Romney versus Obama

May 10, 2012 Joseph S. Nye, Jr.

Leadership theorists suggest that we should pay less attention to leaders’ policy promises than to their emotional intelligence – their self-mastery and ability to reach out to others. So, how do US President Barack Obama and his presumptive Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, measure up?

CAMBRIDGE – While the presidential primary elections in the United States are not over, Mitt Romney is now almost certain to be the party’s nominee to face Democratic President Barack Obama in November.

As Governor of Massachusetts, Romney built a record as a competent and moderate conservative, a political profile that suited him to the state’s electorate. But the Republican Party’s far right wing dominates the primaries, so Romney has worked hard to escape the “moderate” label by staking out very conservative positions. Now, as the party’s presumptive nominee, he must move back toward the political center, where the majority of voters are to be found.

So which is the real Mitt Romney? And how can voters judge the two candidates?

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Patrick Ferrell Jul 1, 2012

Please dude, be honest for a change. Obama has a proven track record, yeah, proven to be BAD. Sure his supporters are going to do what he does, blame everybody but himself. "Oh, he had to adapt to two ongoing wars", the war in Iraq was basically over since the SURGE, which he said wouldn't work when he was in the Senate, actually DID work. Also, Bush went to Iraq with the BLESSINGS of both houses of Congress, including Obama who was in the Senate at the time.

He promised to pull soldiers out of both places if elected, so saying he had to adapt to two wars was HIS DECISION, not anybody else's. Republican's didn't force him to keep GITMO open either, and he triumphantly signed his executive order to close Gitmo in a year, yet it still remains to this day. Whose he gonna blame that one on?

Mitt Romney scares me as a RINO candidate, because if he DOES move back to the middle, it will possibly bring on an independent challenger who is much more conservative, and might jeopardize a conservative win and Obama will win in true Clinton fashion, without a majority of the vote. We will have to wait and see.

I do know that America has been KICKED awake by the HUGE grab for power that Obama and his regime have decided to take on by "recess appointing" people while congress is not in recess, and nothing has been done about it by RINO republicans. He has decided that he is not going to enforce DOMA, or the Immigration laws of this country. He is going to ignore congress' "contempt of congress" charge against Eric Holder for witholding documents pertinent to their investigation of his program that ended up with many dead innocent mexicans, and 2 border patrol agents with guns supplied by Holder to the Mexican drug cartel for the purposes, apparently, of proclaiming that our gun laws were not tough enough, but it blew up in Holder's face.

Face it, Obama's Presidency is INEPT. He passed a law that he SWORE wasn't a tax. The Congress voted on it as "Not a tax", but it was a tax, and now, despite Obama saying he would not raise taxes on anybody making 250K or less (which is a lie now), he will raise his hand triumphantly, and go down in history as the man who imposed the largest tax increase on ALL American's in the history of our Union.

As bad as Romney "COULD BE", we know Obama is BAD AS HE IS now, and no pointing fingers at everybody else is going to save his sorry arse. I just pray Romney keeps his conservative message, because it worked for Reagan and it will work for him. Obama makes Carter look like a school girl in comparison, so we need someone who will stick to his conservative values and will finally do what is RIGHT for America, and save us from bankruptcy. Something he is far more qualified to do than Obama, who has never held a job as a CEO or done anything to run a company, realizing what it takes to do so, and turn a profit to stay in business. The Government doesn't have to make a profit, they can just print more money to make up for it, which devalues our dollar more and more. It's time for regime change.
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james durante May 13, 2012

Wow, this is what passes for political science?! So, tell us, Dr. Nye, based on your psycho-emotional analysis of their lives, which one, Obama or Romney, has better emotional intelligence?

It isn't politicians switching their positions after elections that makes a sham of democracy it is the illusion of any choice in the first place. American capitalism is secure when two candidates wholly and entirely devoted to maintaining it run for office, which is to say, uh, in every election.

Elections are rituals designed to give the populace the illusion that they are making some sort of choice and have some sort of say in the process. True a President Gore may not have invaded Iraq, but, being an oilman, he would have been no less anxious to open Iraqi oil to more outside corporate control. Similarly, neither Obama nor Romney favor any basic change when it comes to the status quo on energy policy or anything else I can think of. Health care? Well, Obama is a socialist for corporations so he wants to give private health insurance companies tax dollars while Romney wants people to exclusively pay premiums to them.

Take any other issue, you'll find the same. Vote for nobody as only nobody can promise fundamental changes that will wrest control from corporations.
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