Barack Obama's big campaign push against Mitt Romney so far has been to criticize Romney's participation in Bain Capital. Notably, Romney wasn't even a part of Bain during the time that Obama's people are attacking. Even so, it should be pointed out that what Obama tried to do with public money is much the same as what venture capital companies try to do every day. For Obama's camp to attack such investors for that activity is actually an attack against Barack Obama's $800 billion (+/-) bailout.
The purpose of venture capital groups such as Bain is to use private investments to turn failing companies around and make them profitable. They take control, find what ever is broken in the business plan, and fix it. Sometimes it because a company is top-heavy with executives. Other times it is because they have too many in the labor force standing around idle. Some times it is because their product is substandard.
Bain does nothing that Obama didn't try to do with GM and others, and the bailout money. The only differences were that Bain usually made money, saved the company, and did it with money from willing private investors, while the jury is still out as the whether GM has actually been saved, no money is being made because of all the red tape and political strings attached like electric cars and union perks, and Obama used an unwilling public's money.
Obama is pre-occupied with "green" products to the point that they have blinders on to the fact that such products have no market. But that didn't matter to Barry! His insistence that GM produce an electric car, even though you can count on one hand the number that they've sold, has kept GM from becoming profitable, and they remain under the government's thumb.
Add to that Obama's insistence that certain dealerships be closed, and that the union be "taken care of", and you have a recipe for disaster. If Obama would have simply hired Bain to assess GM and make their recommendations, we likely would have seen a better outcome for them...and we would have saved $800 billion in the process! Ask all of those mechanics, salesmen, and managers if they are better off now than they were before the bailout!
So, yes! There were many similarities, and differences. Obama wants you to ignore both!
The BIG difference in Obama's eyes is that government managed his efforts, while private individuals manage Bain's efforts. One creates dependency on government while the other shuns it!
You can and must choose which is better!
Permalink Reply by Vern Shotwell on To your title, my friend!
I see no similarities, only stark differences!
Bain is in the business of making money. Pure and simple. Only the strong survive.Those who are sick, and cannot be revived profitably are "gobbled up" The bits and pieces are split up, and consumed.
In the name of efficiency. Survival of the fittest: the law of the jungle.
Ethics? Quite ethical. To deliver the highest return to the investor.
The Obama approach is the antithesis of the above approach....
No concern whatsoever for efficiency or competitive viability.
No consideration even for technical viability! (Power from pond slime indeed.)
No consideration of the "investor". That's you and me!
Ethics? None involved here! Simply steal all you can get, and distribute to those who can help you in some way.
Nope, the differences are obvious. I find no similarities. None at all.
Permalink Reply by Jeff Waller on Oh, but there are similarities...in the fact that outside money was used to help a failing company. The principle is the same. The difference is in the methodology. Capitalists with the funds to invest should be encouraged to do so, but government has no business getting involved. Government's only roles should be to create an atmoshpere that is conducive to prosperity and then to get out of the way.
Other than that, I agree with you on "survival of the fittest". Poorly organized and operated companies should be allowed to fail if there is not enough demand for their services that some investor might come along and fix their problems. Public money should NEVER be used to keep them afloat. It's like trying to pump air into a sunken flatboat with a thousand holes in it.
I think I said much of what you did. Obama used the public's money like it was his own checkbook, and continues to do so. His insistence on GM's electric car was foolish and anathema to making GM profitable.
His campaign's criticism of Mitt and Bain is like their trying to shoot at a picture of Mitt that is pasted firmly to Obama's left foot!
Permalink Reply by Vern Shotwell on Sometimes, my friend, I think you just like to argue! Unlike me, and most others here! Would you pick up an oar, please?
Permalink Reply by Jeff Waller on Debate...not argue!
Permalink Reply by Guy Blanchard on You are 100% correct....Thank you Jeff for telling the truth...Liberals like obama and the msnbc and cnn and abc media types hate the truth...
Permalink Reply by Jeff Waller on Well, at least ONE person agrees with me ;)
Permalink Reply by Tucker Gillenwater on I am sure I read that company's similar to Bain Capital often purchase a company borrow lots of capital, pay them self a hefty bonus then file chapter 11. If true that is, at least to me, unethical.
Permalink Reply by Jeff Waller on I am sure that you didn't read that...
Permalink Reply by Vern Shotwell on I am sure you are familiar with the term editorial license., Jeff.
Rather than arguing, one merely mis-states the conclusions, definitions, and so on!
Permalink Reply by Tucker Gillenwater on There are lots of articles out on the net. Obviously a lot of information is subject to reader beware. I like many conservatives are skeptical with regards to Romney but all of us know exactly where we stand with regards to Obama.
http://prospect.org/comment/13969
"According to a recent story in the Wall Street Journal, more than one in five of the companies that Bain Capital invested in between 1984 and 1999 went bankrupt or shut down within eight years of Romney and his colleagues getting involved." http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/johncassidy/2012/01/bain-capi...
Permalink Reply by Guy Blanchard on obama thought they said pain instead of bain and he said he could not take any...obama is such a two faced lying machine. Why is it people believe this dude?Transparency right?If the AG of arizona told me to show my birth certificate I would do so in about a day.Why is it hawaii takes months and shows the same fake live birth paper? Look,if obama had a real birth certificate he would stick it in all of our faces and say now what?Mr Transparency has a problem showing even his college records,why?Hidding what? Hello people... Wake up and think for yourself....
Permalink Reply by Debrajoe Smith-Beatty on True Guy we do not know who Obama "really" is.
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