Mitt Romney's response to a questioner at an Illinois campaign event asking about his
Goldman Sachs investments is less obvious as an out-of-touch-rich-guy moment than the $10,000 bet or the "couple of Cadillacs" his wife drives, but, like those statements, it conveys just how deeply embedded in a life of privilege Romney is:
"I can assure you, I am not in this race to make money. I've already made enough," Romney said to the questioner who said Romney holds up to $50 million in investments in Goldman Sachs. "I'm not embarrassed about being successful, but I'm embarrassed for people who think there is something wrong with that."
In a direct sense, it's probably true that Romney isn't running for president to get a Fox News paycheck after he loses, or even to lower his own tax rate—though in fact Romney's tax plan does
lower taxes on the rich. But even if Romney hasn't given an instant's thought to what being president, or the Republican nominee, would do for his personal wealth, he's made clear time and time again that his values, the values he would try to write into law, are that wealth and in particular the Wall Street way of becoming wealthy are superior and should be protected from taxes and regulations.
For those of us in the 99 percent, it doesn't really matter whether Mitt Romney would give Goldman Sachs free rein to operate unregulated because it would personally enrich Mitt Romney or because he just thinks it's right that Wall Street should control the economy without being limited in any way by the government. Either way, the outcome is the same.