I don’t think there’s much question that lying on SEC forms is illegal. I don’t see how citing a statute makes much difference.
But again, they aren’t accusing Romney of misrepresenting his position at Bain to the SEC, they’re accusing him of telling the truth to the SEC (since not doing so would be a felony) and misrepresenting to everyone else.
The issue with Obama’s birth certificate wasn’t that it was invading Obama’s privacy, it was that Obama had already shown his birthcertificate in 2008 and some crazies still refused to accept that he was born in the US. It wasn’t a privacy issue, it was an issue with how delusional the birthers were.
From my link (should have posted this earlier):
I don’t think they should make such statements. It’s too risky, for one thing. If Romney is able to adequately show he’s not guilty of anything, it will only cheapen the Obama campaign. They should stick just to what you said above.
What “risk”? Either he continued to manage Bain after 2009, or he didn’t. There is no risk whatsoever in asserting that one of the two statements must be true.
According an article on CNN, 4 people with firsthand knowledge, 3 of whom are Democrats, have stated Romney was not involved with Bain Capital after taking over the Salt Lake City Olympics in 1999. Bain Managing Director Steve Pagliuca, a Democrat who unsuccessfully ran for Senate, also gives an explanation for why Romney’s name appears in the SEC documents:
So what? First, Democratic supporter or not, I bet these guys have skin in this fight, and they’ll say what helps their friend and former colleague, Mittens J. Romney. Second, Romney’s either at the head of Bain or he isn’t. Papers say he was. I don’t see how this kind of thing can allow for a grey area of “Well, we just kept his name on things for about three years cuz we didn’t know who else’s name would fit.”
Was he still making decisions? Really, who knows? I don’t know what he did day-in, day-out *before *1999, quite frankly. People could come forward and say he cleaned toilets twice a week at the Poughkeepsie branch, but it’s all just hearsay. The name at the top of the page says he was in charge of the whole shebang, so that’s what matters. Until 2002.
The American public in general doesn’t give a crap about his tithing. It might help him with the Baptists.
I’m positive there is nothing illegal in there - remember, we may not have these returns, but the IRS does. I’m betting what is in there are investments or tax dodges that are going to stink to high heaven. Remember the talk about how little he paid in taxes? That was last year when he and the blind trust administrator had a chance to clean up the balance sheet a bit. If he released enough returns, we’d see what was really going on. All legal, all possibly standard for someone with his money, but hard to explain to those scraping by who pay a higher tax rate than he does.
I think it’s risky to say Romney may be a felon (unless you’re pretty damn sure), but it later being shown that isn’t the case. Since the Obama campaign suggested that Romney might be a felon, but equivocated with the possibility that he was instead just “misrepresenting his position at Bain to the American people to avoid responsibility for some of the consequences of his investments,” I don’t believe they should have suggested the idea in the first place. It could lead to [insert favorite right-wing media outlet here] embarrassing the Obama administration with cries of dishonest and unscrupulous campaigning. That’s really all there is to it.
Former Baptist here.
Yes, yes. I agree. Stick with the stuff you can show, assuming Romney releases tax returns and such, or stick it to him when he doesn’t by saying he must be hiding something. That should be very effective, without the risk of possibly baseless assertions you cannot prove coming back to haunt you.
Did you read the article? Although, all four expressed personal respect for Romney, 2 are not only Democrats, but are active Obama supporters.
Actually, it’s not. There are meeting lists and other day to day documents which indicates Romney was actively involved prior to managing the Olympics, but no such documents have been found after his departure. And then there is this from Fortune (see link in original CNN article):
Does this really help Mitt? The narrative that the Dems are trying to spin is that Bain did some questionable things in 1999+. The SEC documents show that Mitt had the power to monitor and control what Bain was doing (unless CEO and only stockholder means nothing) and he didn’t. While he was off having fun in Utah, Bain was raiding the pensions of poor steel workers, etc, etc… So even if Mitt wasn’t personally making ethically questionable decisions, the story will be that people nominally under his control might have been and Mitt was profiting from it.
The SEC paperwork on Bain’s investment in Stericycle, a company that disposes aborted fetuses by the way, still had Romney’s name all over it - and this was after the time he had supposedly left the firm.
They’re Bain people first and foremost.
So what? That’s the point. If we rely on documentation for proof of anything here, he’s the top freaking dog until 2002. If day-to-day documents indicate his role with the company prior to 1999, then SEC filings should count toward something afterward.
While the questions regarding Romney’s role at Bain and his tax returns are important, what I find the most interesting is the Romney campaign’s bungling responses to these accusations. Even supporters would have to agree that–fair or not–he has handled these accusations rather poorly. For example
That might be a little too inside baseball for the average voter, but it illustrates the kind of glass jaw Romney showed in the primaries–recall his hemming and hawing over tax returns in the SC debates that eventually led to a conservative crowd booing him. That was almost five months ago, and he still doesn’t have an answer that isn’t laughable.
My guess is that these type of attacks will continue because the Dems know it overloads the Romneybot’s campaigner microchip.
I’m thinking that the reason why Mitt doesn’t want to release his earlier tax returns is because he paid a ridiculously low tax rate (think single digits) in many of these years due to parking all his money in offshore accounts.
nm
He’s trying to put a Republican in the Oval Office. Doesn’t get much more underhanded than that.
That said, my point above illustrates that the chatter about his finances is a lot of irrelevance blowing in the wind. It is entertaining, though, and I won’t complain if his finances turn out to be a factor in his ultimate defeat.
Likewise. Romney went on all those interviews and everyone’s take-away has been “Stop whining”. Oh, and he also spent his interview time compounding the issue by refusing to release his returns which has numerous people across the political spectrum telling him to just do it already. So now he’s faced with two terrible propositions: Continue to refuse and let this dog him throughout with increasing calls of “What is he hiding that’s worse than getting this over with?” or Release them, look like he caved to pressure and suffer having them combed through with multiple stories of this and that as people find new things.
That’s something he should have taken care of five years ago and his campaign is still tripping all over itself on the issue and praying it’ll go away on its own.
Sometimes it really looks as if the GOP leadership has conceded this presidential cycle to the incumbent. The level of incompetence exemplified by the handling of this very predictable issue is astounding. It doesn’t speak well of Mr. Romney’s ability to handle rapidly changing situations, either.