Release your taxes Mitt! Or don't, your in a bad spot either way.

There must be something awfully bad in Mitt Romney's taxes. Awfully bad. To suffer the slings and arrows he has suffered in the past week, to send his wife on the morning shows, to hear Bill Kristol and George Will tell him to release the taxes, and still refuse, something is awfully ugly in those tax forms.

Illegal? I doubt it. I'm sure he can and has passed audits. But there is clearly something damaging. Otherwise why not release the hounds and thumb your nose at the Obama campaign? I've read a hundred theories of what COULD be in those taxes, and in another week I'll have read a thousand. Why would he let this steady drip, drip, drip continue?

Because whatever is in those taxes is even worse than the drips.

The Obama camp got a black man whose middle name is Hussein elected president. They might be pretty good at this election thingee. If they are calling for him to release his taxes, it means they know whats in there. And they have a no-lose situation for if Romney doesn't release, they can bang that drum right up to election day. Drip, drip, drip.  And if he does two things happen, and they are both bad for Romney. (1) there is something bad in there. (2) There isn't much, but Romney caved and again flip-flopped when someone held his feet to the fire. That plays poorly with a GOP base that already doesn't like the guy much, they just hate the black guy more.

I'm off to get more popcorn. This is going to be some great watching.

That feller Jefferson were right handy with a quill pen, weren't he?

In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of AMERICA.

WHEN, in the Course of human Events, it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another; and to assume, among the Powers Of The Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the Causes which impel them to the Separation.

We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their CREATOR with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established, should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security. Such has been the patient Sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The History of the present King of Great-Britain is a History of repeated Injuries and Usurpations, all having in direct Object the Establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

HE has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.

HE has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing Importance, unless suspended in their Operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

HE has refused to pass other Laws for the Accommodation of large Districts of People, unless those People would relinquish the Right of Representation in the Legislature, a Right inestimable to them and formidable to Tyranny only.

HE has called together Legislative Bodies at Places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the Depository of their public Records, for the sole Purpose of fatiguing them into Compliance with his Measures.

HE has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly Firmness his Invasions on the Rights of the people.

HE has refused for a long Time, after such Dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, Incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining, in the mean Time, exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and Convulsions within.

HE has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

HE has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

HE has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and the Amount and Payment of their Salaries.

HE has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their Substance.

HE has kept among us, in times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the Consent of our Legislatures.

HE has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

HE has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

FOR quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us:

FOR protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

FOR cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World:

FOR imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

FOR depriving us in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:

FOR transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended Offences:

FOR abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary Government, and enlarging its Boundaries, so as to render it at once an Example and fit Instrument for introducing the same absolute Rule into these Colonies:

FOR taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

FOR suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Power to legislate for us in all Cases whatsoever.

HE has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection, and waging War against us.

HE has plundered our Seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.

HE is, at this Time, transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to complete the Works of Death, Desolation, and Tyranny, already begun with Circumstances of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized Nation.

HE has constrained our fellow Citizens, taken Captive on the high Seas, to bear Arms against their Country, to become the Executioners of their Friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

HE has excited domestic Insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.

IN every Stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble Terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated Injury. A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every Act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People.

NOR have we been wanting in Attentions to our British Brethren. We have warned them, from Time to Time, of Attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable Jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the Circumstances of our Emigration and Settlement here. We have appealed to their native Justice and Magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the Ties of our common Kindred to disavow these Usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our Connexions and Correspondence. They too have been deaf to the Voice of Justice and of Consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the Necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the Rest of Mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

WE, therefore, the Representatives of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, in GENERAL CONGRESS, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be,FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES; that they are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political Connexion between them and the State of Great-Britain, is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; and that as FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which INDEPENDENT STATES may of Right do. And for the Support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of DIVINE PROVIDENCE, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honour.

The Romney Ancestral Home

Third Base, or as Mitt Romney calls it "The place where I was born"

NPR and a free education nearly every day for this blogger

I'd rather listen to NPR than do anything else. And it's not just for the politics, I like the cultural programs as well. I learned from NPR that Johnny Appleseed existed, but he was not at all who they told us he was when we were kiddos. I learned that before 1900 apples were bitter and that the only use for apples was to make hard cider. In other words, Johnny Appleseed walked through the midwest with some crazy pot on his head spreading the gift of alcohol to the locals. Which may explain the headware. He was the Timothy Leary of his day, you might say.

In that same program I learned that General Foods offered a $50,000 award to anyone who could produce a sweet apple and get it before a panel of judges at the 1900 World's Fair in Chicago. Well a fellow did, and of course he was from Wisconsin and was already an apple grower. But he, like every other soul who had previously grown an apple on earth, or didn't, only had sour bitter apples too. But he had an orchard, there in the Badger State, and in this orchard was this little pain-in-the-ass tree which kept coming up between his orderly rows. He tried to kill it several times yet each spring it defeated both his and the winter's effort to make it conform.

So he gave up and just plowed around the sucker. Not surprisingly, once everything around the tree stopped trying to kill it, the tree decided to do what fruit trees do, and produced fruit. It was a sweet apple and off to Chicago and a big reward went the farmer. He won of course, having the only entry that didn't make the judges pucker. History does not record what he did with the money, but it does record what the new owners of that tree did. They spliced cuttings of it onto established trunks of those old, shriveled up bitter, alcoholic trees that one might still encounter at VFW and Elks lodges throughout this great nation of ours.

Did you know that of anyone alive today, who can read this blog, not one of you have never eaten an apple, or tasted applesause, or apple pie, or an apple fritter, or apple (okay I'll stop) that isn't a product of that first grafting from that one single tree?

Now where could a guy driving from Plain City, Utah  to Boise, Idaho for the purpose of talking into a microphone about 66 badly-bred horses for a  paycheck of $500 dollars learn a great story like that, all for free, and impressing  his passenger all the way? NPR that's where.

It's always way down at the left end of your dial, and when the signal starts to fuzz out on you between cities, just hang in there. Wherever there is a college, there is someone playing NPR, even on Sundays. Even in Idaho. Even in Kansas. It's never higher than 90.9 and it's never lower than 87.5. And it's always free and it's always grand.

Does Mitt Romney seem peculiar to you? Allow me to explain a few things...

I live in Utah and while no longer a  mormon myself,  I know these people. They were my teachers and coaches. They were my neighbors. They have been my employers and my co-workers. Some are family, some are friends.

Every one of them is exactly the same in certain, very important aspects. They worship wealth. They obey authority without question or reflection. They are the most image-conscious individuals you will ever encounter. They are very defensive about not just their religion but their culture. They are happiest when they feel persecuted. They think the world loves and respects them, so when mormons encounter situations which contradict this, they play the persecution card. They crave acceptance. They will do almost anything to gain a convert to their church, and even more to retain a member. They are tyrannical when in the majority. They always want to be in charge.

So Mitt. The ultimate 21st century mormon man. Does he seem a little robotic? Realize he has never had to develop any type of personality at all, save that which is required to schmooze fellow vulture capitalists and order the serfs about. Does he come across as willing to say anything to gain acceptance? See above. Does he strike you as detached from anyone-other-than-rich-whites? Well, he is. Like all of us, Mitt Romney is merely a product of his environment. And his environment was one of privilege and adoration by his almost-identical peers.

I have often wondered why Mitt Romney wants to be the President. He's never actually said why. The closest I've heard anybody come to explaining his vision of why he has been campaigning for seven long years was his wife Anne's blurted statement that "It's our turn!"

Entitled much? Well they are. Romney is the worst kind of mormon, the second generation rich kind. Born on third base, he waits 30 years at expensive prep schools, BYU and Harvard to finally cross home plate, then takes credit for the whole ball game. Mostly, he just had to keep his haircut short and never miss a dentist appointment. If he surrounds himself with other mormons and wealth worshiping sycophants, he will emerge convinced of his  inevitability. Which he did.

Does it seem like he lies easily? Understand that in his mind he's not lying. Understand the man avoided fighting in Vietnam by flying to Paris and teaching French peasants that Joseph Smith found golden plates in a cavern in upstate New York in 1836, translated the symbols on those plates by stuffing his face in a hat and then gave the plates back to an angel who whisked them away into the sky. If you can buy that, if you can attempt to sell that, then saying you created 100,000 jobs at Bain Capital is as easy as blaming your late return home on traffic. You have to understand, the man has never been called to account on what he says in his entire life.

Truth be told, I'm tickled to death that Romney appears to be the GOP nominee. I'm happy that fundies and southern evangelicals will be forced to support (however tepidly) his candidacy. I look forward to the white-hot glare of the media spotlight on his cult's doctrines and practices. I relish the thought that the nation will reject him and that the mormons will crawl back out of the spotlight for at least another generation.