If I listed out the reasons why I could never vote have voted for Mitt Romney, I would be here for quite a long time. There never was any question as to who I was going to vote for this year, anyway, but there were certain quotes, actions and stories that pretty much destroyed any positive feelings I might have ever held for Mitt Romney.
The nail in the already-closed coffin for me was the story (in May) of him cutting off the hair of a former high school classmate while others held the crying student down. Many, including Romney himself, tried to write it off as nothing other than a youthful prank. His friends & family insist that he is nothing like that. Mitt Romney is a thoughtless bully. Clear evidence appears in his words and deeds over many years: treatment of Seamus the dog on the car, his blatant disregard for the lives disrupted by Bain Capital's business practices, the gay staffer on his campaign who was quickly fired, his closed-door statements about the 47%, his enjoyment of firing people, and the fact that he cut off the credit cards of his campaign workers before they even got home. Romney has no morals; he only works to serve his own ambition & self-interest. If he can’t gain something from a person, he has no regard for them.
Mr. Wickham’s description of Mr. Darcy seems apt, “… but Mr. Darcy can please where he chuses. ... He can be a conversible companion if he thinks it worth his while. Among those who are at all his equals in consequence, he is a very different man from what he is to the less prosperous. His pride never deserts him; but with the rich, he is liberal-minded, just, sincere, rational, honourable, and perhaps agreeable, -- allowing something for fortune and figure.”
The reason why just this hits so close to home for me personally is that I was one of the bullied, from about 3rd grade until 12th grade. In grade school, I was the butt of jokes and taunted until I would cry, then called "crybaby! crybaby!". The taunting and bullying continued into junior high and even high school, but had mostly died out by senior year. Some people never learn, however, and one of my charming high school “chums” hit me in the head with a full beer can when I delivered a pizza to a party some 2 years post-graduation. The point is that I was bullied and threatened for 10 of my 13 years in public school, so I have zero tolerance for it and I would never knowingly vote a self-absorbed bully into office.
I believe that people can change, but unless people are challenged, that change is much less likely. Mitt Romney is one of the unchallenged, why should he be challenged? He has never had to be concerned with those of no consequence to him. It seems that Romney is rather like Mr. Darcy in Pride & Prejudice, before Elizabeth spurs his self-reflection, “I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle. As a child I was taught what was right, but I was not taught to correct my temper. I was given good principles, but left to follow them in pride and conceit. Unfortunately an only son (for many years an only child), I was spoilt by my parents, who, though good themselves (my father, particularly, all that was benevolent and amiable), allowed, encouraged, almost taught me to be selfish and overbearing; to care for none beyond my own family circle; to think meanly of all the rest of the world; to wish at least to think meanly of their sense and worth compared with my own.”
This is the number one reason that I could never have voted for Romney and Ryan. I could go on and on.