Priorities USA, the Super PAC that was happy to take money from noted misogynist Bill Maher, used some of that money to produce the single most disgusting political ad in recent memory. It brings back former GST Steel employee Joe Soptic, a laid-off plant worker who was used early in the Obama campaign’s War on Capitalism. Soptic initially blamed Mitt Romney for losing his job, but now he blames Romney for the death of his wife.
In the ad, Soptic claims his wife kept her increasing distress from cancer to herself – because he thinks she knew they couldn’t afford health insurance thanks to “Mitt Romney and Bain” closing the plant he worked at. By the time she was admitted to the hospital with pneumonia, her cancer had become terminal.
“I do not think Mitt Romney realizes what he’s done to anyone, and furthermore I do not think Mitt Romney is concerned,” Soptic concludes.
http://www.youtube.com/v/Nj70XqOxptU?version=3&hl=en_US
Reminder for anyone who might be fooled by the lying propagandists of the bottom-feeding Priorities USA: even if you’re willing to accept the twisted logic that a business manager is personally accountable for the health of every terminated employee’s family, Mitt Romney left Bain Capital before GST Steel went bankrupt. GST Steel was shut down in 2001. Mitt Romney left Bain Capital in 1999. The person most directly responsible for making the decision to close GST was Bain executive and Obama supporter Jonathan Lavine. Priorities USA just accused an Obama supporter of complicity in this poor woman’s death.
Courtesy of Business Insider, the Romney campaign issued this response: “President Obama’s allies continue to use discredited and dishonest attacks in a contemptible effort to conceal the administration’s deplorable economic record. After 42 months of unemployment above 8 percent, it is clear that the President and his campaign do not have a rationale for reelection. He focused on health care instead of the economy, he hasn’t been able to pass a budget through Congress, he hasn’t been able to cut the deficit like he promised and he’s done little to change the way Washington works. Mitt Romney has a Plan for a Stronger Middle Class that will jumpstart the economy and bring back millions of jobs.”
Barack Obama has blown millions of Americans completely out of the workforce, bringing us years of double-digit unemployment. Do we get to blame him for the death of every relative of every American left unemployed by his policies? How about if we make it sporting by focusing only on businesses that have been directly and aggressively destroyed by his Administration, such as offshore drilling companies and coal mines?
And since we’re being asked to tolerate Joe Soptic’s amateur mind-reading efforts, as he tells us what was going through Mitt Romney’s head when Jonathan Lavine closed GST Steel, are we allowed to speculate on what lurked in Soptic’s heart when he decided to use his dead wife as a political prop in a dishonest campaign ad?
Combined with the scurrilous actions of Harry Reid, this Priorities USA ad provides the perfect opportunity to dispense with the myth of Barack Obama’s “likability” once and for all. The President should be asked to disavow Reid and Priorities USA’s despicable ad at every public appearance he makes… just like the media was obsessed with making Mitt Romney repudiate Donald Trump, not so long ago.
There are complex laws forbidding coordination between candidates and Super PACs, but Newt Gingrich disavowed an allied Super PAC ad he found objectionable during the primary campaign, and suffered no legal repercussions for his admirable display of character. We can ask Barack Obama to show a little character, honor, and decency too… and make sure voters are well aware of how he uses the opportunity.
Of course, it’s been seven weeks since Obama took questions from the White House press corps, so it might be a while before reporters get a chance to ask him about the Priorities USA ad. It’s funny how the press corps is so comfortable with going for almost two months without an opportunity to question the sitting President, but they went into a berserk rage on hallowed ground in Poland because they thought it was unacceptable for Mitt Romney to go for a few days without a press availability.
