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Subscribe to RSSSpeaking to a New Hampshire Town Hall audience of more than 250 yesterday, Mitt Romney addressed perceptions that he is a flip-flopper by quoting from a political leader he often cites on the trail, Winston Churchill.
"In the private sector, if you don't change your view when the facts change, well you'll get fired for being stubborn and stupid." Romney said. "Winston Chuchill said, 'When the facts change, I change too, Madam'"
The problem? That quote was not uttered by Britain's great wartime leader, but instead is credited to John Maynard Keynes, the British economist whose economic studies gave rise to so-called Keynesian economic theory, which calls for government intervention in economies to balance market forces, and who is loathed by many conservatives.
The full quote, "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?" is most often attributed to Keynes offering a defense of why he often changed his positions in the constantly-evolving world of macroeconomics.
And while the quote is regularly attributed to Keynes, there is more than a little reason for confusion. In a February blog post on the Wall Street Journal's website a Keynes' biographer is quoted as saying he believes that quote is in fact "apocryphal", and another said there was "no evidence" in the form of primary sources, that Keynes was the quote's originator.
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And NO ONE can change the facts quite as fast as Mittens!
Is there some secret contest going on today to see which one of these Bozo's can make the most 'mis-speaks'? lol
If so... what's the prize?
Dinner with the 'Donald' at Tommy's Ham House?
Time for some *popcorn*
Do you think any of them will ever get to even half as many as Biden? Or maybe catch up to Obama even though they dont get reported by the left media like the GOP?
I dunno, Kirk. But seeing as how this post is about today, think maybe you can contribute something to it?
Drive by you are correct--my apologies as Fiesty and her silly personal attacks sometimes get the best of me. By the way did you say the same statement to her? Could you ask her to contribute something to it versus her attempt to make humor at the expense of someone personally?
But for me I find that someone who is willing to change positions for the better to be a good leader. Certainly Clinton is a great example of that. The fact that Romney has changed positions on issues is not necessarily a bad thing no different than Obama hopefully some day changing his position on gay marriage and be for it rather than against it. However, I do realize that Romney has flip flopped on things like being pro life in order to pander to the GOP voters which I wish he didnt have to do. On Romneycare, I dont understand the big deal and if I were him I would own up to and say the states are great guinea pigs for certain ideas and we should see what has worked and what hasnt. He shouldnt back down from that. Just like NY, California and Illinois are great models of big government, high tax, pro union forms of central government and we can all look how those fiscal models have worked for those states and make judgements accordingly. There I attempted to contribute
Or how about this one on Healthcare Reform?
So, do we have any recourse if by 2019 we don't see the savings? I mean how ludicrous is this answer? You'll see the benefits in 10 years? I laugh when they call Mitt Romney a flip-flopper and he is, but Obama is the king.
"Could you ask her to contribute something to it versus her attempt to make humor at the expense of someone personally?"
Naw- not my day to keep tabs on her. I think maybe she's the 'boss applesauce' of her, or something like that.
Tell you what though, I DO agree with you that changing one's mind as the facts and circumstances change is a good and wise thing. Not everyone thinks that way, though. Posts about closing Gitmo come to mind....
Ha but you kept tabs on me instead? I am hardly worth it. True about Gitmo and I have never stated that I am an Obama hater on all issues and I will give him credit for anything he has done well. If you go through all my posts, I am just a fiscal conservative that feels his economic policies and views are more harmful than good. Not all bad but overall. I think his lack of understanding of basic financial behavior regardless of income or wealth is causing him to lose traction and approval of independants and the swing voters. I may not like his pandering to the unions or trial lawyers but thats politics and that in of itself doesnt push me over the edge. Its the lack of understanding that personal responsibility and accountability and so much of the economic success or lack thereof by society is based on the personal behaviorial choices we all made. Whether it be studying hard to get better grades, choosing to have a baby at 18, choosing a profession that will make us happy like teaching but less lucrative financially, to taking the risk to open your own small business to working hard to become a doctor. It feels like Obama thinks that any succes is based on someone winning the financial lottery and any inequality is purely based on luck. David Walker and others like Obama like to state that the wealthy have used all of these government services roads, police, fire, schools to get wealthy and should pay back their fair share. They forget to state that all of those things are state and local services and the feds have only screwed up education not helped but the poor, middle class use those services much more than the wealthy so shouldnt they contribute even more? I find those arguments silly as we shouldnt be punishing the working successful as we should be celebrating their success. I hate that both sides embellish to the extremes the class warfare stuff and we cant agree on financial issues that impact the 90% that work and contribute but focus on the super rich and the welfare queens. I will stop with the rant but Gitmo is a good one and Obama has a few others that he changed his mind for the better.
Mitt will handle it the way he always does...
'I'm a strong believer in stating your position and not wavering.' [1]
'I changed my position.' [2]
I thought I read this the other day somewhere -
Romney goes after President Obama because the president removed the Winston Churchill bust from the Oval Office and returned it to England. According to the article, this is standard when a new president moves into the Oval Office.
And what's strange is evidently President Obama replaced the Churchill bust with the bust of none other than Abraham Lincoln himself.
Does Romney see a problem with a bust of Abraham Lincoln in the Oval Office? A man who presided over the Civil War here in America for his entire presidency.
And then was shot and killed because of it.
Honestly, Romney is of another time and place. What time and what place I have no idea.
Who the hell would get mad over a bust of Churchill being returned?
The Republicans evidently. Romney in particular.
Idiot.
Pat, even the Obama administration realizes after the fact that they screwed up with the Churchill Bust. They blamed on the Protocol office and it looked tacky in the way they handled it. Romney is being silly for pointing it out but you are being silly for defending it. Its ok Pat, not everything Obama has done in life is 100% perfect and positive. I think we all can live with that.
The bust wasn't as bad as the present of an ipod with his speeches or the DVDs in the wrong format.
Its ok Pat, not everything Obama has done in life is 100% perfect and positive.
Well, maybe he should tie his family dog to the roof of his car for a family trip to Canada. Like Romney did.
Pat, who cares what either Romney or Obama did? Are you really going to vote for a president because he screwed up on the Churchill bust or because Romney said something about a Brit that was wrong. Its ok to admit Obama has made mistakes and still vote for him and its ok for you to admit that not everything Romney stands for is wrong. Makes it easy to create bipartisanship.
To quote another great Republican"We areall Keyenians now"-Ronald Reagan.
To quote another great Republican "fool me once.....uh.....won't get fooled again"
Ooops- might have inadvertently quoted the Who here.
Hey- time for someone to say '57 states', isn't it?
Wow...just, wow!
To quote another great Tea-Bagger/Republican "Lipstick on a pig"
Ohhh, Tommy! NOW y' got my attention!! (not so much, though, for the ol' bald-headed champion they call 'one-eye'....)
Would Alanis Morissette consider this to be "Ironic?"
Wow. "fact check" is misleading for a post that contains nothing more than speculation about the origin of a quote. That's probably the only really "ironic" part of this. This is irresponsible journalism. "The quote is credited to Keynes, but two people who know more about Keynes than probably anyone else in the WORLD don't believe he actually said it... but uh... it Churchill DEFINITELY never said it..." Are you serious? MSNBC is the National Enquirer of Political journalism. The Liberal media doesn't want Mitt to win because they would rather see Perry face Obama in the general election because Obama will STOMP Perry. The farthest right doesn't want Mitt because he's a Mormon/not tea-party enough. Newsflash: Mitt's the only candidate that can beat Obama, and the only candidate with a chance against that Billion dollar war chest.
Well DBO I thought that was a good quote!! LOL
Another flip-flop from Willard?
This is nothing new.
I guess somewhere along the line I didn't keep up with the thread here....while it's real interesting to see two lovebirds communicating about their respect for each other, I kinda thought the point was that Mittens can't even get a quote correct....now, to be fair, I've made up a quote and even an attribution or two in my time....but, I ain't running for President and I don't have a flotilla of advisers and fact-checkers on my payroll....I mean, hello.....when you know you're quote someone and your being watched by the entire free world....don't you feel like it should be accurate?....maybe it's just me...ok, you guys can go back to holding hands.....
Aww, and after all that hard work by the Republicans to turn "Keynesian" into a slur.
Actually, if you do a google search, this quote is attributed to Churchill quite often, including by Dick Morris in a New York Times piece. The closest non-apocryphal source might be this:
Everyone knows that Mitt meant to quote Churchill when he famously said, "A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject."
But the media won't tell you that.