Mark Halperin with Mitt Romney
Mitt Romney sat down with Time's Mark Halperin yesterday for a pretty long interview, and we learned a few interesting things. For example, for all the Republican hatred of Keynesian economics, the Republican candidate said if he cut a trillion dollars out of the budget in his first year, he'd be "throwing us into recession or depression."
The former governor also said he can improve the economy through his very existence -- "entrepreneurs" will start investing simply by virtue of Romney being in office -- and though he wants to increase Pentagon spending and approve tax breaks, we can't afford PBS.
But Halperin, to his credit, also asked some worthwhile questions about Romney's controversial private-sector background. "I know you think that working in the private sector in and of itself gives you insight into how the economy works," the reporter said, "but what specific skills or policies did you learn at Bain that would help you create an environment where jobs would be created?" The presumptive GOP nominee replied:
"Well that's a bit of a question like saying, 'What have you learned in life that would help you lead?' My whole life has been learning to lead, from my parents, to my education, to the experience I had in the private sector, to helping run the Olympics, and then of course helping guide a state. Those experiences in totality have given me an understanding of how America works and how the economy works.
"Twenty five years in business, including business with other nations, competing with companies across the world, has given me an understanding of what it is that makes America a good place to grow and add jobs, and why jobs leave America -- why businesses decide to locate here, and why they decide to locate somewhere else. What outsourcing causes -- what it's caused by, rather. I understand, for instance, how to read a balance sheet. I happen to believe that having been in the private sector for twenty-five years gives me a perspective on how jobs are created -- that someone who's never spent a day in the private sector, like President Obama, simply doesn't understand."
Reading the transcript, it was at this point when it occurred to me that Mitt Romney is basing his campaign on his private-sector work, but he hasn't the foggiest idea how that business experience relates to the responsibilities of a president.
Jon Chait argued that Romney's response to Halperin's question "is pure incoherence.... Basically Romney is just repeating his premise over and over again. He doesn't say why his experience as a rich business guy better enables him to craft pro-growth policies."
It's because there is no good answer to the question. The premise of Romney's campaign is burdened by a flaw: it doesn't make sense.
Let's say for the sake of conversation that Romney was great at running a private-equity firm. Let's even assume he was the greatest private-equity investor in the country. Hell, let's say he was the single greatest private-equity investor in the history of the world.
The question that Halperin, who hardly leans to the left, was getting at is simple enough: So?
Chait added, "Romney insists that his Job Creator experience taught him that energy is part of the cost of a business, so it's bad to pursue policies that result in high energy costs. But obviously this isn't some special knowledge that you need to be in the private sector in order to acquire. If you're the president, businesspeople will be happy to tell you this."
Romney's pitch to voters is fairly straightforward: "I'd be a good president because I made wise private-equity investments and generated enormous profits." There is, however, a disconnect between one and the other: presidents aren't called upon to make wise private-equity investments and generate enormous profits, making the pitch rather irrelevant.
President Obama had a compelling take on this the other day:
"[M]y view of private equity is that it is set up to maximize profits. And that's a healthy part of the free market. That's part of the role of a lot of business people. That's not unique to private equity. And as I think my representatives have said repeatedly, and I will say today, I think there are folks who do good work in that area. And there are times where they identify the capacity for the economy to create new jobs or new industries, but understand that their priority is to maximize profits. And that's not always going to be good for communities or businesses or workers.
"And the reason this is relevant to the campaign is because my opponent, Governor Romney, his main calling card for why he thinks he should be President is his business expertise. He is not going out there touting his experience in Massachusetts. He is saying, I'm a business guy and I know how to fix it, and this is his business.
"And when you're President, as opposed to the head of a private equity firm, then your job is not simply to maximize profits. Your job is to figure out how everybody in the country has a fair shot. Your job is to think about those workers who got laid off and how are we paying for their retraining. Your job is to think about how those communities can start creating new clusters so that they can attract new businesses. Your job as President is to think about how do we set up a equitable tax system so that everybody is paying their fair share that allows us then to invest in science and technology and infrastructure, all of which are going to help us grow.
"And so, if your main argument for how to grow the economy is I knew how to make a lot of money for investors, then you're missing what this job is about. It doesn't mean you weren't good at private equity, but that's not what my job is as President."
The whole argument of late about Bain Capital has been off track. The political world has been debating whether the criticisms represent "character assassination," whether they're an attack on "free enterprise," whether the president is "anti-Wall Street," etc.
The better argument is less convoluted: what did Romney learn at Bain that would help him in the White House? I don't know the answer to that, and yesterday, Romney didn't either.
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That is one thing I am amazed at and that is how robotized and puppetized (new words amazing hey) the GOP/Republicans are. Like they are lost in some dark mist of their rich evil overlords. It is like they are going with a mechanical voice – I must listen to and obey my rich evil and dark masters, they are my Gods, they give me riches at the price of others, all that is important is my evil and dark masters.
Also, have you ever considered that Romney might really be an idiot?
But...but ... I'll be rich one day too. That's what the republican leaders and my preacher tell me anyway . I'll sing while I slave. (with apologies to Bob Dylan)
"Also, have you ever considered that Romney might really be an idiot?"
You know, I've been thinking along those lines myself lately. He has the "affect" (to use a term from my old Psych 101 class) of a smart guy, & he's filthy rich, which makes you think he might have something upstairs. But when asked any semi-penetrating question, he seems to go into auto-pilot mode -- spouting pre-recorded platitudes. He seems incapable of any kind of impromptu, off-the-cuff, thoughtful conversation.
I think Arlington BigFish just hit the nail on the head: Mittsy doesn't have his own thoughts. He can be taught to do business. Peter Drucker will tell you everybody can be taught management. But, can he be a thoughtful manager? Can he truly understand people and empathize with their troubles?
Mittsy doesn't know what he learned at Bain because he merely responded per the manual he was given through previous learning. Now, he has his advisor's ideas, but none of his own, so he can't think through a response.
He may have been a fine student (I don't know this one way or the other) but being quick on his toes and having creative and thoughtful solutions is not his strong point. All he can do is regurgitate what somebody else has already told him. Asking him to detail how that learning will help him become president, other than saying 'I did this' is more than he's capable of thinking through.
Being a public servant isn't about profits... it's more about losses. In our country we have children starving, vets that are homeless, men and women unemployed or under employed, various groups not given basic human rights, unaffordable education and parasitic loan practices... those are example of the losses a president and all elected officials are hired to fix. I'll vote for the person most qualified to fix losses and that understands how those losses affect the our nation.
I can't trust someone to put the good of the people first when they put profits above people. Romney has investing in and creating jobs for other countries.
What Arlington BigFish and Cathy in IL said. Romney had an upper-middle-class upbringing and education; he can speak in grammatical sentences and comport himself according the social norms of the upper middle class. So he looks the part of a successful businessman - no questions asked about how his family's money and connections gave him a leg up. None of that means he's particularly smart, and certainly doesn't make him a wise and thoughtful leader.
"have you ever considered that Romney might really be an idiot?"
isn't that supposed to be followed with the Mark Twain "but I repeat myself"?
Kathleen, Agreed. Running a counrty is more like running a non-profit.
I am merely an amoeba in this sea of politics/business. 30 years ago I owned my own construction company. It was about 5 years old and doing OK. About that time I became president of my church. We (like most all small churches) were struggling financially. I tried for a year to apply my business skills to the church budget to no avail. The second year I reversed all my thinking. I looked for ways to get my congregtion more involved, not give more money. Amazingly, as people became more involved our finacial problems started to disolve.
One important lesson I took from that experience was that money follows commitment, not the other way around. The other thing I learned, particularly about churches but also about people, is that it is good to make them (us) stretch a little. If we stretch ourselves in a commitment, no matter what it is, we always seem to find the funds.
Think about the college student that is truly commited to getting an education/degree. That student may not have much money for many extras, but they always seem to find the money for tuition.
Romney as the Republican nominee makes a lot of sense if you take what Grover Norquist stated in that they "don't need a leader as far as their nominee, just someone who can sign their name to legislation presented to them". They want someone who will help to dismantle the United States piece by piece by being a rubber stamp for every piece of noxious legislation that can be passed by the legislature (should we somehow, gawd forbid, get Romney and a Republican House and Senate).
That's why I think Romney is pushing what he did at Bain as a positive thing, in that he really didn't see that putting most of the companies that they bought into bankruptcy and putting people out of work as a bad thing, as it made him and the investors he worked with a boatload of money. He lives in a completely different world than the rest of our nation.
Bain is easy; levered buyouts largely consist of mortgaging the plant and equipment to the hilt as the interest on the borrowings are deductible. Once the funds are in hand, they pay themselves a "special dividend" which leaves the enterprise cash strapped. Outsource whatever you can and reduce labor costs anyway you can. It runs around for a while like a headless chicken before it dies in bankruptcy. The money pulled out is greater than the money put in so Bain wins. If by chance the enterprise thrives despite the effort to bleed it to death, well you're a winner on valuation and you go public.
Only problem is that this is not a model for governance of a country.
If you would take the time to some research you would find that most of the companies acquired by Bain survived and did not file bankruptcy.
Bain puts it's own capital at risk and reorganizes the company. It does not make money by filing bankruptcy.
He didn't say Bain makes money by filing bankruptcy. He stated that many of the companies Bain worked w/ filed bankruptcy after Bain supposedly fixed them. Bain makes money regardless if the company files for bankruptcy after Bain has left.
One of his qualifications for being a smart guy in business? "I can read balance sheets." Duh. I used to be a full charge bookkeeper and I can MAKE balance sheets. and they just aren't that difficult to read and figure out.
Any basic accounting class teaches balance sheets. But wait, most of us won't be able to go to college any more. Uh oh.
Easy. Romney learned how to take jobs away from a lot of workers, destroy some pensions and given the money to a few rich friends.
Sounds like perfect qualifications to be president of the 1/10th of 1%ers.
Yep. It's Bush's "your on your own"ership philosophy all over again...unless you happen to be the wealthy few. Then Romney et al are ready to be of assistance!!
You know, it has been a long time since Mr. Romney has actually 'worked' in the business sector and i think just by saying he can read a balance sheet (is that covered in Economics 101?), he may not have updated his skills enough to understand how business works today in 2012 and how jobs are created. Maybe that is why he can't get into specifics...if he has any...
Isn't it time we put Rmoney back to work again? I'm looking forward to all the new jobs!
Eileen ; I do believe you have a valid point . He exited Bain around 1998 before the internet boom really took off and cell phones were a "new " technology .
He has been out of the mainstream bidness for almost 15 years ... a lifetime and a half in technological terms.
Balance sheets are not covered in Econ 101 but rather in Financial Accounting.
I had balance sheets taught to me in high school bookkeeping in 1971! I call BS Robert.
I took bookkeeping in high school, and did the books for "Spencer Sporting Goods" for 9 months. (it is a dummy business for high school bookkeeping classes). Then after high school, I took some college classes and spread sheets were emphasized again. I can make them and its not very difficult at all. I can read them also. I did all of this before the computerized Quicken or Peachtree bookkeeping programs came out. If I can make them, I must be qualified to be the POTUS! Nope.
I have to say, 25 years isn't that long to have been in business. Am I missing something or is that pretty unimpressive for someone who's staking the central argument of his campaign on the sheer weight of his experience?
If you rose through the ranks -- rather than jumping in with your father's money -- you might be only 46 years' old and have 25 years of experience. There are legions of businesspeople out there right now who have 25 years of experience but are still learning, are still climbing the corporate ladder, and are very far from thinking that they've accomplished what they set out to. Poor bastards.
Anyway, most middle-aged grownups have more experience than that -- at whatever they've devoted their lives to -- let alone the senior citizens among us (which Romney is, I guess).
25 years in business means Romney has been a dabbler. It means he used wealth and connections he didn't earn himself to take short cuts and reduce the normal career trajectory that others have to contend with. It means he spent a heck of a long time running for office or serving in office. And at least a few minutes committing hate-crime assaults with scissors.
Let's attack not just the kind of experience he claims is relevant -- that of the businessman -- but also the depth and duration of that experience.
I have also worked in the private sector for more than 25 years. I have worked for companies that compete internationally. I know how to read a balance sheet. If that's Mitt's list of qualifications for being President, I too should be on the ballot this fall, along with about 50 million other Americans.
One difference between a venture capitalist (investor) and a government leader is that the investor views the economy as a zero-sum game, such that his profits come at the expense of others losses (his competitors). A government leader's role is to create an environment where the economy can thrive, where education, investment in infrastructure, and fairness in competition create an environment conducive to production and expansion.
No.
A really good businessman recognizes that your competitors aren't your enemies. A really good businessman looks to make his customers succeed, and sometimes that means cooperating with your competition or even referring you customer to the competitor because they can make the customer succeed where you can't.
Yes, very often the business between you and your competitor is near zero-sum. But that's only if you don't count the customers and vendors into the ecology, which is stupid. And even on a purely horizontal level, it's not quite zero sum because when you have a better value proposition than your competitor you are wise to share some of that advantage with your customer (or vendor, in the other direction.)
It's a very long chain from the mine to the garden shed, and nobody along the way is going to do well until the gardener starts putting the spade into the ground.
If a businessman running for office told that story, I'd take him seriously. But that's not the business world Romney knows.
Does Rachel ever change her clothes...they must be disgustingly smelly...always has the same stuff on...no wonder she has trouble forming a complete sentence.
Don't feed the trolls, folks.
Ah Rufus. The mindless rants of a clueless loser!
"someone who's never spent a day in the private sector, like President Obama, simply doesn't understand."
However, Mitt's long service in the military qualifies him to Commander in Chief.
Michael Jordan was a phenomenal basketball player. Not so hot at baseball. Strange; after all, they are both sports!
Someone who's never spent a single day worrying about whether they will have enough money to survive, like Mitt Romney, simply doesn't understand.
I actually think obama's experience as a community organizer and public servant have trained him more appropriately for the office of the presidency than being a ceo of a private equity firm does. The responsibilities of a ceo are in contrast to those of the president. Community service and public service are actually more comparable.
When you read the Jonathan Chait article in The New Yorker, scroll down to the letters and read a brilliant response detailing past Presidents' job preparations for the office from "MoneyMatt". Really well written.
Mitt winning the election means disaster for America and this equals money in his pockets while America becomes poorer lining them.
Question, Romney's part in Bain was company take over and profit creation of that take over? It mostly ended up tearing the company apart in essence? At least, that is the basics of what I understand from him other than his propensity to be a pathological liar. Oh sorry, I mean restory-ing his truth. He says he's familiar with creating jobs, but that's not true, if I understand correctly. Many people lost jobs because of him. So, really, he's not a job creator but a job destroyer.
This is why I love TRMS and the TRMS blog. It's been so frustrating listening to him talk about how being a business owner makes him uniquely qualified to know how to create jobs as if running a single business means you understand overall economic policy. To me, that'd be akin to saying, "I was a private security guard, which makes me uniquely qualified to run military strategy for the US Army." He says that being a CEO taught him what causes outsourcing as if another person couldn't possibly learn that by studying economics and outsourcing. He says that he learned to read a balance sheet as if a person who went to law school couldn't possibly figure that out.
There are some things that running a business teaches you personally and makes you uniquely qualified for, but most of that is in the private sector. It does NOT teach you economic policy or how to get that policy through Congress in some unique way. I'm glad to see SOMEONE pointing it out because hardly anyone is.
PS - my other problem is that Mitt seems to think that the only issue he'll ever have to confront as president is economic ones. Frankly, I'm scared to death of a person who says they're uniquely qualified to run the economy but deride the president for his decision to study law. Tell me, honestly, which do you think has a more profound effect on governing -- private sector experience or an understanding of our country's founding document? Romney seems to think he'll be able to run his White House like he's run his campaign -- only deal with the issues that he feels like dealing with because they're popular and non-controversial. Hate to admit it but the government doesn't work that way.
Good points. That Romney doesn't get this is evident in his recent TV commercials that talk about things a President Romney would do "on Day One." Like approving the Keystone Pipeline (which requires a permit application process - he couldn't possibly just step into office and say "OK, you're approved!"); he says he would immediately announce deficit reductions, too. Just how does a President do that on his first day in office without Congress (who is actually responsible for revenues and spending) even discussing a budget?
He may just be oversimplifying things just to fool uninformed people into voting for him, but the statements are so unrealistic that I'm starting to think he really doesn't know how these things work.
I agree longhorndem - talking about the economy is a small part of the presidency. How about national security? How about foreign policy? How about domestic issues? Romney has run like a scared girl from all of these issues.
Romney is a lame one-trick pony auditioning for a complex multi-dimensional position. He falls woefully short.
Well said, @Longhorn Dem. Moreover, for all of his supposed experience, Romney has been dead wrong on everything. Wrong about the auto industry, wrong about how to approach foreclosures, wrong about repealing the Affordable Care Act (doing so would erase the trillion-dollar savings it provides over the next two decades) wrong about everything. So to his point that being a businessman qualifies him for the office of POTUS - that's already been disproven by his own faulty judgment on everything.
Romney doesn't know the answer because it goes beyond what his talking points are. He keeps lying about his record on "job creation" and he won't even discuss what he did while he was Governor of Massachusetts...something which I think the media, Democrats and the President should mention and hammer him on...not just his lies about "job creation" while at Bain.
I heard a good analogy given by Martin Bashir.He said Bernie Made-off (with billions) can read a balance sheet also,but does that mean he should be President.Gotta love that Bashir.
I've really enjoyed watching Bashir stand in for Lawrence O'Donnell this week, too - hope he'll get a permanent nighttime slot soon.
I also enjoy Martin B. He can be polite and ask the most difficult questions and I am often surprised at his brass b's. I guess its the accent. He doesn't waver in his questioning.
I know. The accent does seem to carry an aura of authority, doesn't it, all without being pugnacious?
Romeny has touted his experience at Bain makes him the person who can best stimulate job growth.
Bain has come out with a statement that 80% of the companies of the companies they have invested in increased revenues, which is exactly what their job was, and good for them!
But let's not leave it at comparing apples to oranges.
In terms of experience in job creation, can we see the statistics as to the effect on US jobs that revenue growth engendered? Was the revenue growth at the cost of US jobs? Or was the revenue growth due at least in part to expansion of the US workforce?
I don't have the resources to come up with those statistcs. I'm hoping maybe MSNBC can come up with them.
This election scares me .....God help us if the Republicans win!
I become disappointed in Americans who listen to the rhetoric rather than look at the facts and the numbers. I pray they are smarter than that, but doubts persist.
My brother, the diehard Repub, came to visit for 3 LONG days. I kept saying, "We agree to disagree, so let's let it all go." And he would agree. Then five minutes later he would say, "So why do all you Socialists expect to get free health care?" WTF? I would explain that we don't want or expect free health care. So then ten minutes later, he would say, "So why should we keep Planned Parenthood going, if they are going to do partial birth abortions on 9 month babies?"It took me ten minutes of trying to explain this to him, all the while he's trying to interject his stupid argument. He said that the middle class is the group stuck for all the taxes, expenses, etc. So I asked him why he was going to vote Republican? And his answer was, "Because Romney would take care of the middle class and make this economy boom again." God, I had a rough three days. I tried explaining but it did no good. If he comes again next year, I'm going to have to explain that if he comes, we keep our mouths shut. He is a unionized railroad worker, due to retire in 2 years at 65. Why would someone like that be a Republican? It explains how people don't understand and vote against their own best interest.
Your bro is trying to convert you, the cons are running out of willing foot soldiers.
The best thing to do is to have some talking points set up. For example, my answer to the socialists question is, Canada spends 4k in taxes a year per capita on health care and 0 people die from lack of insurance. US spends 4k in taxes on health care a year per capita for the right to spend 3k a year on insurance premiums and hospital bills and for 45k people a year to die because they don't have insurance.
If you are talking about economic growth, between 1914 when inflation numbers started being collected and 2010, Republican presidents over 48 years grew the economy by 118% while Democratic presidents over 50 years grew the economy by 767%. There has never been a Republican who left office with unemployment under 5%.
Second Republican terms show less economic growth than first Republican terms whereas Second Democratic terms show more economic growth than first terms. There have only been two third Republican terms in the last century, one from 1929 to 1932 and the other from 1989 to 1992, the former of which was the great depression and the latter of which ended a twelve year run that ran debt/GDP ratio up from 30% to 65%.
Other points can be found in the books "Unequal Democracy", "Free Trade Doesn't Work", and in the movie MEGA-DITTOS!!! at http://teapartycult.com/
Reality is that presidents have little effect on either tax policy or the economy but both have major effects on them. The US economy is not centrally planned and all tax legislation originates in the House of Representatives and not the White House.
The only reason Romney is on this is that it is the sore point of the moment. He calls Obama failed if unemployment isn't under 4% yet, at the end of what he hopes is his first year as POTUS, aims for 6% as a measure of success. Even folks who don't understand Econ or Accounting can see how wildly unfair that is!
LOL, LOVE IT Steve! The president was so right when he said running a hedge fund and being president are very different animals. Romney thinks voters will believe he can fix our economy by waving a magic wand. Maybe he believes he's Harry Potter.
I just finished watching the TIME's video talk with Romney. What's strange is that I think when Mr. Romney gets nervous or tries to spread false truths aka. (LIES) his upper lips start to sweat. I mean if you watch carefully you'll see all the blood rush to his upper lip which looks like it's straining and they become as red as a cherry. And other time when he calm his speech with more general (I believe in America talking points) the color get lighter. Could it be that I have found the tell-tell sign for Mr Romney to know when he might be "lying"? Hmmmm, You be the Judge.
Wouldn't you just LOOOVE to sit a poker table with him?! Lots of "tells".
Romney insists that his Job Creator experience...
Except that Romney doesn't have experience in creating jobs. His work with Bain was indifferent to jobs created-or-destroyed. His focus was on returning a profit to Bain's investors and hefty fees to Bain itself.
Maximizing profitability - while it does require that you understand how a business works - does not necessarily translate into knowing how to govern a country or state. And Romney isn't talking about his time spent as governor of Massachusetts, leaving us with little to say about his suitability as President.
Which is exactly why the President's team is pushing back on the Bain stuff and not letting it go despite the bleatings of "character assassination" - to try to force the conversation toward Romney's single term governorship. That 1) allows them to then point to the anemic employment figures from his time there, and 2) has the collateral benefit of opening the door of making Romney either own or deny his health care reform, both of which hurt him with a large demographic.
Whoops - double posted. Sorry.
Romney's qualification to be President is that he is "The One", i.e., the one who will realize the great Mormon plan to install one of their own in the White House and take control of the country. People who were worried that such a thing would happen with JFK didn't understand the history of the Catholic Church, which didn't force Kennedy to follow their dictates. People fail to notice that the Mormon Church is very zealous in insuring that all Mormons follow exactly the directions of their prophet, on pain of excommunication. So the situation people were worried about with JFK is the situation we will get for sure with Romney in the White House.
Marc Halperin's interview of the Romneybot was about what you expect from this sorry excuse for a journalist. He is merely a stenographer, regurgitating what his interview subjects want him to spout.
On reading his reply, my guess is Romney was only part of Bain as a figurehead to bring in the investors and never actually did anything. His answer is nonsense, why Halperin didn't laugh hm out of the room is perplexing.
A part of me thinks the Romney campaign's focus on Bain is just an effort to thread the needle with both traditional, non-Tea Party Republicans who aren't that excited about the brand these days, and Republican-leaning "independents" (you know, those people who say they're "fiscally conservative but socially liberal" yet vote R 95 times out of 100). On the one hand, they're still captivated by the concept of a businessman President. On the other hand, most of them are, consciously or not, aware of what a disaster our first (and last) "CEO President" was. So, a lot of this intentional focus by Romney on his Bain days is not only to keep the conversation away from Massachusetts (and therefore health care reform), but also to distinguish himself from Bush. He's selling some basic competence, to get those toward the center R's and so-called independents comfortable with him. That's not helped much by his basic policy stance of just doubling down on everything Bush pushed, of course. Which is why he needs to keep spreading the obvious lie of an "Obama spending binge."
I think the most telling point is Romney's claim that he has been learning to lead all his life; from his parents, his education etc. Right there is the proof that he thinks he is fully entitled to the Presidency by birth-no one without his background as the Ivy-league educated son of a leading political leader could possibly have better leadership skills than he!