New Romney ad accuses Obama of cronyism

(CBS News) The Romney campaign is out with a new TV ad Wednesday charging President Obama with handing out political favors to campaign donors.

The ad shows images of money on fire with a narrator asking, "Where did all the Obama stimulus money go?" The same voice answers: "Friends, donors, campaign supporters, special interest groups."

The advertisement is an effort to drive home a line of attack the Romney campaign revived earlier this week criticizing the president for giving taxpayer-backed loan guarantees to green energy company Solyndra, which was partly funded by Obama campaign bundler George Kaiser. The company later filed for bankruptcy.

Obama campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki said earlier this week that "These are old, tired, haggard attacks," added Romney's "treading on thin ice here," and encouraged reporters to look into this issue during Romney's time as governor of Massachusetts.

Tuesday, Pittsburgh CBS affiliate KDKA asked Romney just that, who admitted, when he was governor, "one individual," who was a campaign contributor, sought help from his administration.

"[W]e set up a very elaborate process to make sure neither I nor members of my staff were involved in the decision making. We wanted to make sure that by appearance and reality that this was done without bias and without favoritism," Romney said. (Watch interview in the video at left.)

The Romney campaign has not responded to a CBS News inquiry into who the individual was and what he or she received from the governor.

As for the Obama administration's loan guarantees to Solyndra as well as electric car company Fisker, which also received $500 million in loan guarantees, Romney said "this is a real concern."

"I don't know about any specific law which prevents a president from carrying out a conflict of interest of some kind or providing money to businesses owned by campaign contributors but it certainly stinks," ," Romney told KDKA. "It's the sort of thing that makes people very upset when they know that middle class families in America are struggling and when friends of the president are doing very well, thank you very much thanks to the gift of government."

[eg0ddess]

Cronyism.. what's this Mr. Romney - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/19/mitt-romney-bain-olympics_n_1686873.html?1342723589 .. yep, cronyism at it's best!!!

[Homelessteacher]

I was a sergeant in the 82nd Airborne. I graduated from a top 10 University. I have a Masters Degree. I am a high school English teacher. And I am homeless. I think this story is relevant to a lot of what is going on in our economy and society today. Check it out- search blogspot for "homelessteacher" by David Gardner.

[RollotheNorman]

About as potent as Willard's wrenching of out of context of Obama's comments on "self-made businessment." More thin gruel and small beer from Willard. Willard and the other RepubliCONs are running from talking about the economy and trying to spin it as Obama spinning the situation. LOL, a tactic straight out of Saul Alinsky's playbook.

[JWinATL]

What an absurd thing to say.

[lloydbest1]

Note to Mitt:

People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

[kevcl6750]

The best defense of Obamas' cronyism is that everyone does it ! The worst part of Obamas' Green boondoggles is the way it resembles Soviet Style planned Economics ! Here we have a man with ZERO business experience pouring BILLIONS of US taxpayer $ into one rat hole after another ! Solyndra is just the tip of the iceberg ! Then we see him hanging out with Immelt and they are both laughing about the lack of "shovel ready" infrastructure projects. Meanwhile the "jobs czar " is investing TWO BILLION $ to build medical imaging devices in CHINA !

[TimeToEvolve]

That's funny, the dog Rob Me, owned and operated by the Wall Street billionaires and who does not work or pay taxes, accusing OTHERS of cronyism.

That is freakin' funny and has Karl Rovian tactics written all over it.

[JWinATL]

I would hardly call his payment of over $3.4 million in estimated taxes for 2011 "does not. . .pay taxes!"

[shylove2]

How true, political patronage rights is the only reason for elections.
And where did all that money disappear to in Iraq, the bales of money, not the cost plus contracts where the higher the cost the higher the pluses, which is just good buiness...

[lillyhorton]

Ron Paul for president.

[EmpireGeorge______--]

nobody told you he didn't win the Republican nomination he sought ?

[TimeToEvolve]

This ad certainly proves that it is Rob Me that is doing cronyism. First of all Rob Me is a Republicon and they are all ordered by Karl Rove to blame others for what they are doing.

Also OBVIOUSLY, Rob Me is the choice of Wall Street to be the next Reagan puppet for the Top 1%. Robme lives, breathes and spends cronyism.

[RollotheNorman]

Cronyism? What are the Koch brothers and Sheldon Adelson paying Willard all that money for? For nothing? I'm thinking RepubliCONs have be the Grafters in Chief for the last half century. Anybody really think Wall St. is giving all that money to Willard just for giggles?