Poor Mitt

When I first saw the headline in the Washington Post this morning about Mitt Romney's days as a high school bully, I actually thought it was a joke.  After all, the story was entitled "Mitt Romney's classmates recall pranks, but also troubling incidents."  I'm not one to believe there's a liberal media bias but I saw that headline and thought that the Post was really scrambling to come up with some mud on the Republican nominee-to-be.  The Post is a reputable paper.  Would they really stoop so low?  Then I read the story.

I have to say that I'm surprised that Mitt was a high school bully.  To be honest, I didn't think he had it in him.  He just seems so bland, always taking such great pains to not offend anyone.  Could Mitt Romney really have been the leader of a gang of kids who tackled a fellow classmate and held him down so that Mitt could cut off that classmate's "offensive" bleached hair with a pair of scissors?  That just seems so extreme for plain vanilla Mitt.

If you've sat at the dinner table with me over the past few years, as we've talked about the seemingly constant campaigns to "eradicate" bullying in the local public school system, you know what my position on the issue is.  It may be unpleasant but I think it's also human nature for young people to pick on one another.  When you're an adolescent, one of the most important things to you is your place on the social pecking order.  No matter where you are on that pecking order, it's always very important to have at least one other person below you.  Sometimes, the only way you can think of to make sure that happens is to take steps to actively put that other person below you.  I did it.  I'm not proud of it, but I did it.  I never used scissors, though.

What's even worse than the fact that Mitt carried (or "allegedly" carried) out his attack with scissors is his attempt at an apology.  Here's what he said in response to the story:

"Back in high school, you know, I did some dumb things, and if anybody was hurt by that or offended, obviously, I apologize for that."

Mitt, let me give you a free lesson from my own bully pulpit.  That's not an apology.  An apology is saying that you're sorry for an action that you took (or didn't take).  It's not saying that you're sorry only "... if someone was offended ..." by what you said or did. 

One final thing.  Mitt, you're 65 years old.  You're running for President of the United States.  I'm going to assume that you've still got your full mental capacities.  If you were involved in an incident like the scissors incident cited in the news story, you'd either clearly remember it or be absolutely certain that it never happened.  There's no middle ground.

OK, I'm getting off my high horse to go listen to One Direction.