Above: Trailer for "King of Bain: When Mitt Romney came to town."
So. Jon Huntsman runs a hard campaign on the issues. Does all the retail marketing that a small state like New Hampshire requires. Comes in a respectable third. And who gets the post-primary ink?
Newt Gingrich. And perhaps for all the wrong reasons.
Are the attacks on Mitt Romney's private equity days fair? Or are they just the Republican version of "Swiftboating?"
- A Republican assault on the rich...wait. What? - St. Louis Post-Dispatch
... Debuting today in South Carolina is a 27-minute documentary-style campaign film that attacks GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney for being a job-destroying capitalist greedhead.
The film, "King of Bain: When Mitt Romney Came to Town," was independently produced and shopped around the GOP presidential field. Recently an independent 'super PAC" called Winning Our Future, run by a former aide to Romney rival Newt Gingrich, bought it. ...
- The perils of Gingrich's promise to "tell the truth" - Denver Post Editorial
... Romney's time at the helm of Bain Capital is certainly fair game, but it could provide a much easier — and perhaps more compelling — attack for Democrats when their ammunition includes GOP sound bites. ...
- The peculiar debate over Mr. Romney's business record - Washington Post Editorial
... As a means of corporate finance, private equity is hardly evil per se. Probably it is one feature of U.S. capitalism that makes our system more flexible and capable of "creative destruction" than Europe’s.
Yet there are costs to putting firms through restructuring, so government policy should not unduly favor private equity. Current tax policy does just that. Private equity managers’ winnings count as "carried interest," taxed at a much lower rate than ordinary income. Now there’s an issue.
- A perfect doll - Maureen Dowd, The New York Times
... Romney, who accuses President Obama of "crony capitalism" on the Solyndra deal, introduced his brother-in-law to Lifelike officials, who dutifully hired the relative and promoted him to vice president with an annual salary of $100,000. ...
Now, it seems, being a rich man may be even more damaging than being the wrong religion. To Republicans:
- Mormon slurs notably absent - Provo Daily Herald Editorial
... it's no-holds-barred. Yet there was little or no sign that anybody thought it worthwhile to attack Romney and Huntsman on their Mormonness, which suggests that the politicians and their pollsters have found that most people no longer consider this to be an important factor in considering a candidate. ...
