Romney's reliance on cognitive dissonance

NOW THAT MCMITT has twirled himself as the principal dancer in the Republican spin to the convention, a few questions still remain unanswered. I refer to Number Three in the Grumpy Laws of Political Dissonance which, until now, argued that two conflicting ideas cannot occupy the same human skull at the same time.

For example, it has long been shown by Newton or somebody that two masses cannot occupy the same space at the same time. That's true of ideas, too - even the subatomic weightless ones that Mr. Romney has been casting about. (So have some of his fellow-Republicans like John Boehner. But does anybody really think that he counts for anything these days?) Look at it this way: Can you believe that a door is both locked and unlocked at the same instant? Or be confident that your checkbook will precisely balance while conceding that it never has when you receive the statement? Tell me I'm wrong, folks!

With McMitt, he will confidently tell you that although he agrees the economy is improving, President Obama has made it worse. Or that even though Osama bin Laden is dead, we're finally out of Iraq and the president was absolutely correct on Libya, Obama has been a total failure on foreign policy. (I prefer Joe Biden's trenchant view that "Osama bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive."

There's a fancy term for Romney's blustery contradictory thoughts: cognitive dissonance. If you agree, the remainder of this dreadfully long campaign will be fun.

P.S. Today newspapers carried a photo of McMitt, in his designer jeans and open- collar white shirt casually walking somewhere with his grandchildren. He is trying so hard to be a "regular" ($250 million) guy, don't you think? His tactic would be more persuasive if I saw him standing in a long line at a supermarket checkout clutching a fistful of discount coupons on Super Bowl Sunday.

Joe's a multiple choice politician

JOE LIEBERMAN, the protean politician, a.k.a Zelig, continues to turn up in public to defend his thesis that (1) he wants health care reform because there are unfortunate souls among us who don't have insurance and desperately need it and (2) he will support a filibuster that will essentially kill any reforms in the current congress because his conscience tells him to do it. That sort of thinking is commonly called cognitive dissonance and Lieberman is in the top tier of those who manage to get by each day on their never-ending reliance on psychobabble.

For one thing, Joe knows as well as anybody that to kill the bill and start all over again would take us back to where we've been before - for decades, and may not return until long after he will be enjoying his retirement on a senator's many perks. Where his conscience fails him is his insistence in protecting the very health care industry with which his wife was closely associated for more than three decades.

But he , like some of his colleagues on both sides of the aisle who have the same conflicts of interest, don't allow that to trouble his spirit. He just soldiers on, wherever a TV camera crosses his path, repeating his credo day after day, always full of warm reassurances that he only wants to do what's right for America. But the real problem is that political hypocrites like Lieberman are what's wrong with America.