Newest criticism of Romney: He should have made more money
“Mitt Romney should be a billionaire,” Margaret Collins and Richard Rubin stated flatly last month in a detailed Bloomberg News examination of his wealth. Yet, when Boston Magazine listed the 50 wealthiest Bostonians in 2006, Romney, then the governor of Massachusetts, was not even on the list. His Bain partner, Steve Pagliuca, who joined the firm in 1989 (five years after Romney started it) was listed at No. 35, with a net worth of $410 million…
Does it really matter if Romney is worth $250 million, $1 billion or more? Rich is rich after all, right? I think it does, politically as well as substantively.
Politically, the alternatives are not great. If he were perceived as the first real billionaire to run for president, it would only exacerbate popular doubts about how someone living so removed from the concerns of average Americans — or even just 47 percent of them — could effectively represent them.
And if he is not a billionaire, doesn’t it suggest that he was not a great private-equity investor after all, thus torpedoing his claim to understand how to create jobs and get the economy back on track?
Blowback
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Flop sweat and desperation. Mmmm mmmm mmm.
Added bonus: Bitter tears.
kim roy on October 6, 2012 at 8:38 PM
Fortunately for Romney, this election is still about a lot of people waking up with Rita, er, Obama, sans makeup.
Seth Halpern on October 6, 2012 at 8:39 PM
All candidates must be Clintoon level kleptomaniacs?
The new Bloomie standard?
viking01 on October 6, 2012 at 8:41 PM
Jumped. The. Shark.
changer1701 on October 6, 2012 at 8:42 PM
Gee I dunno, you think Romney could get richer using the perks and powers of his office while he’s in office to get rich like a certain current and soon-to-be-former US Senate Majority Leader?
Or he could slack off and have other people ghostwrite books for him and maybe that would make him richer?
No, no, wait, what’s the matter with WaPo? Haven’t they heard Obamuh–I mean, really, there are limits. How much money is enough? How much do you really need?
stukinIL4now on October 6, 2012 at 8:42 PM
How much would he be worth if he didn’t give away money in charitable donations?
philoquin on October 6, 2012 at 8:43 PM
He could have, but he is someone with noblesse oblige. If money is his prime objective in life, he would not have left Bain Capital to run the SLC Olympics. He accepted $1 a year for his work with the Salt Lake city Olympics and as Governor of MA. And he turned down an offer to return to the financial sector at 30 millions a year after he lost the primary in 2008.
bayview on October 6, 2012 at 8:44 PM
This is a crown jewel, an apotheosis, of modern journalism.
It’s almost like the writer was studying Ace’s prior literature on the media double standard. The very last line is almost overkill, but it puts the piece firmly beyond satire.
HitNRun on October 6, 2012 at 8:44 PM
Stupid or evil? GOP candidates always get one or the other by the press and Dems.
Not so rich: Stupid
Too rich :Eeeeeeevil
thebrokenrattle on October 6, 2012 at 8:45 PM
Yeah. Giving away $4 million a year will do that to ya…
JohnGalt23 on October 6, 2012 at 8:48 PM
In honor of Ace’s blog, I’ll just say that Obama is a SCOAMF. And the WaPo is part of the MF***ingM.
jwolf on October 6, 2012 at 8:49 PM
I got the impression from the WaPo story that Romney is both.
mchristian on October 6, 2012 at 8:51 PM
+1
mchristian on October 6, 2012 at 8:51 PM
Over the course of Mr. Romney’s life, how much money has he donated to charities?
If he had been a penurious (fill-in-the-blank) like most of the elected and unelected officials in this regime, how much money could Mr. Romney have made if he had kept that money?
vityas on October 6, 2012 at 8:52 PM
Umm.. perhaps because he gave away lots of his money to charity over his lifetime?? And he is probably a great employer who made sure that all his employees got bonuses and generous salaries.
Illinidiva on October 6, 2012 at 8:57 PM
Actually for me, I would have rather him have built from the ground up a physical producing entity like his father did. I think if he had to fight his way through all the regulations, the red tape, the environuts he sided with as Massachusetts Governor, was forced to fight against already entrenched through regulation entities he would no longer be so fond of them. As it stands, he pretty much pushed paper as a financial institution.
But what ever, not like we have a choice. Thanks progressive Republicans for having made Obama the only choice Americans had in 2008.
astonerii on October 6, 2012 at 8:59 PM
Correct me if I’m wrong here, but since our Success is not our own, because we didn’t build that, then isn’t it really our fault he isn’t richer? I mean, we could have built him more roads and bridges or something, only then could he have been more successful. I blame myself. And all of you.
trubble on October 6, 2012 at 9:05 PM
Shouldn’t The Mooche be less, er, stocky?
SouthernGent on October 6, 2012 at 9:22 PM
There is dumb, dumber, and dumberer.
This is dumbererest.
bobs1196 on October 6, 2012 at 9:22 PM
Proof positive that the media will go full retard carrying 0bama’s water.
They better hope that the Mayans are right, because how on earth will they recover even a scrap of integrity after this election?
Rebar on October 6, 2012 at 9:31 PM
“I Do Believe at a Some Point, You’ve Made Enough Money.” – Obama
Bobbertsan on October 6, 2012 at 9:32 PM
Romney should be richer and Obama should be poorer.
The Notorious G.O.P on October 6, 2012 at 9:42 PM
Aww, the Parasite class is pissed the host doesn’t have more blood to feed off of. May they all FO and die, miserably.
Thomas More on October 6, 2012 at 9:50 PM
This will be the WaPo’s next editorial. Put money on it.
jwolf on October 6, 2012 at 10:05 PM
At some point, he decided that he didn’t really need more money, and could do more good in the public sector. He would likely have produced significantly more wealth for everyone had he kept on in the private sector, but its an open question if his time wasn’t better spent the way it was.
Count to 10 on October 6, 2012 at 10:28 PM
Exactly. We were supposed to be the “someone else” who built Romney’s wealth, but we failed. Shame on us.
Baerwulf on October 6, 2012 at 10:33 PM
Must be parody.
How rich was Obama when he become president?
Schadenfreude on October 6, 2012 at 11:13 PM
I’m mostly shocked that it took them this long. One of the first things I thought when they were attacking his wealth and Bain’s success was that there were a lot of private equity companies who had created billionaires, so if he is as greedy and inhumane as they were saying, why wasn’t he richer? If he hadn’t bailed out of the business to rescue the Winter Olympics, at no charge, and then run for the most thankless job in the nation, a Republican governor of Massachusetts, also at no charge, he could have been a billionaire by now.
He’s always had an explanation, but, of course, real altruism and service without an ulterior motive are among the most unacceptable of truths to Progressives. Of course, they always claim those attributes for themselves, so how can they credit it when a conservative shows up being the real thing?
Of course, they can rely on their own base to ignore such a bizarre shift in logic as this, they’ve been conditioned not to notice them.
flataffect on October 6, 2012 at 11:34 PM
The real bonus here is the press’s sudden willingness to abandon/explode the “Romney is too rich and out of touch” meme. This is the kind of strategic mistake that only happens in moments of panic.
Caiwyn on October 7, 2012 at 12:03 AM
Ace has been out doing himself.
It’s hard to keep finding the words to describe the ever-lowering depths to which the MFM has been descending, but he’s able to do it. Bravo to the ewok.
juliesa on October 7, 2012 at 12:51 AM
Oh this is comedy gold. First he’s too rich, now he’s not rich enough. Make up your minds.
I am laughing so hard at all this Romney angst because I remember way back in the primaries when the Dems actually wanted Romney to be the candidate, because they thought he would be an easybeat for Obozo.
As Artur Davis said in Florida today “What a difference 90 minutes without a teleprompter makes.”
Ozwitch on October 7, 2012 at 5:22 AM
Perhaps if he held back on his charitable donations he’d have more money tucked away.
One of the many problems with the left is that they don’t plan and save their money. Unlike those of us with ambitions, they don’t understand that you can never make enough, because, you can never save/keep enough.
My wife and I are well off (we built it) and this past week our accountant finished up our taxes for 2011. Every year we prepay our estimate taxes in April to avoid the governments ridiculous late fees. As you may imagine when we get a refund for overpayment the government takes over six months to pay us back, that is, after sending us a letter asking if we’d like to apply our refund to next years taxes. So you see, the government always expects to take more … they can never
maketake too much!The tax code needs to be shortened to one simple page. You add up everything you make, subtract everything you spent and pay a small percentage on what’s left over.
kregg on October 7, 2012 at 8:13 AM