Does Mitt Romney own Ancestry.com?

[Avalux]

I just read a story about Obama being descended from the first slave, on his mother's side. The website Ancestry.com issued a press release and is all over the media making this claim, while admitting "no difinitive proof". It's sure to become a hot topic of conversation with the MSM, and something to get the GOP base worked up into a frenzy about. GOP base: "Obama is even more black than we thought! We hate him more!! Just a tactic to make sure they're motivated to vote for Romney. And for those independents who say "at least Obama is half-white", oops!

After looking into Ancestry.com a bit, I learned the database was started by two BYU grads years ago, and the site is essentially a Mormon enterprise. These days, it's part of a conglomeration of other LDS companies. At one point it was sold to undisclosed owners.

So now I'm wondering Mitt Romney's ties to Ancestry.com, and if he even owns the site and all the databases. He's tied to it in some way and they're working for him, with a lot of money involved.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

1. What would be the implications thereof if he did own it (or have some interest in it)

in regards to this information.

[Avalux]

4. Did you not read my post?

My premise is that the information is false (hence "no difinitive proof&quot , and will be red meat for the GOP base. A way to motivate them to vote for Romney.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

8. Sorry

didn't read through the whole thing before I posted. I'm sort of confused though. His MOTHER has African-American heritage? I'm not sure that this info- if it is verifiable- would have any impact on this race. The only people for whom this would be considered "important" probably would not be voting for President Obama anyway, at least I don't think so.

[Avalux]

11. It would matter to the GOP tea party types, those who Romney is trying to woo.

He's made a mess of his world tour just to impress them. He simply must have every single Republican vote for him to have a chance.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

17. True

however I'm not sure that *this* would "excite" them any more than they already are, particularly those of the "teabagger" persuasion.

[Avalux]

19. I live in Texas, teabaggers everywhere....

no Romney bumperstickers, and I've talked with a couple who hate Obama but don't want to vote for Romney. They're not happy at all.

[goclark]

28. I was recently in Texas, Florida, Mississippi and Louisiana

I did not see one Rmoney bumper sticker, no hats/ shirts with his name on it.

[Yeah Its Spin]

2. Yes

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancestry.com

[spanone]

3. i bet LDS has run the Obama's through the computer files many, many times

[Avalux]

5. I just had a scary thought, as I read Ancestry,com has just finished scanning

all US census records. They plan to posthumously baptize everyone!!!!

[life long demo]

25. Psst, They have been doing that for years

I started doing research in 1994, by late 1997 Ancestry was on line. Don't remember if that's what it was called, but I use to buy CD's from them, on census records. It was in the late 1990s that it came out that LDS was baptizing all the names they got from the census records, and also foreign census/birth/marriage records. It did cause a furor then, and they continue to this day.

[Avalux]

27. Wow I had no idea.

Thanks for the info. Very creepy...

[CJCRANE]

6. But it applies to *everyone* with white Virginian ancestry.

The article posits that Obama's mother's ancestors were in Virginia at the same time as John Punch's descendants.

That's it. That's their reasoning.

So it would apply to anyone who is descended from Virginian ancestors around that time.

[Avalux]

9. I understand that....

But you have to read the article to get that. All people will hear is "Obama's mother was black".

[Spider Jerusalem]

29. Well no, actually

the site linked to from the article presents some documentation that appears to establish a relationship between this John Punch or Bunch and one of Obama's mother's known ancestors, whose male-line descendants have been shown to belong to a Y-chromosome DNA group that's almost entirely found in sub-Saharan Africa. Which is a bit more than "her ancestors were in Virginia at the same time".

[Ruby the Liberal]

7. Yeah - its LDS.

Part of their proxy baptism fetish.

I have a family member who is a professional Genealogist and she won't touch ancestory.com with a stick due to the overwhelming amount of incorrect information in there.

[Ruby the Liberal]

31. I don't know - I don't know a thing about it.

She travels around to dusty old historical society basements and does gravestone etchings by hand. Old school. I do know she tried them and found a lot of mistakes compared to a project she did for someone, and it really turned her off on ever using them again.

I wouldn't have the patience, myself.

[dballance]

10. All I have to say is a big: So What - how does this matter?

The racist assholes were already not going to vote for Obama because he's a "darkie." I don't see how trying to make out his mother as black really helps Rmoney.

[Yeah Its Spin]

13. They are going after those who voted obama because he was half white ;)

[enough]

12. Man I thought you were being paranoid. But you're right. It is a Mormon owned owned for-profit

business.

However, I don't think this is going to hurt Obama, even if they think it will.

[Avalux]

16. As I've said, it may help him with the extreme Right.

They certainly won't vote for Obama, but they may stay home if they don't like Romney. Most presidential candidates go towards the middle in a general election....Romney is doing the opposite, he desperately needs them.

[notadmblnd]

14. Bain Capital Ventures - -peHUB

Bain Capital Ventures - -peHUB
www.pehub.com/tag/bain-capital-ventures/May 31, 2012 – Spectrum Equity, which has invested in SurveyMonkey and Ancestry.com, searches for growth equity deals. Tags: Bain Capital Ventures, ...

http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=ancestry.com+%2B+bain+capital&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

[Avalux]

15. Thanks! good stuff.

How silly the GOPers are.

[Retrograde]

20. Nothing to do with Rmoney

He left Bain in 1999....or 2002.....or last week....or something

[spanone]

21. ol bain did a lot of work with the carlyle group too.....

http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=bain+capital+carlyle+group&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

[SunsetDreams]

23. LOL great minds

[SoCalDem]

18. What I HATE about those ancestry sites is this

They USE official databases, but you have to PAY to see them.

I have tried many of them, and it always comes down to "sign up for a monthly fee" to see what you are looking for.

Sometimes you can find an old city registry or some census, but if it's government data, it should be easily searchable by ANYONE.. and for free

[SunsetDreams]

22. Survey Monkey Board Of Directors/Ancestory.com/Bain Capital Connection

Dave Goldberg - Chief Executive Officer, SurveyMonkey
Dave joined SurveyMonkey in April 2009. He has been a successful entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and technology and music industry executive. He has run, and successfully grown, several online consumer businesses.

Dave founded LAUNCH Media Inc. in 1994, which delivered music and music-related content online, and he led the company through its acquisition by Yahoo! in 2001. Following the sale, Dave served as VP and General Manager of Yahoo! Music, where he led the company's global music operations and built it into the Internet's most popular music destination. During his tenure, traffic increased from two million to twenty five million unique users per month, and four billion music videos were streamed in 2006 alone. In 2006, Dave was named one of Billboard Magazine's top power players in digital music. Recently Dave served as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence with Benchmark Capital where he evaluated investment opportunities for the firm and advised portfolio companies. Earlier in his career, Dave was Director of Marketing Strategy and New Business Development at Capitol Records. Dave also serves on the Board of Directors at Ancestry.com and Dashbox. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University with a BA in History and Government.

Paul Zurlo - Bain Capital Ventures
Paul joined Bain Capital Ventures in 2007. Prior to Bain Capital Ventures, Paul was COO of Mercer Outsourcing, a $750M division of Mercer focused on benefit plan administration. Prior that, he was the president of GoldK (acquired) and CFO of MCK Communications, a Summit Partners portfolio company that he helped take public. At Summit Partners, he made numerous other investments, including: SeaChange Int'l (NASDAQ: SEAC); DSET (NASDAQ: DSET), and Omtool (NASDAQ: OMTL). Paul started his career as a consultant with Bain & Company. Paul received his MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA in Economics from Georgetown University.

Benjamin C. Spero - Managing Director, Spectrum Equity Investors
Ben is a Managing Director in the Menlo Park, CA office of Spectrum Equity Investors. Prior to joining Spectrum Equity Investors, Ben was a consultant at Bain & Company and co-founder of TouchPak, Inc. Ben is a member of Full Circle Fund, and serves on the Santa Clara County Blue Ribbon Commission on Housing & Homelessness.

Ben received an AB in History and Economics, magna cum laude from Duke University. Representative investments: SurveyMonkey.com, LLC, Ancestry.com Inc., NetQuote, Inc., Mortgagebot, LLC, iPay Technologies LLC.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/mp/aboutus/directors/

I don't know if I'm on to anything, but that shows there is a connection between Ancestory.com and Bain through Survey Monkey at least.

[SunsetDreams]

24. .

[BlueToTheBone]

26. A white woman from Kansas was a slave descendent?

Are they kidding?