The “nauseating” attack on Romney’s Bain record
Cory Booker, mayor of Newark and Obama supporter, voices an opinion and then retracts it somewhat:
On NBC’s Meet the Press earlier on Sunday, Booker had strongly criticized an Obama campaign ad which attacked presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney’s tenure at private-equity firm Bain Capital.
“This kind of stuff is nauseating to me on both sides,” Booker said.
“It’s nauseating to the American public. Enough is enough. Stop attacking private equity. Stop attacking Jeremiah Wright,” he added, also referring to a proposal floated and quickly rejected by a pro-GOP super-PAC to attack Obama over his connection to his controversial former pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
On Meet the Press, Booker went further, saying he would not “indict private equity.” “It’s just we’re getting to a ridiculous point in America, especially that I know I live in a state where pension funds, unions and other people are investing in companies like Bain Capital. If you look at the totality of Bain Capital’s record, they’ve done a lot to support businesses, to grow businesses. And this to me, I’m very uncomfortable with.”
The Obama campaign ad in question, released last week, blamed Bain Capital for the closure of a steel plant and the loss of American jobs and accused Romney and other executives of profiting from the decision.
In his YouTube video, Booker backed away from those comments and said Romney’s business record at Bain was fair game.
If all of this is nauseating, then politics itself is nauseating (which it kind of is), because this sort of thing is ubiquitous. Politics isn’t a noble interplay of competing ideas, well-articulated by respectful rivals seeking the common good. In politics, virtually everything is fair game, although the word “fair” is often ignored. But why shouldn’t Romney talk about Obama’s years with Wright, and why shouldn’t Obama focus on Romney’s years at Bain, if either thinks that’s a winning approach?
Politics can be (and often is) a vicious slugfest full of distortions and even outright lies about the opponent, and the exchanges Booker references are by no means the worst we can expect in this campaign. These lies and distortions are the problem, not the subject matter itself (be it Wright or Bain), and it’s the function of the press to set us straight with the truth, although much of the MSM abdicated that effort long ago and joined in the mendacious festivities.
Nor is any of this anything new, going back to the early days of the Republic.
I agree with the way you are thinking: let the truth be explored, and let the truth come out.
Also: exploring every aspect … is the only way a Repub can win. Repubs cannot hide from anything. A Repubs candidate’s only chance is to get the truth out about everything.
For example: Church of Latter Day Saints?
Get the truth out – the whole truth, all of it. When voters know the entirety of the truth, then the issue is demystified, and voters are more comfortable regarding the candidate.
For a Repub, it works that way in every aspect of a candidate’s background. There is no hiding from anything. Axelrod said, only a day or so ago, that the Mormon church is off the table.
Repubs must not be lulled by Axelrod’s words. The Mormon church is not a small issue which Dems/voters will pass over. To the contrary, for a Repub candidate, EVERY aspect of their background is a big media issue. To win, Repubs do not need LESS public info re Mormon Church, but rather MORE public info re Mormon Church. Warts and all. It is a danged weird and illogical religion. Still, get ALL the information out there. Demystify it. There are reasons that Romney is a Mormon. He believes in those reasons, and I am confident he can make a reasoned case for Mormonism, i.e. a case which will cause voters to say: “Okay, I can see why he is a Mormon.”
Same with Bain. I agree with your take. Get ALL the information out there: warts and all. Demystify it. Let Romney explain his thinking and his actions: i.e. let Romney make a case, for Bain, with which voters can identify.
These Romney issues: Mormon, Bain, et al … are opportunities for Romney, if only he will seize them.
Mitt should run heart-wrenching videos about all the jobs lost at Solyndra, or all the car dealerships closed down by Government Motors.
Or the jobs lost when cash for clunkers destroyed millions of dollars of spare parts. Or the jobs lost on drilling moratoriums. Or the “shovel ready jobs” that never existed. Or the millions of future jobs that will never be after 4 years of 1.5 trillion annual deficits. The list is long. This man must be returned to sweet home Chicago. http://tinyurl.com/csuspo3
It’s a battle of competing distortions. Will Obama’s selective history of Bain prevail over Romney’s selective history of Bain?
Not to go through debating the “facts” again. Now I’ve moved more onto a Frank Luntz perspective. Both sides can find some facts to weave into a narrative. Who’s words work?
I posit that Obama going negative on Bain will be more effective than Rmoney attacking Solyndra. The populist nature of the population doesn’t like rich guys who do financial magic which they do not understand.
Even Politico referred to Booker’s later “walkback” as his Hostage Speech.
Shame. He’s been the best thing to happen to Newark in a long time.
If all of this is nauseating, then politics itself is nauseating (which it kind of is), because this sort of thing is ubiquitous. Politics isn’t a noble interplay of competing ideas, well-articulated by respectful rivals seeking the common good.
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Politicians: An Apology:
‘WE WOULD LIKE TO APOLOGIZE FOR THE WAY IN WHICH POLITICIANS ARE REPRESENTED IN THIS PROGRAMME. IT WAS NEVER OUR INTENTION TO IMPLY THAT POLITICIANS ARE WEAK-KNEED, POLITICAL TIME-SERVERS WHO ARE CONCERNED MORE WITH THEIR PERSONAL VENDETTAS AND PRIVATE POWER STRUGGLES THAN THE PROBLEMS OF GOVERNMENT, NOR TO SUGGEST AT ANY POINT THAT THEY SACRIFICE THEIR CREDIBILITY BY DENYING FREE DEBATE ON VITAL MATTERS IN THE MISTAKEN IMPRESSION THAT PARTY UNITY COMES BEFORE THE WELL-BEING OF THE PEOPLE THEY SUPPOSEDLY REPRESENT NOR TO IMPLY AT ANY STAGE THAT THEY ARE SQUABBLING LITTLE TOADIES WITHOUT AN OUNCE OF CONCERN FOR THE VITAL SOCIAL PROBLEMS OF TODAY. NOR INDEED DO WE INTEND THAT VIEWERS SHOULD CONSIDER THEM AS CRABBY ULCEROUS LITTLE SELF-SEEKING VERMIN WITH FURRY LEGS AND AN EXCESSIVE ADDICTION TO ALCOHOL AND CERTAIN EXPLICIT SEXUAL PRACTICES WHICH SOME PEOPLE MIGHT FIND OFFENSIVE.
WE ARE SORRY IF THIS IMPRESSION HAS COME ACROSS.
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Forty years old an an ocean away, and it’s still completely applicable.
“Politics can be (and often is) a vicious slugfest full of distortions and even outright lies about the opponent, and the exchanges Booker references are by no means the worst we can expect in this campaign.”
Yep…seems that’s the American way.
“Nor is any of this anything new, going back to the early days of the Republic.”
Amen.
this Ben Labolt who run the BO campaiagn and can be seen here (not) responding to Anderson Cooper’s questions http://www.therightscoop.com/anderson-cooper-exposes-obamas-bain-hypocrisy-as-slimy-ben-labolt-could-only-answer-with-talking-points/ is truly a piece of work. Not only is he as evasive as Axelrod, he LOOKS LIKE Axelrod, has the same speech patterns and strange little head nods as he avoids the question and scampers to a talking point. I think that the only consolation for the rest of us who can see the koolaid poisoning to which they have been subject is that it must be horrible to be them at night when they put their head down on their pillows because they must know that what they are doing is vapid, sleezy, dishonest, power-grabbing wrongness. It’s actually not-human. We all want to come from an inner truth and they all (must) know that they come from memorized, trained in evasion tactics.
The “Walk Back” from the mayor was wimpy, flabby and SOP politics. There for a few moments I thought there might be 1-Large Set of cojones in the Dem Party.
Nope.