I am 47%

47% of the country will not, under any circumstances vote for Mitt Romney. I am part of that 47%. I wouldn't shake the man's hand if it met him. I wouldn't vote for him if he was running against this guy. Previously I only thought Mitt Romney was spineless. Now I know he is soulless as well. His callous disregard for nearly half the country puts him at odds with everything it means to be American. In fact, I'm ready to pass harsher judgement. Mitt Romney is decidedly un-American.

Just as importantly, he is a liar and a hypocrite. I will start by referring to a great article in the Economist that exposes Republican hypocrisy on the issue of taxes. At the article details, Republicans are largely responsible for the fact that many working Americans don't pay federal income tax. They have lowered tax rates so many times, that lower income people have fallen off the scale entirely. So although 28% of the country (not the 47% referenced by Romney, a number that includes retirees and extremely impoverished people), work they do not pay federal income tax but they do pay payroll taxes. So the "problem" if you consider it that, is one for which Republicans are largely responsible. But this leads us to the great deception, the idea that income tax and tax are synonymous.

This is obvious of course, but Republicans throw the word tax around with such regularity that it is easy to forget that there are many different kind of taxes, and while 47% of Americans pay no federal income tax, the aforementioned 28% do pay payroll taxes, and nearly everyone who purchases good pays sales tax. So when Republicans talk about 47% of the country being freeloaders, they are telling a lie about an issue they are largely responsible for creating. It is the height of deception and hypocrisy. The great irony here is that while these people preach class warfare anytime someone accurately points out that the huge and growing disparity in wealth between the rich and poor is a moral injustice and an economic problem, they are more than willing to stand in front of a group of millionaires and talk about how lazy half the country is.

And that brings me to my second point which will come in the form of a personal anecdote. I work for a network of schools, and I recruit employees - primarily teachers - for our network. I am 26 and pay all my taxes, but this story isn't about me. It is about the hundreds of faceless names that I see on resumes every day. Mitt Romney would have you believe that half the country doesn't want to work, but I am here to tell you otherwise. I see the resumes, and many of them are not pretty. They aren't funny, they are sad. It is easy to tell when people lack the education or the skill necessary to be competitive, but that isn't stopping them from trying. People want to work. People want to make something of themselves. The people Mitt Romney thinks he is speaking of are looking for jobs. They are applying not once, not twice, but three or four times even if they have been turned down in the past. I often see resumes that I don't even consider because I know we would never hire that person, but it kills me each time that happens because I imagine that many of those people are unemployed and doing everything in their power to provide for themselves and their families. Those people and all of us deserve more than what Mitt Romney is selling. Despite the odds beings stacked against them they are trying, and they deserve someone who will empower them further, not callously dismiss their efforts.

Mitt Romney and Republicans think that what America great is an idea. That is wrong. What makes America great is the people who make that idea a reality. What makes America great is Americans. What America needs is a president who believes in Americans, not Mitt Romney.