No one could have seen this coming.
Romney Tax Returns Become a Problem
Mitt Romney, a multimillionaire who is by far the wealthiest of the Republican presidential candidates, said he has no plans to release his income tax returns if he wins his party’s nomination, setting himself apart from past nominees in both parties who have routinely done so….
If the former Massachusetts governor wins the nomination and sticks to his plan, he would be one of the only presidential nominees in the last three decades to withhold his income tax return. While income tax information is private and there is no legal obligation to disclose it, presidents and nominees for the office have regularly done so since the 1970s.
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Mitt Romney reminds me of the saying ‘When you are a Harvard Inbred-Educated Idiot do what Obama does; deceive, lie, cheat your way to the top of the intellectually-inbred heap of credentialed crap.’
Guesses: Unemployed, but draws millions of dollars of capital gains income unrelated to capital he’s personally invested (and not into productive job-creating business). Parked funds in offshore entities which pay/paid no taxes. Made large charitable deductions to the Mormon Church and/or received tax advantages as a minister. Direct or indirect ties to firms/ventures/industries that have received questionable sources of revenue, or been the recipients of tax relief, loophole deductions, initiatives, and/or federal and state subsidies (“corporate welfare”).
Sure bet: He would squirm rather than lead on any tax reform.
Newt’s been talking for years about the need to change the campaign finance laws so that middle class citizens can have a chance in elections. The fact that Romney is one of the richest candidates and thus has this huge advantage — yet doesn’t want anyone to SEE THE DETAILS OF HIS ADVANTAGE IN HIS TAX RETURN is part of a larger symptom of the way the campaign finance laws are stacked against the middle class. (Oh and BTW, THANK YOU for totally screwing over the American people with that, JOHN MCCAIN.)
He’s been running for president for like 6 years. He couldn’t plan his taxes to be able to allow the taxes to be made public, EVEN KNOWING that he was running for the presidency? What is in the tax returns?
Oh, oh, oh – I saw this at conservatives4newt: McCain endorsed Romney — “So now the one who couldn’t beat McCain has been endorsed by the one who couldn’t beat Obama!”
And another thought: all those who recently lost to Democrats are on board with the Romney campaign. How nice.
But I digress.
Newt talked about money in elections and Lincoln and the Bush administration in his Cooper Union event with Mario Cuomo in 2007, moderated by Tim Russert, in honor of the Lincoln-Douglas Debates. Newt is spectacularly informative and thought-provoking as usual. And the way he talks about the Bush administration has given me a clue about why Karl Rove and so many other Bush guys seem to viscerally detest Newt.
And yes, janitor, I meant to say, Romney would be no leader on tax reform. There’s too much he can’t explain about his own finances. Plus, look who his friends are!! Why do you think the Establishment Republicans want him so much?!
HI janitor, I don’t mean why do YOU think they want him. I mean all of us in general.
I still like my theory that this refusal is a distraction. Up and until obama leaks the returns, this will keep the media busy with what will turn out to be a nothing issue. And really, do the American people want to demand candidates release these returns by force. They would sure balk at releasing their own. Romney has big name accounting firms doing his taxes. Even if he would break the law, they wouldn’t.
Barbara, it’s not about “breaking the law”. It’s about being the poster boy unintended recipient of tax benefits that were intended for a different purpose. I watched Romney’s in one debate in which Gingrich boldly proclaimed the need to eliminate capital gains altogether in order to boost business and the economy. Romney squirmed, weasled and stammered. It’s become obvious why.
I agree with janitor. Team Romney wants to keep this hidden for the same reason they wiped harddrives when he left office in Mass… control the bad optics.
There will be nothing technically illegal in Romney’s returns, but it won’t look good to Joe and Jane Average American once the Obama Smear Team is done with it.
Of course, that’s assuming he’s the nominee… a far from certain conclusion at this point.
He’s a walking caricature. Though “poster boy”, with its implications of inanimatedness and absence of dimension, may be more apt.
Dittos. I don’t like it, but if Perry or Gingrich aren’t going to win, this is probably a smart move, not because the not disclosing is smart, but because we always play by our own self imposed rules.
It makes the issue the secrecy and he’s winding up the media and the left wing haters about this issue. For once a candidate [besides Newt] is controlling the debate.
Remember President Me-me-me I-I-I made a promise about his campaign funding and then broke it. Well that set the stage for his presidency.
I fear Romney will take office and forget where he put his balls and go back to appeasing evil.
Don’t care. The Democratic Party at the national level wholly failed to vet their candidate during the last election. I don’t care.
Not a fan of mitt’s but I think his tax retorns are no ones buisness. All I want to know is he qulified,35 years old,natural born citizen of the United States of America,with proof!Then it’s up to the voters to decide if he’s FIT to hold the office.
Obama’s team must be grinning ear-to-ear. They couldn’t ask for a better candidate to run against. Voters still get their ‘news’ from the jorno-listers and Romney just doesn’t seem to get it. Bah!
But… but… he’s electable! Karl Rove and eight people in Iowa said so!
Like so many issues, the facts and the actual documents are secondary or moot. The charges and “news” stories set the tone and shape the public’s view. I am surprised the DNC began the anti-Romney machine already. Maybe their strategy is to generate chaos in the GOP going into the primaries?
The short answer? No, we don’t.
It is indeed unfortunate that, regardless of need, this is just the tip of the iceberg.
I keep telling myself that I’ve had enough, that I’m done; just stop listening, stop reading, stop following what’s going on.
It’s like a highway accident; you know it’s just another wreck, you’ve seen it all before, and you’re not going to look. But you can’t help yourself.
This will be a very long and a very ugly 10 months.
Did Teh Won release his tax returns? And if he did, where can I find them?
I’m thinking the answer to the first is no, thus mooting the second.
Tax returns are private. How many members of Congress release theirs? Instead they file disclosures of assets and financial interests. That is what Romney should do. Everyone knows he’s loaded so what’s the difference? If Obama attacks him for being rich just point to John Kerry, Al Gore, and Bill Clinton who are all worth $100 million – $1 billion. Romney can go one better and release “highlights” of his tax returns such as income, taxes paid, charitable contributions, so long as it doesn’t give Obama an argument that Romney pays taxes at a lower rate than his secretary.
The more he waits, the more this story enters higher and higher brackets. He’ll pay more and more for waiting. Unless he’s playing this for some good reason like Obama played the birth-certificate nonsense, he’s making a mistake.
If I were Mitt, I’d release them on the next big news day to come along. The day bin Laden was killed would’ve been a good day to release them.
I’m a lot more interested in Romney’s executive problem solving ability than in his tax records. I don’t care how rich he is.
I’m looking at his positives… Not a career politician, Success with working in hostile environments, knowledge of how business works and the best rating for dealing with illegal immigration. Oh, you might add no big surprises when it comes to scandals.
The GOP could do a lot worse…
Success in working in hostile enviroments? Meaning a Democrat Massachusetts congress? His ‘success’ was to cave and sign Romneycare, cave and sign higher tax bills, cave and nominate liberal judges, cave and….
Of the candidates running, only Ron Paul strikes me as worse than Romney.
I’d put Huntsman in the As Bad As Romney category.
What if the Donald was to repeatedly harass him about it? Or maybe Romney might commit to releasing that information in the spring of the 3rd year of his first term.
OK-
I ought not post this–as this is a law blog, and this is merely heresay.
However..
There is enough information in this post to do your own research.
This comment was posted on Freep.com (Detroit Free Press).
The comment was pulled shortly after specific questions were raised.
Judge for yourself:
Silverbear Heart · Top Commenter
What no mention of Scott and Mitt Romney’s relative and insider! Unfair !!! After all it is HIS contracts on the Wayne County jail that was refused to be released!!!
Romney has refused to release his tax records, refused to give names of his bundlers. Many Americans do not know of Romney’s links to an ongoing corruption probe in Michigan, the state Romney grew up in and many of his family members remain living in.
The Romney’s family personal investment firm of Solamere needs to be transparent. The Romney family formed Solamere investment firm for their family and close friends use. Solamere is tied to the Romney campaign. The Romeny’s formed two different but linked companies out of Solamere, Solamere Advisers, its secondary group, has people from Stanford which are under criminal charges and investigations for scamming investors as part of a Ponzi scheme.
John Rakolta Jr. CEO of Walbridge along with Scott Romney are National financial co-chairs for Romney’s campaign. Rakolta is linked to the pay and play under investigation in a Detroit Corruption probe. Wayne county executive Fanico, has refused to hand over the bid and contracts of Rakolta’s in a corruption probe on a jail slated to be built. Terry Mullins, was working with Rakolta on the building of the jail, and Mullins is rumored to have been having an affair with Rakolta. Mullins was working for Wayne County when the bid to build the jail went to Rakolta. Mullins has donated money for Rommey’s campaign switching from the Democratic Party, to Republican Party. Scott Romney is also a director for Solamere.
Read more on Romney corruption at:
The Real Mitt Romney the Weather-vane Candidate
http://mittromney2012potus.blogspot.com/
Reply · Like · Follow Post · 7 hours ago
Sorry for the long post, Professor
Either Newt or Santorum, would be a thousand times better than that liberal Mass Republican Party establishment 2 faced lying hypocrite RINO elitist named Romney, who is exactly like Obama, in every aspect of political policy and program implementation, especially their love of borrowing and spending on welfare entitlement programs, crony big govt capitalism, along with their love of inferior substandard forced mandated State Socialized medicine, aka, Romneycare / Obamacare, onto the people, which would, and is, bankrupting the State of Mass, not to mention the America itself, in the case of Obamacare..
The Tea Party is ready and able to support and fund, Newt and or Santorum, to defeat Romney at any and all costs, period.!!
A glass of Orange Juice would be better than Romney.. Romney is the epitome of cronyism, deception, deceit, hypocrisy, and Republican party establishment elitist arrogance.. He mine as well call himself Obama..
As far as the stated topic of discussion- “Do we really need 10 more months of this”.. the answer is yes, as unpleasant as it may seem, as this is the process of Democracy, Freedom, and Liberty in action, and if we chose to ignore it, or dismiss it, or just act with apathy and become insoucian to it, then we deserve to get all the Obama’s in power and office in the future, to completely ruin and destroy our lives, our childrens lives, and our nation, as well as our Freedom and Liberty..