Financial Industry Loves Wall Street Willie

Willard Mitt Romney (aka Wall Street Willie) can't seem to generate any enthusiasm for his candidacy among ordinary Americans -- not even in the Republican Party. Most Republicans may be grudgingly starting to accept that he may be the best candidate out of their four rather pitiful choices, but they're not excited about it. Even with the weak opponents he has in the GOP nominating race, he has been unable to get a majority of the Republican votes -- registering only about 40%.

But things are different with the denizens of Wall Street and other members of the financial services industry. They know that he is one of their own -- a rich person who makes his money off the misery of workers and small investors. They know that he, like themselves, believes rules and regulations are just for ordinary Americans, while rich bankers and other financial businesses should be free to make billions by abusing consumers.

And they are showing their love for Wall Street Willie by making massive donations to his super-PAC (Restore Our Future). The super-PAC has raised about $43.2 million. About $20.5 million of that money has come from the financial services industry. That's 47.45%, or nearly half of all the money donated to the super-PAC.

The Center for Public Integrity, using Federal Election Commission data, did an analysis and found:

At least $13.5 million came from private equity firms ($7 million) and hedge funds ($6.5 million) while most of the rest came from investment banks and other asset managers. So-called “non-bank lenders” that run storefront cash-for-title and payday lending operations gave the super PAC $437,500, according to the analysis.

The financial services industry (Wall Street) knows which side of its bread the butter is on. They know that Romney is the candidate that would help them the most if elected -- by once again de-regulating the industry. Then they could get back to business as usual -- the same kind of business that triggered the current recession and cost this country millions of jobs and trillions of dollars from the accounts of small investors.