Home Town Hero Mitt Romney gets physical again.
Flashback – 2002 – Salt Lake Winter Olympics – Frustrated by the way volunteers were handling traffic at an Olympics venue in Huntsville, the Mittster jumps out of his limo, swears at the people, including police officers, trying to do their job and takes over directing traffic himself.
Flashforward again to last Monday on an Air Canada flight preparing to take off from the Vancouver Olympics. Frustrated when the passenger in front of him fails to return his seat to the upright position as required, the Mittster takes over, swears at the guy, and decides to get physical to ensure compliance.
Before anybody else points it out … Mitt also swears that these incidents didn’t go down that way. And the other parties involved say they did. In the first incident, Mitt was in charge of the entire Salt Lake Olympics. The other guys didn’t have a chance, police officers or not. In the second incident, the other passenger was a Detroit rapper (and looked like it). Mitt is a well-recognized politician with conservative steel gray hair. The airline believed Mitt and ejected the other passenger. But I wonder how it could happen that someone would turn around in the seat and pick a fight with someone behind them on an airline. I’ve been in those seats. You can’t turn around.
These aren’t the only times Mitt has been in trouble for resorting to personal violence. (See Note 1) In June 1981, he was arrested for disorderly conduct when he got physical with a park ranger at a state park in Massachusetts. The ranger was just trying to do his job enforcing the rules on the registration of boats. Again, during the second act, Romney forced everyone else to back down. After all, he’s “The Mittster” !! These were all just little people.
I believe the other guys. The Mittster sounds just like the kind of guy we need with his finger on the nuclear button.
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Note 1: The web page, http://romneyfacts.com/issue_rap.php, has references to the media documents about these incidents.
I too suffer, to a degree, a malady similar to “The Mittsters,” it is called Intermittent Explosive Disorder (IED). Here is a link which explains it: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/intermittent-explosive-disorder/DS00730
The episodes I’ve experienced in the past have been much, much shorter than what the Mayo Clinic link describes — thirty seconds at the most. Perhaps because the duration of my episodes is so much shorter than what the Mayo Clinic describes I don’t actually have IED; however, knowing how I feel when they occur I’m convinced I am a sufferer to at least some degree. I’ve needlessly injured myself and ruined property when these ridiculous outbursts occur and afterwards am inwardly quite embarrassed.
My wife has helped me with strategies to counter this behavior: acting deliberately and with forethought work well with me if I can remember to do so, and, using the old aphorism “count to ten and take a deep breath” helps a lot as well.
Don’t get me wrong, this behavior does not result in me being disfunctional (at least as far as I am concerned!); it’s more of a low-level malady lurking in my subconscious waiting for a trigger to make an ass out of myself.
To divulge how trivial some of these triggers are here is an example: when I am wearing ear buds with my MP3 player and the cord catches on something and the buds are “ripped” from my ears I get infuriated. It seems to always be something very trivial that lights the fuse.
So, I empathize a bit with “The Mittster” and hopes he consults with his wife or me for help.
Could be.
I still don’t want his finger on the red button.