Is Mr. Romney a Serial Liar – Part 2

October 26, 2012

 Is Mr. Romney a Serial Liar – Part 2

Did Mr. Romney serve his country during the VietNam War?  No!

A look at Romney's relationship with Vietnam offers a window into a 1960s world that allowed him to avoid combat as fighting peaked. His story also demonstrates his commitment to the Mormon Church, which he rarely discusses publicly but which helped shape his life. He said in 2007 – his first White House bid under way – that he had "longed in many respects to actually be in Vietnam." But his actions, Selective Service records and previous statements show little interest in joining a conflict that ultimately claimed more than 58,000 American lives. Huffington Post, June 5 2012

“I was supportive of my country," Romney said in 2007. "I longed in many respects to actually be in Vietnam and be representing our country there, and in some ways it was frustrating not to feel like I was there as part of the troops that were fighting in Vietnam."

"It was not my desire to go off and serve in Vietnam, but nor did I take any actions to remove myself from the pool of young men who were eligible for the draft," Mr. Romney said. Source: nytimes.com

This is absolutely untrue.

Mr. Romney received his first deferment for "activity in study" in October 1965 while at Stanford. And, while in his first year at Stanford and when his father was governor of Michigan, he was anointed as a Mormon “minister of religion” and went to France for 31 months.  This was considered a missionary deferment. After returning from serving the people of France, he received at least 2 more student deferments.

"I longed in many respects to actually be in Vietnam and be representing our country there….” .My question to Mr. Romney is: Then why didn’t you just join the military and serve?

But the frustration and longing he recalled in 2007 do not match a sentiment he shared as a Massachusetts Senate candidate in 1994, when he told The Boston Herald, "I was not planning on signing up for the military."

"If it wasn't a political blunder to move into Vietnam, I don't know what is," a 23-year-old Romney would tell The Boston Globe in 1970 during the fifth year of his deferment.

But while telling the truth about his lack of “desire to go off and serve” in 1994, Romney lied again, telling the Boston Herald he didn’t “...take any actions to remove myself from the pool of young men who were eligible for the draft.” While posing as pro-draft and pro-war, he was evading the draft with an “activity in study” and “missionary” deferments.

It is worth noting that Mitt Romney’s father did not serve in the military either, along with his 5 sons. The candidate says his sons are serving their country by supporting his candidacy and helping him run for the Presidency. That is 3 generations of Romneys who have not served in the military.

And that’s not all folks.

Mr. Romney and Mr. Ryan are considering $11 billion in cuts for the Veterans Administration. He is a proponent  of “privatizing” our beloved veterans’ care.  Mr. Romney said, “Sometimes you wonder, would there be some way to introduce some private sector competition, somebody else that could come in and say, you know each soldier gets X thousand dollars attributed to them and then they can choose whether they want to go on the government system or the private system and then it follows them, like what happens with schools in Florida where they have a voucher that follows them, who knows.” Washington Monthly, Nov 2011

Yes, the taxpayer-financed, government-run V.A. hospitals are some of the finest medical facilities in the country. That is, by the way, as it should be — men and women in uniform put their lives on the line for us, and providing them with world-class medical care and facilities is the least the country can do in return. In this case, it just so happens that world-class care comes in government-run facilities.

So what lies behind the Republican obsession with privatization and voucherization? Ideology, of course. It’s literally a fundamental article of faith in the G.O.P. that the private sector is always better than the government, and no amount of evidence can shake that belief. It also serves the interest of the health insurance industry and that of “oh so sorry to bring this up again” corporate greed.