Romney Finds Himself in a Dog Fight

Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney really has a dog fight on his hands at the moment.

Seriously. A dog fight.

Here's the deal: There's been a story in political circles for a long time now about the Romney family taking a road trip vacation. The inside of the Romney family car was filed with, well, Romneys, plus all their luggage and gear. There was no room for the poor family dog, Seamus.

So they tied a crate to the roof of the car, and put Seamus in the crate and away they went. Apparently, the dog was afraid or generally unhappy up there, so he had a bit of a diarrhea attack, which oozed down the back window of the car.

Dogs Against Romney protest at a campaign event

Hardly the type of thing to put one in a vacation mood.

There's conflicting reports on whether the Romneys stopped and hosed down the car and Seamus, or just drove through a car wash to clean up. (The car wash story seems pretty unreliable to me.)

For the record, Seamus survived the trip in the crate to Canada just fine.  Romney said Seamus liked it up there and Seamus died later of natural causes at a ripe old age.

In any event, the Seamus in a crate story is becoming an issue for Romney, the current front runner in the field of Republican presidential candidates.

New York Times columnist Gail Collins has for years now brought up Seamus in the crate every time she mentions Romney. And I mean Every. Single. Time. It's her meme.

Now there's a blog, called, Dogs Against Romney, which is apparently dog lovers, writing in behest of dogs, saying that Romney is probably not a good fit to be president because, in their view, putting a dog on a crate on the roof of a speeding car is animal abuse.

Dogs Against Romney are even selling a t-shirt with a logo that reads: "Rubbing Mitt's Nose In It."

My dog Jackson, himself a declared presidential candidate, has also weighed in on the controversy. As Jackson's media handler, I'll quote him thus:    "Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr"

Let me add that Jackson's Grrrrrrrr was definitely not a happy one. I could tell, because when Romney appeared on the television news, Jackson tried to bite the TV screen. And let me tell you his teeth are pretty damn sharp.

Newt Gingrich, now Romney's arch-nemesis, has also picked up on the story, attacking Romney as not fit because of the Seamus issue. A Gingrich campaign ad out there quotes Romney committing all kinds of alleged sins (At least what Gingrich considers sins) and the Seamus episode is in there.

I don't know where this dog fight will lead, but it's a warning for any political candidate out there: Stupid, bad dog stories always have a way of coming back to bite you.