Sky Dancing

a place to discuss real issues

Tagg Romney Followed Mitt’s Advice: “Borrow Money…from Your Parents; Start a Business.”

in

bostonboomer
Who names their kid "Taggart?"

The New York Times has an interesting story about Solamere Capital, a private equity firm founded by Mitt Romney’s son Tagg (short for Taggart) shortly after his dad’s last campaign for POTUS ended in 2008.

About a month after Mitt Romney ended his bid for the Republican presidential nomination in February 2008, his eldest son, Tagg, and Spencer Zwick, the campaign’s top fund-raiser, met with a beef company executive who had been a major campaign donor over dinner at the posh Torrey Pines resort in San Diego….

Neither had experience in private equity. But what the close friends did have was the Romney name and a Rolodex of deep-pocketed potential investors who had backed Mr. Romney’s presidential run — more than enough to start them down that familiar path from politics to profit.

I’m sure you recall Mitt Romney’s advice to community college students at a recent campaign appearance in Ohio.

WESTERVILLE, Ohio — Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney offered a group of college students this advice on Friday: If you want to start a business, borrow money from your parents.

Romney, a wealthy former investment banker who has struggled to soften his image as a member of America’s super elite, was discussing ways of achieving the American dream at Otterbein University. He said, “We’ve always encouraged young people: Take a shot, go for it. Take a risk. Get the education. Borrow money if you have to from your parents. Start a business.”

Well, Mitt knows whereof he speaks! He kicked in $10 million to help Tagg and some friends start up Solamere. On top of that, he gave his eldest son access to his superrich campaign donors. What a guy.

The small firm, including Tagg Romney, 42, Mr. Zwick, 32, and a third partner they brought in, Eric Scheuermann, 47, the only one with a private equity background, is in line to collect at least $16.8 million in fees over the first six years of the fund, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm has earned a 20 percent return since 2010, despite having invested only about half of its money so far.

And guess what? Solamere’s employee roster is practically a who’s who of Romney campaign personnel:

While Solamere has not operated exactly as a subsidiary of the Romney campaign, it has seemed that way at times. The firm shared its first address with the Romney campaign headquarters in Boston. Later, the company was located in the same building as Mr. Romney’s leadership PAC, Free and Strong America, before moving to trendy Newbury Street in Boston.

Please go read the whole article. If Mitt Romney is elected POTUS this time, will he be the leader of the American people or will the U.S. government simply become a wholly owned subsidiary of Romney family enterprises?

Comments

31 responses to “Tagg Romney Followed Mitt’s Advice: “Borrow Money…from Your Parents; Start a Business.””

  1. bostonboomer Avatar
    bostonboomer

    Solamere doesn’t even find businesses to invest in. It just makes money off other firms that invest in businesses. From the NYT article, p. 2:

    Solamere settled on a strategy tailored to wealthy individuals, requiring a minimum $10 million investment, with some exceptions. Unlike many private equity funds that specialize in scouting out companies to invest in directly, Solamere is a “fund of funds” that invests in 22 other private equity funds. The firm has also made eight co-investments, which give its investors the option of putting additional money into deals arranged by other firms.

    1. RalphB Avatar
      RalphB

      They really are just a parasite then. Wonder if the whole clan is a waste of skin?

      1. bostonboomer Avatar
        bostonboomer

        You’re still wondering??

      2. RalphB Avatar
        RalphB

        Actually, that was a rhetorical question 🙂

      3. dakinikat Avatar
        dakinikat

        Isn’t that the truth though?

      4. Fannie Avatar
        Fannie

        yup, the FEED Romney clan

    2. Wonk the Vote Avatar
      Wonk the Vote

      “Hey kids, borrow the money your parents made on paper so you can make more money on paper! Woohoo! Free hotels for everyone!” Mittopoly.

      1. dakinikat Avatar
        dakinikat

        Don’t forget that your parents make money gambling and leveraging businesses into the ground while taking all the cash out.

    3. ecocatwoman Avatar
      ecocatwoman

      So what kind of work did Tagg do before he became a private equity businessman?

      1. bostonboomer Avatar
        bostonboomer

        There’s some background on him later in the NYT article. He has some business experience.

  2. Pat Johnson Avatar
    Pat Johnson

    Off topic but if the name “Taggart” doesn’t blow your mind try the name given to Jessica Simpson’s new baby girl. Maxwell Drew.

    That’s right Maxwell who will be called “Maxi” by her family from her on in.

    Somehow I can hear the sounds of “Maxi Pad” trailing off the lips of her future classmates as this poor kid traverses life dragging around the name Maxwell.

    What is wrong with these people who would do this to a baby for god’s sake?

    1. bostonboomer Avatar
      bostonboomer

      Ugh. So she finally had the baby?

    2. Wonk the Vote Avatar
      Wonk the Vote

      Maxwell, even with the Maxi, is better than some other celeb baby names. Shrug.

      Taggart is odd. Convenient that it rhymes with braggart.

      1. JJ Lopez Minkoff Avatar
        JJ Lopez Minkoff

        Wasn’t there a movie or some tv show with a cop named Taggart (last name.)

        1. JJ Lopez Minkoff Avatar
          JJ Lopez Minkoff

          Yup: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taggart

      2. Seriously Avatar
        Seriously

        I like Maxwell Drew, and Maxi’s a cute nickname. Unfortunately, the kid’s last name is Johnson. Maxi Johnson might get some teasing, but. *shrug* I doubt life at West Bev is that arduous. Taggart sounds like a last name, maybe in the family tree somewhere?

    3. Fannie Avatar
      Fannie

      how about “wishing star” “night star” “happy star” and “bright star”…………….gotta say, luv your post Pat…………

    4. ecocatwoman Avatar
      ecocatwoman

      The meaning of Taggart: http://www.babynamescountry.com/meanings/Taggart.html I’ll save you the trouble. It means “son of the priest.”

  3. bostonboomer Avatar
    bostonboomer

    NYT:

    Another investor was Meg Whitman, the former eBay chief executive and a national finance co-chairwoman of the 2008 campaign. She invested more than $1 million, according to financial disclosures, and was a featured speaker at Solamere’s investor conference last year.

  4. Wonk the Vote Avatar
    Wonk the Vote

    Fitting little Romney anecdote for May Day.

  5. Wonk the Vote Avatar
    Wonk the Vote

    Mitt… Tagg… see it’s the double consonants… could be a superstitious thing.

    1. dakinikat Avatar
      dakinikat

      Biff … it’s a prep school thing

      1. bostonboomer Avatar
        bostonboomer

        He also has a son named Matt. More double consonants. You may be onto something, Wonk.

      2. bostonboomer Avatar
        bostonboomer

        Nope…the other sons are Craig, Ben and Josh. It should be Craigg, Benn, and Joshh.

      3. RalphB Avatar
        RalphB

        Which one is nicknamed Muffy?

  6. RalphB Avatar
    RalphB

    Charlies Pierce on Occupy today.

    The ‘End’ of Occupy and the Corruption of Our Country

    This was a banana republic. It was a failed state in everything except the fact that no tanks rolled in the streets. The terrorists were not hiding in Waziristan. They were having lunch at Cipriani’s and sitting in luxury boxes at the Meadowlands. The government existed only to increase their profits and to provide a quasi-legal context for organized piracy. There was an extraordinary contempt for the law, for the institutions of government, and for the people the law and those institutions were supposed to serve. The country was cored out. It was a shell of a country and a shell corporation, and it has not recovered yet.

    From the start, I said that the best thing about the Occupy movement was that at least they were yelling at the right buildings. I think, at the start, some of the Tea Party people felt the same way, but they were so easily and quickly assimilated into conventional right-wing politics that their most lasting contribution has been to push the Republican party so far out into the fringes that they might as well televise their convention this summer on River Monsters. This is because, from the start, they yelled at the wrong buildings. They yelled at the Congress and at the state legislatures, as though they were anything more than the simple vehicles through which the real work of stealing the country got done.
    […]
    If the Occupy people want to march, I say let them march. If they resist conventional politics, that may be because conventional politics are worth resisting. What I do know is that, if i weren’t for the people in the streets last autumn, the Obama people would be running a very different campaign and Willard Romney wouldn’t look half as ridiculous as he does. Somebody has to care enough not to care.

  7. RalphB Avatar
    RalphB

    Apparently the trial court judge, a Dubya appointee, wasn’t sufficiently wingnutty. Texas women are screwed as of the present. Perhaps a normal 3 judge panel will reverse him.

    Republican Judge Jerry Smith Blocks Pro-Planned Parenthood Order Just Hours After It Was Issued

    Last month, Republican Fifth Circuit Judge Jerry Smith pitched a tantrum in open court, demanding that the Department of Justice respond to some imprecise political rhetoric by President Obama in an attempt to embarrass the president. Today, the staunch Republican judge raised further doubt about his ability to separate politics from the law by suspending a decision benefiting Planned Parenthood just hours after it was handed down by another judge.

    1. bostonboomer Avatar
      bostonboomer

      Jesus H. Christ!

      Sorry….

      1. RalphB Avatar
        RalphB

        I agree!

  8. RalphB Avatar
    RalphB

    I’ll bet we don’t see a “Mission Accomplished” sign.

    Obama, Under Veil of Secrecy, Visits Kabul to Seal Agreement

    KABUL, Afghanistan – President Obama landed here Tuesday, on a surprise visit, to sign a strategic partnership agreement with Afghanistan meant to mark the beginning of the end of a war that has lasted for more than a decade.

    Mr. Obama, arriving after nightfall under a veil of secrecy at Bagram Air Base north of Kabul, flew by helicopter to the presidential palace, where he was to meet President Hamid Karzai before both leaders signed the pact. It is intended to be a road map for two nations lashed together by more than a decade of war and groping for a new relationship after the departure of American troops, scheduled for the end of 2014.

    Mr. Obama was scheduled to address the American people from Afghanistan on Tuesday evening, which would be the middle of the night in Afghanistan. The address – on the first anniversary of the American raid that killed Osama bin Laden in neighboring Pakistan – will give Mr. Obama a new opportunity to make an election-year case that he has wound down two expensive and now unpopular wars, here and in Iraq.

  9. ecocatwoman Avatar
    ecocatwoman

    For Dr. Boomer: this story of psychological studies on NPR this afternoon left me shaking my head. http://www.npr.org/2012/05/01/151764534/psychology-of-fraud-why-good-people-do-bad-things Seriously? The conclusions drawn that people make bad decisions if they are in “business” mode, which isn’t “ethical” mode? And auto inspectors will pass a car that should be charged with violations to correct if the car is a Honda Civic versus a BMW. Really?