Twitter Wars: Chrysler Exec Tweets Romney “Full of … Well, You Know.”

By Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger

No word yet if the Moon is in the seventh house or if Jupiter has aligned with Mars but something curious is happening among the monied gentry that form the Republican base. Seems Presidential candidate Mitt Romney is being called out and dissed by the “family.” First, NJ governor Chris Christie, once thought of as a possible Romney running mate for VP, praises Obama for his FEMA support after Hurricane Sandy (and juxtaposed with Romney’s call to end FEMA), and now Chrysler exec. Ralph Gilles calls Romney a liar and full of something rhyming with Mitt.

What prompted Giles’ ire was a tweeted claim by the candidate that, “Obama is a terrible negotiator. He bails out Chrysler and now Chrysler wants to send all Jeep manufacturing to China–and will!”  The responding electronic  salvo from Gilles was blunt and scatological, “”You are full of sh*t!”  Gilles later apologized for his language, but his sentiment was backed up by Chrysler Group LLC Chief Executive Sergio Marchionne who emailed employees that, “I feel obliged to unambiguously restate our position: Jeep production will not be moved from the United States to China.”

Romney had claimed at a speech in swing state Ohio that he read a news article flatly stating that all Jeep production was moving.  Jeep has a huge assembly facility in Toledo, so the claim hit like an Arctic blast to a state with 7% unemployment (down from 10.5 % in 2010). Marchionne, who heads both Chrysler and Fiat, seemed to blame Romney’s possible dyslexia saying Jeep production in China would be for the Chinese market, and that the company would not take any production away from Chrysler’s U.S. plants. Rather, he said, Chrysler is adding jobs and investment at its Ohio plant.

No word yet on what Romney read. Maybe the polls in Ohio showing him trailing by 3-4 percentage points.

What makes the two circumstances interesting is the public nature of the family dispute. It’s rare that any Republican strays from Ronald Reagan’s cult like (and faintly un-American) “11th Commandment’ that,  “Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican.”

Even more rare is upsetting the guy you think might be the next President — unless, that is, you don’t ….

Source: Huffington Post

~Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger