Thread: Does Mitt Romney buissness background make uniquely qualified?[W:26]

Originally Posted by lo2

Hi there

First a little about me: I am guy from Denmark, who is (as a lot of people around the world) interested in American Politics, so I have been following the 2012 campaign since sometime last may when the GOP candidates started announcing. As you might guess since I am from Denmark, my points of view are quite liberal, and if I could cast a vote, I would defiantly vote for Obama. I will however try and keep this post as unbiased as possible,

I have been pondering about this question for quite some time and I would really like to get other people's thoughts on this, also people who are more insightful as to American Politics.

Ok well now onto the matter.

Mitt Romney's main argument so far is that he has had a fairly successful business career, where he has made a lot of great investments which have made a lot of companies grow and thereby hire people. He even goes on to state that this somehow makes him uniquely qualified, far more qualified than the current incumbent. But here is where I do not get it, because how is that so?

He certainly knows a lot about business and all that stuff, and I admit more than Barack Obama, and he would defiantly be better at running a company than Barack Obama. The case however is just that, as far as I can see, running a country and a business is not really the same thing. When you run a country you lay the ground works for job creation, and try and create an environment where businesses thrive and companies grow, which means new jobs. Then one might add, that he might be better at creating these conditions, because he has been in the private sector. But I suspect Barack Obama has tons of people around him, who knows everything about the private sector and how one creates job and what affects company either negatively or positively. Also if Mitt Romney were so good with business, how come he had such a mediocre term as governor of Massachusetts? something he hardly mentions.

So is it not a value based election, where we for instance have Obamacare, where I guess that one can admit that it is not good for businesses. But it does provide healthcare coverage for a lot of people who would not be covered. So to me it is more like do we want to become richer but more unequal, or do we want to become slightly less rich and slightly more equal, so is that not for instance an example of what this election is about?

Well the post got quite long and perhaps a bit unstructured as well, but I hope you will manage to read through, and I look very much forward to hear your thoughts on this!

I agree and started a similar thread. Different skill sets. Historically there's no evidence that business experience makes for better presidents. If anything the evidence supports the opposite conclusion. Obviously Romney's government experience is more relevant, but he doesn't want to talk about that because he had a poor record of job creation and his signature achievement was the same health care reform that Obama signed and that republicans claim t o revile.

It does to a certain extent. While it is true that there is a qualitative difference between private management and public management, there is a reason why the two had a long and complicated history of being intertwined in study.

Originally Posted by ksu_aviator

Well, you've made a lot of bad assumptions. You assumed that the President has a set of competent advisers, he does not. He hired people like Van Jones and Kathleen Sebelius. You assumed that Obamacare provides something for someone...it does not. It raises taxes and requires participation in a market that millions had chosen not to participate, but it does not provide anything to anyone.

But, the topic at hand is what best qualifies a President to be a President. It wasn't that long ago that a military background was absolutely essential. And that makes a lot of sense. The only real power the President has is as the Commander of the armed forces. His other jobs are really ancillary. However, public opinion of the primary purpose of the President has changed, and now he is tasked with managing the economy as his primary purpose. As such, people today look for one of two traits: education in the theories of macro economics and political intervention OR participation in the micro economics of business.

So you have a choice. You can choose the candidate that has classical training in theories behind economic activity and how the government can best control it or you can choose the candidate that has experience in how the economy is affected by the government (and in theory know what best to do or not do).

Further, there is an implication in how a business man would know how to provide services at a cost that is less than the revenue.

Whether any of that is true or not really depends more on the individual and not their background, but it is fallacies like "I have a higher education" and "I'm a great business man" that drive our election.

So, if we want to talk about Romney V. Obama we have to give the advantage to Romney. Romney has been both a business man and a politician with an executive like power. But the reality is very few pay a great deal of attention to that. Most pay attention to (in order) Party, Philosophy, and Personal strife.

Who are these millions of people who have become immune to sickness or cancer and impervious to injury? Has a new "super race" materialized overnight? When you say a ridicuous thing like that you lose me right there and I don't bother reading anymore. You need to lay off the comic books. Everyone participates in the health care system sooner or later...even if it is just a toe tag.

Originally Posted by 99percenter

No, but romney's mexican citizenship makes him uniquely unqualified.

This is cute... so how is Romney a Mexican... please, do tell...

Something about Romney's grandparents moving to Mexico to better pursue their Mormon faith (don't know if it was the bigomy or what) so there is a question about his birth. Ridiculous or not, I don't know. But, this should give the Obama hating "birthers" something to ponder, you would think; unless they really are just Bigots. ???

Moderator's Warning:

Stick to the topic at hand and cease with the personal attacks and trolling or else.

Wuh, I never got a warning before! Somebody asked a question, I guess we're not allowed to answer....Whatever. Picky, picky.

Judging from his speech on Memorial Day I think he has an uphill task. His foreign policy is dead wrong. He wants to shrink the military further to pay for social needs and at the same time wants the military to be strongest in the world. Maybe he has some ideas how to go about it.

SAN DIEGO, Calif. May 28 (Reuters) - Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney chose Memorial Day to proclaim to the American people his conviction that the world is a dangerous place, and the United States must remain its most formidable military power.

"The world is not safe," Romney told veterans on Memorial Day. He was joined by Senator John McCain, in a speech to honor the veterans of America's wars.

The United States now has two paths forward, Romney said. He called one "the pathway to Europe," suggesting Europe had acquiesced to geopolitical threats. "To shrink our military smaller and smaller to pay for our social needs."

The other path, Romney said, is "to commit to preserve America as the strongest military in the world, second to none, with no comparable power anywhere in the world."

Romney To Vets: 'The World Is Not Safe,' Requires Powerful American Military

Originally Posted by ksu_aviator

Well, you've made a lot of bad assumptions. You assumed that the President has a set of competent advisers, he does not. He hired people like Van Jones and Kathleen Sebelius. You assumed that Obamacare provides something for someone...it does not. It raises taxes and requires participation in a market that millions had chosen not to participate, but it does not provide anything to anyone.

Well you cannot just mention two people whom you do not think highly of, and then make the assumption that all of his advisers are bad. I am pretty sure that Obama can hire some of the best economists and business persons if he wishes to do so.

Also how can you say that Obamacare does not provide anything to anybody. It most certainly does, which I guess is why Republicans want to keep part of it, if the individual mandate is struck down by the SCOTUS.

Originally Posted by ksu_aviator

But, the topic at hand is what best qualifies a President to be a President. It wasn't that long ago that a military background was absolutely essential. And that makes a lot of sense. The only real power the President has is as the Commander of the armed forces. His other jobs are really ancillary. However, public opinion of the primary purpose of the President has changed, and now he is tasked with managing the economy as his primary purpose. As such, people today look for one of two traits: education in the theories of macro economics and political intervention OR participation in the micro economics of business.

So you have a choice. You can choose the candidate that has classical training in theories behind economic activity and how the government can best control it or you can choose the candidate that has experience in how the economy is affected by the government (and in theory know what best to do or not do).

Further, there is an implication in how a business man would know how to provide services at a cost that is less than the revenue.

Whether any of that is true or not really depends more on the individual and not their background, but it is fallacies like "I have a higher education" and "I'm a great business man" that drive our election.

So, if we want to talk about Romney V. Obama we have to give the advantage to Romney. Romney has been both a business man and a politician with an executive like power. But the reality is very few pay a great deal of attention to that. Most pay attention to (in order) Party, Philosophy, and Personal strife.

But you say that Romney has an executive record, which is true, but he was apparently not very good at it. And then you say that Romney knows how the businesses are affected by the government policy, but I would state that tons of such people exist, but some of whom are in congress and some whom surround Obama. Also Romney has not really brought any new ideas to the table, that none of the other Republicans without a business background has not proposed, in fact he wants to cut tax less than for instance Newt Gingrich.

And has Obama not studied law? So as such he has not really studied economics.

And yeah LOL, what happened with all that trolling!?

Originally Posted by lo2

Hi there

First a little about me: I am guy from Denmark, who is (as a lot of people around the world) interested in American Politics, so I have been following the 2012 campaign since sometime last may when the GOP candidates started announcing. As you might guess since I am from Denmark, my points of view are quite liberal, and if I could cast a vote, I would defiantly vote for Obama. I will however try and keep this post as unbiased as possible,

I have been pondering about this question for quite some time and I would really like to get other people's thoughts on this, also people who are more insightful as to American Politics.

First, thank you for your interest in U.S. presidential politics. You mention the 2012 race, but you must also remember the 2008 race that placed Obama in power. Special attention being paid to the campaign promises during that race made by Obama. He promised, non-partisan open and honest gov't, reducing the national deficit by half, going line by line through the federal budget and eliminating programs that 'do not work' and many fine sounding goals of improving gov't services and improving the U.S. economy, especially the private job market. Largely, Obama did nothing of the sort, the deficit is huge, the national debt increased by over $5,000,000,000,000 (is that enough zeros?) and raised federal spending from 20% of GDP (Bush average) to 24% of GDP (Obama average) while keeping federal taxation unchanged at 17% of GDP, causing a federal deficit of 40%, clearly an unsustainable level of borrow and spend, simply to keep the federal gov't going.

Originally Posted by lo2

Ok well now onto the matter.

Mitt Romney's main argument so far is that he has had a fairly successful business career, where he has made a lot of great investments which have made a lot of companies grow and thereby hire people. He even goes on to state that this somehow makes him uniquely qualified, far more qualified than the current incumbent. But here is where I do not get it, because how is that so?

Romney's experience both in priavte business and as the governor of a (very liberal) state are executive experience, something that Obama never had prior to his first executive job as POTUS. The highest executive position in the nation could certainly benefit from an experienced executive holding it. Obama was briefly an IL state legislator then briefly an IL U.S. senator, having introduced or passed NO legislation of note, although he is a good public speaker (his main strength).

Originally Posted by lo2

He certainly knows a lot about business and all that stuff, and I admit more than Barack Obama, and he would defiantly be better at running a company than Barack Obama. The case however is just that, as far as I can see, running a country and a business is not really the same thing. When you run a country you lay the ground works for job creation, and try and create an environment where businesses thrive and companies grow, which means new jobs. Then one might add, that he might be better at creating these conditions, because he has been in the private sector. But I suspect Barack Obama has tons of people around him, who knows everything about the private sector and how one creates job and what affects company either negatively or positively. Also if Mitt Romney were so good with business, how come he had such a mediocre term as governor of Massachusetts? something he hardly mentions.

What Romney, and the GOP, wish to convey is that borrow and spend by the gov't with the HOPE that the private economy will somehow benefit from it, did not work, so the private economy must be allowed to grow by reducing the federal take in spending and by reducing some of the choking federal regulations that have reduced available fossil fuel energy from oil/gas drilling and coal mining/electric power production. The gov't creates nothing, it simply redistributes income to provide a military, basic gov't infrastructure and the rest is mostly individual entitlements or subsidies to the states and some private businesses. Much of the 'stimulus' money the Obama has 'invested' went to help union labor 'jobs' both public and private, yet much of that created no jobs, it simply shored up the huge pension and benefit schemes to keep the current and retired union employees solvent (temporarily). Obama also spent a lot of public treasure, but called it 'loans' to solar, wind and other 'alternative' energy companies that have yet to show any marketable products or technology improvements. Gambling is not a federal gov't power, certainly not wise spending in times of economic hardship.

Originally Posted by lo2

So is it not a value based election, where we for instance have Obamacare, where I guess that one can admit that it is not good for businesses. But it does provide healthcare coverage for a lot of people who would not be covered. So to me it is more like do we want to become richer but more unequal, or do we want to become slightly less rich and slightly more equal, so is that not for instance an example of what this election is about?

Well the post got quite long and perhaps a bit unstructured as well, but I hope you will manage to read through, and I look very much forward to hear your thoughts on this!

That "not value based" argument is lame, IMHO, as there is certainly a value based difference between a 20% increase in federal spending (what Obama did as a big picture) and a reduction in federal spending (what Romney and the GOP promise as a big picture). Only by reducing the HUGE federal deficit, may the private ecomony start to grow (faster). Business people are not stupid, they know that the ONLY way to repay the national debt is by taxation, the ONLY way to support gov't spending is by taxation and Obama seems content to borrow (instead of tax) to support ever more spending. Who will invest to make their business grow or to hire more people KNOWING that federal taxes will likely be raise very much and very soon to balance the federal budget and start to pay down the HUGE national debt (now over 100% of GDP)? As long as this huge gov't borrowing and spending persists the private economy will slowly crawl along, in fear that any investment will have its return swallowed up by fedral tax increases rather than reward that investment with a profitable return. In the U.S. 70% of all income taxes are paid by the top 10% of the income earners, most of those being the very businesses that must do the investing and hiring to improve the economy.

I hope my little rant has helped you to understand, that as unexciting as Romney is, and as clever of a speaker as Obama is, that the U.S. economic recovery is dependent on smaller federal gov't spending and not on increased taxation (or borrowing, which is simply future increased taxation). As for national health care, I think that the SCOTUS will soon say that our gov't can not compel us to buy private "health" insurance (or any other private product or service) or pay a fine. If the gov't wishes to make national medical care come to be, that it must do it directly through taxation and providing of the medical services, not merely order us to buy it for ourselves (on the private market) and then tax us to give it to those that can "not afford" it.