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Warning: Pants on Fire hazard (Japanese firefighter, via Wikipedia)
Mitt Romney clearly wants the issue of his tax returns to go away. At the same time he adamantly refuses to do the one thing that would make the issue go away: release more returns. So Romney’s newest strange attempt to get the media to drop the issue without him actually providing any real transparency is to claim he has looked at his tax returns for us and we should take his word that he paid at least 13 percent in taxes every year. From the Washington Post:
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said Thursday that he has paid a tax rate of at least 13 percent on his income in each of the last 10 years, offering his fullest explanation to date of his tax status.
In response to repeated demands from Democrats that he release his tax returns, Romney has so far made public only last year’s tax records, which showed he paid 13.9 percent on his 2010 income. He has said he will also release his 2011 return but has no plans to make public additional information.
[...]
“I did go back and look at my taxes and over the past 10 years I never paid less than 13 percent. I think the most recent year is 13.6 or something like that. So I paid taxes every single year,” he said.
Since Romney has made some bold claims about his tax returns but refused to provide the proof he clearly has available, I’m anxiously waiting for PolitiFact to declare this statement a “Pants on Fire.“ I won’t be holding my breath or the fire hose, though.
I strongly suspect this latest move by Romney is not going to stop reporters from repeatedly asking the tax return question of him, his running mate, his surrogates and his wife. By making this statement about his tax returns, Romney is effectively admitting the issue has traction, which in turn makes his continued refusal to finally put an end to the speculation by simply releasing more returns appear even more bizarre.
34 Comments
We trusted Obama to give us change. Is this any worse?
If he did pay 13% last year it means he paid over $2,730,000 in federal taxes. A lot more than those who are whining about his proportional rate being to low. Our tax code allows capital gains for everybody to be taxed at a lower rate than income from wages. If you dont like it change the tax code but quit making this non issue and issue.
This issue may very well be a distraction from much more important topics. While it does highlight the disparity of bearing the burdens of this nations expenses, and those who will claim that Romney’s 13% is a greater dollar amount than any you or I might have paid fail utterly to see that working class families paying anywhere from 20-35% are actually bearing a greater individual burden than are the wealthy, there are larger issues at stake here.
As I typed this response robbep was making my point for me. Thanks Rob
Change it don’t bitch?
Yeah we would love to if Congress weren’t bought and paid for whores of the criminal elite.
Yep, this highlights the hypocrisy of poor, poor rich people having to pay too much. The horror of Mitt and Ann having to live on a mere 18 million after taxes.
My kid who worked lives at home, works two part time jobs, and who walks to work so he can save for college paid just a hair less percentage wise on his less than $20,000 a year job. Who should I feel sorry for? The guy who labors over 40 hours and has to live on less than $20,000 forgoing the luxury of a vehicle so that maybe he can afford tuition or a multi millionaire with 5 homes whose daddy paid for his school, transportation, and housing whining that HIS just over 13% is too much and he totally deserves to keep more of it because he’s such a “savvy businessman?”
And why is that?
Oh that’s right because Bain Capital LOBBIED for capital gains to be taxed at a lower rate.
You must not watch Jon Stewart.
http://news.yahoo.com/jon-stewart-explains-romney-got-low-tax-rate-135143214.html
It’s amazing when you call up Congress and ask why billionaires are paying a lower effective rate then middle class working Americans and they say well because it’s investments and capitol gains. They say this without any sense at all of what that means.
So sitting on your ass while your money makes money should be taxed at a lower rate then going to work every day breaking your back week after week, year after year.
Let the class war begin.
The even more amazing thing is the number of people arguing that Romney totally deserves it because he works so hard for it.
They must not understand the definition of a) investment(as in you are putting in capital and others are putting in labor, YOU AREN’T WORKING, OTHERS ARE) or b) the term blind trust(If Ann is to be believed, Mitt wasn’t even responsible for the decision making in determining what to invest in he simply got lucky or unlucky based on the decisions of his portfolio manager, not that Romney himself didn’t argue that “blind trust” was a ruse once upon a time.)
Last time I looked, Romney has never had any vote on the tax system of the US. Unlike Obama.
…”I think the most recent year is 13.6 or something like that”. I can’t recall the exact number, it’s been hours since I looked, so, you know, give or take 10 or 20%. It was a lot of taxes. I paid a lot of taxes, trust me. Part of it, of course, has to be estimated. I’d be happy to check into that for you and get back to you. ha ha ha. I’ll check with my accounting staff. A lot depends on how many houses I own and how many Cadillacs Ann has donated that she hasn’t, you know, added in. But trust me, I paid a LOT of taxes and some of it was donations, I donated a lot too. That’s all part of it and I donated a LOT. Probably more than taxes and I paid a lot taxes.
How can I say this politely? Well, I really am a sweet old lady, but, well…..blow me.
18 million dollars…….let’s put this in context. Romney’s AFTER TAX income is the equivalent of 360 people making $50,000 a year before they pay a single cent to Uncle Sam.
And if we were to go by the median wage of $26,364(which is what half this country earns in income) Romney makes the equivalent of over 680 people laboring for their income AFTER taxes.
Boohoo, I’m so happy that Romney and Ryan are going to make fixing this gave injustice and try to get their taxes down to zero by getting rid of taxes on investment income. That way he can keep almost the equivalent of 800 workers making median wage in this country for having someone manage a blind trust.
No but he sure does have him some lobbyists that can bribe lawmakers.
See the above article where Bain in 2007 spent massiv amounts of money to keep Romney’s taxes low.
If he paid that much in taxes and had 20% contributions like he claims he must have earned 27m. But that is too low since he likely had other deductions as well like horseys and things.
I don’t believe him anyway. The only way he can prove this is to release the tax returns and he will not do that because there is likely some very embarassing things in them, even if he did pay the 13%.
I wonder if he is saying the income from his partnership or S corporation would have been taxable but it was passed through to an IRA or something and therefore was not taxable. I would be willing to bet he is parsing his words here. But we will never know for sure.
The class war is just about over. We lost.
Mitt Romney would have us believe he’s going to create 12 million jobs by lowering Mitt Romney’s tax rate further. You don’t think what he pays now compared to the rest of us is an issue?
Under the Ryan plan Romney’s tax rate would go from under 14% to under 1%. Knowing how much of his job creator bonus is likely to wind up in Switzerland, Bermuda or the Cayman Islands might help people evaluate his claim.
No. The the rich think they’ve won. But it’s only just begun.
Stop trying to cheer me up.
Romney’s “Trust me, I paid no less than 13%” line is right up there with the classics:
“Your check is in the mail.”
“Really, I’ll still love you in the morning.”
“Sure, I’ll pull out in time.”
“No, I won’t cum in your mouth.”
The Dem faithful are going to continue beating this dead horse because they have nothing else to offer. It appears that Joe Q Public doesn’t care since Willard is now leading 47% to Zeros 45% in the latest Gallup Poll.
The Dems better come up with something better soon if they don’t want to see thousands of Mormon missionaries goose stepping down Pennsylvania Av while singing Hail To The Chief.
Should I be afraid of Mormons?
Remind me again where Romney stands on electoral votes? I’m pretty sure we don’t use Gallup to determine elections.
I could have said bicycling but i thought goose stepping had a better visual impact.
It does. Now I’m afraid of Mormons.
I know all about the electrical college but the popular vote usually determines the results and when it doesn’t the Repubs win.
My theory is that what he’s hiding isn’t his tax percentage but something that would mark him as a player in some legal tax avoidance scheme as recently described by the Tax Justice Institute which describes that about 1/3 of the worlds wealth is held by the top 92,000. Romney, of course, is a member of that club.
That’s a lot of stolen pensions and ruined lives. Its called blood money.
Meh I don’t think the morons controlling this country much care who wins this cycle. They’ve put some chips down on red and blue and bought off the security team running the casino. They figure that’s enough to win no matter what.
The only thing that cheers me up is knowing what screw ups they are at just about everything means that eventually we’ll hit a tipping point and they will lose and they won’t see it coming(cue the who could have imagined choir.) It just makes me sad that we aren’t there yet and some undeserving people are going to suffer first.
LOLROFL
Thank you for a funny and insightful comment.
.
I. might add that the money Romney avoids paying a fair and equitable tax upon was earned by wrecking the lives of working class American families.
13% of what?
Total income?
Taxable income after 90% of his total was deductions/credit/offshored?
Ask the question.
I thought Romney admired Ronald Reagan? Reagan said “trust, but verify.”
It worked…everybody is crowing like 13% is a fine number!!!
As Lawrence O’Donnell has suggested, I suspect that he had off shore accounts…(we know he did) and that he was granted amnesty. This means he was a draft dodger for years. Bottom line. Sure…it’s not illegal, but would anyone want him for pres, knowing that he thinks it’s okay for rich folks to dodge taxes and that he believes they should be let off free of charge??
I doubt it.
Here’s what a tax expert has to say about Romney’s claims: