They are not the same. They are not equal. One is better.

[kentuck]

We have permitted a false equivalency in the media. There is no longer any penalty for out-right, bald-faced lies. They will not be held to "fact-checkers". They will only rely upon the money they can get from their richest contributors.

It really doesn't matter anymore if a candidate did not pay any taxes for more than a dozen years. It doesn't matter that he says he is going to cut taxes for everyone by 20% and still balance the budget ? It doesn't matter if he is an avaricious money-grubbing outlaw, who called himself a "venture capitalist, but who in reality, was someone who loaned huge sums of money to companies and when they could not pay them back, along with their wealthy commissions, they had to file for bankruptcy. Mitt Romney made many, many millions of dollars by shipping many of these jobs overseas. The money he received for many of these "deals", he stashed in the Netherlands, in Switzerland, Cayman Islands, Jamaica, and other places as tax havens so he would not have to pay taxes to the country from whom he is now running for President.

To compare such a candidate with our President and give them equal footing is a false equivalency. They are not equal. One is an outright liar and a scam artist. He has lied on national television and Chrysler executives called him on it in public. Still, he continued with the lies because he knew there was no one to hold him or his Party accountable.

[seabeyond]

1. i actually had a loud disagreement with oldest son on this the other day. insisting they both lie.

hubby hates disagreements. i generally keep things mellow. but, that one got me. insisted not equal, educate himself. (was about the debate and romneys lies)

i came back, i was right. he had nothing.

it was an eye opener for him and has since paid attention to this with manipulation from media to create that false equivalency. excellent bit of education for the boy.

[brush]

2. Just a small note

Romney's Bain would, from what I've read, only put enough of it's own money to acquire companies (usually by giving substantial sums to the upper management). Quite often they would then GET LOANS FROM BANKS, not their own money, on the companies' dime. When the companies could no longer make the payments on those loans, plus Bain's huge management fees, Bain would sent the companies into bankruptcy, layoff employess, take pension funds and liquidation monies and divest themselves of the troubled company. All would then be fine with Bain as it walked away with huge profits, not so fine with all the former employees though.

[kentuck]

4. Absolutely right!

They didn't put up their own money.

[CincyDem]

3. I get into this "they both lie" argument all the time

I've made the most progress helping republicans see the difference between inaccurately predicting a possible future versus lying about current and/or past facts. Obama didn't accurately predict the future and Romney lies about what is provable fact today.

All politicians make projections of a future that can occur if they are elected. Those projections don't always come to fruition for a variety of reasons (most notably during O's first 4 years - because of the chinless wonder from our southern neighbor Kentucky). During 2008, O' projected that he could close Gitmo and reduce the deficit. As time progressed during the term, new information presented itself and those hopes dimmed.

Few politician have such a distant relationship with the truth as Romney. I'm not talking about the insanity of his future projections - they're as valuable as predicting tomorrow's winning lottery numbers. I'm talking about the "reframing" of facts in evidence so he can appease his current audience. Yeah - where I grew up that was called lying.

Obama has projections about the future. Romney has projections about the future. Every politician has projections about the future and not all of them will come true.

Romney has out and out lies about the past (I supported the auto bail out) and the present (Jeep is sending your jobs to China) that are in direct contradiction to all facts. Not every politician has those kinds of claims in their portfolio - although more and more republicans are jumping on the bandwagon.