analysis of data, he is not always precise.

Not always precise? The Times must mean that, um, figuratively. Here’s how Romney explains why no contemporaneous news accounts place him or his father at any of King’s civil rights marches:

Mitt Romney acknowledged yesterday that he never saw his father march with Martin Luther King Jr. as he asserted in a nationally televised speech this month, and historical evidence shows that Michigan's Governor George Romney and the civil rights leader never did march together.

Romney said his father had told him he had marched with King and that he had been using the word "saw" in a "figurative sense."

"If you look at the literature, if you look at the dictionary, the term 'saw' includes being aware of in the sense I've described," Romney told reporters in Iowa. "It's a figure of speech and very familiar, and it's very common. And I saw my dad march with Martin Luther King. I did not see it with my own eyes, but I saw him in the sense of being aware of his participation in that great effort."

As Michael Dobbs, who writes The Washington Post’s Fact Checker blog points out:

Mitt Romney was 16 years old in 1963 at the time that Martin Luther King organized a series of "Freedom Marches" through American cities, including Detroit. At the time, the Mormon Church, of which the Romneys were prominent members, still maintained an official ban on the full participation of African-Americans in religious rites, a ban that was not lifted until 1978. Nevertheless, the senior Romney sympathized with the Civil Rights movement and issued a proclamation in support of a civil rights march through Detroit in June attended by King.

According to researchers at the Martin Luther King Jr. Papers Project at Stanford University, George Romney declined to attend the first march on June 23, a Sunday, on the grounds that he would not take part in political activity on the Sabbath. Susan Englander, who is associate editor of the King papers, said that Romney participated in a different march six days later through the suburb of Grosse Pointe. She believes that it is unlikely that King was present on that occasion, as contemporaneous newspaper reports fail to mention him.

Though the participation of the Romney père et fils at any of King’s civil rights marches is a figment of the candidate’s overactive imagination, he was nonetheless so moved by the thought of racism, that his eyes welled with tears (video) on NBC's "Meet the Press" as he recalled hearing a news report on this car radio in 1978 that the Mormon Church would no longer discriminate against blacks, telling Tim Russert that he "pulled over and literally wept."

That’s not how Romney played this supposedly seminal moment during his unsuccessful 1994 race against Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, reports Boston Globe columnist Joan Vennochi:

Joseph P. Kennedy II, Kennedy's nephew and a congressman at the time, criticized the Mormon Church for its policy of racial exclusion. The Romney campaign angrily noted that the policy changed in 1978. Romney said he was greatly relieved, but said nothing about weeping for joy when he learned about it. During a press conference, Romney also accused Kennedy of betraying his brother John's victory in 1960 when JFK faced voter skepticism about his Catholic religion.

Mission accomplished: Joe Kennedy apologized, and Senator Kennedy backed off, too. Romney's Mormon faith was off the table, where it belongs. Romney never delved any deeper into his feelings about his church's past policy, saving a Bill Clinton moment for national TV and his presidential quest.

Leaving aside that even back then, Romney used “religious bigotry” as a smokescreen, Vennochi means “Clintonian” in a “feel your pain” sort of way. Syndicated columnist Star Parker, uses the term in a “you can’t trust a word out of his mouth” sort of way:

It's doubtful that anyone needs any more reasons to explain why Americans are fed up with politics as usual. Nevertheless, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has given us one more.

Apparently when Romney said, "I saw my father march with Martin Luther King," in his much publicized "Faith in America" speech … he meant this "figuratively."

According to the former Massachusetts governor, "If you look at the literature or the dictionary the term 'saw' includes being aware of in the sense I have described. It is a figure of speech...."

We haven't seen a politician parse a sentence like this since Bill Clinton dissected the meaning of the verb "is" and explained that it was Monica who had sex with him and not the other way around.

The next sentence in the speech following the King claim was, "I saw my parents provide compassionate care to others, in personal ways nearby...." Also figuratively?

It sure sounds that way to Wall Street Journal editorial board member Jason Riley. By the time the Mormon Church issued its "Official Declaration" on June 8, 1978, to extend "priesthood and temple blessings to all worthy male members of the Church" – only after the church’s then-president Spencer Kimball received a "revelation” - Riley notes that “the U.S. was more than a century removed from a civil war over the status of blacks; W.E.B Du Bois and Henry Moskowitz had co-founded the NAACP; and President Truman had integrated the military three decades before.” 

Until this “revelation,” Mormons regarded people who had even “one drop” of black in  them "unrighteous," "despised" and "loathsome" descendants of the biblical Cain, who was cursed for killing Abel. And afterward?  

Riley cites Mormon scholar Armand Mauss who wrote in 2004 that "ironically, the doctrinal folklore that many of us thought had been discredited, or at least made moot, through the 1978 revelation, continued to appear …  [in church literature] written well after 1978 and continues to be taught by well-meaning teachers and leaders in the church to this very day."

No doubt, Romney was raised on these teachings – Riley writes that by in 1978, “Romney was a 31-year-old vice president at Bain & Co. and a lifelong devout Mormon. Throughout his current campaign for the Republican nomination, Mr. Romney has declined to distance himself from the repugnant racial teachings of his church.”

What if in addition to refusing to repudiate the (past?) racism of the Mormon Church, Romney himself repeated these repugnant doctrines while trying to win converts as a missionary in France, or teaching Sunday school as a church bishop?

The MSM shouldn’t allow Romney to hide behind “anti-Mormon bigotry” in refusing to answer questions about his beliefs – or buy into the fiction that asking such questions of a presidential candidate is imposing an unconstitutional “religious test.”  As Riley puts it, “[i]t's due diligence.”

Especially, as some suggest, the lack of truthfulness about Mormonism may go beyond Romney’s own personal problems with honesty.

In a Townhall.com column radio talk show host Bob Burney (weekday afternoons, WRFD, 880 AM in Columbus, OH) asks, “What has happened to the simple principle of telling the truth?,” referring to “notable change in the way the LDS Church presents itself to the general public, an effort that began sometime around the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City”:

Prior to that, there was not a readily-apparent effort by Mormons to identify themselves as a form of Christianity. … I remember a time when it was common for Mormons to be offended if you called them Christian. That was then.

Sometime around 2002 a very noticeable shift occurred. Suddenly they wanted to be accepted as a part of mainstream Christianity ... [E]ven a peripheral study of Mormonism will reveal that the Jesus of Mormonism isn’t even in the same universe (literally) as the Jesus of orthodox Christianity. The Jesus of Mormonism is the “spirit child” of his “heavenly parents.” He is in no way part of a triune Godhead. …

At the same time, the official LDS Web site was totally overhauled and some of the more bizarre doctrines held by the Church were carefully hidden deep within the site - doctrines such as “the Fall” actually being a good thing … the ability to actually become a God and have your own planet to rule over … that Jesus and Lucifer (yes, Satan) were actually brothers. …

This is America. You can believe anything you want. … If you believe it, be proud of it - don’t try to hide it. …

[When presidential candidate Mike] Huckabee … wondered out loud to the veteran religion reporter Zev Chafets: “Don’t Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?” Well, that’s exactly what they believe! Several news outlets immediately accused Huckabee of attacking Romney’s religion. Blogs went berserk!

How did candidate Romney respond to someone revealing what his church actually believes? He said, “But I think attacking someone’s religion is really going too far. It’s just not the American way, and I think people will reject that,” Romney told NBC’s “Today” show. …

Does this have anything to do with Mitt Romney and his qualifications to be president? Everyone will have to decide that in his or her own heart. I just wish the Mormons, including Mitt Romney, would simply be more candid and tell us the straight truth about their religion.

And who ran 2002 Winter Olympics when the Mormons were busy repackaging their religion for public (read MSM) consumption? Romney.

The only way John Fund, Hugh Hewitt, Charles Krauthammer and other pundits can call people who are asking inconvenient questions (in other words, doing their jobs for them) “bigots” is to choose to remain ignorant by confining their “research” on Mormonism to marketing materials sanctioned by the Mormon Church. They have abrogated their responsibilities as journalists by not bothering to delve into the “doctrinal folklore” that Fund’s colleague Riley briefly touches on in his column – unwritten, passed orally from Sunday school teacher to future priests and missionaries. For instance, Fund once dismissed the “White Horse Prophesy” as a fantasy. Perhaps he ought to bestir himself to look further into it.

To answer Burney’s question, if a man can lie about his core beliefs he will lie about everything else – and Romney’s record of flip-flopping on abortion and other fundamental issues certainly bears this out. If the pundits weren’t so busy ascribing character flaws to people who balk at voting for Romney, the candidate’s reluctance to forthrightly discuss Mormonism - further, to lie about its doctrines (second item) – would have raised red flags a long time ago.

As Parker bluntly puts it: “Republicans can win back the hearts and minds of Americans. But they have to get real and get honest. Unlike the former governor of Massachusetts.”

Buyer’s Remorse

The Washington Post published a rather droll piece about those highly specialized kitchen gadgets and small electronics that seem like “must haves” when you’re shopping for a Christmas gift or to add pizzazz to a holiday party, but that eventually make you wonder, “What was I thinking?”:

The Thing that appears in Sunday circulars and in great stacks just inside the main entrance of the Bed Bath & Beyond or the Tar- zhay each December. The Thing that is utilized in holiday kitchens for slicing and dicing and icing and spicing - and oh it's so nice-ing - before falling to the rear of your cupboard, behind the Rubbermaid lids.

The Thing is spontaneously purchased with the best of intentions. It usually costs $39.99 or less, well within the comfort zone for spontaneity of this sort.

This year's Things include: The caramel apple dipper. The Wilton cookie press. The Laroma hot chocolate maker, piled in a 48-box pyramid in the home section of Macy's … Your Choice, the signs surrounding it say, as if you and the Laroma selected each other a long time ago, even if you don't remember doing so.

A couple of years ago, the Thing was the portable chocolate fountain. A "must-have for holiday parties," ad copy read. … At last, you could bring that melty goodness home - put it on a platter with marshmallows and poundcake and other dippables. It was good for a Christmas party or two, and good for those secret times afterward when the dippables were gone but, by God, your fingers were not.

And after that? Well, how much melted chocolate does a body really need, anyway?

To the cupboard it went, another ghost of your Christmas past. …

Like buying jeans a size too small or investing in a Rosetta Stone course in Dutch, the holiday Thing is a promise to your future self. You will entertain more.

Phoenix radio talk show host Andrew Tallman (weekdays, 5 - 7 PM on KPXQ, 1360 AM) explains why we give (and get) “bad gifts” – such as the orange sweater that “Soprano’s” executive producer Matthew Weiner’s brother got for Hanukkah from their Mom one year (the color is the least of it).

Editorial Note: The Heel gave The Stiletto a gift for Hanukkah that captured her essence so perfectly, she squealed with delight: A DSW gift card! He liked his gift from The Stiletto as well, judging by the number of times he said "Oh my G-d" after he opened it (he's an atheisit).

The Other Shoe Drops: Updates To Previous Posts

† Turks Kept U.S. In The Dark About Iraq Bombing Raid: Well, it appears that the price of keeping Turkey as a backstabbing ally is to lie through our teeth, first about the Armenian Genocide and now about whether we are selling out the Iraqi Kurds.

Even as Turkish military and government officials insisting that the U.S. not only put bulls eyes on Kurdish villages in Northern Iraq suspected of harboring Kurdistan Workers Party (P.K.K.) rebels, but cleared Iraqi airspace for the December 16^th incursion, for several days State Department and Pentagon officials in Washington and Baghdad continued to claim that U.S. commanders in Iraq were out of the loop until the first of two waves of Turkish bombers had already crossed into Iraq. It turns out that the U.S. wasn’t caught all that unawares by the bombing raid – they just would have liked more lead time than the Turks gave them to clear the airspace.

Over the week-end Turkey may - or may not - have launched a new air offensive against the PKK in Northern Iraq (no one in our government seems to know for sure), despite U.S. and E.U. concerns that repeated military incursions will destabilize the region and further weaken the already shaky Iraqi government. This time, the U.S. Embassy refuses to confirm that our drones and spy planes provided the intelligence.

On Sunday, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told the quasi-governmental Anatolian News Agency that the attacks are being conducted “without enmity” and in accordance with international law, but that’s not how the Iraqi Kurds see it. The New York Times reports:

Shortly before Sunday’s attack, Massoud Barzani, the political leader of Iraqi Kurdistan, visited refugees who had fled border areas after the Turkish bombing on Saturday and condemned the airstrikes as “unacceptable.”

“Their goal is not only the P.K.K. but the whole idea of an autonomous Kurdish region,” he told the families, according to the Kurdistan TV channel. “This problem is not solved militarily and we are prepared for all peaceful solutions.”

Barzani’s assessment of Ankara’s motives is likely to prove out in the end. When the one politically and economically stable region in Iraq has been blown to smithereens, its people scattered amongst various refugee camps, how will the U.S. achieve its military and political goals so that we can finally stand down? The Turks obviously don’t give a damn, as long as they have license to kill every Kurd they can for as long as they can. At some point, it will become obvious to NATO, the U.N., the EU – and perhaps even the U.S. – that Turkey has begun another genocidal campaign.

Some can already see the handwriting on the wall.

† Small Towns Cry “Tio” Over Lawsuits To Overturn Anti-Illegal Immigration Ordinances: Dozens of small towns across the U.S. that tried to enact ordinances to deter employers from hiring forged documented aliens and landlords from renting to them, either found their laws voided in court or were forced to rescind them to avoid racking up exorbitant legal fees to defend them against lawsuits by the ACLU, unions and activists.

Alone amongst local and state governments, AZ has succeeded in passing a law aimed at employers who knowingly hire illegal aliens that has withstood legal challenges, and it will take effect on January 1, 2008. Businesses will be required to use the Department of Homeland Security’s E-Verify system, to verify Social Security numbers and other records to confirm legal employment status. After the first violation, the employer’s business license is suspended for 10 days; on the second, it is revoked. The New York Times calls it “the strictest workplace-enforcement law in the country,” and claims its true aim is “the biggest purge of illegal immigrants in the Southwest since the federal government’s Operation Wetback in 1954.”

By one count, 500,000 illegal immigrants live and work in AZ, making up roughly 9 to 12 percent of the work force, typically in low-skilled jobs in the service, construction and landscaping industries. Hundreds of forged documented aliens are not waiting until January 1^st and are already leaving the state (or “self-deported,” as State Rep. Russell Pearce of Mesa, the author of the law, put it) or have been fired, and some school districts have started to see drops in enrollment – which should eventually lessen the burden on taxpayers who have to foot the bill for building new schools and hiring new teachers and administrators to educate the increasing numbers of children born to Mexican nationals here illegally.

There’s something else going on in AZ that is helping spur the reverse migration to Mexico: In the aftermath of the September murder of Phoenix police officer Nick Erfle by illegal alien Erik Jovani Martinez, Scottsdale police have been asking for proof of citizenship from every suspect arrested since October 15^th and turning illegals over to ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) to be deported. "Scottsdale police had arrested Martinez on a misdemeanor charge 16 months earlier but they released him then because they didn't know he was an illegal immigrant who had been twice deported,” reports The Associated Press. Scottsdale Mayor Mary Manross takes the view that police are not engaged in racial profiling because every suspect is asked about citizenship.

† Are Muslims Required To Kill To Worship Allah?: The Los Angeles Times reports that Muslims in the NC towns of Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill knew just where to go after morning services on the first day of Eid al-Adha - the "festival of sacrifice" - to buy the live lambs and goats that would be ritualistically slaughtered, their throats slit to the shouts of “Allah Akbar.” This year, the NC Department of Agriculture obtained a restraining order to stop the slaughters, alleging that hog farmer Eddie Rowe was operating an unsanitary and illegal slaughter facility on his land:

[O]n Wednesday, the first day of the three-day festival, confusion reigned in place of celebration. Throughout the day, minivans and sedans pulled into Rowe's driveway. About 250 animals had been ordered; most of the families had pre-paid. Now some of them were canceling, and Rowe - in his red baseball cap and deer-hunting jacket - was returning up to $160 for each animal, counting out crisp bills into waiting hands.

Other families took their animals, saying they had plans to kill them somewhere else. State agriculture officials determined that such slaughter fell into a legal gray area and said they would not prosecute anyone who did so. …

And so the doctors and scientists - most lured to the region by research firms, hospitals and major universities - chatted on cellphones in Arabic, Bengali and Uzbek, trying to find someplace to kill their lambs. Young sons and daughters stuck their noses through fences, staring at animals that were unaware they may have won a reprieve. …

Steven C. Wells, director of the meat and poultry inspection division … monitored the Eid al-Adha proceedings [in 2005] and found in some cases that the meat was not handled in a sanitary manner. In others, the animals' throats were improperly cut. Wells said they were seen kicking for two to three minutes.

"That does not constitute humane slaughter," Wells said.

Kudos to NC agriculture officials for going where PETA fears to tread to stop the barbarism of hundreds of wantonly killed animals – Rowe and his farm hands routinely buried the carcasses in the woods, though the meat is supposed to be donated to the poor according to Mohammad’s instructions – dying in agony.

† Prince Charles Is Carbon Neutral. Now We Are (ROTFL) Amused. (third item): There are gift cards, and there are gift cards. One that has become popular amongst jet-setters and Masters of the Universe is a “jet card” that entitles the bearer to 10, 20, or 25 hours of flight time on a business jet. “The airlines and traveling public have experienced record delays in 2007, which makes jet cards even more attractive to those who can afford them,” reports Aviation.com. Depending on the type of aircraft and number of hours, jet card range in price from around $50 K to $340 K. The cost of purchasing carbon offsets is not included.

† We Fight Them Over There So We Don’t Have To Fight Them Over Here?: Part II (second item): Investigative journalist and syndicated columnist Joel Mowbray reports that Maura Harty, head of consular affairs at the State Department, is leaving her post. Good riddance:

Harty oversaw passports, administration of embassies and consulates, and, most important, visas. It was in visa policy where she continued the path blazed by her predecessor, Mary Ryan, who had made it easier than ever in countries around the world for foreigners to receive visas -  often in contravention of the law.

Though visa policy receives little congressional scrutiny, it is a critical component of border security. All 19 of the September 11 terrorists came here on valid temporary visas - despite the fact that at least 15 of the terrorists did not qualify for one under the law.

The terrorists didn't acquire visas through skill or fraud; they simply took advantage of a system rigged to approve almost every Saudi national who wished to come to the United States - a practice that plainly violated the law. …

Despite being a controversial nominee, Harty was confirmed in 2002 after she pledged to the Senate that she would protect Americans from future terrorists by vigorously enforcing the laws relating to visas. She didn’t.

Rather than tighten visa procedures, Harty oversaw a relaxing of the rules in countries such as Egypt and Pakistan. Even in the country that produced 15 of the September 11 terrorists -  Saudi Arabia -  approval rates for visa applicants remained stunningly high. …

With Harty poised to retire by the end of February, the White House needs to avoid the mistake it made five years ago. …

Had President Bush's advisers conducted even a cursory review, they would have learned that Harty was a protégé and clone of Ryan, who almost certainly would not undo the very policies the September 11 terrorists exploited to enter the United States.

Gee, do you suppose that the Saudis being major contributors to the Bush 41 and Clinton Presidential Libraries ($10 million to each), not to mention the personal and financial ties Bush 41 and 43 have with the Saudi royal family, had anything to do with these back-to-back appointments of Ryan (Clinton Administration) and Harty (Bush 43) – and the open door policy toward Saudi nationals, as though 9/11 never happened?