Politico: The Bain of Mitt Romney's campaign from 1994 -- Kennedy versus Romney

With the release of these two ads on Politico from the Kennedy/Romney race in 1994, it brings up the question, 'Who wants Romney out of the race?'  Must admit my mouth dropped open when I played the ads on Politico after I read the article on Hot Air "Is it time Romney to start Rick Perry?."  With all of this touting by Romney of his background as a business leader, you would think he would have thought twice before running after reading about his time as head of Bain Capital.

Earlier this spring, Republican Donald Trump became the first presidential aspirant to attack Romney’s record in the open, dismissing him as “a funds guy” who would “buy companies, he’d close companies, he’d get rid of the jobs.”

Wondered at the time what Trump was saying and why.  No need to wonder now as these ads plus this Politico article tell the story of a company under the leadership of Romeny that was more worried about making money then what happened to the employees of the companies they bought.  Not a very good background to run in today's environment.

If you take his background at Bain and add his tearing down a 3,000 sq ft home in La Jolla, CA, to build a $12M mansion on the ocean, you are left with the impression Romney will not play well people who are struggling to buy gas and groceries.  Have no problem with Romney building this mansion, but he is the one who while talking to a group of unemployed people in Florida declared he was also unemployed.  How is building a mansion by a GOP candidate going to relate the average person?  The timing couldn't be worse.  One article suggested Romney was building the Western White House which would be highly presumptuous of him.

Romney has his shares of Bain Capital in a blind trust, but continues to hire some of his advisors from Bain.  In late June Bain Capital's Hedge Fund's Brookside Capital was fined by the SEC for shorting stock which they bought back in three days.  You can find article after article going back into the 1990's of how Bain operated -- buying up business while Romney was the head of Bain, laying off employees, and then bringing them back at lower wages and benefits.  It is all in the archives.  It wasn't brought out in the 2008 race because the United States economy was not in such bad shape with so many laid off.  Now his time as head of Bain Capital is being put under the microscope which brings up the question of 'Why is he running again?'

Whatever the reason for the release of these two unused ads from 1994 along with this article is open for speculation by a number of people:

The Bain of Mitt Romney’s campaign

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Mitt Romney's work at Bain & Co. ties him to countless controversial decisions. | AP PhotoClose

By ALEXANDER BURNS | 7/14/11 4:37 AM EDT 

A company that laid off hundreds of employees. A federal “bailout” to rescue a failing bank. Mitt Romney, at the center of it all. 

It’s a story line from a tough Democratic ad that was teed up for use against Romney in his 1994 Senate campaign in Massachusetts. The spot, which was provided exclusively to POLITICO, never actually aired. But it’s all but certain that some version of its allegations will surface in the GOP primary or the general election, if Romney makes it that far.

That ad would have been damaging had it appeared when it was produced nearly two decades ago. But it could take on new relevance in a 2012 campaign in which Romney is touting his business career as proof he can lead a national economic turnaround.

In every one of Romney’s campaigns, his time in the private sector — specifically, at the consulting firm Bain & Co. and the investment company Bain Capital — has been a double-edged credential, branding him as a savvy businessman while tying him to countless controversial management decisions.

Romney has served as chief executive at both Bain Capital, which he helped found in the 1980s, and Bain & Co., which launched his career and which he later helped rescue from failure. 

When Romney challenged Sen. Ted Kennedy in 1994, it was his connection to those two companies that played a significant role in sinking his campaign as Democrats tied him to plant closings and worker firings.

In 2012, those familiar attacks from his past are likely to take on a new potency: Bain Capital’s involvement in mass layoffs is likely to haunt Romney in a campaign focused on jobs. Other episodes, such as the claims that Romney benefited from a federal bank rescue, could ignite anew.

The never-aired “bailout” ad, shared with POLITICO by one of Kennedy’s advisers, remains an unexploded grenade from that race, underscoring Romney’s vulnerability in the first presidential election fought since the 2008 financial meltdown.

According to former Kennedy advisers, the ad never ran because it turned out to be unnecessary: Kennedy had already broken Romney with a series of ads tying him to layoffs in Indiana.

The commercial — produced for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee by the firm Doak, Shrum, Harris, Carrier, Devine — highlights Romney’s role in turning around Bain & Co. during its financial distress.

“The way the company was rescued was with a federal bailout of $10 million,” the ad says. “The rest of us had to absorb the loss … Romney? He and others made $4 million in this deal. … Mitt Romney: Maybe he’s just against government when it helps working men and women.” 

The facts of the Bain & Co. turnaround are a little more complicated, but a Boston Globe report from 1994 confirms that Bain saw several million dollars in loans forgiven by the FDIC, which had taken over Bain’s failed creditor, the Bank of New England.

Romney aides pushed back strongly on the Democratic charge that Bain & Co. received anything like a TARP-style “bailout.” While the FDIC is a government agency, it is funded by deposit insurance payments rather than taxes. The agency agreed to reduce Bain & Co.’s liability to the Bank of New England, but didn’t pump new funds into the flagging firm. Other Bain creditors also took a haircut in order to avert the company’s collapse.

Excerpt:  Read more at Politico

Here are the two Kennedy ads: