Romney Watch: New Frontiers of Falsehood

[Dardedar]

I do believe he is getting worse. Twenty-one whoppers from Mittens in the last week:

Chronicling Mitt's Mendacity, Vol. XXIV

[supak]

Darrel, are you playing around in the June 2012 0.45 market at Intrade, because it sure looks like someone is trying to help me fund my future bets on AGW.

https://data.intrade.com/graphing/jsp/t ... tId=757509

[Dardedar]

Darrel, are you playing around in the June 2012 0.45 market at Intrade,...

Nope. I don't even know what that chart means. "GTA?" What is that, Grand Theft Auto? "Time and sales." When GTA Five comes out?

[supak]

Darrel, are you playing around in the June 2012 0.45 market at Intrade,...

Nope. I don't even know what that chart means. "GTA?" What is that, Grand Theft Auto? "Time and sales." When GTA Five comes out?

https://www.intrade.com/v4/markets/?eventId=91252

I was just kidding with you because I thought you'd like to know what's happening in my Global Temperature Anomaly Markets. Every month, you can bet on the GISTEMP (Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies) global land and ocean surface temperature anomalies. They have a market for the GTA going over 0.45, 0.55, 0.65, and 0.75. They should wind up with the 0.45 being the most likely, and the 0.75 being the least. Some drunk wingnut (or someone who just knows it's me in there bidding and they want to give me money for some reason) came into the 0.45 market in the last few days and chased my descending bids down to the point where the 0.45 is now 60%, while the 0.55 is 65%, and some idiot drove the 0.65 up to 70%.

That's why one of my comments was:

Jeapordy answer: #62 on Billboard's "Greatest Songs of All Time"...

Of course, being in the music biz, you might know that the answer is "Upside Down" by Diana Ross.

Anyhow, thought you might get a kick out of the never ending idiocy of wingnut Intrade bettors.

[supak]

Darrel, are you playing around in the June 2012 0.45 market at Intrade,...

Nope. I don't even know what that chart means. "GTA?" What is that, Grand Theft Auto? "Time and sales." When GTA Five comes out?

I'm a little slow sometimes... Now that I've had a day to think about this, all I can say is: you're alright...

[L.Wood]

Romney adviser says Obamcare penalty is not a tax — so why do some conservatives want him fired?

Posted on July 3, 2012

In the wake of the Supreme Court Obamacare ruling, it‘s admittedly hard to keep everyone’s argument straight. Who’s calling it a tax, who’s calling it a penalty? And what exactly is it, anyway?

On Monday, Mitt Romney adviser Eric Fehrnstrom went on MSNBC to clear some of that up, and to state unequivocally where Romney stands (we covered the original here). To the surprise of many, he was clear that Romney agrees with President Obama that the penalty in the mandate is not a tax:

TheBlaze
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Romney now says healthcare mandate is a tax, shifting position
Posted Wednesday, Jul. 04, 2012

telegraphstar

[L.Wood]

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BOSTON GLOBE REFUSES TO RETRACT FACTS ON HOW ROMNEY REMAINED AS BAIN CEO UNTIL 2002.

By DYLAN BYERS |
7/12/12 5:31 PM EDT

Boston Globe editor Martin Baron emails Mitt Romney communications director Gail Gitcho:

Dear Ms. Gitcho:

We received your request late this afternoon for a correction regarding this morning’s Globe story. Having carefully reviewed that request, we see no basis for publishing a correction. The Globe story was entirely accurate.

The Globe story was based on government documents filed by Bain Capital itself. Those described Governor Romney as remaining at the helm of Bain Capital as its “sole stockholder, chairman of the board, chief executive officer, and president” until 2002. The story also cited state financial disclosure forms filed by Romney that showed he earned income as a Bain “executive” in 2001 and 2002, separate from investment earnings.

The Globe story accurately described the contents of those documents.

The Globe story also gave a full account of the Romney campaign’s position that, notwithstanding several years of regulatory filings, Mitt Romney “retired from Bain Capital in 1999 … (and) has had no involvement in the management or investment activities of Bain Capital, or with any of its portfolio companies, since that time.” In your correction request, you reiterate points that are fully detailed in the Globe story.

Sincerely,

Martin Baron
Editor, The Boston Globe

The Romney campaign did not immediately respond to a request for a copy of their correction request.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/201 ... 28799.html

Recall that Romney is trying to cover his ass on Bain's investment in Stericycle, a firm that disposes of aborted fetuses which he acquired in 1999.

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[L.Wood]

Romney finally has to explain

Here's the thing about privileged characters like Mitt Romney: they've never really been vetted, indeed rarely challenged. Say you're a senior at a posh prep school in Michigan, for example, and you think it'd be fun to pick on the weakest kid in your class. So you get a bunch of guys to hold the faggot down while you cut off his offensively long hair.

What happens? Well, if your father's the governor of Michigan, nothing happens. ...
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Being Mitt Romney means never having to explain.

So when somebody actually calls his bluff, a guy like Romney tends to react badly — first with a clumsy, easily-refuted lie. Then with foot-stamping indignation that anybody's allowed to question his word as a gentleman. My dear fellow, it's simply not done.

The sheer political stupidity of the Romney campaign's attempts to distance him from his career at Bain Capital can't be overstated. Never mind that his entire case for the presidency rests upon the "job-creating" credentials his success at Bain supposedly give him.
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Stung by the Obama campaign's focus on GS Industries, a Kansas City steel company Bain drove into bankruptcy in 2001, the Romney campaign sent out a debunking press release, Slate's David Weigel noted, with bolded sentences in all caps: "The Bankruptcy And Layoffs At GS Industries All Occurred AFTER Governor Romney Had Left Bain Capital in February 1999."

Down at the county courthouse, this is known as the some-other-dude-done-it defense. Never mind that Bain had acquired GS Industries for $8 million in 1993, leveraged the investment with debt equaling more than ten times the company's yearly income (paying itself a nifty $36 million dividend in 1994), then eventually walked away from a $554 million debt — stiffing creditors, leaving 750 workers jobless, and sticking the U.S. Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. with $44 million in unfunded liabilities.

Writing in Bloomberg.com, private equity banker Anthony Luzzatto Gardner dissects Bain's "casino capitalism."

"Romney was fabulously successful in generating high returns for [Bain] investors," he explains. "He did so, in large part, through heavy use of tax-deductible debt, usually to finance outsized dividends for the firm's partners and investors. When some of the investments went bad, workers and creditors felt most of the pain. Romney privatized the gains and socialized the losses."
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So anyway, every GOP pundit on every cable TV talk show repeated Romney's bogus alibi. Hey, all that dodgy stuff — the bankruptcies, the mass firings, the factory closings, the investments in companies specializing in offshoring American jobs — none of that happened on Mitt's watch.
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Except guess what? There's no need to quibble over exactly when Romney "retired retroactively," as campaign advisor Ed Gillespie memorably claimed after the Boston Globe found the Mittster's signature on stacks of SEC documents filed by Bain up to three years after he'd supposedly cleaned out his cubicle and returned his restroom key.

The documents not only listed Romney as president, CEO, and board chairman, but — here's the best part — "sole shareholder" until 2003.

So who cares what day-to-day managerial decisions Mitt made or didn't make during his sojourn in Utah? He OWNED Bain Capital, lock, stock and hedge funds. It was the principal source of his personal fortune.

Anybody who believes that evil trolls had somehow seized control and were making decisions about Mitt's money without Mitt's knowledge...

Well, what won't such persons believe?

Gene Lyons' complete article with links at Arkansas Times blog, Jul 18 '12

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[Dardedar]

[Dardedar]

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[Dardedar]

Mitt's 26 whoppers this week...

Chronicling Mitt's Mendacity, Vol. XXVII

[Dardedar]

[Dardedar]

[Dardedar]

Romney Praises Israel's Socialized Health Care System

JERUSALEM — Presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney offered praise for the Israeli health care system today — a medical plan that has been socialized since its founding in 1948.

Romney, who championed the Massachusetts health care mandate, but is an opponent of the federal mandate passed by President Barack Obama, marveled at how little Israel spends on health care relative to the United States.
"When our health care costs are completely out of control. Do you realize what health care spending is as a percentage of the GDP in Israel? 8 percent. You spend 8 percent of GDP on health care. And you’re a pretty healthy nation," Romney told donors at a fundraiser at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, speaking of a health care system that is compulsory for Israelis and funded by the government. "We spend 18 percent of our GDP on health care. 10 percentage points more. That gap, that 10 percent cost, let me compare that with the size of our military. Our military budget is 4 percent. Our gap with Israel is 10 points of GDP. We have to find ways, not just to provide health care to more people, but to find ways to finally manage our health care costs."

LINK

[Dardedar]

[L.Wood]

Mitt Romney paid no taxes over the course of 10 years ?

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's (D-Nev.) charge, in an interview with The Huffington Post, that Mitt Romney paid no taxes over the course of 10 years wasn't the first time he's made that accusation of the presumptive Republican nominee.

"His father, George Romney, set the precedent that people running for president would file their tax returns and let everybody look at them," Reid declared, in a little-noticed floor speech from mid-July. "But Mitt Romney can't do that because he's basically paid no taxes in the prior 12 years."

Reid's most recent remarks have been criticized as deliberately provocative, if not reckless, speculation. The majority leader said he was told that Romney "didn't pay any taxes for 10 years" by someone who invested with Bain Capital, Romney's former private equity firm. But Reid hasn't named names, and went so far as to admit that he didn't know if his information was accurate.

Yet the fact that Reid made a similar assertion with little fanfare nearly three weeks ago (the 12 years he references likely include the two for which Romney has released tax information) suggests that he personally believes the information to be true.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/0 ... 28511.html

[David Franks]

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The fact that somebody has used the words you say they used does not mean that you're quoting them.
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[Dardedar]

Mitt Romney Would Pay 0.82 Percent in Taxes Under Paul Ryan's Plan

The Atlantic

"Under Paul Ryan's plan, Mitt Romney wouldn't pay any taxes for the next ten years -- or any of the years after that. Now, do I know that that's true. Yes, I'm certain.

Well, maybe not quite nothing. In 2010 -- the only year we have seen a full return from him -- Romney would have paid an effective tax rate of around 0.82 percent under the Ryan plan, rather than the 13.9 percent he actually did. How would someone with more than $21 million in taxable income pay so little? Well, the vast majority of Romney's income came from capital gains, interest, and dividends. And Ryan wants to eliminate all taxes on capital gains, interest and dividends."

The rest... here.

And don't miss:

The Worst Part of Paul Ryan's Budget

The Atlantic

"Paul Ryan's budget takes us back to 1950. That's not a metaphor. That's a statistic.

When the CBO projected Ryan's plan four decades into the future, it concluded that the size of government would shrink to 15% of the economy by 2050. How small is 15%? As a share of GDP, it would be the smallest government since 1950/'51. Here's Ryan's proposed 2050 budget and our real 1950 budget, side by side. The Y axis is percent-share of GDP."

[Dardedar]

[Dardedar]

Kevin Drum on Mitten's honesty....

"t's common to twist and distort and cherry pick. But Romney has flatly claimed that Obama said something that, in fact, a John McCain aide said. He's snipped out sentences from an Obama speech and spliced the two halves back together so nobody can tell what he did. Then he did it again to another Obama speech. And he unequivocally said that Obama plans to drop work requirements for welfare even though he's done nothing of the sort.

This really is a post-truth campaign. It's different. It's one thing to be nasty. All campaigns are nasty. It's one thing to twist and distort and mock. Every campaign does that too.... But this is different. This is a presidential candidate just baldly making stuff up on the assumption that nobody will ever know."

Twenty-nine lies in the last week. About average for him. Is this the most dishonest Mormon ever or what?

http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2012/ ... -xxix?lite