This was a bad week to be Mitt Romney. Sure, his firing of the person he hired to be his foreign affairs advisor, who happened to be gay, didn't help things off. It was especially damaging when this happened on the heels of Obama giving his historic statement on gay marriage and equality. Add the bullying incident uncovered when he was in high school and, as a cherry to the top of the week, a speech he gave at the very gay unfriendly Liberty University, founded by Jerry Falwell, and you can see this would probably be a week Romney would soon like to forget.

The takeaway Romney and his staff seem to exhibit from this week's events should really trouble those who are thinking of voting for the man. Like everything that happens with public people who get in trouble, the deeds that have caused the initial trouble is not what people are focusing on; it is the reaction, the cover-up or the ignoring that is causing harm with the candidate. Remember early in the campaign when Romney tried to sell the idea that people disliked him because of his wealth? Republicans would cheer when he made those statements and the Republican pundits would make, and continue to make, the false statement that just because Romney is Republican and rich is the reason why some dislike him. They are more too eager to point out people like Warren Buffett and Soros who are rich and on the left that Democrats have no problems with.

Compassion is the answer, my friends. Empathy is the answer, my friends. The issue has always been the compassion factor when I comes to Republicans. It's ironic that a party that clings to the teachings of Jesus so much are unwilling to show compassion in policy. In a way, Republicans may want to put religion in government but are more than willing to separate the underlying traditions of Christianity when it comes to government. If you can't help yourself, don't expect government to assist you seems to be the message of the Republican party.

With Romney, when we were dealing with his economic and compassion, there could be an argument made that business is something that you could separate humanity from. Business is about making money and sometimes in making money people can be hurt. His company was built upon making money for his clients, not necessarily for the businesses they took over. The new allegations and his reactions to them, are showing the non-business side of Romney and even if, as some would like to do, you took away the actual actions he did, the reaction to those incidents are troubling and that is what is causing so many to take a good, hard look at Romney the person. Business deals and actions can be put into a ruthless business context, but how you deal with people; that you can't just dismiss.

Did you hear what happened when Romney was given information about the bullying incident he supposedly participated in at his high school on radio show by a Fox personality? Romney chuckled (I'll use that word instead of saying laughed) four times while he explained it was just a prank, he didn't know the person was homosexual, not recalling the incident and he gave a half hearted apology to anyone he might have hurt or offended when the incident occurred. A prank? A prank is not hunting someone down, having a number of students pin him down and having you, Romney, as the ringleader, pulling out a pair of scissors and cutting off his hair. That isn't something to chuckle at. That Romney claims he doesn't remember the incident while other classmates do remember the incident is just crazy. I have forgotten a number of things from high school, and when I talk to some people I've known in high school and they mention an incident I might have forgotten, just the mention of it will stir some memories. But, to be real, those might be something odd like who might have been dating whom at some party or an incident I wasn't a part of and might have been told to me by someone else at the time.

No one has to remind me of the Natasha Dolittle incident, or the USC prank, or the Disneyland fiasco, or the pool party at Larry's house or a vast amount of things I was a participant in during high school. I remember them happening, so it seems highly unlikely, unless somehow all five people that recounted the story for the paper were lying, Mitt Romney led them in a vicious attack of a student which they have effected them severely for almost 50 years.

The Romney issue, as I've said, has less to do with what he did in the past and more about his reaction today. I don't know if is reaction has to do with the detachment of privilege, a basic uncaring nature or some other factor, but when you couple his business issues and now his compassion issue you get a portrait of a man who will not 'feel your pain,' who is not a compassionate conservative. It makes you realize, when you take all into consideration, why he would say Corporations are people, my friends.