New Hateful Romney Ad: Obama Declared "War on Religion" And He's Like The USSR

[FourScore]

Thu Aug 09, 2012 at 06:06 AM PDT
New Hateful Romney Ad: Obama Declared "War on Religion" And He's Like The USSR
by Ian Reifowitz

Mitt Romney and the Republican National Committee have a new ad up on the air http://content.usatoday.com/communities/onpolitics/post/2012/08/mitt-romney-ad-religious-freedom-lech-walesa-/1#.UCPYYqCrqvZ. I'll just provide some of the details and hold my comments until you've had a chance to read them. I'm not providing the video here but you can see it, if you truly must, at the link above. The narration begins:

"President Obama used his healthcare plan to declare war on religion, forcing religious institutions to go against their faith."

First of all, that claim is completely false. But that's a topic for another discussion.

Then Romney brought up Pope John Paul II's heroic efforts in speaking out against the Soviet Union. The narrator then asked:

"When religious freedom is threatened, who do you want to stand with?"

Let's try to assess this calmly. So, Romney accused President Obama of having "declare[d] war on religion." Furthermore, Romney stated that religious freedom is threatened today, and essentially compared President Obama to the Soviet Union, a murderous dictatorship that, among numerous other terrible crimes, brutally suppressed its citizens' ability to practice their religious faith.

I'm honestly having trouble fully expressing how angry I am about this ad. This is not the first hateful thing the Romney campaign has done, having race-baited time and again throughout this campaign.

I've asked when the media will call the Romney campaign out on its racism. So has fellow Kossack chaunceydevega, in a post I highly recommend.

Now it's time to ask whether the media will call out Romney for seeking to divide people based on religion, and for painting Barack Obama as no different than the Soviet Union under Brezhnev.

I won't say this "war on religion" ad reaches a new low, because that would be a very high bar to clear (no pun intended). But it certainly reaches a different kind of low. Mitt Romney needs to answer for it.

The American people need to recognize this hatemonger for what he is.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/08/09/1118227/-New-Hateful-Romney-Ad-Obama-Declared-War-on-Religion-And-He-s-Like-The-USSR

[AtomicKitten]

1. ... says the Mormon.

[pnwmom]

2. The FEC shouldn't allow the Republicans to use images of religious figures as mascots.

The Bush campaign did this on their website, too, with a photo of Bush and John Paul 2 meeting at the Vatican, under the headline "Catholics for Bush."

[C_U_L8R]

3. in other words... Romney's got nuthin'

completely out of ammo and ideas.
I've never seen such a limp and uninspired campaign by any politician.

[Lucy Goosey]

4. If Obamacare is a "war on religion" then so was Romneycare

Was Romneycare A War On Religion? As governor, Romney greatly expanded access publicly-financed contraception through his 2006 health care reform law. The state’s Commonwealth Care, established under Romneycare, offers subsidized, low or no-cost insurance to low-income residents and provides primary and preventive care that includes “family planning services” and prescription contraceptives. In 2005, Romney also “signed a bill that could expand the number of people who get family-planning services, including the morning-after pill” and asked the Department of Health and Human Services to require Catholic hospitals to issue the morning after pill to rape victims.

In fact, the Obamacare rule Romney is now characterizing as an affront to religious liberties is very similar to a 2002 state law he tacitly supported. Like more than two dozen states across the country, Massachusetts required insurers that provide outpatient benefits to cover hormone replacement therapy and all FDA-approved contraceptive methods — well before Obamacare became law. The Massachusetts rule exempts “an employer that is a church or qualified church-controlled organization” from the mandate, but prohibits institutions such as hospitals, universities, and nursing homes from deny their employees birth control coverage.

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/08/09/663091/was-romneycare-a-war-on-religion/

I'm totally shocked to find that Romney is a lying hypocrite on this issue.

[hifiguy]

5. Do the dumbasses running his campaign actually think

that this is going to attract the undecided and the "centrist moderates"? Do they really? If they do, they are even dumber than I thought, which hardly seems possible.

[uponit7771]

7. This is a turnout election, they don't care about the middle if they make it up with 5% on thier bas

[nc4bo]

9. Still catering, to the moon is 10,000 years old, base.

Maybe peel off one or two jesus freaks in the process.

And you know what, I'm completely and utterly sick of this dumb shit and there ain't a dang thing I (or any of us) can do about it.

Romney lies so much his tongue should rot and fall out his mouth.

[uponit7771]

6. RMoney: "...Obama is a poopy head..." that's about what rMoney is going to

[nichomachus]

8. Yet he and his cult mates try to get people to abandon their religion

and join the Mormon cult

[Skidmore]

10. He's getting pretty shrill and desparate.

People tend not to like shrillness.

[Festivito]

11. A war on CERTAIN "religious INSTITUTIONS", not war on religion.

People have freedoms.
Institutions want the freedom to not allow people freedom.
Ahem, people have the freedom.
Not the institution.