Written By: Hans Benes
E-mail: [email protected]
As this Presidential campaign nears its finish line, Mitt Romney is becoming more aggressive with his rhetoric. At the top of his list of issues is China. According to Romney, China is a cheater in the business world, costing this country millions of jobs. By following his plan, which has still to be defined, Romney promises to create twelve million new jobs.
Presumably these jobs will be in the manufacturing sector. Manufacturing jobs have often been sent abroad to take advantage of China’s cheap labor pool. But, like many of the Romney initiatives presented, details are sorely missing. It’s one thing to proclaim new jobs and support for the middle class, it’s quite another in establishing real objectives to do so.
What is really hurting Romney, however, is his past business affiliation with China. Bain Capital, under the leadership of the Republican nominee was a leader in outsourcing jobs to China. And now his recently released tax return identifies investments in Iran, China and stem cell research. His investment in China’s state run oil company, CNOOC, was liquidated last year, shortly before the Republican debate in Iowa.
Mitt, you can’t have it both ways! You can’t call China cheaters while investing in their companies to help them cheat! As we have well established over the years, those who fund terrorists are terrorists in their own right. Therefore, by funding the cheaters, Romney is a cheater as well. And that is nothing to say of the ethical issues such investments raise. One can argue that these are investments in larger, diversified portfolios headed by managers not under his control. But any savvy investor researches funds he might invest in to make sure the fund’s portfolio matches his strategic objectives.
So why invest in cheaters? Clearly the goal is to make money. The problem is: once your aim is to make money at whatever cost, you lose all semblance of self-respect. Providing capital to Chinese companies gives them the ability to steal American jobs. Calling them cheaters in retrospect is too little too late. Apparently, Mitt Romney’s personal financial vision is vastly different than the one he has for this country.
The success of his latest plea for support to the American middle class worker will determine his Presidential fate. For them, China is a big issue. And a potential President, who has shown that he is more interested in personal financial gain than the fate of struggling American workers, faces a very difficult task.
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2 Responses
“… a potential President, who has shown that he is more interested in personal financial gain than the fate of struggling American workers,”
This completely ignores the fact that EVERYONE who has worked for Mitt, including Liberal democrats, has said what a genuine and generous man he is. Or that he give more to charity, both in real dollars and as a percentage of his income, than Obama has in his entire life.
What do you say about a sitting President who has playing more golf and hoop, sent his wife on more extravagant vacations and held more fund-raisers than the past 4 Presidents, combined?
Which one of those two men can REALLY be argued to not care about struggling American workers more than personal and political gain, Hans?
To begin with, if you really want to open pandora’s box by playing the “…past 4 Presidents, combined” card”, then you bring George W. into play, and I don’t think you really want to do that. We can both agree that the reason George W. has been invisible in Romney’s campaign is that Mitt wants to distance himself as much as possible from Republican, Bush, policies from 2000-2008.
As for Romney and his contributions to charity (the Mormon Church requires a 10% tithe), they have little to do with Romney and China. All of his China deals were based on making money. It’s not just his investments, but his Bain Capital policies as well. He shipped jobs overseas specifically to enhance the company’s bottom line. And let’s not get into the Cayman accounts.
If Romney really cared about American voters, he would never be insensitive enough to disenfranchise 47% of the population. In addition, how did he suddenly manage to find 12 million jobs? If he really cared, he would have presented his proposal long ago. By waiting until election time, it appears purely as a campaign ploy. In fact, he still hasn’t stated, “How.” And finally, the Republicans ran on a jobs platform in 2010. Whatever happened to them? Apparently that failure was discreetly merged into Obama’s record.