Posted on 01/13/2012 6:14:08 PM PST by VinL
Furthermore, making a profit is only one component of owning a business. Whatever happened to the idea that you are responsible for your workers and to the larger community? Too often, people feel like just pawns in a ‘game’ of ever increasing largesse for the top dogs. The big shots are always the winners – often getting payouts in the millions when their companies fail — and the “losers” are left to figure out how to eat or buy clothes for their children. (A new study found that $100 million “golden parachutes” have become commonplace for failed CEOs).
Romney’s “class envy” claim is predicated on a lie we often here from the uber-rich and their defenders: the highest goal and achievement for Americans is to be wealthy, when all most people want is to be able to provide a decent lives for their families…
The unlikely hero in this tale has been Newt Gingrich, who has been making the most coherent argument for ethical capitalism. Says Gingrich, what we want is, “a free enterprise system that is honest. . . fair to everyone and gives everyone an equal opportunity to pursue happiness.” Criticizing Romney’s brand of free enterprise, (Newt)said, “It’s not fine if the person who is rich manipulates the system, gets away with all the cash and leaves behind the human beings.”
Be still my heart.
(Excerpt) Read more at hotair.com ...
The argument is being made that Bain was “unethical” in it’s business practices.
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No, the argument is that Romney is unethical, untrustworthy, greedy, and self aggrandizing beyond acceptable dimensions.
I'm in real estate. I started buying junk in bad neighborhoods. I chased out the families that wanted to live like garbage, the criminals and the gangs. I rehabbed the buildings refinanced and then later sold them. I guess in our new lexicon I'm an evil capitalist that threw families out on the street. Of course no one wants to talk about the families that moved in and enjoyed having a nice safe place to live.
I think we’re getting pretty away from the original point. Romney was bragging about his experience at Bain making him more qualified than any of the other candidates for the presidency, especially his part in creating jobs. When challenged on job creation, he threw out the 100,000 jobs number. So we’re looking at Bain trying to reconcile that claim. Either he did or he didn’t. And if he didn’t then it’s just another Romney lie.
When it was pointed out that Bain also destroyed a lot of jobs, then Romney claimed the 100,000 jobs was “net, net.” Ok, if that’s true, how about backing up those claims with facts and figures. I think his boastful claims make makes his experience at Bain a valid issue. Let’s see him back up his claims.
We already know he ran to the left of Ted Kennedy on abortion, gay rights, gun control, global warming, etc, and governed as a liberal in Massachusetts leaving his state saddled with taxpayer funded abortion, gay marriage, liberal activist judges, high cost budget busting government subsidized healthcare and mandates against the citizens. These are indisputable facts on the record. And despite his protests to the contrary, RomneyCare, which he still brags about today, is all the proof we need of his big government progressivism. So, if now he’s claiming his experience at Bain proves he’s a fiscal conservative and a job creator, then he should have no trouble backing up his claims with facts. He should aggressively pursue this. Prove his accusers wrong.
He’s been further challenged on the fact that some of his profits were made by exploiting the taxpayers and or by running up the debts of some the companies he controlled through Bain, then taking out the cash for his investors leaving the companies crippled under high debt loads and facing eventual bankruptcy. If this is untrue, he should be able to prove it company by company. He has admitted some of his buyouts failed as we can’t be successful 100% of the time. Ok, let’s have a list of successes and failures, jobs created, jobs lost, dollars taken out by Bain, et al, taxpayer money lost, etc.
Does anyone have a spreadsheet of the companies involved?
I'm with you 1,000%. These should have been the points of attack on Romney. When they choose to attack his venture capital practices they dragged in free enterprise and bought into the socialist garbage about "ethical" capitalism.
This is so frustrating because they have made Romney a sympathetic figure in the process.
Jim
This Wall Street Journal piece providing a broad overview of booms and busts at Bain is the closest I have seen to what you are looking for.Although it does not get into an accounting of net jobs gained or lost. No one has to date.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204331304577140850713493694.html
Chuckee, you know we disagree on the Bain thing with Romney, but we don't disagree on Romney being a disaster for the election.
I want you to look at that last line you wrote and imagine it as part of a billion dollar ad campaign used against Romney in ad after ad by Barack Obama. Then imagine it in ad after ad by the super-PACS that will be supporting Obama, and then imagine all of the news media, the entertainment industry, late-night shows, and Hollywood providing FREE anti-Romney caricatures based on his being an insensitive, hyper-wealthy, silver-spoon-in-mouth, caring, job firing, middle class despising, Simon Legree.
Romney is not electable, and whether you agree with Newt's attack or not, it has highlighted a supreme weakness of Romney in the election.
We really have only one choice in S Carolina, and that is the poll leader other than Romney by the middle of this week, for the primary, oddly enough, is on 21 January, Saturday.
That will probably be Newt. If we permit that conservative vote to be split one more time in the S Carolina primary, then Romney will not be stopped due to the anointing power of the GOP media, and then he will go on to a terrible defeat in the general election.
God is our only hope.
But, it appears that our only choice is being narrowed down to Gingrich or Santorum, and it must be decided now. The Romney replacement would be helped by appearing to surge this week.
You have to bring it in. He’s now boasting his job creation record at Bain proves he’s a qualified free-market conservative. And HE threw out the number of 100,000 jobs created net, net. Let him prove it. Supply a list of Bain enhanced companies, jobs lost, jobs created.
Furthermore, he also claims that RomneyCare is a free-market solution. He still claims this today. This is laughable. If RomneyCare is free-market, why did it require government force to implement it? And this then brings into question his entire understanding of free-market capitalism. Free-market capitalism does not include or require taxpayer funds, subsidies, guarantees, mandates, penalties or government coercion, government favoritism, or any government involvement whatsoever.
So again I must ask, how many of Bain’s conservative “free-market” undertakings involve government financing, government loans, government subsidies, government guarantees, government favoritism, etc, and or mountains of crippling, bankrupting debt loads, and how many consequently left the taxpayers footing the bill one way or another?
A simple company by company list will suffice.
Seeing as how Romney himself brought Bain into the race, these are fair questions.
That has always been true! We Americans tend to forget how much we need Him.
Your example isn't complete, Wm, to apply to the issue with Bain.
For it to be somewhere near applicable, you'd have to add the story of getting a false appraisal of the property, borrowing a million based on that, paying "friends" extravagant fees for services rendered that consumed the lion's share of the borrowed money, and then filing bankruptcy with your shell corporation so that no one gets stuck with paying back the lender of the money.
Add that and the story is similar.
Yep.
That’s what you call “chrony” capitalism.
Under Capitalism, GM would have gone bankrupt and Ford and others would have picked up brands and market share. AIG would have lost INVESTOR money and not TAXPAYER money.
If you think for one second that those you mentioned were operating under Capitalism, you are mistaken.
I am no fan of Newt Gingrich but I have to say that having worked in the industry, I understand what he’s saying and believe he is correct. Taking over a failing business, turning it around and selling it for a profit is one thing, raiding a failing business’ carcass is another.
“Chuckee, you know we disagree on the Bain thing”
That is unfortunate, Xzins. I was hoping to bring you over to the dark side. LOL
Thank you so much for posting to me! I think you really mean to use the word “immoral” rather than “amoral” in what you wrote. The word “amoral” would be more apropos to the Capitalism-as-car metaphor that was being used earlier. For example:
Car=amoral vehicle, incapable of morality, completely neutral
Driver who recklessly ignores all speed limits and stop signs=immoral person
Driver who obeys the rules of the road=moral person
As was being said earlier, Capitalism, like a car, can be driven within the bounds of morality or not. It depends upon the human agent.
Again, thanks!
Very good!
And I'm supposed to be WORKING right now! Okay, back to the grindstone ...
Newt is the new Palin. Therefore anything he says is golden.
Whether that’s true or not, he’s certainly the new Newt isn’t he. LOL
Not a surprise to see that you find Roepke beyond your ability. After all he was part of National Review when that magazine had some substance to it.
No, he is not Palin, he is the Palin Surrogate.
Sarah is our dream, our last hope here. No-one can be the next Sarah. She can never run because she is what a POTUS would be like in our ideal dreams. We can't lose that or we lose hope. We stay alive by always hoping she will run the NEXT election.
After Newt loses one race or another we will always have Sarah. No matter how bad things get just repeat the words "If only Sarah had run" and the sun will come out for you.
You are still delusional placemarker
Of course I didn’t mean that literally. Only with regard to the behavior of some freepers.
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