HEADS UP: Massachusetts was 37th in job creation when Romney took office and 47th when he left

Senior Romney adviser Ed Gillespie had a similar exchange with “Fox News Sunday” host Chris Wallace. “When [Romney] took office it was No. 50 in job creation. Actually 51 if you count the District of Columbia,” Gillespie said. To his credit, Fox News’ Chris Wallace didn’t let Ed Gillespie get away with that claim either and corrected him that Massachusetts was 47th during the entire Romney governorship. Massachusetts ranked 37th when Mitt Romney took office. It ranked 47th when he left office. He actually made things worse. Not better. Massachusetts was never “30th in the nation.” Not when he took office or left office. – JM Ashby

“You can chant down speakers, my friend, but it’s hard to Etch-A-Sketch the truth away.” — David Axelrod, quoted by National Journal, on being shouted down by Mitt Romney supporters at a rally in Boston. via

image: barackobama

Priorities USA ad: Romney’s fuzzy math on jobs he supposedly created at Bain — This may seem like a “gotcha” gimmick, mocking Romney for his evolving I-once-caught-a-fish-this-big style of job-creation estimates, but it’s actually a very serious point.Indeed, Romney’s single most important claim as a candidate for the presidency is that he, during his private-sector career, was a “job creator.” If this isn’t true, his rationale for national office crumbles. And when a person making a bold claim can’t keep his story straight, it’s generally a strong hint that the claim is dubious. Bill Burton, a senior strategist at Priorities USA Action, told me this morning, “If [Romney] just released an accounting of the jobs gained and the jobs lost when he was at Bain, he could clear this whole controversy right up.” –Steve Benen

(Source: underthemountainbunker.com)

Mitt Romney: Not a Job Creator

(Source: underthemountainbunker.com)

… And there’s something about raping companies and leaving them in debt and setting up Swiss bank accounts and corporate businesses in the Grand Caymans. I have a serious problem with that.

Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC), today on Jansing & Co.

Former Bain Executive: Romney bears the blame for Ampad layoffs — In 1994 Romney sidestepped questions related to the plant’s layoffs by saying he was on a leave of absence from the company at the time during his run for Senate. Romney’s explanation is similar to that he recently used to deflect recent Democratic criticism of Bain layoffs at GTS Steel, saying he had already left to run the Olympics when Bain acquired the company. But according to a 2002 interview with former managing director of Bain Capital Marc Wolpow, Romney was directly responsible for Ampad’s layoffs. Wopow and a fellow Bain partner sat on the board of directors of Ampad, and were responsible with carrying out the Bain business plan that caused the layoffs. “My job was to maximize the profits to Bain Capital’s partners from the Ampad transaction,” Wolpow told the Globe in 2002. Wolpow said Romney was responsible for the business plan carried out by Bain in Indiana.”Mitt’s employees executed that transaction,” he said. “We carried out the business plan. He was CEO of the firm.” ”I reported directly to Mitt Romney … You can’t be CEO of Bain Capital and say, `I really don’t know what my guys were doing.” Wolpow said that to maximize profits, Bain “implemented an aggressive plant closing and cost-cutting program.” — Buzzfeed

(Source: underthemountainbunker.com)

Paul Krugman: Romney’s business experience wouldn’t help him as president — “Yes, he made a lot of money. He made a lot of money in ways that were often not good for workers… And it is also totally important to point out, as President Obama just did, what a President needs to do is not what you need to do if you’re trying to make a bunch of money for private equity for investors. Slashing spending at times like these is a terrible thing, it makes the economy much, much worse… I think the way to phrase it is, this is not a stimulus — although it is — but as a ‘we need those school teachers, we need those fire fighters, we need those police officers.’ We are starving essential public services. There are potholes in our roads.” – Raw Story

Romney has placed his career at Bain the center of his campaign. On several occasions he has asserted that, while at Bain, he was responsible for creating 100,000 jobs. Multiple independent fact checkers have concluded that Romney’s claims on jobs are simply false. – Think Progress

(Source: underthemountainbunker.com)

Jim Cramer: Romney is ‘a job destroyer, not a creator’ — Appearing on Meet The Press in the roundtable segment, the Mad Money host differed with David Gregory’s**perspective that Romney had a “real area of strength” over President Barack Obama on the economy. Gregory based his view on a recent ad from the Romney campaign that mentioned how the former Massachusetts governor would approve of the controversial Keystone pipeline if he was president. “Romney is known as a job destroyer, not a creator,” Cramer said. “I just don’t think that this will stick, I think Bain sticks. I think the idea that you bring in Bain, which is what happened, in the 80′s. They fire people and that’s how they get prosperity for the rich.” – Raw Story

** NOTE on David Gregory’s ‘perspective’: This month, Gregory headlined as a keynote speaker for a major Republican advocacy group. Your liberal media.

(Source: underthemountainbunker.com)

Campaign ads for people who should listen to them (but won’t)

Obama super PAC launches Bain offensive – “Whether the companies they came in and worked with made money or not, was irrelevant. Bain Capital always made money,” Wells says in the ad. “If we lost, they made money. If we survived, they made money. It’s as simple as that.” Wells warns: “He promised us the same things he’s promising the United States. And he’ll give you the same thing he gave us: nothing. He’ll take it all.” […] The key message point in the Priorities ad is the argument that Romney and Bain were making money through a rigged game, in which they’d be sure to turn a profit regardless of how their acquisitions fared.

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And here’s a video reminder on what kind of people would never be swayed by such “information” or “reality” when it comes to voting for anyone but the Republican (even Romney) on any presidential ticket:

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INTERVIEWER: So, something’s not working here.
TOOTHLESS GUY ON FOOD STAMPS: That’s right.
INTV: Voting Republican hasn’t worked for you.
TGOFS: But it could.
INTV: But it hasn’t.
TGOFS: It hasn’t but it could.

Take that Obama! Let the eagle soar!