Put a flaming turd in the White House. Vote for Newt.
"I swear I'll suckup to Wall Street AND Israel. Thanks for the $10 million Sheldon. I'll be a good little ass-kisser."
Newt Gingrich took aim at Wall Street and by extension Republican presidential opponent Mitt Romney yesterday as the former U.S. House speaker said he isn't running for president to "represent Goldman Sachs."
Yet the investment firm Gingrich derided and the banking industry as a whole stand to gain from his proposals to eliminate the capital gains tax and repeal two financial-sector measures, four analysts said in separate phone interviews.
Gingrich's tax package, which also calls for a reduction of the personal income and corporate tax rates, would be beneficial to many on Wall Street, including those at Goldman Sachs Group Inc., an investment banking firm based in New York, the analysts said.
"This is negative political rhetoric that's not based on anything, either his own history or his proposed policies," said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, an economic policy adviser to Republican presidential candidate John McCain in 2008. "He is proposing a flat, consumption-style tax, which gives incentives for people to use the financial system."
Gingrich's comments yesterday are "inconsistent with what he's proposing," said Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action Forum, an anti-tax organization based in Washington. "It's hard to defend on the logic."
Gingrich Proposals
In campaign speeches, Gingrich has promised voters that on his first day as president, he'd repeal, in addition to Obama's health-care legislation, the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act to monitor corporate auditing and the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act of Wall Street regulations.
He often highlights his proposal on the capital gains tax rate, which is scheduled to rise to 20 percent from 15 percent by 2013. Gingrich would eliminate it.
The Dodd-Frank Act, passed in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, authorized hundreds of new regulations to curb misconduct and excessive risk-taking by Wall Street financial firms.
It includes new rules restricting the kinds of trades banks can make with their own money, increasing supervision and oversight by federal regulators, and imposing new requirements to protect consumers from unfair or complicated products.
The new law requires most derivatives to be traded on exchanges, gives shareholders a say in how executives are paid, and limits the amount merchants pay for debit-card transactions.
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which Congress passed with an overwhelming majority in the wake of the collapse of Enron Corp (ENRNQ)., formed a new watchdog to oversee U.S. auditing and required managers to sign off on financial reports and internal controls at their public companies.
"If these laws were removed, you would see, over time, an increase in profitability, an increase in hiring to work for financial firms, an increase in economic activity," said Gerard Cassidy, managing director of bank equity research RBC Capital Markets LLC. "It would enable financial companies to become more profitable."
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