By Melanie Nathan, September 16, 2012

Mitt Romney keeps putting his foot in it and just when you think it cannot get any worse, it does. A cornerstone of the Romney Ryan campaign are bold lies  and now Mitt Romney is praising a fellow liar for his values and leadership.  In the must watch video below Mitt Romney thanks Tony Perkins and the Perkins led hate group, Family Research Council, for their leadership on family values. In a recorded message to the attendees at The Voter Value Summit in D.C., Mitt Romney is using the hate group pander to prop his campaign.

Imagine a presidential candidate of the United States of America thanking the leader of a known hate group, who had direct dealings with the Klu Klux Klan, and who has made the most abhorrent and outlandish public statements against fellow Americans, for his leadership and values?

The Southern {Poverty Law center has described Perkins’ Family Research Council as a “Hate Group” which under their definition means that they purposefully disseminate lies against their targets, such as gay people. By thanking Perkins for his leadership Romney is endorsing each and every lie the man has told to earn the SPLC distinction of ‘hate group.’

Romney’s message is clearly an attack on same-sex relationships and certainly a dig at marriage equality. By contextualizing his thanks to Perkins and his praise of Rick Santorum with the economic struggle of Americans, one can only wonder about the audacity of his delivery. While he is clearly endorsing the anti-gay sentiments to wedge Americans, he is drawing a subtle analogy between the problems of America and so called values that Perkins supports which are anti-choice and gay hating.

The clear grovelling in the dirt with a pig like Perkins surely is not fitting for a presidential candidate. But we know where Mitt’s audience is and now we know how low he will stoop for the votes that he so desperately needs.