Thursday, August 09, 2012

Getting Romney's culture quote just right

There may have been some confusion about what Romney actually said about culture and economic success, so I thought I would document it:

I recognize the power of at least culture and a few other things....As you come here and you see the G.D.P. per capita, for instance, in Massachussetts, which is about $53,000, and compare that with the G.D.P. per capita just across the state of Mississippi managed by Governor Haley Barbour, which is more like $31,000 per capita, you notice such a dramatically stark difference in economic vitality....If you could learn anything from the economic history of the world it’s this: culture makes all the difference.... I recognize the hand of providence in selecting this place.
I think I got that right.  If not perfectly correct, then I'm certain it fits the spirit of what he was trying to say.

News report of quote is here, and economic info here.

17 comments:

THE CLIMATE WARS said...

That should be" The hand of Providence",
Roger Williams having by 1639 discerned Mississippi to be place entirely preterite.

One wonders what Cotton Mather and the city fathers of Salem would have done had prosthelytizing Mormons or Scientologists appeared at the height of the witch trials

dhogaza said...

"One wonders what Cotton Mather and the city fathers of Salem would have done had prosthelytizing Mormons or Scientologists appeared at the height of the witch trials"

They would've worried about running out of rope ...

John said...

If Romney had traveled backward in time, and visited the antebellum South, he would have noted that the slaveowners had lots of money, while the slaves were very poor. Romney would have concluded that the slaveowners had a superior culture, which accounted for their wealth.

Romney would definitely have resisted the left-wing notion that the wealth of the Southern ruling class was financed by the poverty of their slaves.

bill said...

I recall many years ago watching a documentary made in newly post-democratic South Africa where one of the main characters was a white businessman who was complaining that his black employees irrationally resented his affluence and status, as exemplified by his new Mercedes, and we got to see him chiding them along the lines of "ah, but I've had to work hard for it. You''l ve to, too."

Ugh! And this was supposed to be one of the 'progressives'!

It was a pretty-good introduction to actual South Africa rather than the anticipated 'free' state, though...

Martin Vermeer said...

The good news is, Romney reads books

THE CLIMATE WARS said...

The Society for the Supression of Savage Customs continues to offer a substantial reward for the apprehension of post-bellum slave dealers attempting the sale of Mormon missionaries in the markets of Mali and Burkina Faso.

The market appears glutted , as attempts to trade Elders in for Watchtower salesmen in Kano have so far met with no successs.

Anonymous said...

Reminds me of Lincoln

Beware of saying the better can enslave the lesser because then you make yourself a slave to the first man you meet who is better than you.

Alastair said...

Perhaps it should be pointed out to Romsey that the Israelis, unlike the Palestinians, receive over $5 billion dollars a year from the US. When he becomes president, then that might be a good place to start when reducing the deficit.

Anonymous said...

Shorter Romny

"Thank God the Pilgrims did not land at Biloxi Rock"

~@:>

Alastair said...

"Even excluding all of these extra costs, America’s $84.8 billion in aid to Israel from fiscal years 1949 through 1998, and the interest the U.S. paid to borrow this money, has cost U.S. taxpayers $134.8 billion, not adjusted for inflation. Or, put another way, the nearly $14,630 every one of 5.8 million Israelis received from the U.S. government by Oct. 31, 1997 has cost American taxpayers $23,240 per Israeli."

http://ifamericansknew.org/stats/cost_of_israel.html

dhogaza said...

John:

"Romney would have concluded that the slaveowners had a superior culture, which accounted for their wealth."

Oddly enough, the slaveowners reached the same conclusion on their own, comparing the "superiority" of their culture to that of the contemporary North. As well as favorably comparing their culture to that of the Roman era, many Romans, as they were eager to point out, also having been slaveowners ...

dhogaza said...

Martin:

"The good news is, Romney reads books"

Though, as Jared Diamond pointed out a couple of days ago in the NYTimes, it's not clear he understands them. Apparently he drew some "interesting" conclusions from Diamond's "Guns, Steel and Germs" which astonish the author ...

Rattus Norvegicus said...

And this op-ed from today's Times nails Romney's rather cloistered world view to the wall.

Anonymous said...

As Hansen has noted, the entire distribution has shifted to the right making what were once extreme outliars now commonplace.

~@:>

Martin Vermeer said...

> outliars

Sigmund!!

Anonymous said...

The right side of a shifty (ab)normal disturbution is indeed a slippery slope.

~@:>

J Bowers said...

Some choice Romney and Ryan quotes in these articles:

* Mitt Romney Started Bain Capital With Money From Families Tied To Death Squads
* Paul Ryan's Skeleton in the Closet

For a failed and dead screenwriter who couldn't walk her own talk, Rand sure does maintain an influence, and I wonder what the Latin-American electorate will think of Romney now. I predict huge purges of eligible voters from the electoral register.