Last Saturday C.C.C. and I went to a BP gas station (gasolinera)
to get some morning coffee and dulces (sweets). Upon entry to the gasolinera a
gentleman who was sitting at a table reading a newspaper said “Hello."
I ignored this provocation.
After making our purchase, C.C.C. and I—for the first time
in history—sat at one of the tables, and opposite Hello no less, to drink our
coffee and eat our dulces.
“I said to a friend ‘If you had a billion dollar business
who would you want running it, Obama or Romney.’ That’s all I said. He didn’t say anything.”
He-he-he-he-he. First, “Hello,” and now, throwing gasolina on
the fire, this. No-no-no-no-no. He’s not going to get me to go there. I have
read the treatise “Rules of Affability,” rule A-120.35(c) of which is “Never
Engage in Political Discussions with an Unknown Man at a Gas Station.” And sub (i) of the aforesaid says “humor
him.” That is what I did. “Yeah, you’re right,” I responded affably, eating
quickly.
The Rules of Affability do not apply to blogs.*
“United
States of America ” may sound vaguely like a
corporation but if it was it would have an “Inc.” at the end. There’s no inc.
The United States of America
is a “country;” it has its own word (“country”) which is different from the
word for corporation (“corporation.”). And
there may be other distinctions between countries and corporations. Hello, and
there are many Hello’s in the U.S.A. ,
acknowledge this semantic distinction of course. Nonetheless, the economic efficiencies
of corporations, especially U.S.A.
corporations, are of such renown among Hello’s that experience running said
economically efficient corporations has become a political desideratum. Some
years ago we had a fellow with very big ears, “Rose Perot,” run for president as
an independent. Perot’s political raison
d’etre was that he had founded a corporation called Electronic Data Systems
and made it hugely profitable. Hello’s positively swooned over Ross Perot
for a time, at one point he was leading both the Republican and Democratic candidates in the polls. The idea is that economically efficient people like
Ross Perot can make the U.S.
government economically efficient too. “Profits” may be another distinction
between countries and corporations (in “output”) and whether Hello’s want
corporate types to make the U.S.A.
government “profitable” too is beyond our knowledge. Perot sold EDS, as
corporate founders are permitted to do, for $2.5 billion in 1984. It is not
believed that Hello’s wish one such as Perot, or Mitt Romney, to actually sell
the U.S.A. after making it profitable, so that may be another distinction
between running a corporation and running a country.
Mitt Romney sells himself as a presidential candidate
largely on the basis of the aforesaid reasoning. Romney did not found Bain Capital but he
was instrumental in making it, and himself, very wealthy and able to afford
houses with car elevators and horses named Dressage. Among other things. We
wish to make the following point however: Bain Capital is not Electronic Data
Systems (different names). Not only different names, different stuff they do. EDS managed data processing for other corporations and also for the U.S.
government’s Medicare program. Medicare. So Hello, “good” economically
efficient corporations and corporate-types can make money, big money, off “bad”
economically inefficient government programs? Yes they can because corporations and Medicare
process a lot of data. Perot and E.D.S. said to them, “Hey, look at all that
data over there. It needs processing. We will do it for you for $X.” And corporations and Medicare said “okay” and
EDS and Perot made a lot of money. Employed a lot of people too, 136,000.** That’s
the size of McKinney , Texas
What’s good for McKinney is
good for the U.S.A.
So Hello, who gets credit for the Medicare jobs created at
EDS, Ross Perot or who? Oh, we're affable, let’s
give him the whole credit. Ross Perot created 136,000 jobs. Jobs. Mitt Romney said last night all the U.S.A. needs is jobs and he, off
his experience at Bain Capital, can do it.
Bain Capital employees: “400+”.***
Hello?
Hello, Bain employs as many people as RBM Building Services,
Inc. “the largest solely owned janitorial company in the state of Utah .”**** Bain is worth $66 billion today and employees
400 (+) people. The successor corporation to Ross Perot’s EDS was worth $22 billion in 2007 and employed
136,000. So some kinds of businesses are “worth” more but employ far fewer people.
What kind of business is Bain? Bain is a “private equity” firm. What the hell
do they do? A private equity firm
invests. A private equity firm is an “investment manager” that invests the firm’s
and other people’s money in other people’s businesses.*****
?
I invest. Can I be a private equity firm? If I had enough money I could. If you or I
(or better, you and I) had enough
money to buy other people’s businesses we could. Could we then take credit for
the jobs created by the businesses started by other people that we invest
in? That’s
what Mitt Romney does. Mitt Romney
claims that Bain Capital created 100,000 jobs through the companies it invested
in, like Staples. Through. That’s
still less than the 136,000 people that EDS employed. How many more jobs could Ross Perot claim he
created through EDS? I don’t know.
Bain Capital invests. It makes money. Bain can make money
when the companies it invests in create jobs and Bain can make money when the
companies it invests in don’t create jobs. Mitt Romney is no more qualified a job creator
than Jon Moss, the head of “the largest solely owned janitorial company in the
state of Utah .”
Hello?
* E-1.1.
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