Bain, Romney, and Huntsman

Tweet of the week, as far as I'm concerned:

@baseballcrankDan McLaughlin

Hey, guess what company was once rescused by vulture investors? Huntsman Corp. onforb.es/wfy4ri

I heard snippets from Newt Gingrich's Bain Capital movie. It literally sounds like a Mondale-Ferraro ad produced by Roger and Me era Michael Moore. Lots of scary music, lots of quavering-voiced folks (most of them senior citizens) talking about how Bain Capital came to town and closed down the factory/mill/rendering plant/etc, plus occasional snippets from Romney speeches taken so wholly out of context as to sound like broadcasts from Mars. Newt really should be embarrassed. 

The problem for Bain, and for Romney, isn't that they were "vultures." (caw!) It's that they came in after businesses either failed or ran into problems that proved difficult or insurmountable. Every failure has a story behind it. Markets change. Regulatory burdens increase. Unions drain profits. Patents expire. Sometimes, companies just ossify. Sometimes you can't even finger a particular villain. If you read the Forbes article McLaughlin links to, you'll learn that Huntsman Corp. was nearly bankrupted by sudden, unexpected increases in their raw materials costs. Huntsman pere was urged to file for bankruptcy, but was too proud to do so, and instead worked with a private equity firm to buy out his debt in exchange for a 49% equity position. Did people lose their jobs? Dunno, but everyone would have lost their jobs (or at least would have been on the chopping block) had the company been liquidated. 

Bain's targets were already on the ropes. Bain was there to try to spin gold out of lead, to make lemons out of lemonade. That's not Mitt Romney's fault, and it's not worthy of an attack from a purported conservative. 

Predictions: GOP 2012 Edition

I wasn't going to do one of those 2012 predictions, but I just can't resist. Herewith are the official Free Will predictions for the Republican presidential nomination race: 


1. Newt Gingrich will fail to reach 10% in the Iowa caucuses. He will also fail to reach 10% in South Carolina or Florida. Like Howard Dean in 2004, he will continue competing, but will not be a factor. 


2. Michele Bachmann will fail to crack 5% in Iowa, and will drop out of the race. Which will be too damn bad. 


3. John Huntsman will fail to crack 10% in New Hampshire and will drop out of the race. 


4. Rick Satorum will slightly under-perform in Iowa (I'd say 15%). His message and persona will fail to spark any interest in South Carolina, and he will drop out of the race. 


5. Rick Perry will slightly over-perform in Iowa, and then do very well in South Carolina. He will try to make a serious play for the Tea Party/Sarah Palin/Ron Paul vote, and even succeed at that for a while. But, when it comes time to slam Mitt Romney as Mr. Wall Street, he will be unable to do so without coming across as anti-business, not to mention inarticulate. (cue sound of Tim Pawlenty kicking himself in the a**). 


6. Ron Paul will get over 20% of the vote in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina and several other states (but no big ones like Florida or Ohio). He will be the subject of withering media scrutiny previously reserved for the likes of Sarah Palin and Pat Buchanan, which hurt him, but not kill him outright. He will be joining Rick Perry and Mitt Romney on the debate stage for months. While much will be made of his "crazy uncle" ravings and his racist newsletters, no one in the professional media and political classes will wonder why his message is so potent as to attract significant support despite his manifest deficiencies. Look for Paul to have a major speaking slot at the convention as the price for keeping away from a third party run. Look also for that speech to be a 21st century version of 1992's "we are in a cultural war" barn burner. 


7. Barring death, incapacity, or a thermonuclear-grade gaffe so embarrassing as to make him literally vanish into a hole in the ground, Mitt Romney will be the nominee. But, he's going to have to break a sweat to earn the nomination. Romney will rise to the occasion and take on Obama on his own turf, but it will be a close run thing. Conservative voters will turn out to vote for him in November, but will put most of their energy (and $$) into House and Senate candidates who promise to be "independent voices" in Washington, meaning they will run - in part - to act as a counter-weight to the Republican nominee. 

The Nine: How Are the GOP Presidential Candidates Doing?

We've had three debates since Rick Perry entered the race and "solidified" the field. Say what you will about tactics, consultants, southern strategies, and Ed Rollins, it never fails to amaze how the awesome task of running for president always comes down to the candidate themselves. In the last three weeks, we've seen some people help themselves immensely, and we've seen others do incalculable harm, often while being themselves. Let's go down the roll call.

Michelle Bachmann: Just three weeks ago, Lady Icarus was running in second, had driven Tim Pawlenty from the race, and was offering witheringly effective critiques of the president. Then Rick Perry entered the race, and Bachmann went on TV and announced that vaccines cause "mental retardation." From Tea Party Queen to Lunatic Fringe in the space of one sentence. Depressing.

Herman Cain: I keep hearing how Cain can't win, that he's nothing but a pizzaman, and that he'll never rise from the second tier. But, he keeps winning these debates, at least according to the Luntz focus groups, and the hive mind of the right-wing blogosphere. He's also been admirably above the fray, refusing to violate Ronald Reagan's 11th commandment.

Newt Gingrich: yesterday's man has been putting his intellect and debating skills on full display, but he'll never escape his past. Gingrich deserves all praise for the 1994 revolution, and his toe-to-toe battles with the Clintons, but he legislated as a Big Government Republican, thus frittering away the '94 mandate. He is fundamentally untrustworthy.

John Huntsman: the one thing Huntsman has going for him is his tax reform/economic plan, which is serious and conservative. That is undercut by his smarmy presentation and his smug certitude about global warming and evolution.

Gary Johnson: the cool kids have been agitating for Johnson to be included in these debates, and he brought...poop jokes. Cribbed from Rush Limbaugh.

Ron Paul: agreed that Paul's foreign policy is to the left of Dennis Kucinich, but on economics and the role of government in society, he is - incredibly - still a lonely voice. His answer describing what society would do for the hypothetical dying young man was very thoughtful and even moving (in describing his medical practice pre-Great Society Paul said "we never turned anyone away"). Shades of 2008 when Paul was cast as the "crazy uncle" when he started ranting about the Fed, Wall Street, and the overweening government that was driving us all to ruin.

Rick Perry: "the race is very fluid," "it's a long time before Iowa," "it's a marathon, not a sprint." But, Rick Perry's lackluster debate performances have been killing him. You can be as conservative as you want, but if conservatives can't see that you will be able to beat the glib Obama in a debate, then it's no sale. Perry's outrageous claim that "you have no heart" if you don't support in-state tuition for illegal immigrants may be his "vaccines cause mental retardation;" the line that kills his candidacy. Sorry, jerk, but I just don't see how failing to support special privileges to illegal immigrants is racist or cruel.

Mitt Romney: I have no great eagerness to see Romney as the nominee, but I gotta say he has really stepped up his game since Perry got into the race. His presentation has been solid. His critiques of Obama have been sharp. And, John Nolte points out that he has demonstrated a real ability to neutralize the anti-GOP media. But, Romney remains fundamentally untrustworthy because he has already demonstrated that he would govern as a Big Government conservative. Romney certainly fits the ABO role well. But, a Romney win could easily mean that Obamacare will not be repealed. If he is to be the nominee, we'll need a lot more Tea Party members of Congress.

Rick Santorum: another second-tier guy who has been putting in first-tier debate performances. This is why you include some of the lower eschalon candidates in these early debates. One of them always shines, even as his campaign is little more than his wife and kids knocking on doors. If nothing else changes, I think Cain or Santorum will "shock the world" in Iowa, and emerge as this cycle's Huckabee.

Altered States: The Campaign Against John Huntsman

I'm beginning to think there is an alternate reality United States out there where John Huntsman is the leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, and Obama's minions' are desperately spreading inside information about him as a preemptive move to damage him before the primaries even start. (also in this alternate reality, Obama has a beard). How else to explain the seemingly endless stories from administration insiders about what a team player Huntsman was back when he was ambassador to China?:

When President Obama visited China in 2009, Huntsman told at least three top White House officials that he supported what the administration was doing domestically, including health reform, according to a person who was there. Opposition to “Obamacare” is one of the most potent issues among GOP primary voters, making this stance quite problematic. The strategist contends that as Utah governor, Huntsman championed “a free-market health-care plan, and is in line with the vast majority of Republicans and independents.”

I'll be honest, the first time I ever heard of Huntsman was when he was nominated to the Chinese embassy post. He barely registers in GOP primary polling. He has no national constituency to speak of. OK, he was governor of Utah, which is a conservative state, but he doesn't seem to have had a conservative record. Not only that, Utah voters have shown themselves to be rather restive regarding the demerits in their local politicos' bona fides. They've already sent Bob Bennett packing, and are threatening to do the same to Orrin Hatch. Want to bet Huntsman would have a Tea Party problem right about now if he was still in office?

The Obama team's approach to this is hard to fathom. I remember being bemused at the analysis at the time Huntsman was named to the Beijing post, which mostly focused on how the sophisticated political operatives in the White House had deftly undercut a potential GOP rival by packing him off to Beijing. Sheesh! Did he get there via a clipper ship voyage around Cape Horn? Does the diplomatic pouch from China travel by carrier pigeon? Is the the real action at the embassy in Ouagadougou? Did they honestly think he would just disappear for four years, like a Khartoum viceroy?

The point is, if you want to get rid of a guy, you don't send him out on a high profile posting to the rising power in the Pacific Rim. Want to get rid of a GOP rival? Set a honey trap (or a vinegar one, if you are Larry Craig) or send an FBI informant to his office with a wire and a briefcase full of cash.

Of course, Huntsman's approach is equally mystifying. I'd like to know the name on one Republican aspirant to the presidency who held a post in a Democratic administration during the time immediately preceding his presidential run. And, Huntsman comes across as a real Charlie Crist-type: a telegenic "moderate" who looks good on paper, but will caucus with Democrats if he thinks that will advance his career. Obama's got a lot to worry about, but facing off against John Huntsman in November 2012 shouldn't cause him to break into a sweat.