The rich irony: Romney’s many financial ties to Iran

[flamingdem]

from Times of Israel via Ben LaBolt:


During last Monday’s foreign policy debate, President Obama systematically refuted Governor Mitt Romney’s accusations about US policy on Iran. More than that, he pointed out Romney’s outrageous personal conduct over the issue:

…while we were coordinating an international coalition to make sure these sanctions were effective, you were still invested in a Chinese state oil company that was doing business with the Iranian oil sector.

Are these new accusations correct? Absolutely, yes. Even the fact-checking bloggers at Fox News have admitted as much.

According to Romney’s tax records released earlier this year, during 2009 and 2010, over $77,000 of Romney’s money was being invested into CNOOC, an oil company fully owned by the government of China.

Candidate Romney expressed concern about Iran’s nuclear program, and bashed the Chinese for unfair economic practices, but, meanwhile, investor Romney was not deterred by the fact that CNOOC had just signed an agreement to develop the huge North Pars gas field in Iran.

In fact, Romney’s CNOOC holdings are just the tip of the iceberg, part of a consistent record of behavior by the candidate in which he talks a big game on Iran but undermines this impression in his personal conduct.

Romney has only held major elected office once in his life, as the governor of Massachusetts from January 2003 to January 2007. During that time, he did absolutely nothing to divest its state employee pension fund from companies that do business with Iran, even after conservative security analysts raised public concern (PDF) about these investments in 2004.

Governor Romney had extensive influence over the pension’s decisions through ex-officio membership and additional appointments to its investment management board, but there is zero evidence that he did anything at the time to constrain Iran, an issue that is now supposedly so near and dear to his heart.

http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/romneys-financial-ties-to-iran/

[OSPREYXIV]

1. You don't need a weatherman...

to know which way the wind blows.
(It blows far off-shore.)

Live outside the US long enough, learn another language,learn another culture and very quickly it becomes clear how America came to dominance. From an economic and/or military POV, the US has profoundly affected human history in what amounts to the blink of an eye. Power per se is neither good nor evil. For this reason alone, the
next ten days are incredibly important. What is being played out in this election cycle could not have had the remotest chance of happening if
we were capable of ever-so-slightly shifting our perspective, if only for a moment, to realize how we can change destiny--for the better--if we can waking up and face some very simple facts.

Hurricane Sandy is the ultimate irony, nature's ice-cold bucket of wakeup seawater. These are only offshore antics that are just a chip off the whole block. There's smoke, there's fire, there's
a turkey that needs to be roasted.

We keep trudging down a rut of least resistance, following ever-diminishing trails of corporate cookie crumbs while old lies are being repeated, repeated, repeated, repeated, repeated and... we'll all starve to death.

Remember! That 47% is really 47% of the 99%!
and the 1% doesn't want anyone (47% or 52%)
finding out who owns those voting machines.

Kudos to the poster:
Keep digging. Keep stirring. Keep cooking.
Keep the pot boiling over a really hot fire.
Follow the money. Follow. the. money.
Kudos to the poster.

Freedom is a flame.
Feed it with facts and fan it in the open air or
the Light of Liberty will be extinguished.

[flamingdem]

2. Thanks for your poetic, wide-angle thoughts

at this critical point. I also think about the big picture of US domination and the fact that so many millions around the world know this election is critical to our shared future. It's not just about the USA! We're upset that Americans could even consider a con man like Romney. This needs to be addressed after we win Nov. 6.