Friday Night Video – Rachel Maddow and Shannon O’Brien on Mitt Romney’s Bain Truthiness
July 13, 2012 4 Comments
I think it’s smart of Mitt Romney to demand that Barack Obama apologize for Romney’s lies about when Romney left Bain Capital. It’s straight from the Karl Rove playbook of accusing your opponent of your own crimes. For example, George W. Bush ran away from serving in the Vietnam war, so he accused the war hero John Kerry of being unpatriotic. So long as the media doesn’t do its job investigating and reporting on the facts, the truth gets obscured in the minds of those who don’t follow politics closely.
Romney’s current problems concerning his lies about when he worked at Bain Capital don’t reside in the lies themselves, but with the possibility that the media might actually report these lies. Rachel Maddow certainly engages in actual reporting, including a conversation with Shannon O’Brien, who lost the 2002 Massachusetts governor’s race to Mitt Romney in part because Romney denied any association with Bain’s unethical activity after February 1999. Despite being paid, you know, $100,000 per year by the company. Nice work if you can get it…
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About Matthew
Yea but Willard is way behind the 8-ball on this. He’s getting killed in the Bain message war, and I was actually flabbergasted by his performance last night. He could have shown a little humility and said:
“Look, I should have been more clear about the Bain situation, which is complicated. Everyone knows by 1999 my entire effort and focus was on the Olympics in Utah. For complicated legal and accounting reasons my name was still on documents that appear after 1999, and there were some meetings I was legally obligated to attend. But the reality was, I was not running the company, nor was I controlling the direction and decisions Bain was making. So to say I was not involved with Bain after 1999 is very true in a realistic, practical sense. But with some official documentation, it doesn’t look that way. I should have been more clear, and for that I apologize.”
Geez.. i need to work on a campaign..
Anyway, he could have also used this opportunity to defend Bain’s role in job creation, which he didn’t. (and look, the whole venture capitalist nature is more complicated than “firing people” or “outsourcing.”) He didn’t
Most importantly, he could have shown people a human side and at least tried to appear honest and likable… wow did he strike out there..
“Mitt, what about your taxes?”
“Fuck you I showed what I’m legally obligated to show, and you’re not getting any more.”
“Mitt, what about this Bain stuff?”
“It’s all lies and Obama should apologize to ME”
“Mitt, how about something positive?”
“Negative negative negative.. The economy sucks, everything sucks. Vote for me.”
I honestly thought going in the absolute worst thing he could do was trot out the same talking points and stonewalling, and that’s exactly what he did. He reinforced all the bad press he’s been getting. I am shocked at how badly his campaign is being run, frankly.
Your reasoning is pretty clear and I’m definitely convinced that you’d make a more effective political adviser to the Romney camp than the bunch that they currently have! The only quibble I have is the apologizing, as Republicans don’t go there, but it would be totally possible for Romney to say exactly what you propose, and then attack Obama for not understanding how the business world works. (Which is often through cronyism and double standards, but hey, why go there?)
Romney’s campaign has definitely been pretty poorly run. It’s what makes me wonder at times whether Republicans are happy to have Obama in office as it helps their fund-raising and they can prevent progress without getting blamed for the economy. And in the meantime, their rich buddies make ever-increasing profits. It’s a short-sighted way to live, as an economy which spread profits to more people would be more sustainable, but these are people who can never have enough.
Thanks! The more I read with each passing hour, the more I cam convinced this campaign is strictly amateur hour stuff.. shocking as it’s been going for 4+ years now. But then maybe it’s telling as Romney couldn’t win the GOP nomination in 2008 with such a weak field.
The apologizing stuff would have been out of character, I agree, but might have shown a human side. I think the Romney campaign is embroiled in groupthink. I am following the twitter feed and they are Tweeting about Hugo Chavez. Anything to change the topic. Anything to try to deflect. GOP talking heads are hoping for Condi Rice as VP pick. Can you imagine how apeshit the TP blogosphere and radio would go with a pro-choice VP candidate? Hooooo boy.. Please Mitt, go there. Game Change baby!!
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