Mitt Romney's Greatest Hits: Sympathy For The Corporation

Up until now, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has been the presumed frontrunner of the GOP presidential candidates. But the recent focus on Romney's tenure as head of the private equity firm Bain capital — a position which went a long way towards making Romney the approximately $190 to $250 million he's now worth — has created something of a rift in the Republican Party over the merits of free market capitalism, and turned the the GOP presidential field into the equivalent of a circular firing squad.

And along with the Bain story has been a parallel development: The growing library of seemingly phony, tone-deaf, and just plain strange statements — from calling himself "unemployed," to claiming to have worried about losing his job, to asserting membership in the middle class — which suggest Romney is frankly clueless about both the nature of economic life in the Great Recession, as well as what it's like to not occupy the tippy-top fraction of the one percent. The matter is made particularly relevant by the recent spike in Romney's national unfavorable rating, and, of course, by the degree to which his proposed policies would strip the middle class and the poor of needed support while slashing the tax burden on himself and his fellow travelers in the highest echelons of wealth.

http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2012/01/23/406595/video-mitt-romneys-greate...

Category:

News & Politics

[CesarManiaX]

GO FUCK YOURSELF ROMNEY!

[CarlosMonteiro1985]

The flip-flop I'm waiting for is when he finally becomes the nominee and the Republicans "fall in line" en masse behind him.

[archangel2467]

Not worried about the poor --- they have a safety net... What world do you live in... most people are 1 or 2 paychecks from the street. GET A CLUE

[CastroLive]

@fishhead06 And you guys take the bate and elect them.

[fishhead06]

@CastroLive It's a game he helped designed. Bain Capital is one of the corporations that lobbied like crazy to keep the loopholes that allow Romney to pay such low taxes. Romney is a living, walking example of how Congress has been bought by the super-rich to protect their interests at the expense of everyone else. Wake up!

[THETRUTHVSLIES2012]

I think he used his chruch to laundry his dirty money...

[rich1299yt]

What's even worse for US democracy is that the US supreme court also considers corporations to be citizens with the rights of actual humans. Why stop there? Why not declare cars to be people too and charge people with murder if they crash their car? It makes about as much sense as claiming that corporations are citizens with the same rights as actual human beings. It seems to me that what the US needs more than anything else is an army of psychiatrists starting work with US judges & politicians.

[rich1299yt]

As an outside observer of US politics I find it disturbing that this guy is considered a moderate Republican. It really makes me wonder just how nuts are the rest of the Republicans and how they ever get anyone elected? Obama gets called a socialist in the US yet in most democratic countries he'd be right of centre or maybe centrist but not a socialist at all. Its worrisome that the country with the largest army has its political centre so far to the right. No wonder the US is always at war.

[GrantDing]

Yes, he only paid about 3 million in taxes. $3 MILLION.

Oh yeah, and the reason it only paid 3 million was because he and his wife donated about $3.5 million to charity on top of that. So, he put about $6.5 million into helping people (which, coincidentally is over 30% of his income - a FAR higher percentage then most people in the US. I guess you feel he didn't pay his 'fair share' while you paid 15% tax to a total of something like $6000? Fuck off.

[CastroLive]

Chill the fuck down! He probably meant not very much compared to his other income. And so what if he is rich? So what if he pays 15%. He is just playing the game. You wouldn't?