The irony of today's campaign fisticuffs: FOX News tries to clear
Romney's name with a statement about his tenure at Bain Capital:
Contacted by Fox News and asked about
the documents, a source at Bain Capital insisted that Romney never returned to the firm
or did any substantive work for it, or for its "portfolio companies," after
February 1999. - July 2, FOX
News in a piece about
"Obama's Vicious Lies" about Bain Capital. (emphasis mine)
Then Mother Jones comes out with this :
But documents filed by Bain and
Stericycle with the Securities and Exchange Commission--and obtained by Mother
Jones--list Romney as an active participant in the investment. And this deal
helped Stericycle, a company with a poor safety record, grow, while yielding
tens of millions of dollars in profits for Romney and his partners. The
documents--one of which was signed by Romney--also contradict the official account of
Romney's exit from Bain. (emphasis mine)
What Will Matt Rhoades Do?
In the field of political campaigns, the campaign manager is king - when he can
do his job right: he is not merely a "spin meister" but the man who
navigates the entire campaign through thick and thin waters. The problem with
being a Republican campaign manager, is that candidates are vetted too poorly:
if a campaign manager doesn't know exactly how many times and exactly where a
candidate peed in his life, he's hamstrung...and worthless. Rick Perry's
manager, Joe Allbaugh, would no doubt have loved to know about Perry's
"N*ggerhead" and the McCain campaign showed world class non-vetting
when it chose Sarah Palin. Matt Rhoades is a very quiet, behind-the-scenes
character. Suspiciously so:
In a Republican primary packed with highly flammable candidates who have taken turns at self-immolation,
Rhoades is the organizing force behind Romney's safe and smooth campaign. -
Jason Horowitz, Washington Post, November 20th, 2011.
Now, unfortunately, that campaign is neither
safe nor smooth:
The document also states that Romney
"may be deemed to share voting and dispositive power with respect to"
2,116,588 shares of common stock in Stericycle "in his capacity as sole
shareholder" of the Bain entities that invested in the company. That was
about 11 percent of the outstanding shares of common stock. (The whole $75
million investment won Bain, Romney, and their partners 22.64 percent of the
firm's stock--the largest bloc among the firm's owners.) The original copy of the filing was
signed by Romney. ( emphasis mine )
The Romney campaigns' now-blatant lie, that Romney was effectively
"retired" from Bain Captial in February, 1999 certainly puts Romney
in a bad position, but what about Rhoades? Romney may only sidetrack the
scandal by telling people Obama is behind all of this bru-ha-ha, but
Rhoades will have to come up with something better, more substantial.
Echoes of Dick Cheney
Throughout his entire vice-presidential tenure, Dick Cheney
eschewed questions about his involvement with Halliburton, the blockbuster war
supplier. His "retirement" spin lasted eight years throughout which
he received "pension benefits" of approximately $120,00 per year. His
closed-door conferences with the corporate behemoth were glossed over time and
time again by a Bush administration adept at keeping a great many secrets.So
it's possible that the Rhoades management team has taken a page from Cheney's
"retirement" meme: let it stand and people will forget about it. And
for the record, a "part-time leave of absence" is not
"retirement."*
So what will Matt Rhoades do to get Bain off Romney's back? It will take some very, very fancy spin and very adroit footwork to steer the campaign in a forward direction and away from the hammering of the Obama campaign.
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