Obama Campaign To Wall Street: We'll Go Easy On You Guys

President Obama's campaign manager has a message for Wall Street: This time around, we'll lay off.

Jim Messina, Obama's campaign manager, told the hosts of a $38,500 per-plate fundraiser geared towards investment bankers and hedge fund managers that the president wouldn't make Wall Street look bad during his re-election campaign, Bloomberg reports. The assurance follows Obama's call to raise taxes on the rich in his latest budget proposal.

The current attempt at appeasement also comes as Obama attempts to win back the donors that provided him with so much last election. Despite criticizing Wall Street during a 2007 speech at the Nasdaq stock exchange, financial industry donations to Obama outpaced Wall Street cash to his GOP rival John McCain two-to-one at certain points in that campaign, according to the New York Daily News.

This time, Wall Street donors are instead favoring Republican candidates, their dollars going to the GOP by a five to one margin. And Mitt Romney, the Republican front runner and a former Wall Street man himself, is netting most of that cash, according to campaign finance data.

In addition, an October fundraiser geared towards Wall Street donors and headlined by billionaire investor Warren Buffett had a "disappointing" turn out, according to the New York Post.

Wall Street may be having a change of heart after Obama has repeatedly slammed the industry during his first few years in office. The president criticized the financial industry in a December 2009 CBS 60 Minutes interview for giving themselves big bonuses -- calling them "fat cat bankers" -- after U.S. taxpayers bailed them out. In April 2010, he chided a group of Wall Street leaders for their “reckless practices,” according to The New York Times.

Another Wall Street bugaboo may be Obama's push for more financial regulation -- some Wall Streeters said Obama's support for the Dodd-Frank financial reform act turned them off from the president.

Obama's repeated calls to raise taxes on the wealthy may also be ruffling the financial industry's feathers. The president's budget proposal for 2013 included a provision -- dubbed the "Buffett rule" -- that would require households making more than $1 million to pay at least 30 percent of their income in taxes.

Comments

[Joe Padilla]

04:11 AM on 02/23/2012

We'll go easy on you guys if you give me money.

Well. Who knew? This is a breaking news story of such incredible depth.

[Al Nava]

01:53 AM on 02/20/2012

It's obvious to any intelligent (non-sheep) being that Obama preaches fake Populism while appeasing his Wall Street elite pals. Obama feeds us crumbs of "progress" while providing a feast to Wall Street.

The Working-Class wants a Progressive warrior to lead this nation, not a Wall Street puppet like Obama (or Romney, Santorum, or Gingrich)!

[Acebass]

12:47 PM on 02/19/2012

We need a legitimate third party for liberals...

[Al Nava]

01:49 AM on 02/20/2012

I concur!
A Progressive Party.

[Acebass]

06:36 AM on 02/20/2012

Agreed!

[FireThemAll2012]

07:25 AM on 02/17/2012

You never tell someone who just gave you $40,000 that they are next and that you are out to get them. Obama will wait till after the election and if he's re elected, then he'll go after them. When he speaks you can almost see the fork in his tongue.

[Al Nava]

01:56 AM on 02/20/2012

Don't expect prosecutions of any Wall Streeters after Obama gets re-elected because they are Obama's friends.

[Georgia Yankee]

07:29 PM on 02/16/2012

I wonder how many presidential pardons were doled out at that dinner.

[Joe Padilla]

04:12 AM on 02/23/2012

Not very many because the statute of limitations has expired on these guys.

[tempered1]

04:34 PM on 02/16/2012

HOW DARE YOU SAY THAT!!!

WE'LL LAY OFF??????????

Here I'm a retired citizen; had NOTHING to do with the financial fraud and thievery that destroyed this nation and the world, I bailed the banks out, I've seen my interest bearing acounts stagnate and flatline (returning damn near ZERO for years now); I've been subjected to ever higher prices for everything from soup to nuts daily with no relieft in sight, gasoline and home heating oil are fast becoming necessities I can't afford, food is becoming a luxury beyond my reach, my home equity and value have been wiped out (my home is now a liability), I can't afford to get sick, I have no reserves left (they've been forcibly taken from me by higher prices), my cushion is gone - and YOU SAY THAT????

GOD HELP US IF YOU CAVE and DON'T GO AFTER THOSE WHO PERPETRATED THIS CRIME UPON HUMANITY!

If you don't you'll have proven to every hard working, average joe of this nation and the world that your words are nothing more than just empty rhetoric and your own self-serving self-interest (re-election) come first!

Mr President - WE DON'T NEED A PRESIDENT WHO CATERS - WE NEED A PRESIDENT WHO DOES THE RIGHT THING and STANDS UP for the INTEREST OF ALL! Anything less and you'll have proven yourself to be nothing more than a wolf in sheeps clothing!

I hope and pray I'm wrong!

[phoenixx1]

07:39 PM on 02/16/2012

F&F

[luv2livzen]

02:33 AM on 02/17/2012

He's referring to toning down his Wall St. bashing in his speeches, & in his campaign talks. It isn't about anything else.

Press the GOP in Congress to write a strong reformed regulation bill for the banks / Wall St. Right now, the GOP has watered it down so it's worthless. Strong regulations May defer them from repeating the exact thing we're still digging out of.

I, too, want to see lots of !% felons behind bars!! It's not feasible for Obama to go too crazy on that before Nov.. in my opinion. Wall St. runs the country & the economy & Obama can't change that all by himself! Sure wish he could.

[Wow Unbelievable]

01:09 PM on 02/16/2012

So as long as you keep lining our pockets we'll leave you alone.. Hum, that sure sounds like the old Ma f!a days.

[luv2livzen]

02:36 AM on 02/17/2012

that's not what the article said. not "we'll leave you alone'. Obama wants strong reformed regulations for banks / Wall St. GOP in Congress disagrees. Pressure them - maybe we can all convince them!

[Al Nava]

02:01 AM on 02/20/2012

Obama (like Romney, Gingrich, & Santorum) is a Wall Street puppet.

[Tquin]

12:46 PM on 02/16/2012

Obama will go easy on Wall Street because he owes them so much. He needs their help to get re-elected. After the election, he will turn on them once again. That is the way a politician uses people. Even you!

[Al Nava]

02:02 AM on 02/20/2012

Obama won't "turn on them" just like he didn't "turn on them" now. Obama is their puppet.

[altohone]

10:12 AM on 02/16/2012

Pointing out Wall Street criminality, excessive compensation, undo influence on policy and entitlement does not make them look bad.

They are bad, and they are solely responsible for how it looks to everyone.

[luv2livzen]

03:04 AM on 02/17/2012

F&F!!

[ZeraLee]

09:42 AM on 02/16/2012

They were all for Obama when he was talking bailouts, but when it comes to dangerously irresponsible regulations they look to the republicans.

Does this surprise anyone?

[Mogul Mogul]

07:52 AM on 02/16/2012

So the Wall St. cash is going to the GOP five to one. Big ffing surprise! If Obama didn't have his head up the big bank's backside he would have seen this coming.

[Al Nava]

02:02 AM on 02/20/2012

I concur!

[jrwest78]

06:42 AM on 02/16/2012

tax income, not wealth

[luv2livzen]

02:38 AM on 02/17/2012

For annual income tax - it is for income. Dividends on investments -- not the value of the investment.

Or did I over simplify & misunderstand?

[jrwest78]

02:22 PM on 02/17/2012

if I remember this thread correctly, I may have been arguing the validity of a 15% tax on investment income, which is wealth

[supergenius02]

03:37 AM on 02/16/2012

President Obama will not make Wall Street look bad as long as they cough up the $38,500 for Obama fundraisers and donate generously, of course, to his Super PACs. So much for hope and change. I wonder how many dinners has Obama thrown for ordinary or unemployed folks and talk to them and treat them special like the millionaires and billionaires at his glitzy fundraisers.

[eumenides]

07:18 AM on 02/16/2012

small price to pay to feed at the trough of the citizen's treasury

[Rich Cash]

03:00 AM on 02/16/2012

$38,500 for a plate of food. And these are supposedly Democrats. It's obsene! That amount of money could support a family of four for an entire year.

[luv2livzen]

03:26 AM on 02/16/2012

I agree. But - that's how all political fundraising goes. And alot of charity fundraising. Out of my league!

[Rich Cash]

03:39 AM on 02/16/2012

You and me, both! F&F!

[supergenius02]

03:40 AM on 02/16/2012

Charity? Hardly. This about making sure Obama stays in power, stays in the well staffed White House super mansion, countless parties with the rich and famous and private anytime access to a  fleet of taxpayer funded jets, helicopters and limos.

[Al Nava]

02:09 AM on 02/20/2012

Don't let a title ("Democrat") fool you into thinking that Obama is not a Wall Street puppet (like Romney, Gingrich, & Santorum). Obama is a elitist and at best, throws us crumbs while allowing his Wall Street pals to feast.

[Sabrae]

02:53 AM on 02/16/2012

Oddly enough, Wall Street turned it's allegiance to Romney about the time Obama said no more bail-outs in his SOTU.

They seem very confident that Mitt is going to hand them an easy ride.

[luv2livzen]

03:29 AM on 02/16/2012

Yep - he's FROM Wall St. He EVADES taxes. ($$ off-shore) He pays less than 14% to the IRS (tax bracket) which is lower than the average American. He's ultra rich. He's the 1%. Same as them.

[wsdave]

04:06 AM on 02/16/2012

Actually, there is no evidence that he evades taxes, only that he AVOIDS them.

[jrwest78]

06:43 AM on 02/16/2012

investment income shouldn't be taxed more than 15%

[VPerry24]

05:18 AM on 02/16/2012

and then came the bailout for the mortgage banks while telling the people that help is on the way.
And people don't even see it, now that is scary!