Romney’s Vulture Capitalism Being Dragged Into the Spotlight

Ever turn on a kitchen light and see cockroaches scurrying frantically back into the walls?  Right now Mitt Romney and his fellow vulture capitalists are trying desperately to scurry back into the shadows.  They prefer to do their “work” away from the public eye.

They can run but they can’t hide.  Gingrich’s and Perry’s attacks on Romney’s career as a corporate raider — and other rightwingers’ attacks on Perry and Gingrich for “attacking capitalism” — have brought this entire sordid subject into the limelight.  They’ve changed the conversation.

Corporate raiders, private equity firms — and whether these companies help the economy or only enrich a few at the expense of the many — this subject is being debated and argued furiously throughout the country.  Several months ago you could have put an entire room to sleep if you said “Bain Capital” or “private equity firm.”

This new public scrutiny is the last thing Wall Street wants.  They liked it better when the entire subject was too complicated for the public to understand, and too boring for anyone to even care if they understood it or not.  Those days are over.  The rock has been lifted and the public is getting a close look at those squiggly creepy-crawly creatures squirming in the sunlight.

Newt Gingrich referred to the documentary which exposed Mitt Romney’s “job” record:

“Now, this rattled a number of so-called conservatives, who say that to challenge where the money went and to challenge what deals were cut is to be anti-free enterprise.  I'm not going to back down or be afraid to say we, the American people, have the right to know, and any candidate for president has an obligation to tell us, and I think that these extraordinarily wealthy institutions are going to somehow bring enough pressure to bear to say, 'You better shut up,' tells you just how bad-off the system has gotten.”

Whatever anyone thinks of Gingrich, and whatever his true motives are, that statement was spot on.

While Gingrich and Perry are pretending to be populists so they can derail Romney’s campaign, Romney is being defended by a Who’s Who of the Far Right:  Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Karl Rove, Jim DeMint, and Rudy Giuliani.  Guiliani in particular has made some huge investments in vulture capital firms.

These ongoing arguments and mutual attacks can only be a good thing.  The louder the arguments get, the more front-and-center this whole issue will become and the better informed the voters will be.

Mitt Romney: Job Creator. NOT!

It’s already well known that Mitt Romney eliminated zillions of jobs during his career at Bain Capital and other private equity firms.  Hopefully, the Democrats’ TV commercials will drive this point home relentlessly to everyone who doesn’t already know this.

But it gets even better.  This is the most specific item yet about Romney’s distinguished “career.”  A Kansas City, MO steel mill, Worldwide Grinding Systems, went out of business less than ten years after Bain Capital became the company’s majority shareholder.  Romney was CEO of Bain Capital during this period.

Worldwide Grinding Systems had been in business since 1888.  When the company folded, its workers were denied the severance pay and health coverage they’d been promised.  And their retirement pensions were reduced by $400 a month.  Nice job Mitt.

And the flipflops get even better too.  Mitt Romney has already performed more flipflops on more issues than any creature in the universe.  And now this:  Romney was against the Wall Street bailout of 2008 — when George W. Bush was president — and he was against Obama’s bailout of the auto industry.  But when Worldwide Grinding Systems went bankrupt — thank you Mitt Romney — the company received a $44 million bailout from the federal government.

And after the dust settled, Bain Capital ended up making a $4 million dollar profit — plus $4.5 million in consulting fees — from purchasing and destroying Worldwide Grinding Systems.

Does anybody seriously want this leech in the White House???  What Bain CEO Mitt Romney did to Worldwide Grinding Systems, President Mitt Romney will do to America.