Between the latest peek-a-boo from one of Reid’s aides (he says Reid’s source is a Republican then takes it back), the mandatory accompanying Kevin Drum tsk-tsk, and the Kos and friends conspiracy theories (it’s Jon Huntsman Sr., no, it’s Jon Huntsman Jr.), I just can’t stop reading the latest speculation about Harry and his anonymous sources.
There’s really nothing wrong with reveling in what’s pretty much a self-inflicted wound by the fuckup, shit magnet Romney operation. Like all serious people, we can agree that Harry Reid is history’s greatest monster for his McCarthyite, Stalinist use of an anonymous source he refuses to reveal, so we can view this as the sideshow that it is. My only concern–and this is probably just because I’ve been reading too many conspiracy sites–is the nagging feeling that Romney’s campaign is some kind of deception operation designed to hold our attention while Republicans clean up in the House and Senate races.
negative 1
Per Kos yesterday there is reason for optimism on House and Senate. Basically looks like a better chance of no movement now.
Betty Cracker
I worry about the House and Senate angle too. I don’t think RomneyFAIL is deliberate, but it could nonetheless keep us distracted.
Linda Featheringill
We should worry about the house and senate. I think that Team Obama has the presidential race pretty much under control. But we need to make a difference in the House and Senate.
And no, I’m not up to date on these races. I’ll try to remedy that.
c u n d gulag
Yeah, despite all of Romney’s Mitt-stakes, and all the times he’s Mitt-spoken, and all of the bullMitt he’s throwing around, the base will be motivated to come out and vote, no matter what, just to get rid of that KenyanSocialistFascistCommunistAtheistMuslimUsurper out of office – which means that while they’re holding their nose and voting for Romney, they’ll also be looking to vote for the people who can keep Obama in check if Barack wins, and Romney in check if Mitt wins.
The base has a Mitts-trust of their Presidential candidate.
Linda Featheringill
But I do like the image of a self-sacrificing Romney going out there and playing the clown so that his Republican brothers and sisters can sew up the House and the Senate.
:-)
El Cid
I continue to be driven by John Stewart’s severe bipartisan chastisement. Democrats are now just saying that Mitt Romney killed that guy’s wife, and responsible people should be mortified.
Comrade Javamanphil
Can you just imagine the media outcry if Reid had done something truly reckless like compromise national security by leaking the name of a covert agent? Good thing that never happens.
MattF
I’d like to think that Harry is playing a long game towards killing the filibuster next year. Given that a couple of liberal Supremes are on the verge of retirement, it would be no small deal.
Dennis G.
Mitt Romney is like John Edwards, only his mistress is his money and his tax shelters and dodges are his love children. Harry Reid is like one of those tabloid reporters stalking Romney and hinting that he has a secret life.
It is unbelievable for some that somebody with such baggage would run for President, but it does happen.
Cheers
SteveinSC
I still can’t get any response from the exquisite prigs normally hovering around BJ. Oh! the Horror, Democrats fighting back, Quick Mikka the smelling salts. The negative flood of ads are a monster released by Citizens United and applauded by all the right wing and their sycophants amongst the pundit class. But it looks like the parents are the ones getting bit in the ass by their own spawn.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
Yeah, cause everyone’s so excited about electing a president, that they forget to vote for their congressman. Your scenario means that a lot of people vote for Obama and then vote against the Democratic congresspeople. Are you forgetting about the “qualities” of our president: If any people cross over, they are going to vote against Obama and yet vote for the Democrats further down.
What you are really saying: I’m a Democrat, we shouldn’t be winning, so we have to lose.
Raven
“most things I worry about
never happen anyway”
T. Petty
the Conster
@El Cid:
Seriously? If that’s true, then Begala needs to go on that show and let Jon know he’s hurting America. Begala’s been a stand up guy for Harry through this. How times have changed.
Anya
Can I confess that cringe every time I hear about Priorities USA ad? And yes, I do believe we shouldn’t stoop to the level of republicans. But the Harry Reid thing does not bother me.
Lee
Re: The Romney campaign.
In my Facebook feed I’ve been seeing a graphic about how Obama is trying to take away the troops right to vote. I’ve slapped it down every time I’ve seen it (about 3x). It no longer is appearing in my feed.
Keep your foot on their throat and do not let it up until after the election. Then just gloat :)
Fouten
NIMBY!
Duckworth is going to take IL-08 from that (no longer a) deadbeat a-hole Walsh if I have to knock on every fracking door in the district!
http://www.tammyduckworth.com/
SiubhanDuinne
@Linda Featheringill:
Shouldn’t that be brethren and cistern?
Snarki, child of Loki
Priorities USA has to go MUCH lower to “stoop to the level of republicans”.
Now, if they implied that Mitt was BFF with Willy Horton, Osama bin Laden, and Zombie Hitler, that would be a *start* along that road. But so far they’ve treated Mitt with grandmotherly kindness.
SteveinSC
It is getting clearer and clearer. Contrary to his adoring lick-spittles, Romney is not a smart man. Else how could he be so fucking incompetent in his decisions with respect to his limping campaign? Eighteen years panting for this run for the presidency and he didn’t get his shit together on taxes on his Olympics “success” his dancing horses. He knew full well, even from his Massachusetts campaigns his opponents would be peering up his ass with a telescope yet he took no action. There’s not much rattling around in that head with the “executive-style hair,” borne out, I might add, by his academic “resume.”
lol
I wouldn’t necessarily take it for granted that the base will come out for Romney.
The whole Romneycare thing has sort of played into their worse fears about him. It’s just killing enthusiasm. Will they still come out and vote? Probably. Will they volunteer and give money? Probably not. You should see the threads at Free Republic.
The more demoralizing the Romney campaign becomes, it’s just going to kill the down-ticket candidates that are depending on the Presidential campaign to drive base turnout.
mistermix
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): Local campaigns do not have the resources to fight the onslaught of SuperPAC ads that Obama’s campaign does, and we should be looking at some downticket races, especially in states were we might convince people to split their vote the other way (Romney because they can’t trust a muslim kenyan, but then a Democrat for House and/or Senate).
Coattails are overrated, btw.
geg6
I’m with you, mm. Fucking Harry Reid, of all people, is out there fighting as hard as any Dem in my memory. Just throwing elbows and upper cuts all over the place like a guy with nothing to lose, which is what he is. And, astonishingly, he’s even managed to impose a bit of discipline in the Senate Dem caucus. Harry Reid, AFAIC, is a motherfucking hero.
I can’t believe I’m saying that. But it’s true. Obviously, it takes a while to rile up ol’ Harry. But it turns out that he’s honeybadger. Ooops.
RSA
This is what gets me. Reid has accused Romney of doing something that Romney himself has argued is a great thing: reducing one’s tax burden to as low a level as possible. Even if Reid has entirely made up the story, it’s at worst a white lie. It’s not like, say, accusing the Clintons of murder, or accusing John Kerry of being a liar and a coward in wartime, or accusing Obama of being ineligible to be President. Reid is accusing Romney of achieving his own stated goals.
Robin G.
Wait, they think Reid really *has* a source? I’ve just assumed he’s making this up out of whole cloth. (Not that that bothers me, mind.)
Ira-NY
The tax return issue hurts the GOP all along the waterfront.
It reminds people in an unambiguous manner that the true mission of the GOP is to comfort the comfortable and afflict the afflicted.
Quincy
I think we’ll hold the senate. And it will be a better caucus, with Warren and Baldwin and without Nelson or Lieberman. The House is a longshot, which is why Obama needs to bury Mitt by the end of Sept. He won’t surpass 340 EVs but I want his margin to be locked in. No projected toss- ups. As much as Rethug voters hate Obama, they’ll stay home if they know it’s hopeless. They did in 08 despite their love for Caribou Barbie. Our only shot at the House is a Presidential contest everyone knows to be over 3 weeks early.
Scott
@Anya: The Priorities ad doesn’t bother me in the least. Put yourself in Joe Soptic’s shoes: He had a good job and a great life for several years. Then Bain Capital came to town and singlehandedly, purposefully destroyed that life, and the lives of everyone who worked at the company. If not for Bain, Soptic would still have had insurance. Whether his wife would have died anyway is irrelevant to that fact.
He hates Romney for ruining his entire life. Wouldn’t you?
And I love what Reid’s doing, also. Just because it makes the Villagers’ collective assholes pucker up doesn’t make it a bad thing.
In fact, it makes it better. Republicans do this kinda stuff all the time, and they just shrug it off, because it’s expected. Dems do it, and the earth is somehow off it’s axis, because they’re not supposed to fight back.
Well, I say Fuck that!
max
Oh. Is that who the kool kids think it is? Gee, it kinda dawned on me the other night that it was McCain (or one of his staffers). He’s all mavericky and jealous and cranky when those johnny-come-latelies are on his lawn.
the mandatory accompanying Kevin Drum tsk-tsk
The objections here seem to be that there’s NO WAY Romney might have avoided having any income, and *therefore* Reid must be making it up from whole cloth, so therefore Reid is lying and that’s just awful and bad and wrong, because McConnell only does that every goddamn day. Which seems to me to fall in the category of ‘life in prison for possession of a small marijuana roach’ type of grandstanding, but hey, whatever.
I say, not only could Romney have avoided paying income taxes twixt ’99 and nowish, more or less, it would have been simple. The formula: make a lot of money (and pay taxes on it), salt a bunch of it away in bonds and equities controlled by assorted baby corporations solely owned and controlled by Mitt Romney – and then, after 1999, strategically declare lots of capital losses on bum stock picks, give lots of money to the Mormon church, and declare lots of business expenses for flying to business conferences in Aruba (and Aspen and Davos and Iowa) while he appears (from the IRS perspective) to be a failed businessman. Maybe throw in some losses on Ann’s dressage ‘business’, keep profits from foreign investments offshore, and at the end of the day, have no income. Or a mere governor’s salary.
I’m sure a sophisticated
financial looterinvestor with as much money as Romney has can come up with much more hoity toity tax evasion tricks (smothered in legalese) than that, but I am a just a peon.I think Kevin’s brain just goes all Orange County sometimes and then he straightens out after a bit.
Or a placeholder satisfying the necessity that the R’s put up a candidate. They basically couldn’t agree on a candidate, which is why they had such a fraught primary season. So the party upper crust got behind the Mormon robot. Because, if we must have lunatic ranting and rabid frothing (and we must since Obama is the worst President since President Hitler – and he’s not even white! At least Hitler was white! Mein Gott!), we should have *dignified* frothing and ranting.
The only problem being that the Republican base ain’t gonna vote for the same damn Mormon robot that cooked up Obamacare. I mean, really.
Romney wasn’t going to win at the beginning of the year, when it was obvious he had suffered too much damage during the primaries, he wasn’t going to win in June, even with the big seasonally-adjusted summer lull in jobs we’ve been getting stuck with for three, and he ain’t gonna win in November, either. The usual sorts have all but admitted Romney’s a loser. The trick Rove is trying to pull off involves keeping his guys in office while resisting the tidal wave of votes coming out to vote for Obama and vote against the robot. He’s wanting to minimize the pro-Obama turnout and hoping that’s enough to carry the down ticket races. Thus the otherwise useless ads American Crossroads is running against Obama. Thus are really, ‘Go ahead an vote for Obama, but remember to vote for a Republican for Congress!’
Democrats, as usual, are getting all nervous about their chances, and missing the game.
max
[‘I mostly checked out on the summer campaign when James Fallows referred to Karl Rove as a genius. The guy ‘won’ two predetermined campaigns for governor, then said nasty things about McCain’s black baby, and then lost an election, and then through sheer dumb luck managed to win the same election on the second go round. He’s a genius only if you live in a world inhabited by mental midgets. Christ.’]
kay
@Anya:
The only good thing about the ad is it forces Romney to talk about health care. Mitt Romney should have to talk about health care, because he’s running on repealing the health care law.
They’re failing us, media. They’re not forcing him to answer specific questions. Shit, he rarely answers a question AT ALL, of any kind.
That we are relying on attack ads to talk about taxes and health care and welfare is not the fault of campaigns or allied groups. When there is a space, a void, something will fill it.
Mitt Romney could have lowered himself to speak to the peons honestly on his work at Bain. He deliberately and carefully chose not to. Mitt Romney could have explained to the peons what his plan is to provide an option for health care when people lose their jobs. He chose not to. The worst part is, he was never even asked.
I don’t know what people are supposed to do to get answers from this guy. Send him a certified letter? Pay to get into one of his fundraisers and corner him? He’s revealed nothing. The only real debate we’ve had “on issues” (and these ARE issues, despite what the useless whining pundits are bleating) has been sparked by paid political advertising. It sucks, but that’s what we got. It’s ALL we got.
SteveinSC
@Scott: I’m with you on this ad for sure. Anya can contact Mika Brzezinski and the two of them can weep over the death of civility.
MazeDancer
Fabulous Fighting Harry’s source is going to come out. Whatever day it’s needed, a leak will happen. it would be better if there were two sources at a press conference. But sources get revealed eventually in these kinds of dramas.
It really makes no sense for the Majority Leader to be so relentless if he has no source. Wholesale lying this specifically leads to a big reveal that hijacks the campaign – Reid Lied would be problematic and take focus off Mitt. So Harry has a source. The source may have an agenda that colors the facts. But there is something there.
p.a.
pessimist-me is still worried about the presidential race. as bad a romney campaign and as bad a candidate as he is, their money-hoover is still on ‘vacuum’. when it switches to ‘exhaust’ in the upcoming weeks, will their ads have much effect? i know kos is trying to get congressional dems in safe seats to throw some $$$ towards contested districts/states, but given the history of the past decade, i’m not hopeful that congressional dems will actually, you know, think of the greater good.
optimist-me sees the repub lunatics close to if not already running things. since they are, well loons, (is there a word for like-sounding mixed metaphors?), the hope is they could fuck up elections at the national, state and local levels. stupid is as stupid does.
amk
Isn’t mccarthy wingnuts’ wet dreams hero ? Does this mean they approve of Harry’s tactics ?
Mino
@MattF: I think the filibuster is GONE, whomever takes the Senate.
@mistermix: I think the unions are on that, and reducing their direct presidential involvement.
I just pray the state governments aren’t overwhelmed. We’ve all seen how wrong, how fast, things can deteriorate with Republican state dominance. They can undo a lot more than I ever thought they could with this Supremem Court.
amk
If kevin drum’s ass is so uptight, how does he do daily thingy ? By penning his bitching and moaning pieces everyday ?
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Quest for Drum and John Steward if you are reading;
Since we all know Harry Reid is a evil for accusing a man of acting legally without proof, is Harry Reid a worse American Monster than?
Benedict Arnold
Arron Burr
Jefferson Davis
FDR
mai naem
Huntsman’s dad has some kind of chemical business which is worth around Mitt’s stated net worth so Huntsman is at least in the same league financially. Furthermore, Huntsman was governor of Utah so you know he’s got to know some of Mitt’s tax stuff and some of the Olympics deals and residency. Last thing is that Huntsman Sr. got some kind of contract during the Olympics and that was followed by Bain being involved in a merger deal of Huntsman Sr’s company. Huntsman Jr. was involved in the company at some level so it’s not out of the realm of possibility that Mitt would have invited them to invest in some tax free Bain deals. Also too, as much of a money grubber as Romney comes across as, he’s probably screwed a bunch of people along the way in Bain deals(employees and investors) and this is the perfect way of getting back at him. The Repubs picked the wrong Mormon. Huntsman would have given Obama a run for his money and he wouldn’t have made all the stupid android mistakes. He’s got a great looking family including an adopted chinese kid.He speaks Chinese. He was Obama’s ambassador to China so it’s not like Obama could have said he was not capable. He’s rich. He’s conservative. Repubs are dumb.
c u n d gulag
@Mino:
Mino,
It’s gone if the Republicans get a hold of the Senate.
I think Harry Reid will make some alterations, like you have to do filibusters the old way – by getting up and talking, and not by simply putting a hold on any and every thing the Democrats propose.
Me?
I still think filibusters, if done the traditional way, are still valuable for calling attention to a minorities position.
But either way, what’s been happening for the last four years, can’t go on. And if they must go, then they must go.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@SteveinSC:
Yes, it really looks like Mittens was born on third base and a bunch of Mormons decided Romney Is The ONE! and carried him to home base again and again.
Cassidy
@SteveinSC: Shit. We should be re-writing the rules of the game. We should have people making the nastiness of Karl Rove look like an elementary school class president campaign. I want to hear about Mitt’s weekend Vegas trysts with hookers and Meth. Fuck civility.
El Cid
If Romney were the type of conservative that conservatives fantasize about (ew), he’d be grinning into the cameras on how he’s made hundreds of millions of dollars and paid not one dollar of stinking federal income taxes to the parasite, welfare-check writing, food-stamp givin’ fedrul gubmit.
He’d be the aggressive, in-yer-faish big-baller, the high roller, Trump with humanoid hair, the Hanibal Gordon Lecter Gecko that Republicans want to see running.
El Cid
@Cassidy:
I think that would have the reverse effect of humanizing him.
(One of the things that drove conservative movement activists off the deeper end, ever exploring for the deepest end, was that a lot of the white male good ol’ boys who hated Bill Clinton and his pro-hippie ways and his emasculating wife suddenly had a newfound respect for him when they learned all about him getting BJ’s from a young intern in the White House. They liked him more when they learned he was a good old-fashioned horndog using his power and authority to help him get some on the side.)
Cassidy
@El Cid: Yeah, you’re probably right. Make it a Mexican, male, muslim prostitute then.
gypsy howell
And the funny thing is Mitt’s hiding from his alleged record of paying no income taxes. Isn’t that essentially the republican platform: that the rich should not have to pay taxes; not income taxes and certainly not capital gains taxes? That NO ONE should have to pay taxes? That taxes are theft?
Why, you’d think he’d be celebrating his success in this area.
You’d think that if you actually believed that’s what most Americans really want, that is.
Comrade Mary
@SteveinSC: Exquisite Prigs is SO my next band name.
Gex-mobile
Judith Miller can anonymous source us into the Iraq war and that’s okay with Americans. Harry Reid uses one to try to force a presidential candidate to be truthful to voters, and the vapors are about to gas us all out.
When the ruins of a once functional society are studied, somehow this sort of detail seems key to understanding what happened.
Ivan Ivanovich Renko
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Whodathunk that a tall white man with perfect hair would be a complete fucking idiot?
Lots of us who’ve watched tall white men get over and over and over across Corporate Murka.
TS
@Anya:
This ad is not stooping to any level – it is telling the truth that corporations have massive control over people – (corporations that are owned or approved of by Mitt Romney) when health care is dependent on employment. Mitt Romney says he will repeal the ACA and continue to allow people to face these type of unemployment consequences.
Mitt Romney wants you to think the ad is in bad taste – because it attacks his actions and policies – I find it beyond compassionate to see someone talking honestly about what Bain capital actions did to him, his family, his town and his life.
Gex-mobile
@mai naem: You just explained it all, though. Anything that makes him palatable to civilized people is considered a flaw by the base.
gogol's wife
@Scott:
Oh but the front page of the NYTimes is telling me this morning that Romney helped a couple in Texas keep their home. A whole article on one couple. I think they should just save money on reporters and just print a Romney ad on each front page.
amk
@Anya: Too much jon stewart?
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
@Anya:
If it makes you feel any better, the ad you don’t like is from a PAC, not the Obama campaign. And seeing as it was the GOP (with help from SCOTUS) that unleashed the SuperPACs, this is just them getting a taste of their own medicine. It never occurred to them that the tactics they were enabling would be used against them.
Or as Mr. Romney would say: “Hoist. Petard. Painful.”
Ironically, hitting GOP candidates over the head repeatedly with this kind of medicine might be the only way to get bipartisan support for a Citizens United repeal from some future Congress.
dogwood
@gogol’s wife:
Is it a Mormon couple?
Anonymous At Work
Haven’t considered Huntsman before. I will say that Reid’s coy plays here are keeping the press riveted. And Reid’s end-game is so damn obvious. Reid is waiting for the meme being played out on blogs to make the mainstream: Romney should release his tax returns to make this go away and that’s the only solution. Once that meme hits the mainstream media, and/or the accompanying meme of “What’s in Romney’s returns that’s as bad as, or *worse than*, not paying taxes for 10 years?”, Reid can step back and let the sharks attack.
Mr Stagger Lee
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): I am in a a newly created congressional district, and it looks like the Democrat will win here, but then again, have we seen the flood of Citizens United money come in yet? This is the wild card of the election.
redshirt
@SteveinSC: Yes. Many of us have had our internal Overton Windows moved such that we too – screaming Liberals, the lot of us – equate money with smarts, with skill, with success.
I’ve not seen anything from Mitt – ever – that makes me think “smart”. Lucky by birth, blessed with CEO looks, and cautious enough not to lose money is about the best that can be said of him.
Everything else is a glaring example of our American Aristocracy and how it has come to rule the game.
Also too: Harry Reid is AWESOME! I hope it’s the Huntsmans. Would be sweet.
Snarki, child of Loki
Paying zero (or close to zero) income taxes is easy to spot in the tax forms.
But I’m sure that Willard isn’t filing a 1040-EZ, so the forms are likely to be quite numerous, and it will take some real effort to comb through them to find how Willard sold off his stake in a company that collects aborted embryos and processes them into pet food.
Or the goatse.cx dude ranch, or the pedo matchmaking service for old-traditional Mormons. Or the business ties with the bin Laden family and Iran.
The longer Willard holds out, the worse it must be.
Violet
@geg6:
Amen. I called his office to thank him. When they asked where I was calling from, and I told the nice intern my red state location, he responded with, “Wow!” and made a comment about how it’s nice to hear from people supporting Reid and especially to know there are people in red states supporting what he’s doing. Feel free to call and add your thanks! I like to think I’m partly responsible for the latest leak.
WaterGirl
@Violet: IF you still have the phone number, maybe you could post it here. That’s how I ended up calling earlier this week – someone on BJ posted the phone number and suggested the call.
Speaking of rumors, I caused quite a stir inside my little head this morning. I was all wrong, of course, but it was kind of funny. I saw two links on the Maddow site – one said Huntsman would be making an announcement next week and I thought maybe they were going to out themselves as the source or maybe he was throwing his hat back in the ring in some way. The other link said Santorum would be making an announcement and I thought maybe he would be VP.
Both links, as it turned out, were to stories from 2011, but I was able to spin quite the story in my head before I noticed!
xian
@negative 1: we need a wave. we need a tsunami. we need demoralized Republicans staying home.
Cassidy
@xian: Or a wave/ tsunami while Republicans are standing on the shore. I”m not picky.
Violet
@WaterGirl: I got the number from the other thread where someone posted it, but I’ll see if I can look it up.
Okay, found it. Here’s Harry Reid’s Washington office number: 202-224-3542
And here’s a link to all his offices and their contact numbers, in case you want to call somewhere else:
http://www.reid.senate.gov/contact/offices.cfm
Lurking Canadian
@kay:
Actually, I think he revealed something very important with his “quiet rooms” comment. Mitt Romney does not believe in democracy. He just plain doesn’t think the public has a right to make decisions.
Since this is the year 2012, not the year 1712, I think that says something moderately important about his fitness for office.
JCT
@Violet: That’s a great idea, I’m now in a red state as well, so I’ll give his office a call.
I think Reid is a stud for what he is doing and the steady drip-drip must be driving Romney mad. Hah, apparently he’s been saying that the ad is such a “lie” that it should be pulled for inaccuracy . Pot, kettle black, much?
Hmmmm. I wonder if the goal is to have some big “reveal” around the time of the convention — talk about shooting Romney’s tires out. Couldn’t happen to a bigger asshole.
SteveinSC
Red State!? Holy Shit! I live in an Infrared state. It has been said that South Carolina regrets not only the Civil War, but the Revolution as well.
pseudonymous in nc
@gogol’s wife:
If you read the piece, it’s not quite as big of a suck-job as the headline suggests; Mittens came up with a whiz-bang tax-advantaged rent-to-own scheme — five houses, one for each of his spawn — and it went a bit tits-up in the Texas housing slump. Key quote:
That’s Mittens: master of the loophole-exploiting gadget play. Except that it tends not to come off for everyone’s benefit, and you can’t do that with a nation’s economy.
TK-421
@Snarki, child of Loki:
Hindsight is often the only way we would spot tax shenanigans, and that’s only if we see the tax returns, and that’s only if income is earned in the US.
Otherwise, no it would NOT be easy to spot zero/close to zero income taxes. People forget that a tax liability is not just the tax rate itself. A tax liability is the result of the tax rate (carried interest, 15% on dividends, etc.) and the income itself.
Yeah, makes sense and is obvious, right? But what if I reduced my income earned in the US to zero or near zero? Then the rate is almost meaningless, right? Could I do that? Is that possible?
Yes, it is possible and in Mitt’s case quite likely. Once I’m involved in international transactions, I have many opportunities to keep massive amounts of money offshore, and that money itself becomes a source of tax-free income.
So let’s say, just as a hypothetical, I had an entity in Luxembourg that made a ton of money by buying and selling a phonebook company in Italy. None of those capital gains have to be reported in the US, because that income wasn’t earned in the US. The IRS can’t touch it. And if that pile of money earns a couple million a year in interest/dividends/stock market gains/capital gains/etc, the only government that can tax it is Luxembourg…who, not coincidentally, doesn’t want to tax it. That’s why I set up the entity in Luxembourg in the first place.
I know, pure hypothetical, it’s not like this actually happened or anything.
BruinKid
Maybe that’s why the new talking point seems to be to compare taxes to profit. See? Exxon paid $3 in taxes for every $1 of profit they made, so they’re super-patriotic!
Yeah, by that same standard, I’m infinitely patriotic, because my “profit” was negative last year after I paid all my rent and bills, but I still had to pay over $700 in federal income tax alone.
Regardless of how stupid this comparison is (or maybe because of how stupid it is), look for it to permeate right-wing thought in the coming days and weeks.
wrb
@El Cid:
That’s horrible.
It was his daughter, not his wife!
Romney’s Chappaquiddick
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/06/29/1104487/-Romney-the-GOP-Cult-of-Lying
karen
I’m in Silver Spring, MD. I’ve been seeing non stop ads with a Crossroad ad-Romney ad-Anti-Tim Kaine Ad – Americans for Prosperity Ad and anti-Casino in PG County ad ONE RIGHT AFTER THE OTHER!!
I guess DVRing my TV so I can zip though the ads will be coming sooner than I thought.
And has anyone seen the Romney Girl ad? Who’s funding that?
Joel
@Scott: Yup. Yup. Yup.
The ad is entirely fair.
Joel
@Scott: Yup. Yup. Yup.
The ad is entirely fair.
Joel
@El Cid: Hannibal Lecter has too much of teh ghey for the Republican’s tastes.
I think the ideal republican candidate would be a combination of Gordon Gekko and Walter Sobchak.
Joel
@El Cid: Hannibal Lecter has too much of teh ghey for the Republican’s tastes.
I think the ideal republican candidate would be a combination of Gordon Gekko and Walter Sobchak.
LanceThruster
@El Cid:
What about serious people?