Everybody is talking about the leaked video of Romney talking about 47 percent who pay no income tax and feed at the government trough, while the hard working 53 percent support the rest of the country. 

 

Even conservatives are slapping their heads. David Brooks writes,

Personally, I think he’s a kind, decent man who says stupid things because he is pretending to be something he is not — some sort of cartoonish government-hater. But it scarcely matters. He’s running a depressingly inept presidential campaign. Mr. Romney, your entitlement reform ideas are essential, but when will the incompetence stop?

We're all receiving some sort of a government benefit – Medicare or public education or safe streets. Our veterans use hospitals that mend them after the bodies have been ruined by war. We all have family members who have needed unemployment, due to this horrific economy. 

I'm hesitant to say that Romney's statement is typical of the conservative point of view and that this endemic of widespread wrong thinking. Yes, there's this 53% website that I've checked out from time to time, but other than one or two wingnuts in a compound in Montana, nobody is ready to stop caring for the veterans, children, and the elderly. 

Here's a nice chart from Klein about who pays income tax and who doesn't. 10 percent of those who don't pay income tax are the elderly. Stop your whining about eating cat food, old man, and pay us some money. 

Did Romney just lose the election? Will this leaked video lead to a landslide win for Obama? 

Romney is right about the fact that 47% will never vote for him, because partisanship is solidified in this country. But to paint the die-hard Democratic voters as the freeloaders vs. the hard-working Republicans is sloppy and stupid. He certainly offended even his base who are all getting help from government in one way or another. Were the offended enough to vote for the other guy? Will they decide to stay home on voting day? 

UPDATE: I'm watching FOX and reading conservative blogs right now. I'm curious how they are responding to this gaffe. The NRO people aren't happy. 

Oooh. Nice chart.

UPDATE2: David Frum writes:

So when a politician or a broadcaster talks about 47% in "dependency," the image that swims into many white voters' minds is not their mother in Florida, her Social Security untaxed, receiving Medicare benefits vastly greater than her lifetime tax contributions; it is not their uncle, laid off after 30 years and now too old to start over. No, the image that comes into mind is minorities on welfare.