DNC - ABC NEWS: Romney Makes Campaign Stop at TARP-Funded Financial Group

Key Points: Mitt Romney stopped this morning in Concord, N.H., to speak with employees at the Lincoln Financial Group about jobs and the economy, a typical event for the campaign of a business-minded Republican as of late except for one catch: the financial group was bailed out by TARP – the 2008 Wall Street bailout.

Lincoln Financial Group – which is also known as Lincoln National Corporation - received $950 million from TARP, according the U.S. Treasury Department. Lincoln Financial has since paid the money back in full.

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But it is Romney's complicated - and sometimes downright contradictory - record on issues like TARP, abortion rights and health care that could cast a shadow on the presidential hopeful as he continues to shake off the perception that he's gone back and forth on the main issues a few too many times.


http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2011/06/romney-makes-campaign-stop-at-tarp-funded-financial-group.html

Romney Makes Campaign Stop at TARP-Funded Financial Group
June 27, 2011 3:24 PM

PrintRSSSHARE: EmailMoreABC News' Emily Friedman (@EmilyABC) reports:

Mitt Romney stopped this morning in Concord, N.H., to speak with employees at the Lincoln Financial Group about jobs and the economy, a typical event for the campaign of a business-minded Republican as of late except for one catch: the financial group was bailed out by TARP – the 2008 Wall Street bailout.

Lincoln Financial Group – which is also known as Lincoln National Corporation - received $950 million from TARP, according the U.S. Treasury Department. Lincoln Financial has since paid the money back in full.

TARP, the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program signed in 2008 to prevent the economy from collapsing, is one of several issues Romney critics point to when trying to peg him as a flip-flopper.

Romney, who has been touting his business background on the trail, has a complicated record when it comes to TARP, made even more so by his adamant opposition to the bailout of the auto industry that used TARP funds. Romney has gone on the record several times in the past saying that he’d like to see TARP shutdown and that he thinks bailouts like TARP should alarm Americans, but his campaign says it’s not that simple.

A source close to the Romney campaign told ABC News that the venue for today’s campaign stop was “not an issue” and added that Romney never opposed TARP to begin with.

The Romney campaign says that while Romney doesn’t oppose TARP itself – he thinks it was right for the country at the time – he does believe it was poorly executed.

But it is Romney's complicated - and sometimes downright contradictory - record on issues like TARP, abortion rights and health care that could cast a shadow on the presidential hopeful as he continues to shake off the perception that he's gone back and forth on the main issues a few too many times.

He has come under fire from fellow Republicans for his support of the Wall Street bailout. Romney’s record as a moderate has at least one conservative Republican, Rep. Thaddeus McCotter, teasing his own presidential bid.

“I've taken issue with several of [Romney’s] positions, including his support for the Wall Street bailout, [his position on] climate change, and obviously for Romneycare in Massachusetts,” 

McCotter said this month on the ABC politics program “Top Line.”“I do not subscribe to the theory that somehow he has been vindicated. And I don't think anyone in my district thinks going bankrupt would have been better, and leaving that $700 billion on Wall Street, where they caused the problem, would have been better.”

ALG Praises Bloomberg News' Victory in Supreme Court Decision, Demands Fed Comply With Court Ruling to Disclose $2 Trillion in Bailout Loans

March 21^st, 2011, Fairfax, VA— Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today praised Bloomberg News' victory at the Supreme Court today, and demanded the Federal Reserve comply with a court order to disclose the recipients of some $2 trillion of loans it made at the height of the financial crisis requested by Bloomberg News in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. 

"The Federal Reserve has exhausted all of its avenues of appeal, and now it must disclose who received over $2 trillion in secret emergency loans.  The American people have a right to know the full extent of the Fed's relationship with financial institutions, foreign banks, and foreign central banks really is," Wilson said.

The central bank has thus far refused to comply with Bloomberg's FOIA request despite a Southern District Court of New York order that the Federal Reserve Board of Governors comply with Bloomberg News' Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to produce the details of some $2 trillion in emergency loans that were made. This includes who received the $2 trillion of loans, the terms under which they were received, and what collateral was taken by the Reserve branches in exchange for the loans.

The Fed had appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals, but the court decided not to hear their appeal, according to Bloomberg News. 

"Just because control over the nation's monetary policy has been outsourced to essentially private financial institutions does not shield those institutions from public scrutiny," Wilson said, concluding, "The banks' resistance in this case to transparency reminds the American people of why Congress needs to regain control of those policies."

Attachments:

ALG Blasts Fed Refusal to Comply With Court Ruling to Disclose $2 Trillion in Bailout Loans (August 24th, 2010)

ALG Urges Senate to Condition Bernanke Reappointment on Fed Compliance with Court Ruling (August 26th, 2009)

ALG Calls Upon House to Enact Fed Audit Bill (May 28th, 2009)

NRN - Must Reads from March 18, 2011

• Continuing Resolution and Government Spending: Enough is enough
• Progressive government is obsolete
• TARP was no win for taxpayers
• Krauthammer: It's still an empty lockbox
• Cartoon of the day, "Obama's March Madness"
• Rep. Stephen Fincher is taking on the FDA
• Stossel: End the drug war
• Obama politicos make a mockery of Sunshine Week
• Chevy Volt: The car from Atlas Shrugged Motors
• Pew survey shows that Fox News was most popular news network in 2010

Read more at NetRightDaily.com.

Rep. Frank Guinta named to important House subcommittee looking into TARP & govt. bailouts

(Washington –  January 18, 2011)   Representative Frank Guinta (R, NH-01) has been named Vice Chairman of the House Subcommittee on TARP, Financial Services and Bailouts of Public and Private Programs.  It will look into financial and monetary policy, banking, housing and insurance regulation, as well as financial crises, rescues and tax policy. The subcommittee is part of the larger House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, chaired by Representative Darrell Issa (R, CA-49).

“Congressman Guinta’s experience as a mayor and his commitment to accountability in government convinced me he was the right candidate to serve as vice chair for this subcommittee,” said Issa. “In this position, he will play a leading role in sorting out still unanswered questions about the financial meltdown and federal programs that are failing to achieve measurable goals to help the economy while wasting taxpayer dollars.”

Guinta said he is eager to begin his new assignment.  “Granite Staters have told me they are unhappy with the billions of dollars spent on bailouts.  They want to know where all that money went, what it produced, and cases where it was wasted.  When waste is identified, they want it stopped immediately. My goal is to do everything I can to keep the money paid by hardworking taxpayers from being needlessly squandered.  I was sent to Washington to help get our nation’s financial house in order, and I look forward to working on this important subcommittee to do just that.”

Guinta also serves on the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

CEI Daily - Domestic Energy Jobs, Ron Paul, and Happy Meals

Domestic Energy Jobs

Tuesday's election was a win for domestic energy jobs.

Associate Fellow Ben Lieberman explains that voters punished "anti-energy" politicians at the polls.

"Draw up a map of the U.S. and shade in the regions that rely on energy jobs — places like Appalachia, the Rockies, western Gulf states, Alaska — and that’s where we saw some of the strongest anti-Obama sentiment succeeding on election day. With few exceptions, the only Democratic congressional candidates who won in these areas were those able to distance themselves from President Obama’s energy policies — or to be more accurate, his anti-energy policies. In its first two years, the Obama administration has tried to slam the door shut on domestic production of coal, oil, and natural gas. But now, many of the administration’s congressional allies in this effort have gotten a pink slip from their constituents."

 

Happy Meals San Francisco has banned happy meals. Fellow in Regulatory Studies Ryan Young argues that the San Francisco city government is wrong in acting as a stand-in parent to city residents. "Hearing 'no' now and again is an important part of not growing up spoiled; though parents are the ones who should be saying it. But who needs parents when the nanny state is here?"

Ron Paul

Ron Paul is next in line to head the Federal Reserve Oversight Subcommittee.

Warren Brookes Fellow Kathryn Ciano says that Paul will likely change the parameters of the Fed's power. 

"The Federal Reserve has enjoyed casual oversight while Congressman Barney Frank served as chairman of the Monetary Policy subcommittee. That is about to change. Ron Paul has spent his tenure in politics pushing vehemently for a Federal Reserve audit. Paul has been particularly forceful in asking that the Fed reveal where the government is actually spending TARP funds."