Hide the Ball: Romney's Long History of Hiding His Exorbitant, but Questionable, Business Practices

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http://truth-out.org/news/item/10542-hide-the-ball-romneys-long-history-of-hiding-his-exorbitant-but-legal-business-practices

Thursday, 26 July 2012 11:16
By Dina Rasor and Jason Leopold, Truthout | News Analysis

How is it possible that, for two decades now, Mitt Romney has successfully avoided revealing any details about his vast wealth, has been able to manipulate and stash wealth overseas with no public accountability, has not been held to account for his complete lack of transparency, has painted himself as a creator of thousands of jobs even though the public record shows business decisions he presided over resulted in the loss of jobs because of mass wealth being scooped out of the assets of these same companies?

Since he launched his political career in the mid-1990s, through three previous campaigns, Romney has faced the same exact questions that he is now facing as a candidate for the highest office in the land and, just as he is doing now, he has not been forthcoming in his responses.

A familiar story from Romney that has emerged over the years is that he is responsible for all of Bain's successes, but none of its failures (he took a leave of absence, he says, when questions arose about the company's deal-making or he "retroactively" retired from the firm while not disclosing that he was still receiving large yearly compensations from the company). This is hauntingly similar to many businesses that use the government so they can privatize the profits and socialize the risks and then say they made it on their own while denouncing big government.

Truthout reviewed hundreds of news reports published between 1994 and 2002, the year Romney mounted a senatorial challenge against the late Edward Kennedy, and the year of a successful Massachusetts gubernatorial run, respectively. What we found is not only hard evidence of a man with questionable business acumen, but an individual who appears to see himself as privileged and not above skirting the edge of the law. He has taken most of his vast wealth and hid it in "blind trusts" that he himself has ridiculed in 1994 saying: "The blind trust is an age old ruse, if you will, which is to say, you can always tell a blind trust what it can and can not do. You give a blind trust rules."