Used to be that corporations were legal fictions and people were real. Now we’ve already established that corporations are people (Mitt told us so specifically). But now it’s also clear that people have become the legal fiction. Mitt claims that his continuing to be listed as CEO, chairman of the board, and sole stockholder of Bain Capital from 1999 (when he “left” the company) to 2002, and being paid an annual 6-figure sum is some sort of legal fiction, some bureaucratic device necessary to keep the lights on and the buyouts continuing while a team of lawyers took the few years necessary to untangle the interlocking web of holding companies so that Mitt’s “retirement” from the company would be in order and his name wouldn’t need to keep being plastered all over the paperwork filed on behalf of the company that he had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with in any shape or form or anything, no, not my job man, I wasn’t there, it must’ve been somebody else. (dang, that’s a long sentence—gotta watch the coffee)

And of course Mitt is insulted, he’s outraged, that Democrats would suggest that he might continue to have had even the tiniest bit of interest in a company he was listed as CEO, chairman and sole owner of. How dare they insinuate that he would dream of paying the slightest attention to what the people running the show at Bain were doing to a company he was listed as “owning 100%” of. No diligent and responsible businessman would ever, you know, make a few calls, exchange a couple emails to see that the great corporate benefactor Bain Capital had decided to start looting pension plans. Heck, that would be like Bob Evans retiring from his sausage company and then caring that the new guys started stuffing the links with sawdust and selling them with his name on the package. What sensible businessman would spend 5 minutes worrying about something like that? No, the best businessman knows when to pull back; “Do whatever you want guys, it’s only my money and reputation. Ha Ha!”

So “CEO, chairman of the board and 100% owner” was just a necessary fiction for Mitt to take off and run the Olympics. What kind of fiction will the US presidency be for Mitt? Maybe we could just skip the presidency phase and let him go straight to running another Olympics. The 2014 Winter Games are in Sochi. Know where that is? Me neither. Sounds like a good place for Mitt.