Tag Archives: obama campaign

Campaigns respond to Romney’s 1985 “harvest companies for profit” speech

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Both campaigns responded to yesterday’s article by David Corn, regarding the 1985 video of Mitt Romney saying that the goal of Bain Capital was to buy stakes in undervalued companies and then “harvest them at a significant profit” years later:

The Obama campaign, via Randy Johnson, a former worker at Ampad: “Today’s video confirms what I and other workers fired by Mitt Romney’s Bain Capital already know: that Romney’s business experience was never about creating jobs. Romney’s own words prove that his focus was putting profits before people from the very beginning, ‘harvesting’ companies to make a ‘significant profit’ for himself and   his investors – even if it meant investing in companies that shipped   American jobs to China. Any other explanation Romney puts forth about   this ‘private sector’ experience or understanding of the ‘real economy’ are just empty words from a man desperately trying to rewrite the past in order to win an election.”

The Romney campaign, via campaign spokesperson Amanda Henneberg: ”In addition to starting new businesses, Mitt Romney helped build Bain Capital by turning  around broken companies, creating and saving  thousands of jobs. The problem today is that President Obama hasn’t been able to turn around our economy in the same way.”

As David Corn noted yesterday, “Romney mentioned that it would routinely take up to eight years to turn around a firm—though he now slams the president for failing to revive the entire US economy in half that time.”

Response to “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?” YES!

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Better off now than 4 years ago? Romney launches aggressive GOP response during Dem convention: Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign is launching an aggressive Republican response at the site of the Democratic National Convention aimed at stealing attention and driving new questions about President Barack Obama’s leadership on the eve of his nomination for a second term. As thousands of Democratic activists gather in Charlotte on Monday, Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan will campaign 230 miles to the east in Greenville. Aides say the Wisconsin congressman will focus on a simple question reflecting a message that staffers and surrogates will deliver in North Carolina and across the nation: “Are you better off than you were four years ago?”

RESPONSE:

Matthew Yglesias: It would probably be political malpractice to offer this as an answer to the question “are you better off than you were four years ago,” but the chart above (highlighting month-to-month changes in employment) gestures at what I think the most accurate response to that question is. Barack Obama wasn’t president four years ago. Nor did he become president magically on Election Day 2008. Between “four years ago” and his inauguration came the months of September, October, November, and December 2008 plus almost all of January 2009 (he took office on January 20th). That five month span was a terrible time for the American economy, seeing the net loss of over 3 million jobs. Under the circumstances, it’s perfectly plausible that lots of people are worse off than they were four years ago (perhaps employed in a lower-paid, lower-status job than they used to have) but better off then they were when Obama took office (perhaps employed rather than unemployed).

Bob Cesca: Yes, I agree that there are still people who are hurting. Unemployment remains unacceptably high, and, ultimately, the depth of the Great Recession is still playing itself out in the difficult task of mitigating it and returning the economy to a place of steady prosperity. But when it comes to the question of whether we’re better off, there’s no doubt that everyone is better off now than we were when, for example, the economy was collapsing with no end in sight; when we were engaged in two wars with no end in sight; when healthcare was less affordable; when mutual funds and 401(k) retirement plans were losing value as the stock market crashed; and so forth. More of this presently. (Frankly, I hesitate to enumerate all of the catastrophes we faced in 2008 and early 2009 because grouping them together makes each individual item seem less catastrophic.) So how effective were the policies of the Obama administration? Continue…

DailyKos: I think that the answer to the question is that, Yes, we are better off than we were four years ago.

1.  The war in Iraq is over.
2.  Bin Laden is dead.
3.  The Stock Market is up.
4.  We are creating new jobs, not losing jobs.
5.  We have stopped the increase in medical insurance costs.
6.  More people in the USA have medical insurance than ever before.
7.  The American automobile industry is stronger than ever.
8.  WE are producing more  domestic energy than ever.
9.  We are working toward new and innovative forms of energy.

Still, wages are frozen for working people.  CEO’s are making unprecedented profits.  The income disparity in the USA is completely skewed. We Can Do Better.  But, not by electing Tea Party and GOP representatives, Senators and Mitt Romney.

The Obama Campaign is tightening up the response to this question — THANK GOD:

David Axelrod: ”Here’s what I can say, Chris,” answered Axelrod, who advises Obama’s reelection campaign. “We are in a better position than we were in the economy in the sense that when the president took office, we were losing 800,000 jobs a month, and the quarter before he took office was the worst since the Great Depression. We are [now] in a different place: 29 straight months of job growth and private sector jobs. Are we where we need to be? No.” Axelrod then pointed out that Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney had failed to outline a specific alternative during his speech at the Republican National Convention last Thursday — a convention that Axelrod called “a terrible failure.” Wallace recited grim statistics reflecting increased unemployment, higher gas prices, more national debt and lower incomes. He put the question to Axelrod again. “I think the average American recognizes it took years to create the crisis that erupted in 2008 and peaked in January 2009,” Axelrod said. “It’s going to take some time to work through it.”

Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley: (today) “We are clearly better off as a country because we’re now creating jobs rather than losing them.”

Stephanie Cutter: ”Absolutely. By any measure the country has moved forward over the last four years. It might not be as fast as some people would’ve hoped. The president agrees with that.”

It’s amusing that the Romney campaign is also using the talking point as their response: “If we want a new direction, we need a new president.”  NEW DIRECTION? Are  you kidding me? Romney-Ryan are indicating they’d go back to the failed policies of the Bush Administration — the exact same policies that took us to the place we were FOUR YEARS AGO.

Juan Cole: Labor Day Question: Are you Better off than You were in 1970?: The real question isn’t whether we are better off than we were four years ago. It takes a long time to recover from burst bubbles and near-depressions (the Japanese have still not recovered from their burst bubble of the early 1990s). The real question is whether the working and middle classes of the United States will go on allowing themselves to be taken advantage of by our super-rich, who are gathering to themselves more and more of the national income. The top 1% owned 25% of the privately held national wealth in the United States in the 1950s, but have 38% of it today. In contrast, real wages per hour for the average worker in the United States, adjusted for inflation, peaked in 1970. We’re now down from that, with a generation and a half blocked from meaningful economic advancement. But, you will say, the US is a much wealthier society now than it was in 1970 or 1990. Where has all the extra money generated by American labor and investment gone? It has gone to the rich. Yes, folks, the rich are taking home a fifth of everything we make as a country each year, up from ten percent in 1970. We are 310 million people. About 3 million get a fifth of the annual income. Those 3 million people are 3 million Mitt Romneys. They want low taxes and they want to get rid of social security, medicare and Obamacare. Continue…

 

The Obamans

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“But there are a lot of nervous Republicans outside the campaign who don’t think that’s true. And most of those nervous Republicans would be even more nervous if they knew what Chicago was still, patiently, sitting on.” — Mark Halperin | TIME.com

lycanpedia: A nudge and a wink from Halperin who lauds the Obama machine for its bulldozing of Romney on Bain and taxes.

Mitt Romney suggests releasing more tax returns could damage him politically

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There should be no question in anyone’s mind that Mitt Romney has a lot to hide.

Think Progress reports that Romney appeared on Fox & Friends this morning to respond to the growing list of conservatives who are calling for him to release his tax returns. Romney said the public will see just two years of returns and no more, before appearing to admit that the records may contain something politically damaging:

ROMNEY: “The Obama people keep on wanting more and more and more. More things to pick through, more things for their opposition research to try make a mountain out of and to distort and to be dishonest about. We’re going to put out two years of tax returns.”

Uh huh. Here’s what we learned from just ONE return:

image: da731 

 

Morning Bunker Report: Sunday 5.13.2012

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WHAT THE REPUBLICAN PARTY STANDS FOR TODAY—————————–—

Mitt Romney panders to the far-right Christian fundagelicals who think his religion is a cult – Toward the beginning of the ceremony, Mark DeMoss, a well-known Evangelical and longtime Romney supporter, took to the podium to vouch for the Mormon candidate. He recounted a meeting between Romney and Dr. Falwell four years ago, after which the candidate sent the pastor a chair engraved with the words, “There’s always room for you at my table.” ”I trust him to do the right thing,” DeMoss said. “To do the moral thing, to do what’s best for our country. I trust his integrity, his moral compass, his judgment, and his perfect decency. Finally, I trust his values, for I feel they mirror my own.” It was meant to be a unifying moment of culture war diplomacy on DeMoss’s part, a nod to his fellow Evangelicals that Romney was, in fact, one of them. But in the middle of his speech, an angry voice from the back of the graduates’ section interrupted: “Hey Mitt! Jesus is the only way!” [...] For the thousands of conservative Evangelicals on campus Saturday who reject the candidate’s claim to Christianity, Romney may represent a compromise: They’re voting for him because they can’t do better. —  Mitt Romney’s Pitch To The True Believers [image: arcaneimages]

  • THE BOND between Romney and Christian fundagelical fascists will be a shared hate of those who are different: “As fundamental as these principles are, they may become topics of democratic debate. So it is today with the enduring institution of marriage. Marriage is a relationship between one man and one woman. The protection of religious freedom has also become a matter of debate. It strikes me as odd that the free exercise of religious faith is sometimes treated as a problem, something America is stuck with instead of blessed with. Perhaps religious conscience upsets the designs of those who feel that the highest wisdom and authority comes from government.” - Mitt Romney, speaking at today’s commencement at Dead Dead Dead Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University.
  • Romney backs away from supporting same-sex adoption – “Well, actually I think all states but one allow gay adoption. So that’s a position which has been decided by most of the state legislatures, including the one in my state some time ago. So I simply acknowledge the fact that gay adoption is legal in all states but one.” – Raw Story
  • JESUS CHRIST Himself is too ‘counterculture’ for this place: No ‘Counterculture’ Hair Allowed At Liberty University – the rules governing hair on Liberty’s campus are very strict. From the rules for men: Hair and clothing styles related to a counterculture (as determined by the Student Affairs Deans’ Review Committee) are not acceptable. Hair should be cut in such a way that it will not come over the ears, collar or eyebrows at any time. Ponytails for men are unacceptable.

Wait, Suddenly Right-Wing Bloggers Don’t Want Candidates Vetted? – In the wake of the Washington Post’s unflattering article yesterday about how five of Mitt Romney’s high school classmates recalled the Republican candidate leading an assault against a presumed gay schoolmate, pinning him down, and cutting his long hair while tears filled up in the boy’s eyes, conservative bloggers were indignant the Post would bother with such trivial pursuits. -”Is a decades old high school story really ‘news’?” (Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin.) -”Cutting-edge reporting from WaPo: Let’s take an in-depth look at … Romney’s cruel high-school pranks.” (Ed Morrissey) -”It’s a waste of time and energy and effort.” (Fox News’ Karl Rove.) -”BREAKING NEWS: Mitt Romney Went to High School. Seriously.” (Erick Erickson) Suddenly the far-right press thinks it’s pointless to delve deep into a candidate’s past in search of clues about his personality and clues to what shaped him into an adult. Suddenly they mock efforts by the press to paint a detailed personal portrait of would-be presidents by combing over their biographies. In short, suddenly right-wing bloggers are strongly opposed to vetting. – Media Matters

YOUR LIBERAL MEDIA: NBC’s David Gregory To Headline Conference For Major Republican Advocacy Group – The Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics states: Journalists should: — Avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived. — Remain free of associations and activities that may compromise integrity or damage credibility. — Refuse gifts, favors, fees, free travel and special treatment, and shun secondary employment, political involvement, public office and service in community organizations if they compromise journalistic integrity. Regardless of whether Gregory is being paid for this event and of what he says in his keynote, allowing the NFIB to raise money for its political mission using his name, reputation, and celebrity appears to be at odds with journalistic ethics. — Think Progress

Arizona Ron Paul supporters boo Romney’s son off stage – Supporters of Ron Paul booed the son of presidential hopeful Mitt Romney off the stage Saturday at the Arizona Republican Party convention as he sought to solidify support for his father’s nomination. Hundreds of state GOP members were gathered at Grand Canyon University to elect delegates for the national convention in August in Tampa, which is expected to select Mitt Romney as the official Republican nominee to challenge President Barack Obama. — azcentral.com

PRESIDENT OBAMA / DEMOCRATS————————————————————

Obama Camp Ties Romney To JP Morgan Scandal – The Obama campaign is seizing on the news that financial giant JP Morgan lost billions of dollars trading derivatives with customer funds to attack Mitt Romney for wanting to repeal the 2010 law meant to curtail these kinds of risky bets. “Rolling back Wall Street reform, as Mitt Romney proposes, would be reckless,” says Obama camp spokeswoman Lis Smith in a statement to TPM. “The law promotes transparency, limits the types of risky investments that can be made with deposits insured by federal taxpayers, and prevents investment losses at one bank from threatening the whole financial system. Returning to the failed policy of letting Wall Street write their own rules would put all of us at greater risk of another financial crisis and leave us vulnerable to another taxpayer-funded bank bailout like the one shortly before President Obama took office.” – TPM

Obamacare: A Mother’s Day Gift For All Moms Throughout The U.S. – People always say good health is the greatest gift, so let’s make health a priority this Mother’s Day. Now that I am a mother myself, I am even more appreciative that I have health insurance that covers the care I need. All moms deserve the kind of quality, affordable care that I was lucky enough to receive while pregnant and postpartum, and Obamacare is working to make that dream a reality. — Think Progress

HOW JOURNALISM is done: MSNBC’s Chris Matthews Demonstrates How To Handle Tony Perkins On Television – Perkins’ presence on MSNBC isn’t surprising – the hate group leader has become a regular guest on the network over the past several months, and has typically been treated as a credible, uncontroversial political figure, especially on Hardball. On Thursday, however, things were different.For nearly 15 minutes, Matthews, with the help of Frank, grilled Perkins on his views on homosexuality, marriage equality, and same-sex parenting. Matthews challenged Perkins’ anti-gay misinformation, held him accountable for past statements, and demonstrated how out-of-the-mainstream his extreme positions really are. This is exactly the kind of interview that major news outlets should be conducting when dealing with someone like Perkins. – Media Matters

…

Dianne Feinstein Defends Obama On Gay Marriage: ‘What’s Wrong With People Being Happy?’ – When asked whether Obama had made a political calculation in endorsing gay marriage, Feinstein rejected the idea. “I don’t think it is a flip flop and there is no political calculus in this, because it is not smart from a political point of view. It doesn’t make sense,” Feinstein said. “From a personal point of view, I can tell you what happened because it happened to me,” she continued. “You get to know more and more gay couples and you see the happiness. You see the economic security that marriage brings. And even more fundamentally, you can see children who otherwise would not have an adopted home being able to have that home. And so same-sex couples raise children, they do a fine job. And I think when you see this — and it has happened in California — more and more people say, ‘What is wrong with people being happy?’” — HuffPo [image: randomactsofchaos]

BREAK UP BIG BANKS: A message from Bernie Sanders – J.P. Morgan Chase revealed that its in-house trading operation lost $2 billion in the past six weeks. “The debacle at J.P. Morgan Chase reaffirms my view that the largest six banks in this country, including J.P. Morgan Chase, which have assets equivalent to two-thirds of our GDP, must be broken up. This is important in order to bring more competition into the financial marketplace and to prevent another ‘too-big-to-fail’ bailout,” Sen. Bernie Sanders said. “At a time when 23 million Americans are either unemployed or underemployed, huge financial institutions should not be involved in ‘making wagers or high-stake bets.’ They should be investing in the productive economy creating jobs and improving our standard of living.” — Crooks & Liars

Betty White says she ‘very, very much favors’ Obama – As she prepares to visit the Smithsonian Institution and National Zoo next week, White told The Associated Press she “very, very much favors” President Barack Obama in the election. The 90-year-old actress said Friday she is very bi-partisan and has stayed away from politics all of her life. She usually never says who she is for or against because she doesn’t want to turn off any of her adoring fans. White says in this year’s election, she likes what Obama has done and “how he represents us.” – HuffPo

Morning Bunker Report: Saturday 4.28.2012

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——————————WHAT THE REPUBLICAN PARTY STANDS FOR TODAY

 
Source: sandandglass

MITT THE PROBLEM SOLVER! ROMNEY TELLS STUDENTS to just borrow money from their parents. Mitt Romney is the most tone-deaf motherfucker to ever run for president. HANDS DOWN. This afternoon at an event in Ohio—which students apparently were forced to attend, if the gentleman falling asleep in the front row is any indication—Mitt Romney yammered on about class warfare, and how President Obama is always attacking success, and why don’t kids today have the bootstrapitude it takes to up and start a multimillion dollar sandwich chain like Romney’s good friend Jimmy John did by borrowing $20K from the parental units. – ABL: Balloon Juice | read more: ABL: Raw Story

  • OBVIOUSLY, THE ADVICE FITS RIGHT INTO THE CHARACTERIZATION that Romney is ‘out of touch’ with regular people. Most students don’t have parents with $20,000 in disposable capital sitting around to give to their kids to start a business. — Think Progress
  • REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE MITT ROMNEY campaigned [yesterday] at Otterbein College — a school that benefited from the passage of the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, commonly known as the stimulus. Otterbein received a grant worth more than $80,000 for a federal work-study program in July 2009. Ignoring that fact, though, Romney proceeded to attack the stimulus in his speech to students. – Romney Attacks Stimulus At College That Took Stimulus Funds

YESTERDAY RUSH LIMBAUGH said Hillary Clinton is just a secretary who needs to wear Spanx. [He] said that Clinton “has reached a pinnacle and all she is is a secretary,” adding that the left has “the strangest definition of success.” Limbaugh then said he was being prodded to talk about Clinton’s need to wear “Spanx,” but suggested she had a greater need for “Spankles.” – Rush Limbaugh On Hillary Clinton: ‘All She Is Is A Secretary’ Who Needs To Wear Spanx || Your “Imaginary” GOP War on Women, people!


Because feminists are dykes. GET IT? — Fox News Douchebag Of The Day

BUZZFEED POLITICS IS TRYING SO HARD to campaign for Romney:

MEDIA DARLING SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R-AZ) is blasting Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) for spending too much time in front of the television cameras. [...] “I have never seen Sen. Schumer address any issue unless it was political in the United States Senate,” McCain told Van Susteren. “Bob Dole once said, the most dangerous place to be in Washington D.C. is between Sen. Schumer and a television camera.” “That holds true today,” he added. But very few, if any, senators in recent years have been given more airtime than McCain himself. [...] Between his loss in the November 2008 presidential election and January 2010, McCain had appeared on Sunday morning talk shows at least 19 times. By March 2012, he had broken former Sen. Bob Dole’s (R-KS) record by appearing on NBC’s Meet the Press 64 times. – Crooks & Liars

PRESIDENT OBAMA / DEMOCRATS————————————————————

PRESIDENT OBAMA ON FRIDAY SIGNED an executive order that will help protect veterans from the deceptive practices of some for-profit colleges that seek to take advantage of them. The news was greeted with praise from veterans groups, who have “long felt that student veterans need to have the tools to succeed when it comes to their education.” The American Legion called it “an important victory on behalf of our young servicemembers and veterans who, in seeking to better themselves educationally, have been wrongly and unconscionably victimized by some institutions who see America’s finest as nothing more than a vulnerable market.” — MMFA

NEW WEB VIDEO FROM OBAMA CAMPAIGN — ROMNEY’S PRIORITIES: Mitt wouldn’t have killed Osama bin Laden (but remember, he would have let GM go bankrupt) — A new web video from the Obama campaign, featuring former President Bill Clinton, suggests Mitt Romney wouldn’t have made the decision to go after Osama bin Laden almost one  year ago today — TPM

  • NATURALLY THE ROMNEY CAMPAIGN is in hysterics.  Chait comments: In 2004, Democrats were furious that Bush used the 9/11 attacks as a political asset. Now, Republicans are indignant that Obama is running on having killed Osama bin Laden. (Of course, the difference is that 9/11 was at best something Bush had no responsibility for and at worst a colossal blunder, while killing bin Laden is an actual accomplishment.)
  • GOOD OLD ‘SOUR GRAPES’ JOHN MCCAIN who lost the 2008 presidential election to Barack Obama, harshly criticized him for politicizing the death of Osama bin Laden, which he called the “height of hypocrisy.” – John McCain: Obama Playing Politics With Anniversary Of Bin Laden’s Death
  • BUT REMEMBER THE 2008 CAMPAIGN AND JOHN MCCAIN’S ‘SUPER SECRET PLAN’ to capture bin Laden? John McCain says in almost every stump speech that he knows how to capture Osama bin Laden and that he’d follow the al Qaeda leader to the “Gates of Hell.” So Washington Wire was wondering, what does McCain know that President Bush and the Pentagon don’t about how to sweep up America’s most elusive enemy. If there are “certain policies and procedures” that could lead to OBL’s detention, and a president could implement those policies and procedures now, why wouldn’t McCain stop by the Oval Office for a chat with Bush about how best to proceed? By McCain’s own reasoning, it sounds like he’d rather let bin Laden remain free for another year, until McCain and his “own ideas” can get to work. – McCain’s ‘secret plan’ to get bin Laden

#OccupyThePolls — Obama campaign goes there: GOP trying to destroy economy on purpose

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THIS IS A REMINDER TO OCCUPY THE POLLS in 2012. If you don’t, you know who will.

“The U.S. Senate is supposed to vote on the American Jobs Act as early as tonight.

It’s a bill that will put people to work immediately, and it contains proposals that members of both parties have said in the past that they’d support.

But Senate Republicans want to block it. Not because they have a plan that creates jobs right now — not one Republican, in Congress or in the presidential race, does. They only have a political plan.

Their strategy is to suffocate the economy for the sake of what they think will be a political victory. They think that the more folks see Washington taking no action to create jobs, the better their chances in the next election. So they’re doing everything in their power to make sure nothing gets done.

There’s still time for principled Republican senators to declare their independence from this kamikaze political strategy. And the only way it can happen is if they hear from constituents like you today.”

— Obama campaign goes there: GOP trying to destroy economy on purpose

And THIS:

Image: think-progress

#OccupyThePolls #RegisterAndVote