Has Mitt Romney developed time travel?
Mitch Potter of the Toronto Star wrote Monday that the former Massachusetts Governor told a Milford, MI audience that he was at the Golden Jubilee – a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the American automobile – when he was about 4 years old.
Sounds nice, except for one slight problem.
Romney had not yet been born when the Jubilee took place.
Potter wrote:
The Golden Jubilee described so vividly by Romney was indeed an epic moment in automotive lore. The parade included one of the last public appearances by an elderly Henry Ford.
And it took place June 1, 1946 — fully nine months before Romney was born.
He adds that “Romney could well have been conceived that day. But it is inconceivable he was actually there.”
When contacted by reporters, the Huffington Post notes, the campaign claimed Romney didn’t actually claim to be at the festivities:
“Mitt doesn’t say he was there,” said the aide. “In fact, he says his memory was foggy, he ‘thinks’ his dad had a job there and that he was “probably 4 or something like that.” He was simply telling the story about his dad.”
But the quote from Romney is quite clear.
“I think my dad had a job like being the grand master or whatever of the 50th celebration of the automobile in Detroit. They painted Woodward Avenue with gold paint … My memory is a little foggy here … So I was probably four or something like that, and had the cars go down Woodward Avenue. I know they still have the parade of cars every year,” he told the Tea Party activists gathered at the meeting.
According to the Huffington Post, Romney has done this before:
In 2007, Romney claimed that he saw his father march with Martin Luther King Jr. David Bernstein of the Boston Phoenix researched the claim and wrote that he found “no evidence that the senior Romney actually marched with King, nor anything in the public record suggesting that he ever claimed to do so.” The Romney campaign later responded that they both marched in June 1963, but not on the same day or in the same city, but in the same “series” of events.
On Tuesday, conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh said this was reminiscent of a claim made by then-Senator Hillary Clinton that she was named after Sir Edmund Hilary – the man who first scaled Mt. Everest.
That story was repeated in her informal biography, as well her husband’s autobiography.
But Hilary had not yet climbed Mt. Everest when she was born.
In 2006, the New York Times wrote:
But one big hole has been poked in the story over the years, both in cyberspace and elsewhere: Sir Edmund became famous only after climbing Everest in 1953. Mrs. Clinton, as it happens, was born in 1947.
This is the man Sen. John McCain says Republicans should settle on as their nominee to face Barack Obama.
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