I guess everyone forgot about Romney and Bain Capital (John Kerry, legal, Kerry)

[fibonacci]

Do we really need another politician in office that is involved in what looks like financial fraud on a huge scale? How much did tax payers have to pay for what is looking more and more like Medicare fraud?

To assess Romney, look beyond the bottom line - Los Angeles Times

Ampad prospered briefly after Bain Capital took it public in 1996. But saddled with increasing debt, Ampad began laying off workers, closing plants and losing money within a year. It filed for bankruptcy protection in 2000. By then, Bain Capital had reaped $102 million in advisory fees, sales of stock and other payments, corporate documents show.

Romney and his team gained huge profits from at least half a dozen companies that soon crashed into bankruptcy.

In 1997 Romney and his team purchased a stake in DDi Corp., an Anaheim-based maker of printed electronic circuit boards. Three years later, Bain Capital netted a $36-million profit after it took the company public. Romney sold his own shares for $4.1 million, according to federal securities records, although his profit margin is unclear.

But DDi's stock soon collapsed, and the company filed for bankruptcy in August 2003, laying off more than 2,100 workers. Bain Capital and DDi executives jointly settled a federal class action lawsuit in March, agreeing to pay $4.4 million to shareholders who argued that DDi was poorly managed and "hemorrhaging cash" before the stock offering, court records show. Romney was not named in the suit.

Still other troublesome cases emerged when Romney ran for governor of Massachusetts in 2002. Chief among them was Damon Corp., a medical testing company based in Needham, a Boston suburb.

Romney had joined Damon's board of directors after Bain Capital purchased a stake in 1990. He remained there until Corning Inc. bought the company three years later. Bain tripled its investment.

Romney personally profited on the sale, claiming more than $100,000 in capital gains on sales of his own Damon stock, records showed.

But in 1996, Damon pleaded guilty in federal court in Boston to massive overbilling of the Medicare system and paid $119 million in criminal and civil fines.

Then-U.S. Atty. Donald K. Stern called it "a case, pure and simple, of corporate greed run amok." No one at Bain was implicated in the fraud.

[Winter_Sucks]

I find comfort that Romney is the leading GOP candidate. He has less charisma than John Kerry with more flip-flopping. To add fuel to the fire he made his fortune laying off thousands of employees on main street while he sat on Wall street. Obama will easily defeat Romney.

[beb0p]

Most people in the financial sector knows that Romney made his money by basically 'playing the numbers.' There's no sweat equity to it, anyone with half a brain could do what he did - if the investment pends out he makes money, if it fails, his investors takes the hit and he still makes money off of commission. It's a very good gig if you have the connection and the name recognition that Mitt Romney has, courtesy of his father.

It's all a fraud of course, but's it's legal fraud. He could buy a company with only 10% capital and fund the rest of the 90% via creative accounting... and it's perfectly legal. Then he milks the company - laid off workers, cut corners, squeeze the suppliers, milk every last drop to satisfy the return to his investors. Make the balance sheet looks good on paper and sells the darn thing before it is run to the ground. Short term gains. Big profit. Long term problems. There's a reason they call Mergers and Acquisition, Murder and Execution.

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