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In July 1996, Mitt Romney helped locate the missing teenage daughter of a partner at Bain Capital.
PolitiFact ^

Posted on 02/02/2012 4:17:25 PM PST by fred4prez

"In July 1996, the 14-year-old daughter of Robert Gay, a partner at Bain Capital, had disappeared," the story reads. "She had attended a rave party in New York City and gotten high on ecstasy. Three days later, her distraught father had no idea where she was. Romney took immediate action. He closed down the entire firm and asked all 30 partners and employees to fly to New York to help find Gay’s daughter. Romney set up a command center at the LaGuardia Marriott and hired a private detective firm to assist with the search. He established a toll-free number for tips, coordinating the effort with the NYPD, and went through his Rolodex and called everyone Bain did business with in New York and asked them to help find his friend’s missing daughter. Romney’s accountants at Price Waterhouse Cooper put up posters on street poles, while cashiers at a pharmacy owned by Bain put fliers in the bag of every shopper. Romney and the other Bain employees scoured every part of New York and talked with everyone they could – prostitutes, drug addicts – anyone.

"That day, their hunt made the evening news, which featured photos of the girl and the Bain employees searching for her. As a result, a teenage boy phoned in, asked if there was a reward, and then hung up abruptly. The NYPD traced the call to a home in New Jersey, where they found the girl in the basement, shivering and experiencing withdrawal symptoms from a massive ecstasy dose. Doctors later said the girl might not have survived another day. Romney’s former partner credits Mitt Romney with saving his daughter’s life, saying, ‘It was the most amazing thing, and I’ll never forget this to the day I die.’

(Excerpt) Read more at politifact.com ...


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To: ansel12

My post 230


241 posted on 02/03/2012 1:45:29 AM PST by buwaya
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To: ansel12

My opinion in a nutshell -

http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/133776/


242 posted on 02/03/2012 1:48:54 AM PST by buwaya
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To: buwaya
The point is that back then we were all - even in San Francisco - “conservatives”, by modern standards.

The government wasn't, the institutions weren't, not the media, not the courts, they were making such bold radical jumps to the left that we will never recover, the accomplishments and victories of the hard left in the 1960s, cannot be duplicated today, and not since the 1980s or late 70s.

If the JFK inspired 1965 immigration act had not been passed, then this country would be very far to the right, today. We would have rolled back much of what was done to us in the 1960s.

243 posted on 02/03/2012 1:49:06 AM PST by ansel12 (Romney is unquestionably the weakest party front-runner in contemporary political history.)
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To: ansel12
You really are just making up things as you go.

I'd like to post a public retraction and apology for whatever I made up. Will you please direct me to my offending post(s)?

244 posted on 02/03/2012 1:52:58 AM PST by Scoutmaster (You knew the job was dangerous when you took it)
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To: buwaya

Post 168 was your original answer, that is what I have been quoting, Gingrich was not even on the table for you, only Romney, on this whole thread your preference for Romney in the primary is clear.


245 posted on 02/03/2012 1:54:26 AM PST by ansel12 (Romney is unquestionably the weakest party front-runner in contemporary political history.)
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To: ansel12; Scoutmaster

Sorry, ansel12. It’s early and I’m an idiot. That’s not a good combination. I figured out (I think; it’s still early and I’m still an idiot) that your post was not directed at me.


246 posted on 02/03/2012 1:55:43 AM PST by Scoutmaster (You knew the job was dangerous when you took it)
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To: Scoutmaster

I merely pinged you to my answer, go look at the post again.


247 posted on 02/03/2012 1:57:09 AM PST by ansel12 (Romney is unquestionably the weakest party front-runner in contemporary political history.)
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To: Scoutmaster; buwaya

buwaya’s theology and defense of Mormonism is so bizarre, that I thought some of the Mormon experts could bring him up to date.


248 posted on 02/03/2012 2:00:39 AM PST by ansel12 (Romney is unquestionably the weakest party front-runner in contemporary political history.)
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To: cynwoody; Flycatcher
Flycatcher: The original is a CHAIN E-MAIL!

cynwoody: No, it's not. I first heard this story in 2007 or 2008. Here's a contemporaneous article.

cynwoody? I think Flycatcher is saying that the very puffed up "Romney did everything, right down to personally making the phone calls to everyone Bain did business with in New York" piece is from a Chain e-Mail, not that the base substance of the story (that Bain helped find the missing daughter of a Bain partner) is true.

The contemporaneous article you linked never mentions Mitt Romney's name a single time. It says the "partners" at Bain did the job - and then it certainly sounds as if Bain leaned on those with whom it did business or in whom it invested to get the rest done (which I probably would have done as well). Leaned on others - not that Mitt or Bain partners were out doing these things personally:

"R. R. Donnelly, the firm's printer, printed more than 300,000 fliers bearing Ms. Gay's picture and last known whereabouts. Duane Reade, a drugstore chain in which Bain Capital is an investor, had clerks at 52 stores insert fliers in shopping bags. Price Waterhouse, which does the firm's accounting, sent nearly 100 volunteers to distribute the posters, and Goldman Sachs, Bankers Trust and Morgan Stanley dispatched more than 60 people.

249 posted on 02/03/2012 3:07:26 AM PST by Scoutmaster (You knew the job was dangerous when you took it)
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To: fred4prez; All
More about the story at the link...I'd never heard about this - very cool thing of him to do!

It took a little research. Romney helped. This story is over-the-top and not accurate about Romney 'closing down the firm' and taking all of these personal action - at least not according the news articles from 1996.

You'll need a subscription to Boston Globe archives. Pull up the July 12, 1996, Friday, City Edition.

Turns out that Bob Gay was embarrassed that his daughter took off for a rave party and disappeared. He kept it to himself for a couple of days and then finally told Romney. Romney didn't make any decision - except to tell the other eleven Bain Managing Directors. *They're* the ones who decided to 'shut down the firm' and put money into the search. I'm certain Romney suggested it, but Romney didn't do it (nor these heroic things like calling every Bain contact in New York himself).

From the article:

Bob Gay waited until 2 that night. His daughter never came home.

"That's when we knew something was not right," he said in a telephone interview last night from New York City.

They called all her friends and then called police. They soon learned that Melissa had hopped a train with several friends to New York Saturday night to catch the Rock Rave-Fantasia II concert in Manhattan.

Her friends returned to Connecticut without Melissa sometime Sunday.

Bob Gay doesn't believe his daughter ran away, because she didn't take any clothes and had only $ 10 with her. "I believe she fully intended to go to the concert without telling us, but not stay there in the city," he said.

Ridgefield and New York police are working together. Hospitals have been checked and arrest records canvassed, Gay has been told.

New York police said her friends last saw her at a party at 11 a.m. Sunday near the Whitestone Bridge, which connects Queens and the Bronx.

Last night, officials from both departments would not comment on the case, except to say that the investigation is continuing.

But Bob Gay just couldn't sit back and watch.

On Wednesday he walked the streets of Manhattan looking for his blonde daughter, who was last seen wearing a blue or red-striped shirt and baggy tan pants.

Gay, who has worked for Bain for eight years, kept his ordeal to himself, confiding only in Romney.

But Wednesday, Romney decided to tell the other 11 managing directors, and they decided that finding a missing daughter was more important than operating a $ 1 billion investment firm.

The executives decided not only to give their time but their money, paying all expenses for the search for the fifth of Gay's seven children.

That night, 16 employees flew to New York, turned a function room of the Laguardia Marriott Hotel into a "war room," and got printing giant R. R. Donnelly to print 200,000 fliers with a color picture of Melissa. They also hired a private investigator and set up an 800-number hot line.

Another 40 employees caught an early morning shuttle yesterday, and later were joined by about 250 colleagues from other Wall Street firms, including Goldman Sachs, Price Waterhouse and Bankers Trust.

"Most of us have children," said Stephen Pagliuca, 44, a Bain managing director with four children. "That's the most important thing in our lives. It wasn't even a question. We just decided to do it."

So, this was a good story with a great ending. And there's a subsequent Globe article in which Gay thanks Romney for his help. But the article posted was posted because Romney is running for President - and Romney's role was rewritten and beefed waaaaaaaay up to make him more than a leader, but a superhero.

Romney did the right thing, he just didn't do all of the things in the article. Bain's other eleven Managing Directors were involved in shutting down the firm. When you've done something good, why do your supporters need to taint it by crafting lies about what you did, exaggerating your role, and outright lying about you "shutting down the firm," yada, yada?

250 posted on 02/03/2012 4:17:21 AM PST by Scoutmaster (You knew the job was dangerous when you took it)
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To: Scoutmaster
I think Flycatcher is saying that the very puffed up "Romney did everything, right down to personally making the phone calls to everyone Bain did business with in New York" piece is from a Chain e-Mail, not that the base substance of the story (that Bain helped find the missing daughter of a Bain partner) is true.

Oh?

Like "Mitt single handedly saved the Utah Olympics"?

251 posted on 02/03/2012 4:19:25 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going)
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To: fred4prez
http://www.snopes.com/politics/romney/search.asp
 
 
 
 
Claim: Mitt Romney ASSISTED in the search for his business partner's missing daughter.
 
 
 TRUE
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
"I mean, money is just money."
 
 
 
"I'm Mitt Romney; and I approve this message."

252 posted on 02/03/2012 4:34:37 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going)
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To: Elsie

I wish that Mitt would search for TRUTH; the same way he did for Ms. Gay.

I mean, a soul is just a soul.

And MORMONism is a heresy.


253 posted on 02/03/2012 4:37:19 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going)
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To: Elsie
"I'm not concerned about the very poor. We have a safety net there. If it needs a repair , I'll fix it," he said. "I'm not concerned about the very rich.... I'm concerned about the very heart of America, the 90 to 95 percent of Americans who right now are struggling."

(I guess a Bain partner is just plain rich: not VERY rich.

254 posted on 02/03/2012 4:40:53 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going)
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To: Scoutmaster

Im not putting him on a pedestal, Im saying that it was good he did this, and we dont need to qualify everything. If Clinton worked at a soup kitchen, Id say good for him.

That is very different from using law to give people free money from someone else. Im not gonna sit around and be paranoid.

And we havent established anything. A bunch of people who dont like Mitt and really dont like Mormonism have said that they dont think it is the real story, but they havent proven anything.


255 posted on 02/03/2012 5:14:46 AM PST by Raider Sam (They're on our left, right, front, and back. They aint gettin away this time!)
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To: tinamina

Yes and yes.
Her father a friend of Romney’s was also in the highest of the high as is Romney in lds.


256 posted on 02/03/2012 6:15:55 AM PST by svcw (For the new year: you better toughen You up, if you are going to continue to be stupid.)
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To: fred4prez

Maybe the next President should appoint Romney to coordinate federal-level missing persons searches.


257 posted on 02/03/2012 6:19:41 AM PST by Sloth (If a tax break counts as "spending" then every time I don't rob a bank should be a "deposit.")
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To: buwaya
It might serve you before you defend mormonISM to learn about mormonISM.

mormonISM teaches that Catholics and Protestants are whores of Babylon and an abomination.

mormonISM teaches that their god was once a man.

mormonISM teaches that Mary had sex with their god.

There is zero about mormonISM that is Christian.

They deny the Biblical God.

mormonISM can call themselves Christian it does not make it so, anymore than living in a garage makes one a car.

258 posted on 02/03/2012 6:23:51 AM PST by svcw (For the new year: you better toughen You up, if you are going to continue to be stupid.)
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To: buwaya; moder_ator

“The data is independent of their delusions.”

If you believe that, you are delusional.

“I would also quote a Soviet or Nazi source, if the information was interesting.”

Doesn’t surprise me at all. A Mitt Pimp will claim all kinds of things, regardless of source.


259 posted on 02/03/2012 6:53:43 AM PST by aMorePerfectUnion (Proud RINOmney Denialist since 2007!)
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To: aMorePerfectUnion

-“I would also quote a Soviet or Nazi source, if the information was interesting.”

-—Doesn’t surprise me at all. A Mitt Pimp will claim all kinds of things, regardless of source.

I urge you to think this through. Sit down and consider the concept, and imagine scenarios wherein you require information.

If you require a jog to your imagination, consider what sources Robert Conquest consulted.


260 posted on 02/03/2012 8:20:54 AM PST by buwaya
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