I wanted to give an opinion about why Romney should be open to public scrutiny. I once made online campaigns for a presidential candidate here in the Philippines in 2010. I did it because I thought such candidate, who is a successful businessman and knows a lot about economics, is highly-qualified to be the President of the Philippines. But when accusations and criticisms about some of his past business deals have been hurled against him, such candidate merely retorted that “all of his accusers are liars.” He didn’t respond to prove that such allegations were baseless. I stopped making online campaigns for such presidential candidate since I was somehow demoralized by his inactions to prove that such allegations were not true. Such inability to respond to the allegations led to such candidate's defeat in the 2010 Philippine Presidential Election.  I even voted for Noynoy Aquino to be the President of the Philippines in year 2010.

I think Romney should stop asking an apology from Pres. Obama regarding the so-called dirty political ads that accused the former governor of certain things. It’s childish of Romney to keep on requesting the Team Obama to stop hurling criticisms and accusations against him. Mudslinging is part and parcel of any election-campaign in all throughout the free world. A candidate running for a public office in a democracy should be open to public scrutiny, since voters have the right to know the facts regarding the candidate that they would be voting for. In a democracy, no one is above the law! Elected public officials can be impeached if they have committed certain offenses. Such elected officials can also be prosecuted and penalized if they’ve done crimes in the past or have become law-breakers in the present time. Hence, every candidate who is running for public office in a democracy should be open to public scrutiny since he would be elected to serve public interests.

Romney should come out clean and prove to the American public that he has nothing to hide to them. He should prove that he’s not a corporate raider and he properly pays his taxes. Romney has styled himself as some kind of savior that will lead America out of its economic problems. But how can he successfully lead the US out of economic problems when he himself is being accused of committing shady business deals in the past. He also hasn’t yet released all of his tax returns. The Occupy Wall Street has named corporate greed and business malpractices as among the major factors that contributed to the global economic meltdown. Hence, Romney’s credibility as a presidential candidate would greatly suffer if he can’t prove to the public that he’s a good tax-payer and he’s not a representative of corporate greed.

Romney and Obama are both running for the highest position in the United States. The candidate who looks more credible to voters would certainly win the coming US presidential election. It’s important for Romney to prove that he didn’t ship jobs to Mexico and China nor committed tax-frauds. If Romney’s credibility goes down now, he will have a difficult time convincing voters that he can lead America out of its economic problems.

Both Romney and Obama must show to voters that they are open to public scrutiny. That means both of them should be willing to discuss their past records to the public and can show proofs that they’re really clean politicians who would truly-serve the public. Aside from qualifications, a presidential candidate in a democracy must be truly-credible as a leader. It’s up to the voters to decide who between Romney and Obama deserves to be in the White House.