Hi Jabber,
Depending on what the "dumb things" are, I think it does matter. I agree that many of us are guilty of doing dumb things when we were younger. And Lord knows, many of these dumb things follow us our entire lives.
Personally, I will always thank the Lord that He protected me in some of the dumb things I did - or thought about doing. There was the time I was locked out of the house, so I climbed up the back porch of my parents' house and onto the roof deck off their bedroom so as to let myself into a door I knew wouldn't be locked. That, in retrospect, was a dumb thing.
And then there was the dumb thing I almost did: This involved a blind curve on a road in the little community I lived in for most of my youth. My best friend Jenny told me her sister Marty (a year older than us)had told her that she (Marty) and her friends used to try to speed around that corner at 70 mph, attempting to skid around the corner on just two wheels.
I thought that sounded like good fun, and I resolved to try it - while driving my mother's 4-door Ford LTD. I got up the speed and approached the curve. But at the last moment, my good sense and reason got the better of me. I braked hard and took the curve more sedately, and under control.
And I never tried it again: There was a mom and a grandma walking down the road while pushing a stroller. Had I come around the curve all out of control, I am not sure that I could have avoided hitting them.
Even considering doing this was a dumb thing. And thankfully, because I got myself and the car under control, no one got hurt. But had I persisted in my quest of pursuing a dumb idea, people could have been hurt -- even killed in a worst case scenario -- and I would have had to own up to my actions and live with the results for the rest of my life.
So I guess these little known facts of my youth are what allow me to say that when, in our youth, we do dumb things that we KNOW will involve hurting other people, as Romney has admitted to doing, I am afraid I DO hold it against him. HE SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER.
I feel that his self-control was lacking and that his resultant bullying was more than a name-calling prank, which many people have done, and for which I could probably forgive him.
No, the concept of
Romney holding a fellow classmate down and forcibly cutting his hair - whether or not he knew the guy was gay -- was extremely aggressive.
I don't see that as a "prank," it's an assault. Something which, had he been adult, might be grounds for arrest.
So while I won't say that this activity ALONE ought to make him ineligible for the presidency, I will say that it doesn't sound the the actions of a leader to me.
But, I've never attended a private boarding school. If someone were to tell me this sort of activity happens often there, I'll be glad to re-evaluate my opinion in light of new facts. But as my knowledge currently stands, I have to say it made me think a lot less of the candidate.