I was watching the expanded ‘Face the Nation’ on August 19 and Bob Schieffer was presenting an editorial about nasty campaign tactics during Presidential campaigns. While I do not disagree with him about the long history of vicious campaign tactics, I do disagree about one point specifically. Namely, when he indicated that the SuperPac ‘Priorities USA’ ad about the individual who lost health care benefits is in the same class as the other instances that he that he mentions. http://www.cbsnews.com/.... The facts as laid out in ‘Priorities USA’ advertisement were misleading and perhaps overly dramatic. Priorities USA probably chose the most willing of what was most likely a number of individuals who felt hurt by the actions of Bain Capital. The Obama campaign did not stand behind the ad. However, the ad does bring up the issue of whether a “retirement heist” took place with the purchase of the steel company ‘GS Industries’ by Bain Capital.
Joe Soptic worked for a company taken over by Mitt Romney’s company Bain Capital. Soptic had worked for his company many years and probably thought that he and his family were set for the rest of their lives. I know that if I worked for a company for many years and had benefits stripped away when another company took over I would be very resentful, especially when a relative does not have a full life span. Most people would harbor deep resentment, in my opinion. Did Mitt Romney take a gun and shoot the deceased? Obviously, no he did not. But did Mitt Romney’s company “steal” benefits from the workers of the acquired company? That is the more important question that is being glossed over by the media. Perhaps, Soptic’s wife would have survived for many more years if she had she been covered by her husband’s lost health care insurance? Did Soptic and his wife live a more meager lifestyle after Soptic lost his job with acquired steel company GSI? Did Soptic’s wife suffer? Answers to these other questions would also be helpful in assessing the fairness of the ‘Priorities USA’ SuperPac advertisement. As mentioned, it is likely many other steelworkers besides Soptic are likely to hold resentment about Bain Capital and Mitt Romney. I believe a few more individuals may have made comments at the Democratic Party convention. Perhaps a larger group of workers from companies taken over by Bain Capital can be rounded up.
At least Joe Soptic was indentified by full name and particular situation. The Koch Brothers have advertisements where they have individuals identified by first name only – Robert, Robin, Marie and so on comment on Obama; no comments are made about Romney. The Koch's SuperPac ‘Americans for Prosperity’ fails to provide much in the way of particulars about these individuals. There are reasons to questions individuals in Koch Brothers ads. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/... I frequently have the feeling that some individuals in political ads are actors being paid for their performance. The people in the 'no longer for Obama ads' may be real people but it would be helpful to know much more about them. These individuals are not making ‘man on the street’ type comments. The whole thing looks over produced or stagey. They only comment as to why they do not plan to vote for Obama; there are no concerns or negatives about Romney. In contrast, the’ NewsHour’ August 31 program on PBS television had a group of undecided voters who expressed concerns about both Obama and Romney. http://www.pbs.org/....
In a second batch of Koch Brother individuals someone identified as Connie indicates that she is middle class and feels that Obama has not done enough. Does she really think that Mitt Romney would do more? If one just considers Romney’s plan to eliminate the estate tax how can anyone think that either Romney or the Koch Brothers give a ‘continental damn’ about the middle class. If the estate tax is eliminated the Romney family could possibly save 10s of millions in taxes; the family of the Koch Brothers may well save themselves 10s of billions. That is just the estate tax and does not count the other tax cuts for the 1% that Romney plans. It is all about more money for the 1%. Shifting the tax burden away from the 1% will not help the middle class. I hope that anyone considering Romney will take a look at Romney’s history from various sources. The book ‘The Real Romney’ by the Boston Globe reporters is one source and another source on Romney’s business strategies are in the upcoming issue of ‘Rolling Stone’ magazine which includes several articles including one by Matt Taibbi. At a minmum, Romney has been extremely aggressive to the point of being predatory in the business world.
I am also reading the award winning 2011 book ‘The Retirement Heist’ by Wall Street Journal reporter Ellen E. Schultz. Here is c-span video link. http://www.c-spanvideo.org/... If you want to read about mean and vicious take a look at how companies over the last 30 years went after pools of retirement assets that were supposed to go the workers rather than top executives. I wonder why some of the people who pulled off these “heists” of retirement assets are not in jail. Probably the same reason that lead to ‘Too Big to Fail’ and it consequences. Nothing much happened to the individuals who benefited most from the bank failures. There is reason to question whether Romney’s Bain Capital Company “stole” retirement assets of some of the companies they acquired? From reading the Schultz book, so called “heists” appear to be a common practice in the mergers and acquisitions industry over the last 30 years. There may be thousands or maybe even tens of thousands of former workers in various industries who feel cheated; perhaps there may even be some in the news business. Even though there is no mention of Bain Capital or Romney in the Schultz book, the takeover of the Soptic’s company does appear to fall into a particular type of “heist’ mentioned in the Schultz book. Bain Capital loaded the acquired company with huge debt before taking it ultimately through bankruptcy. Surely, Romney would know and understand what was going on.
I notice that ‘Face the Nation’ has expanded to a full hour and therefore believe that it may have time to delve into the topic of what is a retirement heist. People might argue whether Soptic’s anger is justified or not. Whether the action of Bain Capital constituted a predatory confiscation of retirement and health benefits might be easier to answer. As mentioned in the book ‘The Real Romney’ there is another company 'Dade International' that was acquired by Bain Capital where one might question the facts. Romney expressed regret over the payout to the Bain Capital executives that came out of 'Dade International.' You can evaluate Romney’s level of sincerity for yourselves. I bet there are likely to be many individuals from that company who would have an opinion about the GOP nominee for President.
Other media are questioning the fairness of the Soptic ad so it is not just Bob Schieffer. But Schieffer is an avuncular figure who presented an editorial where he is trying to present a “fair and balance” viewpoint. In my opinion, he and others are missing the main issue involved. Did Mitt Romney’s company “steal” benefits from the workers of this acquired company or other acquired companies? Since Mitt Romney is the Republican nominee, he may have significance influence over everyone’s social security and medicare and other benefits that individuals may be expecting. Does Romney’s selection of Congressman Ryan as his running mate make those who are relying on these earned benefits feel safer? We already absolutely know that Romney/Ryan want to put much more money in the wallets of the 1%.
Do you see a pattern here? I do, it looks to me like Romney wants to treat the American people just like Bain Capital treated the expendable workers at some of the companies that Bain Capital acquired. Romney and his crowd became much richer and the expendable workers were hurt. With his planned massive tax cuts for the very wealthy and his planned retirement and health benefit cuts for average Americans Romney is following the same pattern that he established in business. Romney is planning to make the the 1% much wealthier while at the same time hurting the middle class.
There is another topic that I would like to see covered on ‘Face the Nation.’ Many may remember that ‘Texas Monthly’ magazine had an article about George W. Bush a few months back. You may also remember that he was the 43rd President of the United States. Republicans would like you to forget this and thus he did not attend the GOP convention. The ‘Texas Monthly’ magazine provided additional evidence that George W. Bush did, in fact, go “AWOL.” For some reason he wound up in Alabama rather than Texas A 10 or 15 minute segment on that would be entertaining. It would tie in with the politics are vicious and the John Kerry swift boating themes. Perhaps, CBSNEWS would like to apologize to Dan Rather who appears to have gotten the story right.