NYC Letter: On The Fail Trail -- The Bain Mentality Redux

Day 1,226 of CHOPE
D-minus 230 Days

Campaign Barry wants you to know Mr. Romney's record at Bain Capital -- not Mr. Obama's record in the White House -- is what this election is all about -- as if the White House has been vacant the past four years.*

OBAMA: 'THIS IS WHAT THIS CAMPAIGN
IS GOING TO BE ABOUT'

May 21, 2012 (Business Insider) - President Barack Obama pivoted to politics during his press conference at the NATO summit in Chicago this afternoon, defending his campaign ads attacking Mitt Romney's record at Bain Capital. Mr. Obama:

This is not a distraction. This is what this campaign is about. The reason this is relevant to the campaign is because my opponent, Governor Romney, his main calling card for why he thinks he should be president is his business experience. He is not touting his experience as Governor of Massachusetts. He is saying he is a business guy, and this is his business.

Imagine Mr. Romney's surprise to learn he had zeroed out his experience as Governor of Massachusetts.

Campaign Barry began with Bain attack videos. These garnered Pinocchios from the WaPo Fact Checker (and here and here).

Fair presentation be damned! Campaign Barry pressed on with its Bain attacks but forgot to drill the party shills on the party line. First off-message messenger was Newark mayor Cory Booker, a rising Democrat luminary.

CORY BOOKER DEFENDS BAIN CAPITAL,
CALLS ATTACKS ON PRIVATE EQUITY
'NAUSEATING'
May 20, 2012 (thegrio.com)

Mr. Booker was taken to the woodshed. But big name Democrats continued to slap down the Bain attacks.

DEM GOV. DEVAL PATRICK ON BAIN:
"NOT A BAD COMPANY"
May 22, 2012 (RCP)

DEMOCRATS BALK AT OBAMA CAMPAIGN'S
SUSTAINED ATTACK ON BAIN CAPITAL

May 22, 2012 (The Hill) - Some influential Democrats on and off Capitol Hill are refusing to give President Obama political cover for his attacks on Mitt Romney’s record at Bain Capital.

... Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), a widely respected member of Congress, stopped short of criticizing the president, but made it clear that the campaign should pivot.

"It’s done," she said. "Go on to other things now."

Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) told The Hill, "I think the average American … hopes that this campaign will focus on competing visions for how to strengthen our economy, help create jobs and move the country forward." Pressed on whether he thought Obama’s campaign had operated within those guidelines, Coons paused.

"I’m not going to comment on President Obama’s ad," he said, shaking his head vigorously.

BILL CLINTON: MITT ROMNEY'S
BUSINESS RECORD
'STERLING'
May 31, 2012 (Politico)

HOYER ON PRIVATE EQUITY:
'I THINK PRESIDENT CLINTON IS CORRECT'
June 1, 2012 (WFB)

So are the proles buying Campaign Barry's brilliant Bain attacks?

ATTACKS ON ROMNEY'S BUSINESS PAST
NOT STICKING

May 24, 2012 (CBS News) - President Obama is losing ground in the latest polls to Republican challenger Mitt Romney, who's pushing back against Democrats criticizing his business experience.

As the president has stepped up his attacks on Romney and his record at the private equity firm Bain Capital, Romney has indicated, during this crucial period to define himself to the electorate, he is not going to take the attacks lying down.

"He just doesn't have a clue what to do to get this economy going. I do," Romney asserted in an interview with Mark Halperin, of Time Magazine.

... In the Time interview, Romney turned the tables, almost scoffing at Mr. Obama's qualifications when he ran for president in 2008. Mr. Romney:

Right now we have an economy in trouble, and someone who's spent their career in the economy is more suited to help fix the economy than someone who's spent his life in politics and as a community organizer.

Ed Morrisey at Hot Air does a nice carve up:

First Team O launches the Bain demonization ad on the very same day as an Obama fundraiser hosted by the chief of Blackstone, another private-equity firm. Instead of coordinating with their surrogates, the campaign leaves them in the dark — and a half-dozen or so blast the campaign for demagoguing private equity. Finally, Joe Biden steps in and says that private-equity management is no experience for the Presidency, fully stepping into their own trap. ... The last thing Biden and Obama want is a debate on qualifications.

Mr. Obama is running on his vision, presenting a clear choice between himself and Mr. Romney, who is running on his record. [Pause.] Something here is deja vuey.

But having said that, I am absolutely confident that we will do well in this election as long as we understand what this election is about, and that is we have a choice between the policies that got us into this mess and the policies that are getting us out of this mess. It’s a very simple choice. It’s pretty straightforward.

Mr. Obama,
indulging in and then bemoaning
the politics of fear, division, and blame.
REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
AT DCCC FINANCE EVENT
LOS ANGELES August 16, 2010 (White House)

That was Mr. Obama before the 2010 mid-term elections. The Democrats and the clear choice they represented were crushed at the ballot box. The clear choice voted in record numbers of Republicans: 63 seat gain in the House, 6 Senate seats,** 29 of 37 governorships for a gain of 8, and a record 680 seats in state legislatures.

For some reason, this time round Mr. Obama thinks offering that same clear choice will be a winner.

CHOPE.

Pretty clear. The guy with no record or the guy with the "sterling" record.

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* Certainly the past year. Mr. Obama has attended 145 fundraisers by day's end last Friday since his official re-election announcement, April 4, 2011. That's one every three days on average.

** Republican incumbent Lisa Murkowski ran a successful independent write-in campaign for Senator after being defeated in the Republican Alaskan primary, garnering 39% of the vote. She caucuses with the Republicans.

Posted by Damian at June 3, 2012 11:45 PM