How Does A Romney Look Hoisted On His Own Petard?

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Willard Romney, The Guy That Fired You

The always insightful Matt Taibbi on Willard "I Like To Fire People" Romney's acceptance speech:

"The line that astonished me most from Mitt's speech was this one, where he talked about the changes Americans 'deserved' and should have gotten during Obama's presidency:

'You deserved it because you worked harder than ever before during these years. You deserved it because, when it cost more to fill up your car, you cut out moving lights, and put in longer hours. Or when you lost that job that paid $22.50 an hour, benefits, you took two jobs at $9 an hour…'

"Are you kidding? Mitt Romney was the guy that fired you from that $22.50 an hour job, and helped you replace it with two $9 an hour jobs! He was a pioneer in the area of eliminating the well-paying job with benefits and replacing it with the McJob that offered no benefits at all. One of the things that killed him in the Senate race against Ted Kennedy were Kennedy ads that reminded voters that Mitt's takeovers resulted in slashed wages and lost benefits. He was exactly the guy that eliminated that classic $22.50 manufacturing job, like in the case of GST Steel, where Bain took over with an initial investment of $8 million, paid itself a $36 million dividend, ended up walking away with $50 million, and left GST saddled with over $500 million in debt. 750 of those well-paying jobs were lost.

"What kinds of jobs were left for those fired workers to look for? Well, in the best-case scenario, you might have found one at Ampad, another Bain takeover target, where workers had their pay slashed from $10.22 to $7.88 an hour, tripled co-pays, and eliminated the retirement plan.

"So a guy who eliminated hundreds of $22 an hour jobs and slashed hundreds more jobs to below $9 an hour blasts Barack Obama for not giving you the better life you deserved, after you lost your $22/hour job and had to take two $9/hour jobs. Are we all high or something? Did that really just happen?"

The idea that "The Guy That Fired You" is a "job creator" on the side of the working man and woman is one of the most strained, if not ludicrous, constructions the Rethuglicans are trying to foist on the American people. His whole life has been about making huge financial gains regardless of the consequences to Joe Lunchbucket, parking those gains in tax havens overseas, refusing to come clean on his taxes with the American people, and lying about his policies that would cause further damage to middle and working class families. That's why they're running a despicable, diversionary campaign of racial resentment and unprecedented falsehood - and why they have to be defeated at all costs.

Smoking Guns?

Gawker's John Cook reports on a trove of information they've uncovered concerning Willard "Offshore Mitt" Romney's elaborate gyrations to avoid paying a fair income tax on the bazillion dollars he has parked in various account in the Cayman Islands:

"Mitt Romney's $250 million fortune is largely a black hole: Aside from the meager and vague disclosures he has filed under federal and Massachusetts laws, and the two years of partial tax returns (one filed and another provisional) he has released, there is almost no data on precisely what his vast holdings consist of, or what vehicles he has used to escape taxes on his income. Gawker has obtained a massive cache of confidential financial documents that shed a great deal of light on those finances, and on the tax-dodging tricks available to the hyper-rich that he has used to keep his effective tax rate at roughly 13% over the last decade." (our emphasis)

If there was ever any wonder why Offshore Mitt didn't want anyone looking through his tax returns, this information might explain why Willard and his fellow plutocrats are so eager to change the subject: they don't want people focusing on the fact that they're playing with rules they fixed while the middle class is getting poorer and poorer.

Romney Wants Middle Class To Pay For His Tax Cut

President Obama today in Mansfield, Ohio, on Willard "Mitt the Twit" Romney's tax-cuts- for-the-wealthy plan:

"And here's the thing. He's not asking you to contribute more to pay down the deficit. He's not asking you to pay more to invest in our children's education or rebuild our roads or put more folks back to work. He's asking you to pay more so that people like him can get a big tax cut. In order to afford just one $250,000 tax cut for somebody like Mr. Romney, 125 families like yours would have to pay another $2,000 in taxes each and every year. Does that sound like a good plan for economic growth? Does that sound like a plan you can afford?"

Check it out:

Class Warfare - Romney's Offshore Tax Evasion Edition

How does outsourcing pioneer Willard "No New Tax Returns!" Romney's use of offshore tax havens and his refusal to release his tax returns (and thereby face questioning on them) relate to income inequality issues in America? Mark Braude says, in part:

"Mitt Romney’s brazen attitude toward Bain Capital’s dealings in Panama, coupled with his refusal to release his tax returns, shows he is more than out of touch with the causes of the men and women he would serve. He is openly at odds with their financial well-being. How is it that someone can talk relatively openly about having potentially taxable income parked overseas and remain a viable candidate for the highest public office? How often, really, do places with lax banking regulations such as Liechtenstein, or Andorra, or Switzerland enter our national dialogue? [snip]

"[W]hen all of those individual [American plutocrat] offshore accounts are considered as a whole, they present a resoundingly clear and alarming picture. All of that potentially taxable income sitting in tax havens amounts to billions—some estimates say trillions—of dollars lost from the American tax pool. For local communities, this translates into a host of government services and programs that won’t be launched because the revenue that would have funded them has been lost forever."

It's important that the American people see that this is an issue of responsible citizenship, and that Randians like Willard are having a negative impact on their nation's economic well-being -- imagine any part of the hundreds of billions (or trillions) parked by the Willards of America being used to create jobs instead of just more obscene wealth!

(Photo: "Get a move on, my good man! My plane is leaving for the Cayman Islands in a few minutes!")

Are You A Romney?

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(Photo: A Romney (left); "you people" (right))

Obama Campaign Ad Mocks Willard's Patriotism

The Obama campaign is out with a new ad this morning, that mocks plutocrat humanoid replica Willard "Corporations Are People My Friend" Romney's false patriotism with his offshoring of jobs and his offshore finances. We love Willard's off-key rendition of "America The Beautiful" playing while the screen shows his tax-dodging, job-shipping record.



UPDATE: In the past two days, this ad's been getting a lot of thumbs up, from Vanity Fair's James Wolcott (see our July 15 posting) to this review by Wonkette:

"Watch this new Obama campaign ad and have your mind blown because, my god, wow, it’s actually a perfect ad, and we’re going to be talking about its ice-cold haunting killer beauty perfectness for years to come."

The Man With The Car Elevator Doesn't Feel Your Pain

Despite his efforts to the contrary, plutocratic Conehead Willard "Corporations Are People" Romney can't shake the public's image of him as a hyper-wealthy, entitled corporate prince, completely out of touch with the middle class. A new poll by Bloomberg News shows that Prince Willard is viewed by 55% of likely voters as being out of touch with average Americans (vs. 36% for President Obama). Despite receiving low marks on his handling of the economy, President Obama leads Prince Willard 53% to 40% among likely voters, according to the same poll.

The more the public focuses on what Prince Willard and the Rethugs are offering -- a return to Dumbya's economic policies on steroids, plus reactionary social policies for women, etc. -- the better it is for Obama and the Dems. By resembling the boss that fired them, they sense that Prince Willard's not on their side, and that his Presidency would reverse whatever progress has been made for the middle class. They'd be right.

More Man of the People - Horsey Set Edition

Stephen Colbert takes a riding crop to Willard "Millionaire Mitt" Romney, Common Man.

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Man of the People, cont'd.

News item: one of the horses owned by plutocrat Willard "I Like to Fire People" Romney's wife will will almost certainly compete in the summer Olympics, in the dressage competition.

Mahvelous!

Beltway Media Wrong About Ad Impacts

Not surprisingly, the Beltway village media tut-tutted the Obama campaign's ads pointing out that clueless plutocrat Willard "I Like Firing People" Romney's mission at Bain Capital wasn't to create jobs, as Willard has repeatedly claimed. They acted as stenographers when Willard's nervous campaign accused the Obama campaign of attacking "private equity," etc., rather than Willard's claims of being a "job creator."

Well, according to several focus group studies, the Obama message is hitting home and resonating with the voters. Seeing ads with real people -- not elitist "centrist" pundits and talking heads -- relating their experiences on the receiving end of Willard's brand of smash-and-grab capitalism is potent. As one of the focus groups found,

"In the aisles of Wal-Mart, Bain is a four-letter word."

We Don't Need No Education

"[President Obama] wants another stimulus, he wants to hire more government workers. He says we need more firemen, more policemen, more teachers. Did he not get the message of Wisconsin? The American people did. It's time for us to cut back on government and help the American people." -- weird human replica Willard "Mall Cop" Romney yesterday, responding to the President's call for investments in education and infrastructure. That should go over with people who view police, firemen and teachers as heroes.

Of course, we could simply ask people like Willard to impersonate police, etc. and solve the problem that way.

Weekend Cartoon - Millionaire Mitt Edition

(click to enlarge)


(Garry Trudeau, via gocomics.com)

Tweet of the Day

Rom says unemp shld be 4%. I was Sec of Lab last time it was 4%. We got there by raising taxes on rich and investing in ed and infrstructre.

— Robert Reich (@RBReich) May 5, 2012

Tally-Ho Cartoon of the Day

(click to enlarge)

With several primary wins yesterday, weird and sketchy Willard "Crown Me Already" Romney's march to his coronation nomination continues. One can't help noticing that weird Willard seemed to feel entitled to the Rethug nomination from the start, acting like his opponents were bothersome little people standing in the way. It doesn't help when Mrs. Willard keeps saying "it's our time," as though they've waited long enough for the prize, dammit, so let's dispense with the voting.

Etch-a-Sketch Willard on the "Dignity of Work"

During the recent kerfuffle over Hilary Rosen's poorly framed remarks about Ann Romney not having worked outside of the home, Rethuglicans and their media water-carriers had a great time trying to turn the situation into a "Democrats hate women who stay at home" meme, which of course wasn't Rosen's thrust at all. Shockingly, we have video evidence that one Willard "Etch-a-Sketch" Romney had a different view of the value of stay-at-home mothers -- at least when it came to low-income women -- waaay back in, um... January:

“I wanted to increase the work requirement," Romney said. "I said, for instance, that even if you have a child 2 years of age, you need to go to work. And people said, ‘Well that’s heartless.’ And I said, ‘No, no, I’m willing to spend more giving day care to allow those parents to go back to work. It’ll cost the state more providing that daycare, but I want the individuals to have the dignity of work.” (via "Up With Chris Hayes" and Think Progress)

To sum up for Willard, the "dignity of work" is a concept that, when applied to low-income women with children means "get out and get a job," but when applied to well-to-do women means "stay home and raise the kids." Hmmm.

Quote of the Day

"Just get the government out of the way and wait for 'freedom' to solve all of our problems. Once we get pesky safeguards and regulations out of the way, we'll be free to breathe dirty air and drink dirty water; we'll be free of the burdens of affordable medical care; we'll be free to watch Wall Street excesses rob the country blind; we'll be free to slip into poverty into an inadequate safety net full of holes; we'll be free of the homework assigned to college students; and we'll be free to remain dependent on oil indefinitely." -- MaddowBlog's Steve Benen, summing up weird plutocrat Willard "Corporations Are People" Romney's speech in Chicago yesterday. And as we noted in yesterday's post about voter suppression, we'll also be free to be denied our voting rights, except for Rethuglican candidates.