Last night, Jon Stewart covered the news about the secret Mitt Romney video at that fundraiser, and his hurried press conference to respond to it.
On Day 1 of the reboot?? Yes, the Romney campaign's reboot was spoiled by footage from last May of Governor Romney at a $50,000-a-plate fundraiser, talking to rich people about poorer people, in a manner you would imagine cartoon rich people talk about cartoon poorer people.
MITT ROMNEY (5/17/2012): There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what ... who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, ... who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it.
C. MONTGOMERY BURNS: Release the hounds.
(wild audience cheering and applause)
Release the hounds, indeed.
Who are they? Who are these 47 percenters, the self-perceived victims who only want to suck from the teat of the bootstrap of the job creating... teat-having... boot-teat... just tell us who they are.
MITT ROMNEY (5/17/2012): These are people who pay no income tax. ... So my job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.
Didja hear it? Didja write that down? The people who don't pay income tax. These 47% of this country that will never be convinced to take personal responsibility for their lives. They're unconvincible (sic). Even by a man of such persuasive abilities as Mitt Romney. Even he — whose charisma has been compared not unfavorably with a 1993 Chrysler LeBaron — even he! (audience laughter)
Who are these 47 percenters? Well, let's examine it. It turns out of the 47% who pay no income taxes, nearly 2/3s of those do pay payroll taxes, meaning they workin', they just ain't workin' hard enough! You know, like a family of five making $50,000 dollars a year, aka, the amount of money it takes to see Mitt Romney shit on them in person. (audience cheering and applause)
And the other 40%, the true freeloaders... settle down. The other 40% of the 47%, the true freeloaders who pay no federal income tax or payroll tax are actually made up of those making less than $20,000 dollars a year, and many of the nation's elderly.
Mr. Romney knows them as personal responsibility shirking unconvincibles. You may know them as the greatest generation and/or Nana.
Of course, that says nothing about the real parasites, welfare queens. Public assistance is clearly a path to dependency, and I would like to see evidence otherwise.
Oh, you have some evidence, Mitt Romney's mom? Something about Mitt Romney's dad?
LENORE ROMNEY (1962): You know, we've only owned our home for the last four years. He was a refugee from Mexico. He was on relief — welfare relief — for the first years of his life, but this great country gave him opportunities.
Oh. My. God. George Romney was on welfare. So according to Mitt Romney's own logic, Mitt Romney could not win the vote of his dad!
....
Let me give you a better example to illustrate the dichotomy between the message Mitt Romney is sending verbally, and the message he's sending visually. Ladies and gentlemen, I take you to a cruise ship somewhere in the North Atlantic.
"Hey, ladies and gentlemen, it's me, your captain. I understand there's been some talk of ice on the starboard side of the ship that's attracted some attention."
"Anyway, I just want to take a moment to reassure everybody we have it under control. Obviously, we all look forward to reaching the other side of the ocean with everybody not in a watery grave."
Video and full transcript below the fold.
Hey, remember the Republican convention that took place a few weeks ago? Big opportunity for one Mitt Romney.
MONICA CROWLEY (8/24/2012): He will have his first major national platform to introduce himself and his ideas to the American people.
Yes! After only a solid, let's say, seven years on the campaign trail, Mitt Romney finally had a primetime television slot to introduce himself to the voters, and ultimately ended up getting upstaged by a piece of wood. All right. A piece of wood who spent most of his time talking to a chair! Boom!! Boom!! (audience applause) I still love Clint Eastwood. Going on record, still love Clint Eastwood.
All right. Just under three weeks after being upstaged by a chair and completely botching his response to the recent horrible events in Libya, a new announcement from the Romney campaign!
9/17/2012:
DIANE SAWYER: The Romney camp is said to be engineering a reboot
ABC NEWS: Call it a Romney reset.
JOE JOHNS: We begin with Mitt Romney, who's just unveiled a new campaign strategy.
(gasping) We said we were going to introduce him at the convention? No, no, no. That's not.... You... you always re-introduce the candidate... three weeks... after the convention.
Sort of like saying to a girl, "C'mon, just go on a seventh date with me. I'll grow on you."
So the big rollout of Romney 9.0 started yesterday. How'd the reboot go?
RICHARD LUI (9/18/2012): Topping the agenda today, Mitt Romney in damage control mode.
On Day 1 of the reboot?? Yes, the Romney campaign's reboot was spoiled by footage from last May of Governor Romney at a $50,000-a-plate fundraiser, talking to rich people about poorer people, in a manner you would imagine cartoon rich people talk about cartoon poorer people.
MITT ROMNEY (5/17/2012): There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what ... who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, ... who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it.
C. MONTGOMERY BURNS: Release the hounds.
(wild audience cheering and applause)
Release the hounds, indeed.
Who are they? Who are these 47 percenters, the self-perceived victims who only want to suck from the teat of the bootstrap of the job creating... teat-having... boot-teat... just tell us who they are.
MITT ROMNEY (5/17/2012): These are people who pay no income tax. ... So my job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.
Didja hear it? Didja write that down? The people who don't pay income tax. These 47% of this country that will never be convinced to take personal responsibility for their lives. They're unconvincible (sic). Even by a man of such persuasive abilities as Mitt Romney. Even he — whose charisma has been compared not unfavorably with a 1993 Chrysler LeBaron — even he! (audience laughter)
Who are these 47 percenters? Well, let's examine it. It turns out of the 47% who pay no income taxes, nearly 2/3s of those do pay payroll taxes, meaning they workin', they just ain't workin' hard enough! You know, like a family of five making $50,000 dollars a year, aka, the amount of money it takes to see Mitt Romney shit on them in person. (audience cheering and applause)
And the other 40%, the true freeloaders... settle down. The other 40% of the 47%, the true freeloaders who pay no federal income tax or payroll tax are actually made up of those making less than $20,000 dollars a year, and many of the nation's elderly.
Mr. Romney knows them as personal responsibility shirking unconvincibles. You may know them as the greatest generation and/or Nana.
Of course, that says nothing about the real parasites, welfare queens. Public assistance is clearly a path to dependency, and I would like to see evidence otherwise.
Oh, you have some evidence, Mitt Romney's mom? Something about Mitt Romney's dad?
LENORE ROMNEY (1962): You know, we've only owned our home for the last four years. He was a refugee from Mexico. He was on relief — welfare relief — for the first years of his life, but this great country gave him opportunities.
Oh. My. God. George Romney was on welfare. So according to Mitt Romney's own logic, Mitt Romney could not win the vote of his dad! Who would be one of the 47% of unconvincibles. And the hits keep coming.
Romney continues in the video to suggest the Palestinians don't want peace, and all we can do in the Middle East is kick the can down the road a bit and hope for the best, and that while his dad was born in Mexico, he unfortunately doesn't get the full benefit of that.
MITT ROMNEY (5/17/2012): I'd have a better shot at winning this. (rich donors laughing) But he was unfortunately born to Americans living in Mexico. He lived there for a number of years. And, I mean, I say that jokingly, but it would be helpful to be Latino.
(disgusted audience reaction)
You can't do that! You can't make the joke, and then immediately double-down on the seriousness of the premise. "Hey, Jimmy's mom, what a whore! Right? Of course, of course, I'm kidding, but seriously, she earns her living having sex with people."
By the end of this tape, the only person whose support Mitt Romney might be able to count on holding is his own wife.
MITT ROMNEY (5/17/2012): We use Ann sparingly right now, so that people don't get tired of her, or start attacking.
(in New Jersey accent) "Eh, eh, no, eh, eh. Show me a beautiful woman, and I'll show you someone tired of campaigning with her. Am I right, huh? I'm kidding of course, I'm kidding, but seriously. It it unbearable."
Needless to say, Mitt Romney had to address this situation mid-reboot.
MITT ROMNEY (9/17/2012): Good evening. I understand there's a video that's been on the Internet for a few weeks that has attracted some attention.
That pretty much describes every video on the Internet. You talking about Gangnam style, panda sneezing? Oh right, the video of you disregarding 47% of Americans. That one. That's why you've just casually interrupted a big fundraiser at 10:30pm at night on a Monday with the Mitt Romney version of bedhead.
MITT ROMNEY (9/17/2012): This is really a discussion about the political process of winning the election, and of course, I want to help all Americans. All Americans have a bright and prosperous future.
Sure, yeah, no, wow, his words say, "No big deal, I want to help all Americans", but his eyes and body language say, "Holy shit, we're all gonna die!"
Let me give you a better example to illustrate the dichotomy between the message Mitt Romney is sending verbally, and the message he's sending visually. Ladies and gentlemen, I take you to a cruise ship somewhere in the North Atlantic.
"Hey, ladies and gentlemen, it's me, your captain. I understand there's been some talk of ice on the starboard side of the ship that's attracted some attention."
"Anyway, I just want to take a moment to reassure everybody we have it under control. Obviously, we all look forward to reaching the other side of the ocean with everybody not in a watery grave."
"This would be so much easier if I was Latino."
Then addressing his
Latino voter comments, Jon had on Jessica Williams and Al Madrigal to discuss how easy minorities have it nowadays.
And in a web-only exclusive,
John Hodgman gave his own version of Mitt Romney's fundraiser talk.
And check out their
Moment of Zen!
Meanwhile, after going over
USA Today's
new design, Stephen did his
own interpretation of Romney's remarks at that fundraiser.
He then covered the
Apple-Samsung lawsuit.
Jon talked with author Salman Rushdie about the asshole who made that anti-Islam movie, and Stephen talked with CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin.