The Only Thing Sicker Than Romney’s Dog is His Contempt for Openness and Accountability

Today, smooth talking Mitt Romney heads back to Iowa to try to turn the corner after yet another bizarre and disturbing week for his floundering presidential campaign.

In the last few days alone, Romney has been barraged by a string of bad headlines:

• In what appears to be an effort to delay public examination of his personal finances, Romney missed a second deadline for filing his personal financial disclosures. His campaign claims Romney hasn’t had enough time to compile the report, even though he has been running for President for more than six months. [AP, 6/28/07]
  

• One of Romney’s leading supporters may have illegally chartered a private jet to fly 150 Utahns to his national fundraising call day in Boston. [Salt Lake Tribune, 6/29/07]
  

• Media reports linked two of Romney’s leading donors to companies accused of abusing troubled teenagers in at least seven states. [Reason online, 6/27/07]
  

• Romney refused to take a key staffer off his payroll even though he has been accused of impersonating a State Trooper and yet another reporter is questioning his abusive ways. [AP, 6/25/07; PalmBeachPost.com, 6/27/07]
  

• Romney admitted dipping into his personal fortune yet again as the pace of his campaign’s fundraising has fallen off sharply. [New York Times, 6/27/07]

“The only thing sicker than smooth talking Mitt Romney’s poor dog is his refusal to provide the American people the openness and accountability they expect from their next president,” said Democratic National Committee spokesman Damien LaVera. “The Romney campaign may be disintegrating into a wacky cast of characters and bizarre stories, but the truly disturbing thing is how thoroughly it echoes the Bush Administration’s consistent pattern of putting itself above the law. If Romney thinks he can win by blindly defending scandal-plagued cronies, skirting ethics rules, and surrounding himself with shady donors and fundraisers, the American people have a clear message for his: That dog won’t hunt.”