Meet John Thain, Phil Gramm, Glenn Hubbard And The Rest Of Team Romney

"A repeating landscape on a Hanna-Barbera cartoon..."

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CNN - Fortune

Nearly two dozen luminaries from the worlds of finance, government, and academe had gathered in secret behind smoked-glass windows in a three-story concrete office building on Commercial Street in Boston's North End -- Romney campaign headquarters -- for a meeting of the governor's recently assembled Economic Policy Steering Group. Some had only to cross the river from Cambridge. Others flew in from Chicago, D.C., and the West Coast. Tough duty in the middle of a holiday weekend, but as one participant says, anonymously, it was "for a good cause." Each had been requested by e-mail to "exercise discretion in keeping the contents of the discussion and the membership of the group private." Indeed, no one who was there will confirm for the record that the meeting even took place.

Lanhee Chen, Romney's brainy, combative chief policy director, presided. Among the attendees (a few phoned in) were five former chairmen of the President's Council of Economic Advisers -- Martin Feldstein, Michael Boskin, Glenn Hubbard, Greg Mankiw, and Ed Lazear -- representing every Republican administration since Reagan's. Also present were Al Hubbard, the top economic policy adviser during George W. Bush's second term; Robert Zoellick, a former president of the World Bank (rumored to be a candidate for Treasury); Kathleen Cooper, the chairwoman of the National Bureau of Economic Research; Stanford professor John Taylor; hedge fund managers (and donors) Robert Grady and Chris Shumway; philanthropist Marie-Josée Kravis (third wife of billionaire Henry Kravis); and former Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain (see chart for the full roster).

It's an all-star lineup, and groups like this one serve as holding pens for senior officials in waiting. Columbia Business School dean Glenn Hubbard, who wrote the foreword to Romney's campaign tract, Believe in America, and Mankiw, who teaches introductory economics at Harvard and wrote the textbook read by undergraduates everywhere, are among several holdovers from the 2008 campaign. There are deep ties to the Republican Establishment.  Ron Suskind compares the list to the "repeating landscape on a Hanna-Barbera cartoon."

Continue reading...

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Glenn Hubbard from the Oscar-winning doc Inside Job:

"You've got 3 minutes left.  Give it your best shot..."

Comments

[Cheyenne]

Sweet Jesus. I actually thought this was a joke until I clicked the link.

Did someone tell Mitt Romney to fileld a team of zombie all-stars that could compete with Obama's goon squan?

[DailyBail]

When I saw John Thain, my blood pressure rose. When I saw Phil Gramm, I thought of his annoying voice. And when I saw Glenn Hubbard, I just laughed, because I remembered the Inside Job clip.

[Cheyenne]

Professor Hubbard's angry sanctimony at being exposed as a charlatan is hilarious.

Romney has assembled quite the trifecta ticket of fraud here: a financial fraud in John Thain, a political fraud in Phil Gramm, and an academic fraud in Glenn Hubbard.

Does it ever occur to the Obamneys of the world that selecting advisors whose well-documented failures contributed to the financial crisis might not be a good idea? It's almost as if they're trying to cause another crisis...

[Pitchfork]

I thought Thain was a joke, too. If Team Obama had any sense (or a sense of humor), they'd be airing this shit 24-7:

http://dailybail.com/home/there-are-no-words-to-describe-the-following.html

[Bubba666]

That is the one percent Dream Team!

[SKINFLINT]

I wonder if Mitt is a friend of Lee.

[mikael]

To sentences that gives us the clue to this svindel and finnancial insane religion.
I you notised this.
Prevent losses and destribuite risk.
Sosialising Losses.
Privatising Profits.
That has absolutly nothing to do with or even remotly close to capitalism., Capialismis en its essense Ballance.
Any drift to what ever exrem, is chaos and dissorder, and it always finaly ends up with a sort of cetralizing(monpoly).
All -isms are that, a real capitalistic systemic thinking takes its conserns and proper mesurmenst in all part of the chain.
And corrects it, and that can ONLY be done thue partnershipp, not in any form of -isms.
All -isms have one thing in common, they have a sentral comite/clas.
Hehe.
They are indeed charrlatans and crooks. Nothing more and nothing less. .

A system based on Boom and Burst, he was right all the way, the good old man.
This worsk for just one part, the topp, and nobody else.

peace

[Epinoia]

"Historian Gaetano Salvemini argued in 1936 that fascism makes taxpayers responsible to private enterprise, because "the State pays for the blunders of private enterprise... Profit is private and individual. Loss is public and social."[8] Fascist governments encouraged the pursuit of private profit and offered many benefits to large businesses, but they demanded in return that all economic activity should serve the national interest."

--- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_of_fascism#General_characteristics_of_fascist_economies

[NetRanger]

Oh, Lord! Help us. Did I land on planet STOOPID? Whenever you get academics and corporatists together, the kittens of that litter can only be labeled FACISM.

The fact is, you all are criticizing Romney for his choice. I praise him. I know his plan (its not good) and the choices for his plan are EXCELLENT! (...for his purposes. Did I mention that they're not good.)

Excuse my plain english, but,

RON PAUL 2012: BECAUSE AMERICA HAS BEEN FORKED LONG AND HARD ENOUGH!!!

[LiberatedCitizen]

IMO we have seen what 4 years of obama has brought with his cabinet of Banksters we have had ZERO prosecutions Dodd-Frank is a joke we've had even more corruption including his DOJ, Crony Socialism an even larger Nanny state no one could be worse. He doesn't deserve a second term.

Crony Socialism Strikes Back: Geithner Retaliates Against DeMarco; Accelerates Wind Down Of GSE Treasury Backing

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/socialism-strikes-back-geithner-retaliates-against-demarco-accelerates-wind-down-gse-treasury-b

US Treasury Admits It Conducted A Circular Ponzi Scheme For Years

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/us-treasury-admits-it-conducted-circular-ponzi-scheme-years

DOJ ANNOUNCES NO PROSECUTIONS FOR TOP OBAMA DONOR GOLDMAN SACHS

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/08/12/DOJ-Announces-No-Prosecutions-For-Top-Obama-Donor-Goldman-Sachs

Report: Cronyism, political donations likely behind Obama, Holder failure to charge any bankers after 2008 financial meltdown

http://dailycaller.com/2012/08/07/report-cronyism-political-donations-likely-behind-obama-holder-failure-to-charge-any-bankers-after-2008-financial-meltdown/

[Anthony Clifton]

there is only one source for economic terrorism...

until people make an informed decision to pursue truth with the intent to reach a true conclusion they will remain in the zombie state that has been manufactured by the owners of the lie factory...who curiously print the currency and own the media, and coincidentally operate a cheap crack house ...the Kosher Krackhouse called Congress....the exact opposite of progress

what are the freaking ODDS of that ?

http://snippits-and-slappits.blogspot.com/2012/11/john-friends-news-from-jews-nov-2-2012.html

how about all those blessings ...? ?

http://forward.com/articles/165193/sandy-wreaks-untold-havoc-on-jewish-communities/

seriously, why does stupidity rate so high among genuine idiots ?

[SKINFLINT]

The corporate state has no religion except greed. Many of the large banks are not run by Jews, just as a lot of the MSM is not run by Jews. I do not understand why this is so difficult for people such as yourself to grasp. Do your homework. This is not the place for antisemitism. Do yourself and others a favor and kindly move on.