Romney's Just An Average American (Not!)

Willard Mitt Romney (aka Wall Street Willie) is not just rich, he's incredibly rich. He has a net worth of about a quarter of a billion dollars and makes more than $20 million a year without lifting a finger (or working an hour). And it's been that way his whole life. He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, and has turned it into platinum (by hiding money overseas instead of paying taxes on it -- money he made by destroying American jobs).

But while that is a true picture of Wall Street Willie, that's not the picture he wants to project to the voters. He doesn't want the voters to realize he's richer than the last eight American presidents combined. He wants voters to think he's just like them -- an average ordinary American. That's why he's always appearing without a jacket and with his sleeves rolled up, or even going so far as to dress in jeans (like the picture above).

It's also why he makes ridiculous statements like he did in Florida, when he told a group of unemployed workers (who were praying their unemployment insurance lasts long enough for them to find a new job) that he understood their feelings because he was also unemployed. It was a stupid remark, and the unemployed knew it. His unemployment was of his own choosing, and he still makes more in a month than most of them will see in a lifetime.

This has turned into a major problem for Romney (as if he didn't have enough problems with Independents and women deserting him over his rabid right-wing views). Romney doesn't have any idea of how hard life is for the average Americans in this terrible jobless economy. He doesn't know because he has never had to do without anything, or had to worry about how the rent and bills would be paid and groceries bought for his family. And the American people know that.

A new YouGov Poll shows that Romney has a substantial and growing "empathy gap". The American people think Romney cares about rich people, but doesn't understand (or care) about the problems they have. Consider the following poll numbers:

DOES ROMNEY CARE ABOUT PEOPLE LIKE YOU?
Yes...............38%
No...............63%

ROMNEY CARES ABOUT. . .
the poor...............35%
the middle class...............45%
the rich...............85%

Those numbers reveal a huge problem -- a problem that must be fixed if he is to have much of a chance in November. But he has been supporting the efforts of congressional Republicans to make more cuts in programs to help the poor and middle class, the blocking of any real government jobs program, and huge new tax cuts for the rich. Something tells me that's not the way to fix his "empathy" problem.