Well it's one thing to be wealthy and spend your money as your wish, but it's another thing to be wealthy and try and talk to poorer people like he understands where they're coming from.
OK. This reminded me about something that troubled me a while back but I didn't bring it up here before. Why do people often claim that a person can't understand how others feel without being in the exact same position? Isn't that what empathy is?
This is going a bit off topic but I've seen examples of this a few times lately. For example during the Finnish presidential elections there was someone claiming that since Haavisto (The candidate who lost the final round against Niinistö.) is gay he "cannot understand" average finnish citizens and does not represent them. Also he didn't serve in the army so that puts him in another minority. In my mind this was idiotic (and possibly the guy was simply projecting his own inability to feel empathy) it is one thing to claim that a politician is only looking out for a certain group (or just for him-/herself) but claiming that this person has no empathy is a bold claim. Sometimes there might be truth to it and in this case I have heard some of the Comments Romney makes...
Still, I just wanted to bring this out.
He can say he knows how poor people feel, but until he gives proof of this, through his actions, his speech, or how he manages his money, his actions are under scrutiny.
This.
And, as much as I hate the “You have never actually been there, so there is no way you can understand,” attitude, there is a certain grain of truth to it. Some things have to be experienced for one to truly understand it.
In any case, if Romney indicated he actually understood, or was at least making a good faith attempt to
try to understand, that would be one thing. But his actions and other comments indicate that his claims of understanding the poor are nothing but cheap political rhetoric.
