The Competent, Effective, Responsible Candidate

What a topsy-turvy campaign this has been so far.  Maybe it's time for me to take a crack at a few questions/issues that have been brought up about (or thrown at) Romney this past week.

First, let's look at the Bain Capital issues and Romney's record in the business world, and how that relates to the type of candidate Republicans and Americans generally might be looking for.

In another post I may look again at the issue of health care reform plans as it relates to Romney and the campaign.

ROMNEY THE BUSINESSMAN: In all the various accusations and catch phrases being thrown around about Romney's record at Bain Capital, the one you will not see Romney accused of is being ineffective or incompetent.  Keep that in mind.

So the "charges" as I understand them come down to this: the business of Romney's company (Bain Capital) was to buy or invest in companies that were failing.  These were companies that had either been mismanaged or encountered other business challenges that had led them to the brink of failure.  Since these companies were in tough straits, a company like Bain could come in and say "look, we can help bring money in to the process of trying to save this company, but we also are going to bring in business expertise to help refocus the company, make adjustments in terms of assets (including human assets, aka jobs) and process, etc. so that this company can survive, grow, and succeed.  The Democrats, now strangely joined by his Republican rivals, are trying to label this process as "corporate raiders" or "vultures" or whatever else they come up with.

So here's the thing: THESE WERE COMPANIES THAT WERE FAILING, HEADED FOR DISASTER.  If they weren't, there would not have been an investment opportunity that Bain Capital would be interested in.  If they weren't failing, they would be definition be succeeding and would not need the help of a company like Bain.  If a company fails, guess what happens to the jobs within that company?  Poof.  Right?  So Bain comes in to try to help these companies turn from failure to success.  It didn't always work, but it worked significantly more often than with Bain's competitors.  Which is a way to say that Romney was more effective and successful in this endeavor than many others in his business.  Keep that in mind.

Each company's situation would be different.  Sometimes to save a company, sales of some divisions of the company or other assets would help the rest of the company to refocus and succeed.  Sometimes the companies were bloated with too many employees given the level of revenues the company then had and the labor needs of an efficient organization.  Sometimes jobs were lost in the short term but the company started to succeed and rehire, adding many more jobs than were lost.  Bain's purpose could be said to be to succeed itself and get a return on investment for it's own investors, but it was also in Bain's interest to make the businesses, assets, and investments they made more valuable but helping those failing companies to turnaround and succeed.  It's what Bain did.  And by all reports I've seen, it's what Bain - and Romney - did well.  Keep that in mind.

Is this really rocket science?  I guess I can understand people who just don't want to think through the process being influenced by the labels of "raiders" and "vultures" thrown by Romney's opponents.  And of course the Democrats would be expected to make such accusations.  That's a form of class warfare filled with suspicions of free markets that have been a staple of Democrats for decades.  But Republicans?  Oy.

What I take from this is that Romney and his team need to work to educate and communicate with people about exactly what his business record is.  This should be easy, but in subtle ways I think it's a challenge.

I think there are specific ways to do this, but also it can play into a theme for team Romney.

The specific approach is to take specific companies and specific individuals employed or even formerly employed by these companies but who were then successfully employed elsewhere, and tell some of their stories along the way.  Most people may not be interested in the esoteric discussion of business and its cycles, but they will understand and identify with the process when it's told in story form.

There's also the summary approach - by itself not enough but still helpful - which is to note, as Romney has, that though some specific jobs were lost, in the long run many more jobs were gained in the process.  That's the story of America - ongoing change, failures not defeating us but making us stronger, and in the net analysis, growth and success at the end of the day.  If Romney and his team can tie the process at Bain to the history of America, that will help tremendously.

And this can all tie into an overall theme, which is simply that Mitt Romney is very effective, very competent, successful at what he sets his mind to.  He helped Bain and its companies succeed.  He helped the Salt Lake Olympic Games succeed.  He helped Massachusetts succeed.  And he can get America turned around and back on the road to success in the world and for Americans.