Go to Admin » Appearance » Widgets » and move Gabfire Widget: Social into that MastheadOverlay zone
Romney Campaign Claims He Retired Retroactively (But Kept All of the Profits)
Don’t blame Romney for how he made his money. See, all of this fuss about his inaccurate filings (a federal felony, by the way) – that applies to the little people. If you’re W. Mitt Romney, it’s just a misunderstanding because you didn’t get around to doing it in a timely manner. It took you three years to remember to retire, and in that time, you were going to board meetings and signing documents for Bain, and as the 100% shareholder, you were making all of the profit.
Watch Ed Gillespie, a senior campaign advisor for the Romney campaign, move the shell of responsibility for W. Mitt Romney on Meet the Press here:
Transcript from Think Progress:
GREGORY: He was still financially linked to Bain. And of course, a lot his fortune is due to his time with Bain. Even when he was on leave, does he stand by the business decisions that were made by the firm he created?
GILLESPIE: He actually retired retroactively at that point. He ended up not going back to the firm after his time in Salt Lake City. So he was actually retired from Bain.
W. Mitt Romney’s new argument for why he’s not responsible for the outsourcing of Bain while documents say he was the President, Shareholder, CEO and Chairman of the Board is that later, after he made all of that cash from outsourcing, he retroactively retired. Neat trick! But don’t you try this at home. This is only for the very, very privileged.
Since the Romney camp declared King like that he retired “retroactively”, he is supposed to be exonerated from a) how he made the money b) filing inaccurately and perhaps fraudulently and c) he gets to say one thing to the state disclosure people and another to the federal disclosure people at the same time and not be accountable. Oh, and of course, he gets to tell you whatever he wants and you have to believe. Just trust. You wouldn’t understand. He’s a businessman (aka, divine, untouchable God).
Also, he can claim he was in Massachusetts to conduct business for Bain and therefor eligible to run for Governor, but years later he can say he had retired retroactively and just forgot to get around to filing stuff.
So, hey, Americans! Those tax returns you have to be so careful on, heck, you can just forget to file that you left that company you’re making all of that profit from — and you can forget to tell the SEC, which keeps track of this stuff because of rampant financial disclosure fraud which led to people at the top lying to investors and cheating them out of the information they needed to make a smart investment.
Those rules that Romney is scoffing at? Those are the rules put into place to make someone accountable for corporate actions. If you’ve ever invested in the stock market, you remember when corporations were lying about their finanicials in order to mislead investors into thinking they were a good risk when they were not. Well, these rules about disclosures (the ones Romney and Bain filed that claimed he was the man in charge) are meant, in part, to at least put a bump in the road for the average investor — the middle class family saving for their retirement who likes to invest in American companies and their own future.
Romney’s message to them is screw you, you don’t need to know. While Bain wasn’t publicly traded during this time period, the issue is one of accountability and the rules are there for that purpose. You don’t get to go back and have a three year do-over thirteen years later.
But, when you’re king….
Those rules don’t apply to you.
The Romney campaign is no longer denying Romney was at Bain during the time period in question (1999-2002). Now they are saying that he retroactively retired.
Forgive my crudity, but that’s like retroactively pulling out.
Romney himself said he was sole shareholder, etc in 2003 for 2002. Now he wants to pretend he was never there, but the seeds of his late withdrawal are hard to miss. He’s like an irresponsible boy who got a girl pregnant and first claimed he wasn’t there, didn’t know her, but now, after DNA tests, says he withdrew so it shouldn’t count.
That’s not how real life works. Or rather, that’s not how it works for the little people.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images Find Romney: New Revelations in Romney Left Bain Gate, Will He Run America Like ...
Romney is hiding something. He doesn't want to release his tax returns and he seems to be not telling th ...
Let's review. FactCheck has denied the President's allegations that Romney was an outsourcer based on ...
Mitt Romney puts out new ad today calling Obama a liar for saying he outsourced jobs. On the same day, a ...
The Obama campaign put this hard hitter out Friday - a Friday the 13th I'm sure W. Mitt Romney will reme ...
Paws
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 12:38 pm
So the annual report issued by Bain in December 2002 showing Romney as one of two managing members is what, a mistake? This is no small matter – it means he was “authorized to execute, acknowledge, deliver and record any recordable instrument purporting to affect an interest in real property, whether to be recorded with a Registry of Deeds or with a District Office of the Land Court.”
He was one of only TWO. Did the other one not consult him on anything? How many lies are they going to try and sell us?
big.assets.huffingtonpost...
labman57
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 12:58 pm
You can almost see and hear the collective eye rolls, face palms, and sighs of disdain across the nation.
“Retroactive retirement” — title of Chapter 5 in Willard’s forthcoming literary contrivance, “My Own Revisionist History, the Mitt Romney Story”.
PMom_GA
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:12 pm
So, if Mittens was “retired” from 1999-2002, doesn’t that negate his ability to run for MA governor, since he used the Bain time as “proof” of residency?
Sounds like fraud to me – election fraud. MA – get investigating & get back all the money Mittens “earned” under false pretenses.
Linda1961
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:26 pm
Great catch! If this “retroactive retirement” is correct, he wasn’t eligible to run for governor of MA in 2002.
Sansa
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 3:20 pm
Yep, it seems his entire house of cards is wobbling madly right now. I’m loving it.
Reynardine
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:13 pm
Y’know, check his background good, and I bet it turns out he retroactively pulled out, too, just like you said.
Rocky in texas said...
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:18 pm
Romney was to greedy to pull out.
Hrafnkell Haraldsson
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:22 pm
It’s amazing what you can do when you make facts irrelevant, isn’t it? Good thing the Nazis didn’t think of this argument at Nuremberg – “Oh, I retired before that happened”
Linda1961
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:27 pm
I thought of Nixon using that excuse.
Rocky in texas said...
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:24 pm
Sarah,
Your mention of “pulling out”, “seeds of his late withdrawal”, etc…
reminds me of a slightly preverted thought that has popped into my head a few times over the past couple months…
That is…
Has willard ever done any “engineering” regarding having offspring ?! 5 boys and no girls?
Reynardine
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:51 pm
He did have a stake in a dead fetus disposal company, didn’t he?…but think technology for early prenatal sex detection wasn’t around then. Sperm centrifuging was, though.
Echelon
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 4:02 pm
Hey!! That could be ab explanation for why they have that glossed-over Ken doll look about them. Hmm…
Linda1961
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:28 pm
“Retired retroactively” sounds Orwellian to me.
Rocky in texas said...
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 1:30 pm
It’s getting very clear to me why romney can’t release his tax returns…
Is wikileaks gonna release romneys tax retuns?
Shiva (Moderator)
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 2:08 pm
If you were taking money from the actions of the company, and were listed as the CEO, you were involved. Saying you wernt is simply just another lie Mittens
huina
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 2:52 pm
If Mitt retired (even retroactively), and only there nominally to draw a full salary, then who was running Bain? Was the company put on auto-pilot for three years? Is that why no one is responsible for whatever business decisions made in those three years? Is that the reason that the company drifted toward China with all those jobs?
Kathleen
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 3:22 pm
The ultimate spin. He’s learned this from birth, from his Church. His leaders do the exact same thing with their history, or when the members start to worry what they are doing with their money. “There there, little one,you want to see the books? Just have faith, Sister Jones. We would n.e.v.e.r use the money for ill gotten gains! Have faith, the Lord needs your 10%. In fact it is your only way to salvation, your 10%!…oh did Joseph Smith have sex with 14 yr. old girls, or other men’s wives?…um, well, uh, we don’t really know. We’ll worry about that in the next life, where we will have all the answers…now run along and write that check please!”
clare
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 8:25 pm
That’s a brilliant observation! Did not occur to me but of course they make dead people Mormons RETROACTIVELY!
Gary Vaughn
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 6:18 pm
Does retroactively mean he jumped in the DeLorean with Marty Mcfly?
Dawns_Rainbow
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 8:20 pm
How do you retire retroactively yet keep getting a salary?
TS
Jul. 15th, 2012 at 11:34 pm
They can’t possibly be serious, can they?! How stupid do they think we are? Retired retroactively? What does that even mean? It completely defies logic! Is he implying that he was effectively retired – i.e. not participating in the day-to-day operation of Bain Capital – but just didn’t get around to making it official for three years? If so, then why did he continue to draw a salary and why did the company continue to tell the SEC that he was still in charge in every meaningful way?
The answer to all this is pretty simple: Mitt wants to have it both ways, and his entire life experience tells him that he absolutely can. Hopefully the voters won’t let him get away with it.
Lisa Meeks
Jul. 16th, 2012 at 12:28 am
Here’s how Mitt can show that he means what he says: any business decisions made during that period of time he was actually retired (retroactively) should be made null and void. Any jobs that were moved out of the country due to those decisions should be moved back. Any money made by Mitt during this retirement period should be returned to Bain, along with interest this money has earned. Then, and only then, will I believe Mitt might be telling the truth.
get real
Jul. 16th, 2012 at 3:26 am
What part of ‘CEO, Chairman, President and sole stockholder’ does Willard Mitt Romney not understand?
If he doesn’t even know that, he should automatically be disqualified from even running for President of the United States. By definition.