Verbatim Mitt Romney, in a dull rehash of his economic philosophy in The Wall Street Journal titled “What I Learned at Bain Capital”:
A broad message emerges from my Bain Capital days: A good idea is not enough for a business to succeed. It requires a talented team, a good business plan and capital to execute it. That was true of companies we helped start, like Staples and the Bright Horizons child-care provider, and several of the struggling companies we helped turn around, like the Brookstone retailer and the contact-lens maker Wesley Jessen….
My business experience confirmed my belief in empowering people. For example, at Bain Capital we bought Accuride, a company that made truck rims and wheels, because we saw untapped potential there. We instituted performance bonuses for the management team, which had a dramatic impact. The managers made the plants more productive, and the company started growing, adding 300 jobs while Bain was involved.
People build their businesses without any help from anyone and, by the way, thanks to all the people who helped me build Bain — I couldn’t have done it without you.
And that’s the problem with demagoguing the “you didn’t build that” comment — you can’t possibly talk about business in even the most abstract sense without contradicting your own argument. Mitt seems to be having an ongoing problem with logical consistency lately.
