Based in Tucson, Arizona and Illinois, Jeff Biggers is the David Brower Award/American Book Award-winning author of Reckoning at Eagle Creek: The Secret Legacy of Coal in the Heartland, The United States of Appalachia, and In the Sierra Madre. His forthcoming book, State Out of the Union: Arizona and the Final Showdown Over the American Dream (Nation Books) will be released in September, 2012. His website is: www.jeffbiggers.com While presidential contender Mitt Romney attempted to sway Latino voters at a Univision Forum in Florida last night, the fallout over his taped quips at a Republican fundraiser also include a joke about his Mexican-born father, George Romney. If he had been "born of Mexican parents," Romney said, as opposed to his Mormon transplanted ones, "I'd have a better shot at winning this."
One year ago, in a piece for Salon.com, I took a closer look at Romney's family history in Mexico, and more particularly, their illegal flight from Arizona.
To be clear, while no one should hold Mitt Romney accountable for his ancestors' transgressions more than a century ago, Romney's continual reference to his family's Mexican history begs the question: Did Mitt Romney intentionally lie about -- or, in the very least, misrepresent or "air brush" -- the history of his ancestors' documented escape from Arizona justice in his 2004 memoir, Turnaround: Crisis, Leadership, and the Olympic Games?
You be the judge: Does a proper reckoning of history matter?...
