New evidence is coming out about just how tough and dirty the Mitt Romney campaign fought to block the Ron Paul takeover of the Republican Party at the State Conventions last summer.

It may offer a little sneak preview of what a Romney presidency will be like. And barring war with Syria or some other dramatic October surprise, Romney may well win this election. The economy should decide that.

It turns out that Mitt Romney and other Republican operatives were apparently very much aware of what was going on at the precinct, county, district and state conventions. This was not greedy state and county chairmen wanting to hang onto power so they could go to the RNC as delegates and get drunk. The hardball tactics were apparently approved and refined from state to state from Iowa, where the state chairman got money for the GOP and promises and conveniently kept a Santorum popularity vote win and a Ron Paul delegate win, out of the news for months, all the way to Tampa, where pudgy, Romney Brownshirt goons raced along the streets in golf cart-like vehicles, looking for demonstrators to divert into chain fence cages beyond view of the media. Welcome to Romney’s America.

Remember Arizona? Where there were accusations of voter fraud and physical violence against Ron Paul delegates? Where delegates were sweated out, kept in 100 degree temperatures without air conditioning and without breaks for water or toilet, in hopes of getting them to give up?

Remember Nathan Sproul?

Remember my blog last summer, claiming fraud and miscounts and ballots taken away for the night to be recounted with numbers changed the next day? Well, Mr. Sproul called Ron Paul headquarters and threatened a lawsuit so I had to take down one of those blogs. Now, what I wrote last summer, as a voice in the wilderness , is being published openly by the New York Times. The mainstream media didn’t mind seeing Ron Paul get mauled but their precious Obama is another matter. Now there are public reports of voter fraud at the hands of Mr. Sproul and a new revelation that he has recently been on the Republican Party payroll to the tune of millions of dollars and assigned to do his deeds in five states.

There is more. It turns out that Nathan Sproul is now linked to Karl Rove who may have hired him as well. Rove has a curiously malevolent streak of his own. In Tampa, at the Romney coronation, Rove suggested – in jest we all presume – the murder of fellow Republican Senate Candidate Todd Akin, who had won the Missouri primary fair and square but now refused to resign and let Rove’s favorite candidate, who had lost, take his place.

Akin misspoke on abortion. Rove, who misspoke on murder, is to be excused.

See: Karl Rove tied to shady GOP operative Nathan Sproul

Meanwhile, a major television network is now finally tracking the story of the Louisiana State GOP. Remember how Romney-Santorum people hired off duty policemen, telling them to arrest troublemakers when they pointed them out? And then after they were voted out and new Ron Paul people were voted in to run the convention they had the hired off duty policeman arrest the new duly elected chairmen who was manhandled? One was knocked to the ground another had his fingers broken while in police custody? Well, that is going to court. Yes, the Ron Paul victims will win, but the Romney people could care less, they got what they wanted and no apology has been offered. Welcome to Romney’s America.

Remember our Ron Paul hero in Missouri, Brent Stafford, who was elected county chairman in St. Charles? Who was arrested and hauled off to jail by off duty police hired by Romney people? He was finally acquitted and the Romney person who ordered the arrest actually applauded the court’s decision. Stafford, may file a lawsuit as well, but the Romney people won’t care. They got what they wanted.

Perhaps the most damaging news of all for the Romney campaign is the emerging story of Charlie “The Cheater” Nejedly. Charlie was caught in Maine, wearing a Ron Paul sticker, passing out fake Ron Paul slates at the Maine State Convention which the Romney people had clearly lost. He was outed on the floor in Maine and soon afterward overheard talking to Romney’s likely nominee for Attorney General, campaign legal counsel, Ben Ginsburg. According to the source, Ginsburg told Nejedly, “We need to get you to Boston.”

It now appears that Charlie “the Cheater” worked the Massachusetts convention too and that he was a paid staffer on the Romney payroll. What’s worse, he is a Notre Dame graduate, which leads to all kinds of conflicts for this author. I grew up in South Bend and I love Notre Dame. And this week they play Brigham Young University. And Manti Teo’s parents are in the audience. Oh my? What can I do?

I will still root for Notre Dame, of course, but Mitt Romney “the cheater” may have to wait for me to cool down a bit. What was he thinking? I know what he was thinking? He was thinking that we would all come around and vote for him instead of Obama because of the economy. So he could cheat and fake to his heart’s content. But the more clearly in focus it becomes the less impressed I am of Romney’s America. Where are we headed?

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