ROMNEY WOUNDED AND BLEEDING.

The attack on Romney's business record as CEO of Bain Capitol is very, very, very serious. Romney decided to run on his business record and not on his tenure as  Governor of Massachusetts. The latter  would set him up as a flip flopper de luxe.  His experience in business is the reason he should be President.  This was the alpha and omega of his brittle credibility. He maintained that he had, inter alia, created a 100,000 jobs and with his business credentials was just the guy to lead us out of this mess. 


ROMNEY'S UPHILL FIGHT


As has been detailed, in blog after blog, his fight to be the Republican nominee has been uphill and the "Anyone but Romney" candidates are many and won't give up. This business attack is something that will also not go away. Besides the merciless hammering he is getting from the "Anyone" crowd, this will dog him right till the end from all and sundry. It will also ensure that the end will be a long way off. He is now on the defensive both in the nomination battle and as the likely Republican nominee.


CORPORATE VULTURE


The attack led by Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry is unrelenting and involves, besides campaign stumping, literally millions of dollars of negatives ads. The latter is the selfsame medium that eliminated Gingrich as the number one "Anyone but Romney" candidate in Iowa. They have called him a "Corporate Vulture" and a crony Capitalist. Perry maintains that the workers suffer and a few net the loot. Gingrich links this to fraudulent activity going on in Washington and the corruption in Wall Street. 


THE RETURN OF SARAH    


Even Sarah Palin who has said nothing for months, has called for him to be transparent and reveal his income tax returns and full disclosure of "What Happened at Bain", the company that he was CEO of. This all without the Democrats saying a word.


 The Daily Beast columnist Andrew Sullivan opined, "But with Romney, we have a singular example of someone who made a quarter of a billion dollars by firing the white middle and working class in droves in ways that do not seem designed to promote growth or efficiency, but merely to enrich Bain".


OBAMA'S RE ELECTION AGENDA


This issue fits slap bang into the Obama agenda for this election. The whole issue of the rich not paying enough taxes and making massive profits at the expense of employees' jobs is part of the manifesto Obama is slowly building up to run on. To have a living example of  Romney's alleged deviant behavior exposed in all it's gory details by others can only bring glee to the Re Election camp.


ROMNEY'S COMPANY - BAIN


Bain is what is called a Private Equity Company where some of the worst excesses of  Corporations are said to take place. There are known as Corporate Raiders. They do whatever it takes to make money from failing companies. In this context whatever happened at Bain is not going to go down well. The fired will have little empathy for the efficiencies of Capitalism, especially when Mitt got millions and millions out of the process. The fired are already being paraded around. Those in Mitt' position usually pay Capital Gains tax on income which is a lesser tax than their Middle Class secretaries pay. A point that icon Warren Buffet is making for Obama every day.


All this added to an insensitive remark, admittedly made in another context, that he Romney, "Enjoyed firing people". On top of this he maintained that these criticisms against Bain and him were "envy".


GAME CHANGER


This turn of events is the beginning of a game changer. The one candidate that had the where with all to take on Obama is now wounded and bleeding. This must have the  Republican establishment pulling their hair out. Getting sophisticated theorists on Capitalism, from Milton Friedman's University of Chicago, to explain it all, is just not going to cut it. At best this is the ugly side of Capitalism.


Remember what happened to John Kerry when he ran against George W. Bush. Kerry ran on his war record which was from all objective accounts stellar. He didn't dodge the draft as was implied with Bush. He won three purple hearts. However a PAC, called the Swift Boat Veterans, smeared him of the face of the earth and said he was a phoney. The jury is still out on this issue but Bush won a second term on the doubt. Romney's credibility is far more vulnerable and in this context his credentials as a job creator are compromised. 


One thing is for certain is that nothing is for certain. In this 24/7 media madness you will be challenged if you become relevant. Truth be told JAY H. ELL had believed that Romney's business credentials were the last thing that could be suspect. But then he believed that John Kerry was a war hero!


SOUTH CAROLINA AND BEYOND


So it is onward to South Carolina where, up to going into print, Romney is still far ahead. How this will impact this race is an open question. So many of the establishment have committed themselves  to Romney that cannot back down now. Can, for example, the Tea Party South Carolina Governor, Nikki Halley, call it quits? However whatever happens in South Carolina this issue can only get worse. It is just too hard to see it turning into a positive for Romney. Damage control will obviously lessen the damage but damage there will be.


MEANTIME.....


* A 150 Evangelical leaders are meeting in Texas on a belated effort to get behind a single "Anyone But Romney" social conservative candidate. Like anything too late is bound to be too little.


* Obama raised a record $68 million this last quarter and is well on his way to creating a record billion dollar war chest for his Presidential re -election bid. This is not Political Action Committee money, (PAC), it is for donations that are limited. An individual, for example cannot donate more than $2,500 for any one candidate.


*You can ignore all polls as to match ups between Obama and potential candidates. It has been shown again and again that whoever is in the news is at a big advantage.