It's not Ryan's tax returns we want to see! It's yours Mitt. Tell us about that 100,000,000 IRA, tell us about those tax shelters in the Cayman Islands, tell us if you took amnesty to avoid any tax felony charges. And BTW, 13% is about half of what the rest of us pain in federal income taxes.

Romney could burp what this dufus made in 2 years. I really wish I were in the 13% tax bracket and I know even this admission this is probably another lie by the corporate raider.

Wow. I guess it really pays to become a Congressional representative who's paid $160K yearly.

But I can't figure out, why would Romney need more than two years to vet vice presidential candidates but deny We the People more than two years for us to vet the Presidential candidate.

Doesn't make a whole helluva lot of sense. Why didn't Ryan just release all the tax returns that Romney demanded of him? Or why didn't he tell Romney that he was only gonna give him two years, and that's that.

@GT

No, certainly can't upstage his "boss". How would that look?

Cool. 2 years.

Now- Is 'Eddie Munster' the guy on the top of the ticket?

Hey- anyone asked if Obama has taken billions from one healthcare program to bolster another healcare program, versus taking billions from one healcare program to bolster more tax breaks for the wealthy??

Anyone??

Paul Ryan releases 2 years of tax returns

LOL

I half expected him to moon us Obama supporters. :D

@onermailliw

Here's your link:

http://news.yahoo.com/executives-obama-better-world-economy-poll-092717460--business.html

onermailliw:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/17/us-usa-election-poll-idUSBRE87G07D20120817

Romney released his returns for MA gov job, released them to McCain for the potential VP job, but not for POTUS? Just does not make sense.

Paul Ryan is the second most wealthy person after Rep Issa in the House.

Ask why.

BTW, we must have more tax returns.

Backhouse, who are the seven wealthiest members of the Senate? I'll tell you. John Kerry, Mark Warner, Herb Kohl, John D. Rockefeller IV, Frank Lautenberg, Richard Blumenthal, and Dianne Feinstein. What party does each person belong to? I'll tell you that too. Democrat, Democrat, Democrat, Democrat, Democrat, Democrat, and (you guessed it!) Democrat!

They combine for a net worth of over 925 million dollars. The seven wealthiest REPUBLICAN Senators combine for less than 230 million. That's a ratio of nearly 4 to 1.

Incidentally, where did you get your stat from? The source I consulted lists Democrats Jane Harman and Jared Polis as the most wealthy Representatives after Issa. Ryan isn't even in the top 25.

Ryan family is extremely well off. Ryan's grandfather had road-building business, subsidized by the government.

Ryan and wife have Oil interests.

More...(ye have to look it up).

Letterman said that the Mars Rover was looking for signs of life on Mars and Mitt's tax returns.

CubsFan:

Don't confuse him with facts, he's already struggling to make his point.

"One of the few management details that is known is that that Romney tried to steer Olympic business from Office Depot to Staples, a company he sat on the board of while running the Games. Perhaps there are more links between Romney’s finances, Bain and the Olympics." Have you wonder how many more companies like Office Depot that Romney steer to Bain while he was running Utah Olympic?

"Romney continually says he is proud of his record in Massachusetts, proud of his record at the Olympics and proud of his record of Bain. We're supposed to take him at his word. He will not share with American voters any of the details.

"He destroyed documents that reveal what he did in Massachusetts and at the Olympics.

Why he won't release more than a year of tax returns. Didn't he provide something like 23 years of tax returns to McCain as part of the VP candidate vetting process in '08?

When he ran for Governor in M.A, he asked his opponents for their tax returns, but he never release his own records.

Why he transferred ownership of a shell company in Bermuda to his wife the day before he was sworn in as Governor of MA?

"He won’t disclose details of his tenure at Bain Capital.

"He won’t disclose who is bundling money for his campaign.

He won't disclose detail of his policy, because there are not popular and he would lose.

He will not tell us how he managed to get $100 million dollars in his IRA or what is in his 23 offshore accounts in Cayman Islands, Bermuda, Swiss Banks, etc.

"With each passing week, the list gets longer.

It makes you wonder: what is Willard Mitt Romney hiding? “

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45755883/ns/msnbc-the_last_word/#48684212

http://boston.cbslocal.com/2012/07/24/what-is-mitt-romney-hiding/

Romney, Ryan, and Republicans are not telling seniors the true. The savings achieved in Medicare through the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) would help stabilize Medicare by eliminating overpayments to private insurances, hospital, and pharmaceutical that encourages greater efficiency. As a result, the law extends the life of the Medicare trust fund by eight years and allows seniors to retain all of their guaranteed Medicare benefits. Medicare beneficiaries are already paying less for prescription drug coverage--Pharmaceutical manufacturers are required to provide a 50% discount on prescriptions filled in the Medicare Part D coverage gap. Seniors have already saved $3.5 billion on prescription drug costs thanks to the Affordable Care Act provision and receiving preventive care as a result of the law, while enrollment in Medicare Advantage has increased and premiums have fallen. The law, in other words, does exactly the opposite of Republicans claim: it expands Medicare “as we know it.” ACA do not take money out of Medicare beneficiary but it stabilize the Medicare program and it adds 8 years to Medicare life, and that is the fact that Republican try to spin and lie about it. {think progress}

If Romney repeals the ACA, it would bring back the Medicare-doughnut hole and have seniors pay 50% more for their prescription drug and health prevention services. Also, Romney would eliminate 8 years Medicare life that Mr. Obama instilled it into the program.

Romney & Ryan would take $716 billion dollars out of Medicare beneficiary and convert Medicare into a voucher / coupon and have seniors pay $6400 out of pocket and receive less medical services, in order to pay for millionaires and billionaires tax cut. Therefore, Mr. Romney & Ryan Medicare plan do not control cost or extend the life of Medicare but shorter the life of Medicare and end Medicare “as we know it. “

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45755822/ns/msnbc_tv-the_ed_show/#48683300

http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/health/health_stew/2012/08/the_romney-ryan_700b_disagreem.html

http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/health/health_stew/2012/08/whew_romneyryan_agree_on_medic.html

onermailliw: Check it out and you'll see that business leaders feel Obama is better for the world economy!

Kelly, you are reading too much liberal propaganda. All your sources are liberal. The Ryan Medicare plan does not effect anyone over the age of 55. That means for the next 10 years there are no cuts to those entering the system... It steps down from age 55 and below into a partial payment plan. It gives those under 55 enough time to make provision while not raising their rates. You really need to look into both sides before you choose the liberal view that skews the plan and tells lies about it. Make your own informed decision as to the best course of action... Obama removing $500 billion from it to pay for ACA, or a plan that is well thought out and won't cause it to go insolvent in 23 years.

the average married couple filing taxes pays 24%

why do these guys get a 16-44% discount and pay 13-20%?

when can regular american middle class people start paying 13%?

Anybody who is foolish enough to think that Romney and Ryan are not self serving bureaucrats is an idiot. What they are hiding is how they are screwing our great country.

Romney is clearly hiding something that he knows will make him unelectable.

Where are the rest of them?

Journalistic stupidity -- How does the author think that someone should be disclosing his 2012 tax returns which aren't even due until 4/15/2013 ????? Any withholdings or estimated tax payments would be meaningless.

I'm a Democrat, but let's be fair. The tax code provides a special tax rate of 15% for long term capital gains and Qualified Dividends. But, on the other hand, taxpayers who work for a living are subject to 7.65% (now 5.65% for 2011 & 2012) SS/FICA & Medicare payroll taxes in addition to their 15% income tax, a total of 22.65% up to $ 106,800 in wages.

Mitt Romney obviously was not working, but his investments were. But one question that was not asked, or answered -- Did Mitt Romney return the $ 300,000 he was paid for his presidency at Bain Capital for the 3 years that he was running the Olympics when he somehow "retroactively resigned from Bain" ?

What receipts from lawyers do you have to prove that obama paid anyone millions to "seal" any records.? NONE.

Obama should pull a Cheney/Bush move and have someone at Treasury leak all of Mitt Romney's tax returns to WikiLeaks, say in mid-October. And if the leaker is identified in December, Obama can pardon him in January or February. Either way, Mitt would be finished.........

Poor ol' misguided BB - there is no 2 year requirement. Fox made you look goofy once again, bubba...

I am glad to see Ryan was so fast to show 2 years of taxes. Romney doesn't have to because, according to his wife, he is "golden."

Obviously the best choice for president is the candidate that paid the most in taxes, as a percentage of their income.

But what if it turns out that two candidates paid the same percentage? Well then, it's time for a tie breaker. Tie goes to the one who can answer the most trivia questions about 80's hair metal.

Sarcasm aside, how about you taxpayers cough up $140,000 for your share of the national debt? You think someone who paid a higher percentage in taxes is going to help you with that?

Yea,and those wealthy Deomcrats have no problem at all with the public looking up their tax records one bit!John Kerry's proud of the fact that he pays his share of taxes and made a point of that in his last run..

@backhouse... Are you nuts? Pelosi is worth way more than any one you ate targeting. Let's see her ax returns.

Wow.

As if that should impress the Electorate?

"Tax Free Romney" hasn't even released all of one year of tax returns (2010).

Tax Free Romney has not released his tax-free, illegal, offshore holdings yet...let alone two full years...should we be so "blessed."

Still banking on the lies and conspiracy theories, eh Brian?

Hey, I hear Chick-Fil-A is hiring...did you fill out an app?

Sure you did...or are you just holding out for a "management position"?

Waaaa,ha,ha,ha,ha,ha, gwaddamn! No wonder this country has such a big deficit! Only people paying any taxes are those who are actually working and earning between 35 and 90 thousand a year! Romney claims He paid at least 13% in taxes for those years He's afraid to show us, and Ryan releases the last two years, and has paid 15.9% one year and 20% the next! If these sons-a-bitches are paying those dabs what are people like "Kochs" and "Adelson" paying? Gwaddamn! Any decent sum-bitch tips His/Her waitress 20%. These republicans need to be run back into their holes! The gwaddamn Congress needs to raise tax rates on these rich bastards and close them gaping loopholes in the tax code. I'll bet, if averaged, the effective Federal tax revenues collected in this Country are not much above 5%. No Government, governing a Country like the USA can long exist on such puniness.

The government spends nearly $50,000 every minute, and you morons are worried about what a private citizen makes?

The IRS hasn't found anything I don't think 0bama will either.

Yea,that Medicare plan is so fair for all of us that are 45 and below..NOT! We watch as our parents,older siblings,and grandparents reap all the benefits of Medicaid and Medicare but when we get along to that age it gets pulled out from under the rug from us,yea real fair.Seems we are paying the piper for all the sins of our elders..not right.

Mac Forrester

blah blah Romney claims He paid at least 13% in taxes for those years He's afraid to show us, blah blah...

More than YOU pay 'mac'... Mr. Handout

Hey CUBSFAN: if the republicans are so poor why do we even listen to them about anything at all? The obvious;y failed miserably at foreign affairs and defense since the started to very costly wars based not in fact but known lies and ry;an voted for both. The GOP used to claim the high ground on economic and business issues but if what you are saying is true then we don't need the GO anymore whatsoever. All they do is obstruct and they never offer anything positive whatsoever. Name one positive contribution the GOP has made to the Nation in the past decade.

Once upon a time there was a man named Newt. When Newt disclosed his finances, all the little Republicans learned Newt was on the payroll of the evil land of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. For awhile all the little Republicans did not know what to say! But, because their memories are very short, they soon forgot and embraced a new savior whom they don't really like, but has to be better than the Democrat.

Their new savior wears jeans just like the little people and sounds so much like Ronnie Reagan you would think he had been practicing. But the new savior who we shall call Mitt, has learned a valuble lesson from Newt. That being; refuse to tell the little people what evil lands his money came from!

The End

Mitt Romney has NOT released 2 years of tax returns. He is promising to release his 2011 tax return when he files it in October. He filed an extension for that.

He also did not release his 'Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts statement from his 2010' return. This is the part that discloses the details of his tax haven foreign bank holdings.

Barack Obama released his long form birth certificate. Now it's time for Mitt Romney to release his full 2010 tax return. We don't even really need 10 years. Just the full tax returns for the two years that were promised from this candidate.

Ryan is ...put the cart in front of the Vulture?? Horse-shlt!

the vulture is upstaged.... not a smart thing for the no. 2 to do.

I want to see what he made when the banks where going down and all the info he had on them for his investments!! Both of them made a crap load of $$$$ when every body else last most of theirs. It's call insider trading unless you make up the rules and tax code. Don't vote in millionairs if you don't like the tax code built for the top 1%ers

Ryan gave 10 years to the Romney camp. In an interview Ryan said, "I am releasing just 2, just as Mitt has done."

So today, the Obama administration offered a deal. Give us 10 more years and we will stop demanding any more. This is the kind of bargain a spoiled child tries in a supermarket line. The wise parent calmly, firmly says "No". That is exactly what Romney did.

Let's see if the Obama camp continues down the road to a complete melt down!. Go it head, and you will lose the election for certain!

Brianb-999431

Since you are SOOOOO concerned about all of Obama's papers.. why don't you go up to the WH and ask if you can see them yourself. P.S. Can you let me know if he aced the history of Polka Dots? Gimme us a break.

When are you righties going to stop sending out the dog that just won't hunt.

Obama/Biden 2012 - The GOP Redistribution of Wealth from the Lower/Middle Class Americans to the RICH needs to stop.

Are you kidding me?

My wife has 2 Master's degrees and I have 2 Master's degrees, and we pay nearly twice what Ryan pays?

Heck of a job, Party of No.

I have a problem when reporters feel the need to again put their two cents in and inacuretly state news. You can look at taxhistory.com and see the PDF files of Romney's taxes for the last two years, but for some reason this seems to be missed by the author. Another case of the press twisting the news (and do not take this as a pro-Fox post, because I have seen them do the same). I just wish we could get unbiased factual reporting for once.

Paul Ryan releases 2 years of tax returns

But WHOA! His filthy, lowlife cultist running-mate --- Mittens and his Magic Underwear --- is still hiding his!

And we're just beginning to find out why!!

Monkey see -- monkey do. Interesting -- even the Rasmussen poll show Ryan is huntring the already hurting Romney campaign.

the reason romney doesnt show more returns is obvious.how will it look when a waitress that make so little she qualifies for food stamps pays a higher percentage of what little she earns in tax then a rich elitist like romney.but then she has no voice in our goverment

You come by your title Low IQ quite well.

I am a professional tax preparer and have been for quite some time. You all keep complaining about wanting to see tax records. If you don't like the tax laws then you should be trying to get them changed

I bet you sure liked the earned income credit and the child tax credits and the additional child tax credits and all the other REFUNDABLE credits that probably most of you received.

I say it is high time that welfare and tax give aways are brought under control. I have thousands of clients walking out of my office each year with from 7,000 to 9,000 + refunds and having the gall to ask me "Is that all I get".

Wake up America and lets worry about getting the tax code ammended so we are encouraged to WORK not just work up to the income that will give us the most hand outs from the IRS. That's our money we pay in that is being given away.

I am sure Romney and Paul's taxes are legal and according to the tax code laws. If you don't like it then try to vote people in office that will make a REAL change.

You would think that Mr. $57,000. a day Romney would have the right tax guys to file his 2011 tax return in a timely manner.

Maybe he needs to hire Mrs. Ryan who is a tax attorney for future years.

So Ryan released two years of tax returns, eh?

Is that supposed to make it seem normal that Romney has released only two years of returns?

I have no doubt that if Romney were to reveal his financial/tax issues, his candidacy would be ended pronto. Now I wonder what Ryan is hiding.

Keep following the money, boys and girls, keep following the money.

So it's ok to harp a president about his birth certificate,(and some fools in america still think he isnt). but to ask for tax returns is somehow unfair? really??????. like will smith said in that movie "men in black" "if you dont start sht, wont be sht." now be quite and take your medicine like a man.

Never stop asking questions:

Why don't you go ahead and share how much you paid in taxes. You claim that you paid double that Ryan paid. Well Ryan paid 64k one year. So you are saying you paid 120k in taxes? If so thats great. It means you are probably making well over 700k a year.

Since you are making that much, maybe you should be paying more in taxes. Its obvious you can afford to pay more.

I am waiting for obama to release fast and furious records.

I am also waiting for obama to release his college transcripts.

Yeah, there is that Republican mouthpiece Jim Spence spewing his half-truths and outright lies again. Hey Jim, remember when the poverty rate was down below 8%, back when Bill Clinton was in office? Remember what it was on January 1st of 2009, when GW was still in office? It was back up within a couple of tenths of a percentage point of where it is now, so you can't blame that on the President, now can you?

Yeah, that $16 Trillion national debt. Remember when it was still under $1 Trillion, back when Jimmy Carter was in office? Remember how much Reagan added to it with his tax cuts? Regan more than tripled the national debt, and then his sidekick GW's dad added another trillion dollars of debt to that in his 4 years. And then there is GW, which, between his reported deficits and his inter-governmental borrowing, tallied $6.1 Trillion worth of debt in only 7 years, as his first year was nearly a wash, thanks to Bill Clinton. So Jim, of that $16 Trillion worth of debt, all but $5.9 trillion of it is on the hands of just three Republican Presidents, Reagan, who cut the top tax rate from 70% to 39%, Bush Sr, another tax-cutter, and GW, yet another tax cutter. And you want to vote for another guy who wants to cut taxes on the rich???

Let me ask you something there Jim??? If tax cuts for the rich actually "create" jobs in America, why isn't America literally swimming in secure, good-paying middle-class jobs right now, as our current top income tax rate is half of what it was between 1960 and 1980, most of which time our economy was quite strong? In actual practice, all that tax cuts for the rich accomplish is reckless investments, high-cost foreign vacations and foreign vacation real estate, and the wholesale offshoring of tens of millions of American jobs.

Feel free to contest me if I am wrong Jim, but don't high top individual and corporate tax rates encourage business investment and charity spending here in America trying to mitigate those high tax rates? That is something that both Romney's and Paul Ryan's tax returns both show, is our wealthiest citizens getting away with income tax murder and the heavy investing of their profits overseas where they are exempted from paying income tax on their wealth, a practice which is ruinous to investment in America, charitable institutions in America, as well as ruinous to our infrastructure and to American jobs too. The practice of substantially lowering tax rates for the wealthy has nearly destroyed the America that the rest of us depend on. And contrary to your idiotic belief, only a small percentage of Americans can actually be wealthy no matter how hard that they work.

What is so wrong with empathy and compassion for your fellow Americans? That is the one thing that turns my stomach every time that you, or Roy Wilson, or Mitt, or Paul Ryan open your mouths. You just seem to hate other Americans, you despise anyone who isn't wealthy, and you blame the welfare State for keeping people in welfare, and yet you try so hard to destroy the middle and working classes with you offshoring of our jobs, which then undercuts the wages of any company still in business here at home, and you brag about doing so down at your country club.

I personally think that the best thing that could happen to America right now would be to enact a 90% top tax rate, along with trade barriers against products made in countries that do not honor our patents, or our environmental laws, or our worker health, worker safety, and worker's rights laws either, and the only way to mitigate the high tax rate would be to invest or donate here at home.

We could easily change our currency a few times and force rich people to repatriate their money or lose it, and we could easily enact a 50% tax on offshored wealth too, because wealth kept offshore is wealth that does not benefit America. Why do you wealthy people like the Chinese so much that you have raised their wages by 500% just in the last 10 years, all the while trying to wipe-out all of the American workers who made you rich in the first place? If you rich people don't like it here, I suggest that you move to China, as there are several more people just waiting to take your place here after you leave, people willing to work far-harder than you ever dreamed of working, for far less money than you make too.

Why don't you take your conservative lies back to somewhere people will agree with you, like WND or any of the many other conservative hate sites? There would have been all kinds of economic progress by now except that you Republicans fought tooth and nail trying to destroy our economy for the entire time that Obama has been President, mainly because you hate the 60% majority of America so much, and partially because you can't stand to have anyone who isn't White as President too.

Why is it that any economic policy that doesn't heavily favor the wealthiest Americans is denounced as "socialist"? Why is it that Romney and all of the political action groups supporting him have to resort to running completely false ads, like the $716 billion of pure profit that Obama "stole" from our medical and health insurance communities, the same money that those same communities "stole" from average Americans through 10 years worth of runaway cost increases??? Obama cut the requirement to work from welfare? Why make stuff up that is completely false Jim? Do you conservatives think that your continuous lies are going to fool a majority of the electorate into voting for people who can't seem to tell the truth?

Like I said, why don't you head back to WND where people will believe you rather than spouting off all of your hatred of, and absolute distaste for, the majority of the American people here?

As a trucker who made an average of $50K in 2008 dollars for 30 years, even after my medical deductions, my homeowner deductions, my charity deductions, my employee deductions, and any casualty losses, I never paid less than a 20% tax rate since I was a kid just out of high school, and so have almost all of our middle class too. You ever drive a semi from Denver to NYC and Boston and deliver 15 stops of fresh meat Jim, then drive all the way back to Denver in 6 days so that you can have one day off at home before you have to do it again next week Jim, or are you one of those people that rides a chauffeur-driven limo to work and has your butler do your grocery shopping for you? You have no idea how hard many Americans work.

I must have missed something. What's the thing with Pres. Obama's college transcripts? Is this another birther/conspiracy thing? What is the relevance with it? I don't watch Fox News or listen to any of the conservative mouthpiece lunatics. What's the gist of this?

Ryan showing several years of his taxes exposes two things.....the wide difference in tax rate Ryan pays his taxes versus the rest of middle class...and.......the incredible wide difference lower tax rate Romney the multimillionaire ....claims ....to be only paying. Romney wears this low rate of tax rate like a badge of honor and wants the middle class to fawn all over him because he paid.....this much?/(little?)

Pardon me Mittster...do you have any Grey Poupon to share?

What's more important, tax returns that aren't required to be released and show nothing or spending 3 1/2 years actively destroying the country. Considering no one can think of anything that Obama has done to get the economy back on track and a hell of a lot of things that Obama has done to destroy the country, this is a no brainer! Apparently a lot of people have less than no brains.

Ernest Lee, It is magic 101. While the rubes are staring at the magician's exagerated hand movements or his assistant's large breasts, they don't see the other hand pulling a rabbit out of his shorts. It's a distraction pure and simple, meant to turn the spotlight onto anything but Mitt's corruption. Thanks for asking!

Jimmy........the rich have not been working the last 30 years , they have been buying the politicians to skew the laws so they get richer by doing NOTHING! Now Ryan and Romney want more tax breaks like eliminating capitals gains taxes.....doing nothing to get richer but hiding assets offshore like Romney and creating more laws that allow them to pay little or no taxes....How brave you are to smart off on the computor and call people who lost their jobs lazy asses on the computor. Walk into any unemployment office and shout that out to the guys waiting in line.......see how brave you are whining that to anyone's face......

President Obama/Biden and team Democrats 2012

Witchy...give up your rant.... the majority including repubs want to see the tax cheater/dodger records from Romney! Romney lied and is now caught saying he worked for Bain and now saying retroactively saing he didn't. He lied on his taxes and is caught. IRS can't expose him....but he exposed himself by not showing his taxes!!!

Paul Ryan is a professional politico who has never held a real job in his life. Yet his income far exceeds the salary of a member of Congress. From whence cometh the largesse? I know what's reported. I still think he's just another political hack with far more ambition than ability.

Bmette....Romney did not release his taxes, 2010 incomplete...2011 only an estimate......

Brianb......Ryan plan deliberate divide and conquer....if Ryan medicare plan so damned good why not do same to above 55? BECAUSE IT SUCKS AND THEY ARE PICKING OFF THE LOWER AGES FIRST. Same plan they did in Wisc. If then win election and put in their 55 and lower plan they will come right back and do it to ages above 55...what would stop them......RYAN plan kills medicare if onnly under 55 because higher costs accrue at older age, the pool that lowers costs all around would disappear when 55 and younger removed from savings pool of people. Just like Gingrich said. Voucher plan would cause medicare to wither and die on the vine.......VOTE NO TO PAUL RYAN> SAVE MEDICARE!!!!

Ernest: The same people calling for President Obama's college transcripts are fine with Mitts one year partial tax return. They are also fine with the 13% rate. After all Mittens pays sales tax, property tax and state taxes too!

Both Ryan and Mitt must disclose complete tax returns and not just one or two years. IMO Mitts hiding stuff, big stuff.

Also, I find it curious that after Ryan's father passed away, Ryan's family benefited from Social Security benefits as survivors. Imagine that?! Same person that wants to dismantle benefits, received them! Wonder if he utilized them for college, hm mm. Thought I heard he came from a fairly wealthy family. Another well to do group on the dole. The wealthy do appear to be able to get more from the government than the pittance that most middle and lower classes do, that's for sure.

PIBS....I caught Ann saying ...Mittster is golden too! Guess we know which alter she worships at too! Ann also said Mitt could not do this with out her...so he is that pathetic and incapable without her huh?.....She is not running for president....or...maybe she really is??? Mittster hid asset account in Ann's name right before deadline of asset needed to be known, before he became governor....hiding his crooked ways again!!!!!

TGM.....Ok we will change tax laws....can you remove the voter suppression laws the rich are putting in place so we can legally vote again?...Then can you give us more money to hand to republicans ...you know more money than republicans are giving republicans, so we can pay to have repubs change the laws back to what they should be?

@starsailing

Ryan showing several years of his taxes exposes two things.....the wide difference in tax rate Ryan pays his taxes versus the rest of middle class

WTF are you babbling about now? Households earning between 40-50k pay 12.5% of their income in Federal taxes, 50-75k is 15%. Ryan paid 16% one year and 20% the other so how exactly do you equate that to a "wide difference"? Do you even care if your posts make any sense? Do you EVER check any facts before you make these ridiculous claims?

http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/the-a-p-fact-checks-the-buffett-rule-and-finds-its-premise-flawed/

Kelly, you are reading too much liberal propaganda. All your sources are liberal.

The so-called "Liberal" sources (anyone but Fox News and Rush Limbaugh, apparently) are the best places to get reasoned, rational discussion of our nation's problems. With Fox News, Rush Limbaugh and the loony Glenn Beck types, you get lies and crazy conspiracy theories, not to mention all the trumped-up (pun intended) absurdities and smokescreen issues, designed to manipulate the gullible into voting against their own best interests.

JimSpence - As i sat here and digested all of your rhetoric and half truths, I just have one simple question for you that should be easy to answer:

Who do you consider a "Real American"?

I await your answer.............

Old Timer-88224

Old Timer, how the hell are ya?

Hmmm, you know what? I don’t remember the poverty rate being 8%. But I do remember it getting down to about 11.3% in 2000. Maybe you can look at this chart from the Census Bureau and show me where I’m NOT SEEING 8%!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_poverty_rate_timeline.gif

I also remember WHY it went so low. Do you? Sure you do. It was when that wonderful dot-com bubble was building. You remember that don’t you? When Greenspan kept warning Billy “Blue Dress” Clinton about that “irrational exuberance” thing. But I guess Billy had other things on his mind didn’t he? I remember it very well because I day-traded the hell out of that wonderful economy, made a boat-load of money too. Unfortunately, you know what happened when that bubble finally popped, right? Bush “inherited” a real mess didn’t he? Now, please don’t embarrass yourself with the mythical Clinton “surplus” either, it never existed.

I never said I blame the poverty rate on anyone, I blame the massive amount of money we have wasted on it and, if you look at the graph in the above link, you’ll notice my point of the poverty rate staying in that average of 14%. Try to keep up Timer.

As far as jobs are concerned you should remember this well Old timer. Remember before we realized we weren’t going to be the only manufacturer on the planet, which actually dated back to the 60’s we started losing manufacturing jobs. Then came Jimmy “Peanut Boy” Carter and his allowing China most-favored-nation status. Remember? Then Clinton extended it despite his campaign promise of not renewing it. Then of course he gave us NAFTA, the WTO and the rest is pretty much history.

Come on Old Timer, you know our strongest economies were when, as I stated above even though you probably collapsed my post, we had a balance of manufacturing and service sectors. You could be illiterate, untrained and indigent and you could find a job somewhere. I explained it in my above post so I won’t belabor the point. You and I both know with the advent of technology, automation and decentralization most of the jobs offshored will never come back. Since 1960 we have added 4 billion people to this planet. These emerging economies are going through the exact same thing we did at the turn of the 20^th century. We can’t compete with that. Not with the mindset we have developed over the past 50 years regarding wages, benefits and legacy costs. We are living in a 20^th century economy during the 21^st century.

As far as your disdain for the wealthy and successful I’m surprised. Being an Old Timer I’m sure you once dreamed of being rich, didn’t you? Of course you did, we all do. I doubt you or any Liberal ever read a “Get Poor Quick” or “Get Middle Class Quick” book. But I bet most have read a “Get Rich Quick” book of some kind. Will everyone be rich? Of course not, but we all have the opportunity to. Society will always have classes. To believe otherwise is ridiculous. Our biggest failure is our absolute destruction of our education system.

Read a high school graduates paper and see how most of them can’t use-there, they’re or their- correctly in a sentence. Most Americans read at an 8^th grade level. Ask a high school student, or even most here on the Newsvine or other blog, to calculate 40% of 330 in their head and they’ll stare at you blankly. America has become fat, lazy and stupid and we expect to be competitive against 6.7 billion other people on the planet. Good luck with that wet dream.

Your, and most Liberals, obsession with taxes on the rich is irrational. Your efforts should be at REAL tax reform. If Romney or Buffett or gates pay a smaller percentage of their taxes and they did NOTHING ILLEGAL, you’re blaming the wrong person. Blame our criminal progressive tax system. We have tried it for a century, adjusted tax brackets, added 72,000 pages of tax code and we still don’t have it right. This NOT the fault of the rich or corporations. Obviously they can influence any of these variables but ONLY our criminal government can actually change anything. Romney nor Buffett nor gates has ever written a single tax code. They just use what is available.

Like I have stated. When Romney submits his 500+ page tax return you better believe the IRS is on that like white on rice. If nothing is illegal how can you blame him? Blame the system. Like I’ve posted in other threads our tax code changes DAILY! Do you need it changed that often? I doubt it. Even if we eliminate a few loopholes I guarantee you they will be back within 6-12 months. The rich and Corporations will just hire more accountants, tax-lawyers and MBA’s to find new loopholes. If you REALLY want to change the tax system to be REALLY fair it needs to be a Constitutionally mandated Flat or fair Tax so our easily influenced (bribed) corrupt politicians can’t keep changing it. How do you think all our Congress members retire rich on a $170,000 salary? If they’re so fiscally capable in their own finances why can’t they do the same in our government? Because it’s NOT THEIR MONEY! It’s yours and mine. They don’t care how it’s spent as long as they keep getting reelected. Of course we oblige them with that reelection and then wonder why we’re in the economic disaster we find ourselves.

If there’s nothing illegal with hiding your own money in the Caymans, Switzerland or other offshore tax-haven, I don’t care how much they hide. It’s THEIR MONEY, NOT MINE!

As far as the other issues you mention it would take me hours to address them. But let me just ask you a simple question. Do you know exactly where your tax dollars go? Do you realize how much waste, fraud, abuse and corruption consumes our tax dollars. Our government is out of control. I guarantee you if you ask Barrack Hussein how many social programs we have, he has no idea. We have no idea what the Fed does with our money. The Treasury is a sieve for corrupt money. The banks are in bed with our criminal Congress. And on and on.

We will surpass $16 trillion in debt this week. We have burned through the $2.4 trillion dollars from last August’s debt-ceiling debacle. Regardless of who wins in November we will have another downgrade. We have to. We are ominously close to competing with Greece, Spain, Portugal and Ireland. Who’s going to bail us out? Europe is broke. China is faltering and they have 1.2 billion of their own people they need to worry about. Unfortunately I don’t think changing a few tax rates or dropping a few loopholes is going to do much. We have systemic failures that will take years to fix IF there is the political will to do it. I doubt they will. I honestly don’t think Bernanke, Geithner or any of the other “economists” have a clue what to do.

This is a perfect opportunity for us to fix our dysfunctional government but most Americans won’t like the Draconian step that will be needed. The can will be kicked down the road again. A few tweaks will be made and everyone will be happy for a year or two. Eventually the house of cards we have built for a century will collapse. I’d rather be in control of it rather than it control me.

Anyway, my fingers hurt. Have a great day (night).

Romney/Ryan 2012 for real Americans

Why do I continually see the word effective when speaking of Romney's tax returns? Such as

"he had “never paid less than a 13 percent effective tax rate after reviewing his returns from the past decade.”"

I looked up the word effective and according to microsoft word, it's another word for actual, meaning:

actual or in practice, even if not officially or theoretically so

Is this another word like the one Clinton used to get out of having sex with that other woman; " it depends on what is ment by the word is" I'm not a lawyer but I think I know a skunk when I smell one.

Why are Obama supports so thick? Did you not read the article Romney has released his 2010 return and WILL release his 2011. He isn’t hiding a dang thing. He isn’t required to have it filed until October 15^th! I prepare tax returns for living, and I am currently still working on the more complicated returns. There are some returns that just cannot be completed by the April deadline. That is why there are EXTENSIONS. If I were him and had as many assets as him I would take every bit of time I could to make sure no mistakes are made, and to make sure I don’t have to pay a dime more than required. Mitt, don’t let the jealous lame brained liberals rush your tax guys! Take all the time you can!

Also, why can’t Democrats get that there is difference between wages and investments. They are not the same and are not taxed the same. Where does “Ron Indian” get the notion that the rest of us are paying twice as much as Romney’s 13% tax rate?? Or Oldhamletman get the idea that the average married couple pays 24%? From what I see most people don’t even pay federal income tax. In fact, half the returns I do are people who don’t pay in a dime and get $6,000 -$10,000 out of the system! That’s what makes me angry. Lazy people getting free money from the Government. Most everyone else is in the 10-15% range. The rest of us can pay 13% when we start living off our investments! As far as $100 million in an IRA…. Doesn’t take a genius to figure that one out… Non-deductible IRA contributions and a good advisor…. Let me help some of these lame brained liberals. If you are wondering how Romney got so much money, or why he does certain things with his money, just remember this. He is smarter than you, that’s why he is worth $250 million. If you don’t understand it… that should be a big clue ;-)

It amazes me the Liberal mindset that gets upset with people like Romney just because he was smarter than you and me and took advantage of this amazing country we live in, in order to make as much money as he could. Get over it! Quit being jealous! I want a successful person like him running this country. It’s about time we let someone that actually knows how to run a successful organization run this country.

@Confussed-1578043

Why do I continually see the word effective when speaking of Romney's tax returns?

Is this another word like the one Clinton used to get out of having sex with that other woman; " it depends on what is ment by the word is" I'm not a lawyer but I think I know a skunk when I smell one.

Allow me to enlighten you. The tax rate on investment income is 15% but Romney got certain deductions which lowered his tax liability. So even though the rate was 15% because of his deductions he actually paid 13% of his income in Federal taxes. Hence the term "effective rate".

Sorry, no skunks here. That term has been used in this manner forever and a day. Most likely you think you smell a skunk because you want to smell a skunk

• There was a young fella named Ryan
• Who caught his co-candidate sighin'
• He asked, "Some bad news?"
• "Yah, we're gonna lose!"
• Said Mitt Romney as he began cryin'

If there’s nothing illegal with hiding your own money in the Caymans, Switzerland or other offshore tax-haven, I don’t care how much they hide. It’s THEIR MONEY, NOT MINE!

Sad to see so many people on both sides are still clueless about these off shore, so-called "tax havens". Any and all money earned by a US citizen is subject to taxation. Putting this money in the Caymans or anywhere else has NOTHING to do with avoiding taxes. The reason rich people do so is because the laws and regulations in these places are much easier to follow. Instead of hiring and army of lawyers to manage their money they can hire a handful. In addition, and contrary to what many sheeple here believe, the simpler regulations make it harder for crooks to scam people so their money is safer. Doubt that? Well then find me just one Bernie Madoff type who has gotten away with jack @!$%# in the Caymans. If less regulation made their investments and money more vulnerable do you really think rich people would put their money there?

Common Sense 23

JimSpence - As i sat here and digested all of your rhetoric and half truths, I just have one simple question for you that should be easy to answer:

Who do you consider a "Real American"?

Well common, it's not really easy but I'll give you an introduction.

A real American is one who understands what our nation is built on and the genius of our Constitution and it IS a "Charter of Negative Liberties".

We are a Federal Constitutional Republic with a Representative Democracy.

We are a Republic. We are NOT a Democracy. A Representative Democracy simply states we have periodic free elections.

Federalism is based on the principle of "dual sovereignty". The Federal Constitution mandates the Federal governments Enumerated Powers. State Constitutions allow for everything else as long as it doesn't exceed Federal power.

Prior to 1937 our government stayed within these boundaries. After FDR's "Revolution of 1937" everything changed. We allowed our government unbridled power. The very thing our Founder's and Framer's warned us against. This was the exact thing they fled from, the aristocracy and its relentless grip on the people. With this power came corruption. The banking cabal, corporations and every special interest group realized the power we allowed our government and how easily it can be influenced. Pork barrel took on a significantly different meaning.

A real American realizes that regardless of political affiliation we must return to our Constitutionally mandated Republic tempered by Federalism. Our government has no constraints. To believe the cabal that has this much power won't use it against its own people is naive. It's the same thing the people enslaved under kings and queens thought.

This does NOT mean we revert back to the Middle Ages. Please don't embarrass yourselves that much. But when we fear our government, we have lost the battle of Liberty. When we lose that, the rest will be easy for our government to take from us.

Backwhiner...sorry ..Mittster said himself....Offshore accounts are set up for "offshore corporations investing in America to avoid paying taxes".....He wouldn't be lying would he?????? Or is Mitt calling you the liar...better talk to him and get your stories straight!

You find your income numbers to spin.....and I will use the ones REAL news sources use......

The skunk is the rich person or backhouse that THINKS the capital gains should be at 15% and get additional tax breaks to lower it.. The skunks are Ryan and Romney who want to eliminate the capital gains tax altogether and then raise taxes on the middle class to pay for them....Since you are in sync with Ryan and Romney Backhouse, you are smelling the 3 of you!

Yeah, I'm still lost at what the left seriously thinks they will learn by seeing Mr. Romney's tax returns. That he's rich? Um, if you don't know that by now then you probably aren't smart enough to vote anyhow, so why worry about you?

I'm not an advisor to Mr. Romney, or to Mr. Obama, but I would give both of them the same advice about these various disclosure demands. Give only enough to convince voters you have a chance to win that you are okay. So for Mr. Romney, if moderates demand more information then he will give it. And for Mr. Obama, if disclosing his college transcripts or an actual hard copy of his BC actually mattered to moderates, then he would do it.

The point is that moderates don't seem to interested in either candidate disclosing all these things. And to the braniac above who says that by law you must publish your tax returns to run for president, I can only say you are about as dumb as a box of hair. That said, there is a very good reason NOT to disclose things your political opponents demand: It drives them NUTS! Just look at some of the birthers? Nuts I say. And now we see what drives leftists to extremes not even birthers treaded upon--tax returns.

I doubt you leftists will get what I am saying here, partly because I am a conservative, but mostly because you just aren't very smart, but by going completely insane over these tax returns, even going so far as to conjure up claims Romney is corrupt, you are in fact edging moderates away from Mr. Obama as he appears (by association if not by his own demands) a bubble or two off center.

@starsailing

Backwhiner...sorry ..Mittster said himself....Offshore accounts are set up for "offshore corporations investing in America to avoid paying taxes".....He wouldn't be lying would he?????? Or is Mitt calling you the liar...better talk to him and get your stories straight!

Starbrained, offshore accounts are not offshore corporations but I wouldn't expect you to know the difference or even care as long as you can blather on about things you don't understand.

You find your income numbers to spin.....and I will use the ones REAL news sources use......

ROTFLMAO!! Sure you will, LOL! You just won't share them with the rest of us because why exactly? Sorry but "REAL news sources" could care less about numbers you pull straight out of your ass. And btw, since when is the Associated Press not a "real" news source? Durrrrrr

The skunks are Ryan and Romney who want to eliminate the capital gains tax altogether and then raise taxes on the middle class to pay for them

Gee, again no source to back up your gibberish, what a surprise. I know, I know, there is no way to provide a link to the voices in your head so we'll all just have to take your word for it. lol

Dude your posts are a riot! I'll give you that!

Backcountry164: Your defense of Romney is misplaced. Romney didn't just park his money offshore he created offshore shell companies and then denied making them. He claimed this corporation was created without his knowledge because it was set up by his blind trust even though his "blind trust" was ran by his personal attorney and records show he owned this corporation before forming this blind trust. Put simply he's a liar.

The problem with Romney’s claim? The Bermuda corporation—Sankaty High Yield Asset Investors—was registered in 1997 and Romney was listed as the “the sole shareholder, a director, and president” of the corporation. The Bermuda corporation was under his personal ownership until it was transferred into a blind trust in his wife’s name the day before he was sworn in as governor, possibly to avoid disclosure. In fact, the one fulltax return Romney did release shows that he directly owned the company as recently in 2010 and it was not held in his trust.

Mitt Romney’s continued dishonesty on his investments in offshore tax havens and corporations raises serious questions about why he won’t release his tax returns. Only a release of additional tax returns will allow us to see if Romney avoided U.S. taxes with his offshore holdings.

JimSpence - Actually it was a simple question that could have been answered quite simply but I see you choose to attempt to give me a history lesson from a right wing conservative website. (yes I took the time to look it up)

First and foremost, I never did like history, even throughout school BUT I do remember vividly having to memorize the Preamble and first 3 articles of the constitution therefore even I know this is false and ideological. This country you so proudly speak of WAS and STILL IS a democracy. You see our "founding fathers" revolted from the republic as we were being taxed without representation thus the revolution ensued and so forth and so on. That's why the constitution starts off as "We the people of the UNITED STATES. I could go in but I digress as If I continue you may actually learn something(no offense). Having said that, this is what, in my opinion is a real American, short and sweet.

A real American is a person that would uphold the premise of liberty and justice FOR ALL and not a select few.

A real American would recognize the hate and bigotry that goes on in the world and would stand up and do something about it instead of standing idly by and allow it to happen.

A real American would uphold the words "We find these truths to be self evident that ALL MEN are created equal" instead of promoting separatism and alienation knowing full well that this country was founded by immigrants AND once upon a time welcomed them with open arms.

Finally, A real American would not stand by and watch a person, group, organization, etc... victimize, suppress, or attempt to take away a person's "fundamental right" to "exercise" their those same rights when it benefits them.

No one that I know gives a damn about Romney's or Ryan's income tax returns. So, why do the libs and the media? The rest of us care about getting the country back to work, and stemming the runaway debt. That is what this election is about.

@Larry-367607

Backcountry164: Your defense of Romney is misplaced. Romney didn't just park his money offshore he created offshore shell companies and then denied making them. He claimed this corporation was created without his knowledge because it was set up by his blind trust even though his "blind trust" was ran by his personal attorney and records show he owned this corporation before forming this blind trust. Put simply he's a liar.

You forgot to explain how this enables him to avoid paying personal income tax... probably because it doesn't. After the promises we were made 4 years ago if this is the type of lie you can pin on Romney sounds like he is still the lesser of two evils.

So he gave you two years. what's in the third year he does not want you to see? the fact that he made money from Iraq? the fact that he had ties to cheney and Bush? whats in there mitt? What don't you want me to see?

nice one gorge pauljohn;

and if romney gave you three years you would say why not 4 years? He must be hiding something! lol you are so pathetic

you are probably one of those wacko nutjobs who thinks bush was behind the 9/11 attacks lol

Mitzy is now adding what he gave to charity to his percentage of "paid tax." Um, charity, especially to your church or choice is NOT paying taxes but hey, he wants all of the other rules changed for him, why not that one? He is such a loser. Because money isn't everything.......except in his world.

And oh, yeah, listen to Mitzy when he talks about taxes. He NEVER says INCOME or FEDERAL tax. Because, you see, he doesn't pay ANYTHING to those. Just taxes on all of his homes and cars.

Ross Perot is worth $3.5 billion compared to Romney's $250 million.

Donald Trump (potential GOP presidential candidate for 2012) is worth $2.9 billion.

Both men sorely outweigh Mitt Romney in terms of wealth, and look how many votes Perot got - roughly 19% of the vote in 1992.

Just wanted to point that out.

@SoSickoftheGop

And oh, yeah, listen to Mitzy when he talks about taxes. He NEVER says INCOME or FEDERAL tax. Because, you see, he doesn't pay ANYTHING to those. Just taxes on all of his homes and cars.

LOL! So you think he made less than 30k?? Because that is the only way he could have possibly paid no Federal taxes. But please don't let an easily researchable fact prevent you from spewing nonsense and gibberish.

I'd like to say how much I admire the hard work Paul Ryan has put in to become a wealthy and successful man. When his father died we might never have heard of him. He might have never gone to college, but he did. He might have never embarked on this path, but he did.

Now Congressman Ryan wants to take away the Social Security Survivors Benefits that paid for his college. He wants to make sure that the path he took to wealth isn't available to other middle class children of the current generation. He's worked hard to compromise the society that is based on giving people a hand up so they can achieve their full potential.

There's nothing to admire in that.

Obama administration is making nearly half a billion dollars in unspent highway funds available to states that promise to use the money to create jobs and improve transportation.

The money initially was allocated to the Transportation Department for special projects known as earmarks from 2003 to 2006.

Does anyone else wonder what other monies our government is sitting on?

John, why are spreading lies about Ryan? Why do you liberals insist on saying the same tired old things that have nothing to do with what Ryan proposed in his plan? Is it you just can't fathom an idea that would work to save the Medicare system from complete collapse? Where's Obama's plan to save it? Wait... I know... he took $716 Billion from it to help fund Obamacare.... ::shaking head::

@JimSpence for such a smart person I do not understand how you miss out on the importance of "how much others make and pay in taxes"? Do animals, space aliens, or anything BESIDES a human being on this planet print and produce money? No, humans are the only creature on this planet that makes "money". The first year our government was in existence it printed X amount of money. Why did our government have to print MORE? Could it be because it relates to how much people make and save?

Savings and investments cause inflation, where else can the money come from, thin air? We are all part of the SAME system that we CREATED that is why it matters how much someone makes and pays in taxes. The MORE someone makes the LESS someone else has to make. No matter how hard you work there will only ever be so many "rich" people at one time. This is due to it being a closed zero sum system and math. The only other alternative to a closed system is to ride the bubble and print money out to infinity, which has not worked out so well so far.

The only way to get a closed system to work for any period of time is for savings and investments to LOSE value over time. "But why would I invest it then"? Because you have to. Why did you over pay yourself so much? Why did you need all that money for in the first place again? Maybe pay your workers more since you have plenty money and you would not be able to keep it for ever? Start a system with 100 units of currency, you save 10 units one year. Now the system only has 90 units in circulation if you save MORE next year the system will have even less. This forces the government to print "more" money and devalues the money that you already have saved since there is now 200 units in the system. Your 10 units are now worth only 5 in the old system. Unless people "save" at the same rate we will have problems. Why do people take advantage of instead of helping out others when it comes to savings and investments? Maybe if they could not keep so much money then they would not act so ruthless.

Hard for the government to waste money if you just paid your workers more instead of paying taxes for social programs. If we did not have lobbyists I bet money that our government would not be as wasteful, but then the rich would have the same voice in government as everyone else... More problems created by the same group of people.

How many problems are caused by ONE parent not staying at home to raise their child? Why it is ok for right wing families to have stay at home moms, but everyone else's mom (or dad) has to work? I wonder how much money we waste due to POOR parenting? How many people missed out of important life lessons from their parents because they were both out working just trying to make ends meet. Yes many buy stuff they do not need, but then why did you make all those ads, credit cards, laws, etc. that help fuel our economy and put people in chains at the same time. You knew and did not care.

Natural systems > Man made ones

What you loony leftists forget is that the requirement is 2 years... period!

Source, please?

There is no legal requirement for presidential candidates to release their tax forms! However, there is a long tradition of presidential candidates releasing multiple years of tax forms. Care to guess who started that tradition? George Romney, Mitt's father, in his runup to the 1968 presidential election.

T. George Harris, George Romney's official biographer, recalled what led up to this historic disclosure:

“He balked when I badgered him for a copy of his latest Form 1040, the Federal Individual Income Tax Return,” Harris wrote. “Release of the document, while it might serve a political purpose, would not prove very much, he argued. One year could be a fluke, perhaps done for show, and what mattered in personal finance was how a man conducted himself over the long haul.”

“Stumped by this argument, I was not prepared for the move that it eventually led him to make: He ordered up all the Form 1040's that he and Mrs. Romney had filed over the past twelve years..."

But, of course, George Romney had nothing to hide!

Savings and investments cause inflation, where else can the money come from, thin air?

You, sir, must have skipped Econ 101. Economics is not a zero-sum game. The increase in value comes from an expansion of goods and services and the expansion of capacity within the economic system.

In an economic system where investment leads to increased jobs and manufacturing capabilities with an expansion of the goods and services an economy produces, investment does not lead to inflation.

Here are the FACTS:

1) Romney did not release his tax returns when he ran for governor. His opponent and the Dems asked him to just release the residency with all the financials blacked out, and Romney wouldn't even do that. Then finally Romney admitted he lied about paying taxes in Massachusetts to be eligible to run for governor. Supposedly Romney retroactively amended his taxes to pay Massachusetts taxes, but he never released his taxes and NEVER has.

2) Team Romney required "several years" tax returns for all VP wannabes. The definition of "several" in the dictionary is "Being of a number more than two or three." So it was more than three, probably at least five.

3) Though the president has released eight years tax returns for Republicans to attack, five years is all that Team Obama asked Romney to release. Romney won't release anything prior to 2010 because the 2008/2009 returns would destroy his chances of winning.

4) Romney has not released all of his 2010 tax information -- As wildcastwest posted above:

He also did not release his 'Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts statement from his 2010' return. This is the part that discloses the details of his tax haven foreign bank holdings.

Romney filed an extension on his 2011 in an attempt to sanitize the returns and to delay release until as close to the election as possible. Even so, he pays a very low tax rate in both 2010 and 2011, and 2010 shows a lot of unethical and unAmerican activity.

Romney is already considered untrustworthy just based on his erratic flip-flops and now blatant lies. But looking at his record of lying about his residency and paying taxes in Massachusetts, and saying folks would just have to take his word for it -- Are voters really this stupid? Fool me once...

Don't let this Shyster get away with his lies again. Romney/Ryan -- They aren't in it for you.

Aleithia -- Another historical reminder is when Nixon resigned and Ford wanted to appoint Nelson Rockefeller as the new VP:

[Video of press and Nelson Rockefeller, August 20, 1974]

Rockefeller: The role of a vice president totally depends on the President. If the President wants to use him. Wonderful. If he doesn't. Fine.

Reporter: What will you do about your financial assets to meet the requirements of the vice presidency?

Rockefeller: I'll just conform to the law.

Reporter: Governor, are you prepared to detail your personal finances for Congress, including your tax return?

Rockefeller: I'm prepared to do whatever the Congress asks me and to conform to the law in every respect.

Reporter: What is your net worth now, Governor?

Rockefeller: You are not a member of the Congress. Excuse me.

Reporter: You seem to be a little less open with us.

Rockefeller: Well you're not the Committee of Congress, and I haven't been confirmed. And I haven't gone before the committee. My understanding is that protocol says that you don't discuss matters that are going to be taken up by Committee before you get to the hearings.

Reporter: Do you doubt you will be confirmed?

Rockefeller: Pardon me?

Reporter: Do you doubt you will be confirmed?

Rockefeller: I would never take anything for granted in life. Particularly action of this Congress. Thank you, gentlemen, it's been a pleasure. I may see you again.

Eventually Nelson Rockefeller did get confirmed by the Senate, but not before coughing of up seven years of tax returns.

What is the letter of the law regarding tax returns for polticians running for prez? If the parties are meeting the letter what the heck? I am still at a loss as to the disdain by the Dems on here for the wealthy...when in essence are most of the Dems in DC wealthy also? At 66 I fail to see why liberals are so envious and pious against wealthy folks...isn't that a total contradiction in their own ideals? I filed an extension and will file my returns by the due date as will most folks that file extensions...isn't that legal with the tax codes?

As a CPA I doubt a lot of here ranting about tax returns of someone like Romeny could understand his very very complicated return, I am sure his has a team of tax lawyers to keep legal....I sure as hell would. What are we coming to with this hate, envy, deciet, lies, innuendo and class warfare...people both sides, both sides are guilty as hell and if you think both sides are not then you are delusional people.

Any overly delay in producing legal documents is always subject to suspicion of alterations or deletions. Any way the tax system does prove one thing, you can keep more of your money by not working for it then you do working for it, working wage are taxed higher then investment income, problem being, how to get that first money to be able to invest, second problem is how do you influence your investment to prosper like most of the rich people can.

Donald Trump (potential GOP presidential candidate for 2012) is worth $2.9 billion.

That is false. Donald Trump lies about his net worth. He relies too much on his TV show for income to be worth as much as he claims. He cannot afford to be without it.

Common Sense 23 (#1.104)

our "founding fathers" revolted from the republic as we were being taxed without representation

Hmmmm, “our "founding fathers" revolted from the republic”.

Really? I thought the Founders revolted from a monarchy with its parliament. Remember that guy from England, King George III? The “taxation without representation” was to go to the British EMPIRE, not the British Republic. I think you got cheated in your history classes.

WE ARE NOT A DEMOCRACY!

No matter how much you argue it, we are a REPUBLIC. Now, your “memorizing” the Preamble means nothing. You realize the Preamble of the Constitution, just as the Preamble of the Declaration of Independence, are simply introductions, right? The Preamble as such carries no weight of law. You would have done much better to have read the Federalist Papers than to waste your time memorizing things.

You’ve obviously been indoctrinated with the belief that Democracy means Liberty. It doesn’t. We have been warned by Jefferson in Federalist #48 and Madison in Federalist #10 about the elective Despotism that affected the early States of Connecticut and Rhode Island. Yes, the colonies were in much more turmoil, that’s why we needed the Constitutional Convention. They warned us of the “excesses of democracy” and the “Tyranny of the Majority” that is created by a Democracy.

In a Democracy the Rights of the ultimate minority, the individual, lacks any legal safeguards. Only in a Republic is the individuals, the ultimate minority's, Rights protected.

A perfect example of a Democracy was the events that occurred during the “Occupiers” camps at Zuccotti Park. The assaults, rapes, robberies and other crimes were not allowed to be reported to authorities. Instead, the Occupy organizers told the victims they would have their own “security” investigate. They never did. The victims Rights were ignored for the benefit of the collective. So the movements "image" wasn't damaged, the individuals suffered. In a Republic, as we have, their Rights would have been protected, the crimes investigated and prosecuted.

It seems as if I should be the one to continue so that YOU can learn more but I feel this will fall on deaf ears anyway. You have a long way to go Mr. History buff. But then again you are probably one of the products of our Public School education. It’s obvious by your lack of basic civics or more ominously your indoctrination by the social and economic justice for the collective nonsense.

Nice try though, you can at least remember “We the people of the UNITED STATES”. Now hopefully you can spend some quality time learning what the UNITED STATES really means.

It’s not quite as simple as you seem to think it is. Is it?

Then you’ll understand what a real American is.

Romney/Ryan 2012 for real Americans

John, why are spreading lies about Ryan?

What lies?

-Paul Ryan went to college on funds received from Social Security Survivors Benefits.

-Paul Ryan's budget would eliminate SS Survivors Benefits.

I realize that when the facts are unfavorable to Conservatives they are referred to as "lies" but that doesn't fit the conventional definition of the term.

Ironically, Ryan came to national attention trying to dismantle the very program that helped him go to the college of his choice, pushing an even more radical version of President Bush’s Social Security privatization plan, which failed. He has since become the scourge of the welfare state, a man wholly supported by government who preaches against the evils of government support. He could be the poster boy for President Obama’s supposedly controversial oration about how we all owe our success to some combination of our own hard work, family backing and government support. Let’s say it together: You didn’t build that career by yourself, Congressman Ryan.

Thus Paul Ryan represents the fakery at the heart of the Republican project today. It starts with the contradiction that Mr. Free Enterprise has spent his life in the bosom of government, enjoying the added protection of wingnut welfare benefactors like the Koch brothers.

http://www.salon.com/2012/08/12/paul_ryan_randian_poseur/

The correct question is what is the letter of the law, and is it a good law? NO. Romney only proves our tax code needs major reforms. And Romney shows that we need an amendment requiring a minimum of 10 years tax returns in order to run for president. Romney is the 1% Poster Child for ALL that is wrong with out system and society. Hopefully this will be a *teachable moment* for the sane majority in this country.

Since when does being successful make someone wrong or doing something illegal? I just retired from the military and I paid 19% on my taxes each year: federal, state, social security, and medicare. If I had the money to invest, I would have made more. Since when does release of college records mean anything? I have not seen anything of interest that any of their college degrees has done for this country. They have not used them to help, meaning the Republicans or Democrats. We are in this mess because none of you will demand from your elected officials that they do their job or get replaced come November. I sent emails to mine just yesterday letting them know that votes will be going against those who will not support ending the war in Afghanistan NOW! not in 2014 and concentrate on jobs within the boundaries of the United States. We can vote them in or out. Stop whining about things that cannot be controlled and do what needs to be done.

Ron Indiana @ 1.1: It astounds me that the American Electorate is so stupid that you can get 140+ votes for making such asinine statements.

Make up any s**T, who cares.

It is IMPOSSIBLE to have a $100,000,000 IRA, the present annual contribution for husband and wife is $12,000 and it used to be less. One can never reach $100,000,000.00. Besides, what's your problem about IRAs. Is it that you do not have one? Many, many working American have IRAs or 401Ks.

Please cite your source for amnesty. Or do you claim that you were in jail with him. That would be a novel one.

And you pay 26% income tax? The taxpayers probably bought your computer. Don't give me that S**T. Opponents love to put gross income on the Tax Table, never "taxable income". There is no way you paid 26% most Americans pay less than 10% on their "taxable income". I doubt if you have ever done a tax return.

As far as the Cayman Islands are concerned, where did you get your info on that. More gossip? How about Batavia. You obviously know nothing about tax shelters or "rate of return". I doubt if you have 10 cents to invest.

Where's Obama's plan to save it? Wait... I know... he took $716 Billion from it to help fund Obamacare.... ::shaking head::

Brian's big on calling out what he refers to as "lies", but then turns right around and propagates one that has been disproven many times over. You should really strive to take your own advice, Brian...perhaps then you wouldn't have people

::shaking head and laughing at the stupidity of your response::

Here is how you get a multi-million dollar IRA, like Willards. You run a big private equity firm wth other peoples money. you buy existing businesses, never creating any new jobs. you destroy the companies you buy, You break up said companies, selling everything and firing everybody, after you steal all their pension funds. You pay yourself a huge salary. you set yourself up a 401K. You put over 33 and 1/3 percent of your salary in your 401K. 33 and 1/3 % is the magic number, every dollar over that is basically matched by other peoples tax dollars. To really boost your tax advantage, you give yourself a huge employer matching contribution to your 401K. You quit your job with your 401k contribution and employer matching contribution to be continued for four more years, because your still on the books as a consultant. After your consultant service is done, you roll your 401k over into an IRA.

I tripped over this when I was figuring out what increasing my own 401K from 25% to 30%, the end of this year when I get my back child support paid off, would do to my paycheck. I was thinking that since I haven't been getting that money, I wouldn't miss it. I've decided now that I'm going to increase my 401k to 30% immediately, and go to 35% at the end of the year. Last year, with a 25% 401k contribution and no tax shelters, or fancy tax lawyer trickery, just H&R Block I paid an effective tax rate of 17% on $33,000 gross income. No dependents, no mortgage deduction. For 2013 i expect to get a lot closer to Romney's 13%.

MOST AMERICANS WANT TO SEE THOSE RETURNS AND WITH GOOD REASON

Gallup- A majority of Americans (54%) say Mitt Romney should release additional taxreturns, while 37% say he should not.

Those surveyed are divided on whether the likely Republican nominee is trying to hide anything. 44% believe it would include damaging information — including 15% who say they believe the revelations would be so serious that they would "show he is unfit to be president." http://www.gallup.com/poll/155897/majority-americans-romney-release-tax-returns.aspx/

Ryan has one upped Mitt Romney. Romney has released only one tax return, his 2010 return. He also conveniently did not release the section of the 2010 return known as the FBAR- Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts. The FBAR of course discloses the details of his offshore accounts. Mitt Romney to date has NOT released his 2011 return. He filed an extension for that. So what we have is one partial return from 2010 and no return for 2011. Are we supposed to believe that his accountants just couldn't get his 2011 return done by now? They say he will release the 2011 return by Oct 15... I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for that to happen. It's obvious that he's hoping we'll all just forget about it by then.

Dear Cubsfan2012…… are you smoking crack? Ryan is a Congressman, of the list of the wealthiest 50 Congressman the top two are Republicans. #1 is Michael MaCaul from Texas coming in at $294.21 million. #2 is Darrel Issa from California coming in $220.40 million. So I am not sure where you got your combined numbers because the top two Republican Congressman combine for $514.61 million.

Of the 50 richest US Congressman(women) 32 of them are Republicans and only 18 are Democrats.

Want facts…here you go:

BTW, MaCaul went from $12 million in 2005 to $294.21 million in 2012……where did that money come from during our economic meltdown?

This unsettling account suggests the young Romney—at that point only two years out of Harvard Business School—was willing to push into gray areas when it came to business. More than three dec­ades later, as he tried to nail down the Republican nomination for president of the United States, Romney’s gray areas were again an issue when he repeatedly resisted calls to release more details of his net worth, his tax returns, and the large investments and assets held by him and his wife, Ann. Finally the other Republican candidates forced him to do so, but only highly selective disclosures were forthcoming.

Even so, these provided a lavish smorgasbord for Romney’s critics. Particularly jarring were the Romneys’ many offshore accounts. As Newt Gingrich put it during the primary season, “I don’t know of any American president who has had a Swiss bank account.” But Romney has, as well as other interests in such tax havens as Bermuda and the Cayman Islands.

To give but one example, there is a Bermuda-based entity called Sankaty High Yield Asset Investors Ltd., which has been described in securities filings as “a Bermuda corporation wholly owned by W. Mitt Romney.” It could be that Sankaty is an old vehicle with little importance, but Romney appears to have treated it rather carefully. He set it up in 1997, then transferred it to his wife’s newly created blind trust on January 1, 2003, the day before he was inaugurated as Massachusetts’s governor. The director and president of this entity is R. Bradford Malt, the trustee of the blind trust and Romney’s personal lawyer. Romney failed to list this entity on several financial disclosures, even though such a closely held entity would not qualify as an “excepted investment fund” that would not need to be on his disclosure forms. He finally included it on his 2010 tax return. Even after examining that return, we have no idea what is in this company, but it could be valuable, meaning that it is possible Romney’s wealth is even greater than previous estimates. While the Romneys’ spokespeople insist that the couple has paid all the taxes required by law, investments in tax havens such as Bermuda raise many questions, because they are in “jurisdictions where there is virtually no tax and virtually no compliance,” as one Miami-based offshore lawyer put it.

That’s not the only money Romney has in tax havens. Because of his retirement deal with Bain Capital, his finances are still deeply entangled with the private-equity firm that he founded and spun off from Bain and Co. in 1984. Though he left the firm in 1999, Romney has continued to receive large payments from it—in early June he revealed more than $2 million in new Bain income. The firm today has at least 138 funds organized in the Cayman Islands, and Romney himself has personal interests in at least 12, worth as much as $30 million, hidden behind controversial confidentiality disclaimers. Again, the Romney campaign insists he saves no tax by using them, but there is no way to check this.

Mittens and Ryan: Love the game playing because it will cost you dear with the voters.

Let's release at least 10 years of taxes, and see how the Ryan/Romney budget improves your bottom line. Queen Ann want to have Rafalca bred now, why don't we see how THAT helps your taxes as a business write off.

Mittens: here is what you are trying to avoid...you don't want Joe and Joan America to find out exactly how much they pay to support you, Queen Ann, and those boys of yours who never seem to serve in the military.

Well at least that is 1/2 a year more than Willard did.

See ya'll Monday ... this is just too silly and I just can't stop laughing and my dog thinks I've gone nuts.

Have a good weekend bcwc!

Or maybe he does have something to hide.

Romney and Ryan are expected to release everything from their vet bills to their fifth grade dental records.

But Obama? Biden? Holder? Pelosi? Nahhh. Keep the college records, Obama. Keep the farcical law school records, Biden. Keep the 200,000 F&F documents, Holder. Keep the tax returns, Pelosi. Y'all don't have to release anything.

What's impressive is that they can keep all that stuff and then tell you "Romney's hiding things, but WE'RE NOT" with a straight face.

Ryan stated in an interview right after he was selected that he also would only be releasing tax returns for the two years.

As for 2012, not impressive they both promised to release them. Obviously they will not be done until 2013, long after the election of hopefully not them.

"How about telling us HOW many years of returns Willard demanded from him?"

WHOOP! There it IS!!!

Hey, "old Gal"- nice to know I'm in good company, even if only in fits and bursts from time-to-rime.

Keep 'em honest, you. (as though that were possible, short o,f say, 600 or 700 millions in ad buys....)

WHOOP! There it IS!!!

Right Buzz?

Can we at least have an honest debate here?

Willard's old man set the precedent when HE released 12 years of his tax returns...

Shame his son isn't half the man his father was...

That dog won't hunt.

You want transparency?

Put your big boy pants on and shame the left by providing it- like Romney's father did.

"Show me yours first" is a pretty juvenile thing to require.

Romney's a tax-dodging crook until he proves otherwise- deal with it.

Red-

An honest debate? Sorry no.

Not 'till later in the season. Not until OUR presiedent of OUR country confronts Mitt without his telepromter, comely wife, and all those Rove-bucks floating around out there in" fair-and-balanced" land.

When has more money in advertizing ever promoted an "honest' anything??

Aw crap- I gotta jump outta here again. It's just too damned depressing to read some of this right-wing dribble, and realize some of these dicks actuall have 'suitable' picture ID's.

Yep- Hell in a hand basket.

Yep.

's where were headed.

onermailliw

"More libby blather. Next. Has Obummer relased his tax returns back to 1986? the year he actually got a Social Security card. FactCheck. Org has Obummer registering for Selective service in 1984. How could he do that without a SS card? Hint -he can't and you didn't have to register in 1984. Duh"

While you're sitting on the internet, you might want to check your facts sometime. A quick perusal of the Selective Service homepage shows 2 things: That men 18-25 had to start registering for Selective Service in 1980 (which, by my math, is prior to 1984) and that one can register without a social security number - they simply must register at the Post Office or by mailing in a card. Pesky facts.

Umtigergal Great post!

No one with Romney's resources needs 4 extra months of extension for last years tax filing. What's he trying to hide in last year's return.

He showed 23 years of returns to McCain when applying for the VP job. Why only 1 (or possibly 2) return(s) for the top job?

Yes, Umitergal- what Smitty said!

And no- I've never been able to type.

(Sorry kids.)

Feisty

Ryan did not request the stimulus funds. Nor did he "accept them". They were written into the Stimulus plan anyhow. What democrats do is put some money into republican districts, so they can say "We gave you some money. Vote for us, we will give you more." I've seen it happen AND even though the republican didn't ask for the funds, then loyal patrons like you, can claim the republican lied.

DB in Akron: You either only listen to fox or you are as deceptive as the Romney - Ryan wanabees. There is a record of his letters asking for - requesting - the funds, with his signature, in ink! And he most certainly did accept it. Now, whether or not it was with one of those giant replica checks for PR purposes, we haven't heard yet. But he most certainly did! A LOT of Republicans played the "public outrage - please, please, please can I get some money" game. Next.

Cubs fan, obama released 7 years.....bite me

DB....too funny....videos showing Ryan asking for more stimulus money...documents and Ryan admitting he asked for stimulus money, and....more videos of him saying stimulus money was working.. audio telling callers he did not ask for any stimulus money( BEING A BALD FACE LIAR)and now once again admits he asked and took stimulus money....This guy lies as much as his moneymate!!!!

Feisty Redhead Roselle, IL

Can we at least have an honest debate here?

Willard's old man set the precedent when HE released 12 years of his tax returns...

Yeah let's have that honest debate. Why don't you start by explaining why this wasn't an issue when McCain only released two years worth of tax returns? Please be honest and admit it is just an excuse to change the subject so you won't have to talk about anything that has happened in the last 4 years.

http://firstread.nbcnews.com/_news/2008/04/18/4433200-mccains-tax-returns?lite

Why don't you start by explaining why this wasn't an issue when McCain only released two years worth of tax returns?

Was McCain running on his private business experience as a job creator? The disclosure of 7-8 years of full financial disclosure (both Mitt and Ann since he has a habit of hiding assets in her name) would go a long way in the eyes of the public... who he is asking to elect him to the highest office in the land based on said private experience... Romney has run from every aspect of both his private and public records when challenged. And no... we are not "just going to trust" him on any of it.

backwhiner..........Romney said during repub debates he would release them....uhhh...guess he lied to repubs too huh?...How could that happen, he is so honest!

Geez ya think when Romney documnets showed he worked at Bain, ran Bain, etc...and then he "retroactively" retired from Bain when caught, (Which means he was lying all these years saying he was at the helm of Bain with SEC docs to prove it) now changing his story saying he lied about Bain the whole time.

ROMNEY CAUGHT LYING AGAIN WITH OFFSHORE ACCOUNT IN LUXEMBOURG!

Documents show once again that Romney was head of Bain when he signed documents on his account. Now he is saying what he signed on those documents was a lie because retroactively he left the company. So Romney lied when he said he left the company, now he lies saying he wasn't with Bain when he signed documents. This is criminal!

@starsailing

backwhiner..........Romney said during repub debates he would release them....uhhh...guess he lied to repubs too huh?...How could that happen, he is so honest!

Don't be crazy. Romney would NEVER lie, he's a politician after all. LOL!

Thanks for admitting I was right and that you libs only want to change the subject because you can't talk about the full of @!$%# politician that you've got on your side of the ballot. I could care less what Mitt Romney does or says and I care about his tax returns every bit as much as I care about Obama's birth certificate, which is NOT AT ALL! All of you sheep on the right and the left are easily duped by the con men you keep electing but then you all sit and bitch about the status quo that YOU create. As if your guy is any more honest than the other LOL! Give me a @!$%#ing break!

Oh and "backwhiner"?? Really?? That's the best you can come up with? That is without doubt the most pathetic attempt at an insult by twisting my screenname that I've seen to date. Sooooo many possibilities with my name and you come up with "Backwhiner". That's really just incredibly sad. With your imagination I expected much better from you. LOL

In the Cayman Islands, Romney was listed as a general partner and personally invested in BCIP Associates III Cayman, a private equity fund that is registered at a post office box on Grand Cayman Island and that indirectly buys equity in US companies. The arrangement shields foreign investors from US taxes they would pay for investing directly in US companies.

Romney still retains an investment in the Cayman fund through a trust. Campaign disclosure forms show the investment paid him more than $1 million last year in dividends, interest, and capital gains.

In Bermuda, Romney served as president and sole shareholder for four years of Sankaty High Yield Asset Investors Ltd. It funneled money into Bain Capital's Sankaty family of hedge funds, which invest in bonds and other debt issued by corporations, as well as bank loans.

Like thousands of similar financial entities, Sankaty maintains no office or staff in Bermuda. Its only presence consists of a nameplate at a lawyer's office in downtown Hamilton, capital of the British island territory.

"It's just a mail drop, essentially," said Marc B. Wolpow, who worked with Romney for nine years at Bain Capital and who set up Sankaty Ltd. in October 1997 without ever visiting Bermuda. "There's no one doing any work down there other than lawyers."

[Why don't you start by explaining why this wasn't an issue when McCain only released two years worth of tax returns?]

As a U.S. Senator, McCains tax records were already a matter of public record, therefore the two years he did produce was the year(s) leading up to, and including, his nomination. Presidential candidates show their tax returns as a matter of GOOD FAITH, something Romney has failed to do.

It is not a good sign when Romney releases 23 years of tax returns to McCain, and McCain picks Palin.

If you claim that America deserves better by electing Mitt Romney, then it is your responsibility to demand better of your candidate.

After all, Conservatives are all about "responsibility", right?

How do you like the CEO treatment you are all getting from RoMONEY NO MONEY? This is 100% pure "Need to Know" CEO attitude from RoMONEY and Ryan. When Herr Cheney pulled this, it was the death knell for support for Bush. Treating Americans like they are dumb robots doesn't cut it anymore. Americans of the Middle Class have a distinct distaste for CEO attitudes in the White House. It's why the most aggressive, hostile, right wing CEOs like the Koch Brothers, Adelson, Rove and Ricketts so detest the idea of a President who acknowledges the rights of individual taxpayers.

Think seriously about RoMONEY and Ryan's CEO "Need to Know" attitude...At the moment, it only concerns their taxes. If God Help Us they are elected, that "Need to Know" CEO BS will cover EVERYTHING they do while in office. This is how they get to command the tides of where your tax dollars will go.

Ryan is the worst hypocritical liar in office. He bashes earmarks while earmarking tons of tax dollars for his state. He bashes stimulus all while he took stimulus money for his state...Typical Me, Me, Me..First CEO attitude...The cream goes to the guy at the top and the whey to the slugs paying 99% of the taxes...the Middle Class. So..vote for a Republican..You already had 2 CEOs for 8 years and saw what the repercussions of that mess is.

@ewent

How do you like the CEO treatment you are all getting from RoMONEY NO MONEY? This is 100% pure "Need to Know" CEO attitude from RoMONEY and Ryan. When Herr Cheney pulled this, it was the death knell for support for Bush.

I like it a lot more than the President using executive privilege to hide information regarding the death of a Federal Agent. Compared to that this is absolutely nothing. Funny how you libs make a mountain out of a mole hill while at the same time pretend you don't even notice the actual mountain.

Anyone who hasn't read all 203 pages of the taxes released doesn't have a leg to stand on in asking Mitt to release more (you still haven't received what he already gave you!)

By the way, Mitt goes by Mitt, not Willard.

In the same way that I refer to Obama as Obama, not Hussein.

Be respectful, it's a debate, not a platform for spewing fruitless hatred.

I am a conservative, but Obama is still my president so when I disagree, I do it respectfully. I don't do it to make a point, I do it because I am proud to be an American, and nobody on here is an animal, so act like Americans!

Paul Ryan, set the example for Mitt Romney and release at least five years of your tax returns, in full. Romney only released 1 and a half years.

To serve in Congress or the White House, for the sake of transparency, the House and the Senate set a rule by precedence for members of Congress and people serving in the Oval Office, that they would release, on the average, five years of their tax returns. For example, Rockefeller faced a congressional investigation by Judiciary and Administration Rules Committees in both the House and the Senate. So as part of the rules in order to demonstrate transparency and to potentially serve as Vice President, Congressional Committee Investigations, "twisted his arms," so to speak, and so Rockefeller voluntarily coughed up 7 years of his tax returns.

So here you have Romney, currently withholding from public view his foreign bank holdings; specifically, his 'Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts' statement from his 2010 returns.

The mandatory financial disclosures filed with the Office of Government Ethics says Romney's transactions with foreign entities is 55 pages long.

Why did he hide this part of his tax return from us?

Simply put, the evidence is suggestive that Mitt indulged in illegal tax evasion for a number of years.

The presence of Swiss trustees, Bahamas trusts, and Panama corporations would raise red flags with ANY tax authority. For example, a new Tax Treaty between the U.S. and Switzerland makes it illegal for Americans to avoid paying taxes by hiding their holdings in Swiss bank accounts.

No politician that has been found guilty of tax evasion has ever been allowed to serve, or continue to serve in Congress or the White House.

Sources:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/08/17/1121421/-Hey-MSM-Why-is-Rachel-Maddow-the-only-one-reporting-this

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/2012/08/investigating-mitt-romney-offshore-accounts

http://www.taxhistory.org/www/website.nsf/web/presidentialtaxreturns/

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=7884864&page=1#.UDAj56MpB5Y

Rcky...you can cry like a girl over gutter politics. Why don't you check your own side? Hmmm...college transcripts (not a matter of public record, by the way), birth certificates (notice the plural), teleprompters, the President is a Kenyen Communist Muslim...etc., etc.

Your side swims at the bottom of the septic tank and you have the nerve to complain about the smell??? Grow up and keep your own in check before you even start criticizing others.

The issue is NOT what Willard makes, that is pretty obviously alot. The issue is where he hides it and what he does with his money. If we can't trust him with his own finances how can we trust him with the nation's finances?

They DID release their records...when asked to..

Well Alder, duh is the answer here. If Mitt can effectively shield and protect his income from US taxes, he can do the same with the entire GDP of the US and store it in offshore accounts as well. With the creative use of blocker corporations, we will never get taxed. Also, though it is almost impossible, perhaps we can all have a $100M IRA, even with a max annual contribution limit of 2-30K. What, you want to know how it got to $100M even with such low limits? Nah, that is private info there. Trust him.

Would anyone posting on here, after losing a dollar, allow Romney to help you hunt It? Would any married male posting on here, allow me to help their wife pull Her panties on? Any who answer yes to either is a certifiable idiot.

they are not hiding how much they made, they are hiding the off shore accounts and tax shelters they use. they don't want you to know that as you paid your taxes they found ways to legally not pay. And while we are at it. where is Mitt ryan's and Mitt romney's birth certificates????????? The Long form please.

The thing that pisses you all off is they were able to keep more of their money LEGALLY. If you dont like the tax code find a way to change it. BTW corps do not pay taxes(I own my own business an s corp) and the corp doesn't pay taxes any profit goes agianst my personal taxes. Which if I didnt pay my accountant to find the LEGAL ways to keep me from paying a very high tax rate. I am going to have to reinvest over 25,000 this year that I really don't have to keep my income low enough so I pay outragous taxes. How many of you will have to do that? I am willing to bet most of you will get back well beyond what you pay in, that is what is messed up. I have no problem with using the tax laws to get back or not paying what is rightfully mine, but like it was stated earlier people are getting back thousands that they DON'T deserve.

So bitch and complain all you want about Romney's taxes, I am willing to bet he's done nothing wrong but it really drive you morons crazy!

The problem with your complaint is nothing in Romney or Ryans plan will affect those getting money back that don't pay in for things like earned income credit and such it'll simply soak the middle class by eliminating the few deductions we have left like our employer health care exemption and home mortgage deduction to give mostly to the top 1%. Romney can play his word games all he wants but he isn't concerned with small business and nothing in his plan will help them. But it will screw the middle class many on the right just don't know it or believe it.

No presidential candidate in histories past financial dealings were as muddy as Romneys. There's a difference between inherited wealth or that built with business success like creating a major company and a candididate like Romney with offshore shell corporations and dubious financial dealings.

Still waiting for Bush to show us where the WMD's are in Iraq.

@crisp-2520004#5.1: Holder showed 'em to Issa. Problem was, ole Darrel was blind drunk at the time. Sum-bitch just doesn't remember it. That's another problem with the gwaddamn republicans. Sons-a-bitches are either drunk or tight most of the time, except ole McConnell. That ole fart is just a natural dunce.

Not only does he take advantage of every available tax avoidance scheme personally, he also likes to do so on behalf of the companies he's in charge of. Son of Boss, anyone? T-Rex - you're correct that a lot of seniors and retired folks live on dividends and interest. However, most seniors don't have their retirement invested in blind trusts and shell corporations located in the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, etc. And most don't have Swiss bank accounts, either. I've spent some time doing tax work, and one of the first things I learned is that the more layered the transactions are, the more someone is trying to muddy the waters and cheat. You know the old saying - don't hate the player, hate the game. That is true in most circumstances, but when the player wants to be POTUS, he needs to be above board on ALL levels, and this is one circumstance where it's appropriate to hate the player just as much as the game.

I really think the question is this: Do you really want a person who constantly pushes the envelope with his finances, to the point of engaging in potentially illegal, and certainly unethical, financial transactions all in the name of profit, to be the leader of the free world? So Mitt, where's your FBAR form? Let's get a look at those for the 2010 year and the 2011 year (as soon as you have the return done)...

They made obama show his,,,,,,,it's their turn now.

Ok, Corporate Raider And Tax Cheat Willard Romney, and Tax Cheat Monster Paul "Throw Grandma into the street" Ryan, Where are your Tax Returns from 2000-2009? You know, the same ones that PRESIDENT OBAMA released? You know, the same Tax returns that Corporate Raider And Tax Cheat Willard Romney demanded President Obama release.

Oh I forgot, they may show that Corporate Raider Romney and Tax Cheat Paul Ryan have off shore tax havens and a lot more money hidden away than they want us to know about.

Typical

And thats my opinion.

Trex...funny how Romney had all computer info when he was governor wiped clean and all records wiped clean, same with the Olympics....hiding more criminal activity!!!!

Mitt is always hiding his tracks....thats why he has magic underpants....too hide his tracks....

Have a good weekend lisa!

Newday, Same to you.

barry would rather donate money from your pockets than from his.

"...Romney donated more in one year that YOUR president and vice idiot did in all three plus years they've been in office ... combined"

And get this- The dimwitt (Mitt) claims that amount as part of the percentage of what he paid in taxes. HEY Mitt- the final rate INCLUDES your charitable deductions, y' friggin bean-bag!

And this guy is running as a.....BUSINESSMAN???

One who makes 10 times as much as another could be expected to pay 3% more to charity. How much of each in terms of % was donated to charity. If you look at $$ only you get one result and if you look at % you get another view of it. If someone who makes a million a year gives 3 percent of their income to charity that would be 30,000, hardly going to make much of a dent in their ability to buy food, shelter or clothing. If someone only making 50K a hear give the same percentage that would be about 1200 but deducting that from their income could make a major impact on whether they can afford food, shelter, cloths or insurance premiums, for that matter.

Romney donated more in one year that YOUR president and vice idiot did in all three plus years they've been in office ... combined.

Giving to his church to buy real estate and other capitalistic ventures isn't the same as paying taxes.

This has nothing to with donations or even his wealth. Why is it that so many of you are deflecting to that?

Yes,and that is because he is a Mormon trying to buy himself a place in Heaven.Tithing does'nt count.The Witnesses and many others do the same and they call THAT a donation,and the MOrmon church is problably the most backstabbing capitalist,screwed up church in the country.Also..Mitt can afford it,Obama cant.

Wait! If Romney wins can i have more wives? OMG he is against gay marriage but it's ok by him to have multiple wives. lol The bible says "adam and eve" the morman doctrine says "adam and eve and sue and sharon and jane and....... That is simply anti-christian. how are the bible belt people following this demon?

@george pauljohn#8.6: Most of the men are grinning, some are stocking up with viagra, others walking around in public with obvious erections, some erect , but less obvious, and most of the women are doing a lot of whispering and giggling. Something sexual seems afoot.

Oh...stevie....bad news....Romney took away more money by his offshoringof jobs in one year than he paid in taxes and gave away to his church...........

@starsailing... For every job Romney sent to China, your president pays $1,000,000,000 in cash.

Its the debt he keeps adding and paying it to mother China in interest. Suckers.

sez...fox fake news huh? ahahahahahahaha hey do search on fox news dumber...see studies that show people who watch fox news are dumber for watching fox news!

Clarification: since many on this commentary seem to judge before they've studied.

The church Romney belongs to hasn't practiced plural marriage for over 200 years and when it did, that was only when commanded by God - if you believe the bible, you'll recall that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob also had multiple wives and such was also commanded by God in the same way - if you don't believe the bible, I invite you to try it, there's power in those books. Yes, there are different Mormons out there, Romney and I belong to the same church and I have never regretted it. But don't think my vote is cast so simply a person's regligious views, I don't care what church a person says he belongs to until I believe I can trust him, and his approach for a better country are logical and correct.

Charities: The Mormon church was the first emergency response to the hurricane Katrina victims, more than a day before the U.S. Gov't reacted (arrived). Because it wasn't done for applause, it wasn't noticed as much, but the victims noticed. The tithes brought in to the Church support such causes and help the organization to be prepared in order to respond quickly and appropriately to what we view the rest of the world (our brothers and sisters) to be in need of.

Taxes: Who in the world would offer to pay the government MORE taxes? LOL! Not me, I hire a tax professional to help me pay as little as possible, but I still pay the correct amount to honor the law.

REAL TOPIC: What are Obama and Mitt going to do about the economy?

Obama: We can't fix this, but we can make it better.

Romney: We CAN fix this, on day one I'll open up the Keystone pipeline.

I'm sure they wonder what he is hiding too. Poor suckers are hanging on, can't break ranks now.

If Pelosi runs for President then I'll care CubsFan. EVERY SINGLE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE for decades have released several years of tax returns, including Mittens own father. Why shouldn't Mitt?

Wow, a Cubs fan AND a Republican. how bad does your life suck? To answer your question, Pelosi dosent have to show her tax returns because SHE IS NOT RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT OR VICE PRESIDENT. I know its difficult to read and comprehend at the same time, but you should try it some time. You might actually learn something

Sean, why should the VP be held to the same rules as the President? Because he's only a heartbeat away from BEING President, right?

As Speaker of the House, Pelosi was a heartbeat behind Biden. Third in line. Two heartbeats, and one of them was that of Biden the dinosaur. I'd say she was close enough in the line of succession to be held to her own rules.

I want to see the tax returns too. Romney said yesterday when asked by a reporter that people are not interested in his returns. We are interested it is just very hard to get someone who is clapping there hands over there own ears screaming "I CANT HEAR YOU!" to actually hear you. Maybe we need to get some whiteboards of our own.

.......'There are 535 members of Congress. How many have released their tax returns? 17.'....

Jeezis! THAT Many? And, they are ALL running for the office of President??

WHO KNEW?

Allens...so true...If this had been President Obama saying he wasn't going to release anymore tax returns, the republicons would be all over him like a tight suit....The tea party and republicons are a bunch of hippocrites and need to be voted out in Nov in the House and the Senate....

They need to be given their own country so we can live in peace

LibbiesWill it go round in circles

everyone sing along:

I've got a song ain't got no melody, I'm a gonna sing it to my friends,

I've got a song ain't got no melody, I'm a gonna sing it to my friends,

Libbies go round in circles, whoo-hoo, Libbies fly high on koolaid and lies,

Libbies go round in circles, whoo-hoo, Libbies fly high on koolaid and lies,

We've got a President with NO morals, he's in bed with George Soros,

We've got a President with NO morals, he's in bed with George Soros,

Libbies go round in circles, whoo-hoo, Libbies fly high on koolaid and lies,

Libbies go round in circles, whoo-hoo, Libbies fly high on koolaid and lies,

I've got a dance it ain't got no steps, Libbies like to lie every chance that they get,

I've got a dance it ain't got no steps, Libbies like to lie every chance that they get,

Libbies go round in circles, whoo-hoo, Libbies fly high on koolaid and lies,

Libbies go round in circles, whoo-hoo, Libbies fly high on koolaid and lies.

Romney/Ryan 2012 (real hope and change) No more dope and chains

badger...flying high alright......don't eat the green stuff on the cheese badger!

@starsailing

your ship is sinking, rats are bailing and leader Jim(Obama) Jones says "Drink up, the end is near"

Badger1

With the above post I believe you have opened the door to your obscurity. Bravo on achieving your destiny.

I'm with you - as a constituent in Ryan's district, I can tell you he's done absolutely nothing for the people of this district. The only reason he's been re-elected so many times is because he's not had any serious competition before. It's not because he's actually made a positive contribution to the people.

josh: really, man??? You need to stop watching fox and regurgitating their made up "facts". It makes you look not very bright.

What are you smoking?

Obama has had 26 straight months of growth. Certainly not as fast as we'd all like, but with the GOP obstructing every jobs bill he puts out there, it's not hard to figure out why it's going so slowly.

And if you want to talk about debt, Obama is the LOWEST spending president since Eisenhower. Bush II was the second biggest spender behind only (drumroll) Ronald Reagan. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!

really first off we all know msnbc only shows you what they want you to see where fox news doesnt and actually i like msnbc more than fox second off obama has added jobs but no where near enough and thats why the unemployment rate went up in July smoke that @!$%#. second obama rather give illegal immigrants a chance at jobs then American people.

German, better check your facts. GWB outspent Obama by more than 2:1. Obama is one of the lowest spending presidents since WWII. Look it up.

Bush got 8 years to mess up our country. Logically, statistically and mathematically speaking it takes twice as long to clean a mess as it does to make it. Obama had a BIG mess to clean and 4 years is certainly not enough. I think if we let Mitt Romney into the White House he won't clean anything up he'll just do what he did in Massachusetts which was tank the jobs rate so bad (they were 47th in jobs the year he left) that people started moving out of the state.

Elk, what on EARTH are you talking about? Obama has spent nearly 6 trillion dollars in 3 and a half years. Bush spent a bit over 5 trillion in 8 years.

Obama is outspending Bush over time by nearly 250%. Look up your own stats before advising your betters to do so.

Obama spent more in 3.5 years than Bush spent in 8. US DEBTCLOCK.ORG

Not that difficult when you leave two wars, Medicare Part D and No Child Left Behind off the books.

At least Obama had the balls to add it to the national debt.

lol Josh, you cracked me up, you're a comedian, right? No person in there right or left mind would write what you just wrote unless it was for comic relief. Trying to lighten up the conversation here? Well you did it.

Yea Josh what ARE you smoking?..Have you seen the stock ticker lately? Obama's right the private sector IS doing well...

yea right we will see let obama be re-elected again that's all i got to say.and everyone here who bitches about putting money away to not have to pay taxes i guarantee everyone who is bitching about it would do the same damn thing if they had that king of money and for all you that say no your all liars cuz you would everyone acts like obama doesn't put money away some where every rich person with that kind of money does it im willing to bet all rich people do if they have that kind of money one of the guys that co-founded facebook dropped his us citizenship so he wouldn't have to pay taxes no one makes a huge deal out of that but if someone runs for president does it they are unpatriotic really. if you all had millions of dollars you would put it in tax havens so the government would tax you less.

There goes that quasi fraulein carping about the debt clock again. It's a metaphor, and It's broken, mein fuhrerness. Long as there's republicans in Congress the owner of that clock will never be able to keep enough digits in the damn thing to reveal any accuracy.

Cubs you are an arrogant twit if you think anyone here is better than anyone else. Try to take a class in civics in the coming school term and learn something about being an American and respecting your fellow citizens.

guess what if obama gets re-elected we wont have to worry about what anyone paid as there tax rate cause we will all be jobless.

Then we will be in the same place as the 8.7 million people that George W. Bush's policies threw out of work. You know, the man that was promising all those jobs as the result of his tax cuts. It didn't work then, ain't gonna work for Romney/Ryan either.

As for their health care plan, I remember promises from Bush about health care, too:

Medicare Advantage was started under President George W. Bush, and the idea was that competition among the private insurers would reduce costs. But in recent years the plans have actually cost more than traditional Medicare.

Republicans: we couldn't believe them then and we certainly shouldn't believe them now!

I had no idea Nancy or the others were on the Presidential ballot.

I forgot the part where whoever releases more years tax returns wins the election.

Or whoever pays the highest income tax rate, yet has the smallest net worth wins. Seems everyone wants candidates to pay a high rate of income tax, yet complain when candidates actually have assets. Seems a rare combination. Unless you are an obscure senator who signs a book deal...which generates income, make a real estate deal with a crook...then start building your wealth.

Anyone griping about Ryan being worth a few million....just look at Obama, similar net worth. Duh.

lakerman2....funny how Ryan loved his social security but doesn't want anyone else to have it!

Greg Vick - it is easy to understand why they are in this percent they are paying on cap gains! Which is lower - he has already had his salary taxed and what he did not pay to the government he invested and monies earned are taxed which means he has been taxed twice. Both Romney and Ryan had paid more than most people do in a life time.

If you want to be in this percent then invest your money. Everyone screaming about his (Romney's tax returns are the same type of loons who were screaming for Obama's birth certificate) Romney paid what he was suppose to pay when he was salary and Obama was born in the US. We need to move on America has more important issues than this silly back and forth.

Voting is the American way. If you do not want Romney Ryan in the white house then vote Obama Biden or your choice to sit at home should they win will be the same as if you voted for Romney Ryan outright. Or you could vote Green Party or Independent. The vote is less effectual but it shows that you are American. The only reason why we are the nation that we are is because we vote for our leaders. Our leaders must have our approval unlike a monarchy or a dictatorship. Here in America we chose so go out on November 6th and chose.

AmandaKay, you really need to work on your spelling, grammar and syntax. Perhaps you are typing too fast, since you are so excited about cheerleading for the current adminstration? Perhaps you are Rachel Madow's pseudonym!? She's a piece of work.

You are on drugs Romney may have paid taxes at a lesser percentage rate than you but the dollar amount is far more than what you will ever make in your entire life. The CPA that filled out his taxe forms crossed all the t's and dotted all the i's giving him deductions on what he was due by tax law. If you had done with your money (peanuts) what Romney did with his you to would pay at a lower rate. Anything illegal I am sure the IRS would be all over his returns and the CPA's that did them like stink on s--t. So get over it Romney has done nothing wrong. If you don't like it have them change the tax laws I am sure the rich would love a flat tax. Then everyone would pay yes everyone even the 51% that pay NO TAXES.

What about 3rd grade multiplication do you not understand. Your "big" percentage times your AGI = very small number. His 15% (which is probably Long Term Capital Gains) times a very big AGI = very big number. That's how percentages work. And, that's why a flat tax makes all the sense in the world. Do you complain when someone buys a very expensive item and pays the same percentage Sales Tax you do? Guess what - they pay a whole lot more tax than you do. Sales taxes are flat taxes.

Pretty simple choice here. You see how the rich gave Ryan and Romney these tax breaks so all these rich people pay lower tax rates than you. So who do you vote for? Ryan and Romney who want to give themselves even more tax breaks and remove capital gains taxes and make you pay higher taxes to cover what they won't pay?...Or do you vote for your self intersts and the nations and Vote for President Obama and Biden and the democrats who will change the laws back to where everyone pays their fair share?......DUHHH!!! Of course you need to vote for yourself, fair taxes...Obama/Biden 2012!

31% of Romneys income was taxed as carried interest. It's a special rate of 15% like capital gains except it's a special tax exemption that's only for hedge fund managers and vulture capitalists. It's the commission interest these businesses earn on all investor profits. All other people who derive their income from commissions pay standard tax rates. See what happens when you elect these people? They create their own tax exemptions. It'll be even better with a vulture capitalist as President he can cut the top rate 30%, lower taxes on all those that mostly affect his class and raise the little peoples.

Romneys plan to cut the top rate will give the average 1%er over $260,000 lower taxes. His lowering capital gains will slightly lower rates on other classes but the 1% will reap 85% of the tax benefit. His elimination of the estate tax will go almost entirely to the wealthy. Only 1.9% of people who die have assets greater than the current 5 million cap.

Missy - do you know how many people file extension that do not even come close to what Romney or even Ryan's tax returns are like? You have no idea how he files his returns with him being in congress he may file married but separate or they could be waiting on just one document that has not come to his tax preparer. Not everyone can file a Ez form.

If one story changes your mind I doubt that you really looked at Romney/Ryan at all - If someone has made a mistake either by a goof or on purpose then no one wold ever vote.

The 2010 returns he released are not complete and the 2011 year has not been released yet. It's just unacceptable! The 2010 returns show "What is legally required." which means he has ONLY released what he legally showed the government. The taxes paid to the Caymon Islands, Bermuda and Switzerland for his 2010 returns he did not show anyone. That money is not recognized as US funds so he has not said anything about it at all. Think about that he could have millions or billions of dollars in Swiss Accounts he is paying Switzerland taxes on and not the USA. He also could have accepted IRS Amnesty in 2009 when the IRS gave up trying to hunt down felons who were hiding money and gave people with money in Switzerland the chance to claim it in taxes and stop hiding it. If Mitt Romney took the Swiss Amnesty it means he was a felon and the IRS gave him a promise not to charge him for the felony if he would just declare the money and be honest with it. There is no real way to know this unless Mitt Romney releases his taxes from 2009! That's the year he seems most afraid to admit to. John McCain saw his taxes from 2007 down 15 years when he was vetted for the VP in 2008. John McCain not saying anything right now is a bit concerning too. If Romney had paid taxes and did have nothing to hide McCain could verify it without Romney having to say it himself. McCain has stayed suspiciously quiet.

Why does Mr. Romney need an extension? Because he'a running for President? President Obama is running for re-elction and he filed his taxes.

Missy - you just answer what I have been trying to say for the past few weeks most people have no clue what it takes to do a tax return like his nor have many people even seen them- Do you have any idea what it is like to do someones tax returns the size of Romney's? I doubt it - I have seen something like his but never the magnitude as his. First off he does not do his own (which we can both agree) I am almost sure the people who do his return gives his people a list of everything that they "might" need in order to fill out the return and that is not done in a few days. His deductions and charities alone I would bet one person has to go though them to make sure that they are legit.

After everything has been received it must be sorted and looked over not once but a few times before it can even be considered as a deduction or write off. He also has cap gains which is another animal all together and you and I both know that any loopholes (legal) that are available are applied (if your tax guy did not take advantage then you would fire him/her).

I doubt that just because he is running for president that it is taking a while I bet you that every year it takes a long time. All of you on the left are not stupid and we all know this is just smoke and mirrors (said this before) to not take about real issues just like the birth certificate.

Bree-14, stop looking for justifications and look at the situation rationally. First, a lot of people, like myself, don't particularly like the idea of a president who makes hundreds of millions from the American economy and offshores significant amounts of it to places that are known little else than being places to hide your money. Tax havens! If Obama had money in all of these places you people on the right would be trying to impeach him on nothing more. It would be more ammunition for you to use in all the birther stuff. But these two candidates have not only made a career out of being caught in lies, Romney even on his taxes while running for governor, yet his word is good enough. Why? He's already proven that he'll not only lie unapologetic-ally, but we know very well he'll lie about his taxes to get into office.

Ask yourself honestly, if Obama was in Mitt's shoes with massive offshore accounts and the reluctance in releasing tax records in the same fashion as every other politician, would not really be a concern to you then? And Obama doesn't have the record of outright lies trailing behind him either.

Braincandy - if it is his money then I would say the same thing it is HIS money and it is not against the law - and most president do make loads of money look at the Kennedy's money for example and how they came to gaining their monies. Not trying to justify it just stating fact - I would rather have a president who knows about the ecomony than someone who is learning on the job. I have never called for Obama to be impeached no matter how much I disagree with his policies.

Like I said people on the left are makig hay out of nothing just like the right has done with the birther business - Amercia has some real problems and Romney's taxes are not one of them. When you grow up around people who work for the IRS and ATF you pickup a think or two.

Loads of people hide their monies legally and in this day and age I can not help but blame them.

Stop making excuses, Bree. If you've been around IRS folks you should know the first rule of thumb for an auditor: If there's a lot of layering to an individual's transactions, they have a reason for it - THEY'RE TRYING TO HIDE SOMETHING. It tells an auditor that they need to dig a little harder. Unfortunately, the way the audit game is now, there's not enough time allowed for an agent/auditor to do a thorough, quality audit. But you should already know that - right??

@Bree-14: Stop with the insults! You are as full of sh^t as a constipated Whale! What silly and assumptive patronization!

Tbirdlady - not everyone is trying to hide something and most people in the business can spot a problem within a seconds they are very well trained - if Romney is hiding anything any they would have found it after 10 years. Not making excuses just like I did not make excuses about the birth certificate (yes I believe it is real). What cracks me up is if he is tying to hide something then he is not very good at it if just anyone can just blog it just like Reid and his "source".

Why not argue on his policy or better yet on Obama's record? Romney has given all the records he is required to give and that should be good enough just like Obama has given all the records he is required to give in order to be vetted.

Those of you who are all upset about Romney not given more than 2 years of returns are not planning on voting for him any way - so why the fuss?

As for the audit yeah they are pretty fast you have no idea how fast they are finding the smallest mistake in a matter of seconds - they also go after the preparer before they go after the taxpayer - but you should know that right- as they (tax preparer) are bond by law when they sign their names that they have filed according to all tax laws.

And I'm sure that you're well aware of the disclosure rules within the Service. If the Service had found anything, it certainly wouldn't be public knowledge. And yep - the agents/auditors are good at finding things pretty quickly. But the focus has changed in the last few years - they're not looking at what's on the return so much as looking for what's not there. Smelling the money is name of the game now, and that takes time - a lot of it to do it right. Plus, every return has to be evaluated in terms of its economic reality. Sometimes that's easier to do than others.

As far as the preparers go, you're a bit incorrect about that. It takes time to build a preparer case with audits of several clients and multiple years of returns in order to establish a penalty case that will hold up in the event of an appeal. You don't just go after a preparer right out of the gate based on the examination of one return - multiple years or not.

As for your question - why the fuss? I damn well want to know and expect that the POTUS is above board, especially when it comes to taxes. Everyone in this country is expected to pay their fair share - and while it may not be illegal for Romney to engage in these sorts of financial activities, it's definitely unethical. I personally don't want to see a financially unethical person as the leader of the free world.

Birthers.....THE WHOLE NATION IS LAUGHING AT YOU...not with you.......Bree...give me a list of your buddies hiding money to avoid paying taxes, I want to get the 5% whistleblower fee IRS gives to whistleblowers who turn in tax dodgers...I got $10,000 plus this year by doing that!.

Claiming the complexity of his returns is why he delays releasing them doesn't really wash does it? No one said he had to release the last 2 years returns just that he release more prior returns. How about 2002 through 2009. That would be plenty.

As for audits, there's only a 7.9% chance of an audit for even the richest taxpayer. Theres a better than even chance he hasn't been audited in the last 7 years.

Mac Forester - I never once called any of you names and you sir are the reason that so many people on this site have gotten a bad rap. I am not on this site often and those I have spoken with have been very nice and understand what a debate is without name calling. It is a shame that you have to stoop to that level.

Starsailing I never said I knew of anyone who is hiding money if you got that from what I said you might want to read it again...I said I am sure that there are people who do this andare on both sides. What I was laughing at is that if he is hiding money he did not do a good job as everyone seems to know about it.

When one runs for office you bet that they go through his returns with a fine tooth comb.

Tbirdlady there is a department I am sure you have heard that look for monies that should be there or in simply terms follow the missing money.

Larry you just proved my point yet again Romney's returns I bet you anything are the size of a small phone book and very few people would even understand them - I know I would not and for that matter IF there is something there we will find out.

It seems like that most of you are not going to vote for Romney and you are so sure he is not going to win so why all the fuss? All candidates give what is required and that is that, so why whine about it. Would I like for Obama to open up more about his life sure I would but that is just not going to happen - and I am o.k. with that - like the song said you can't always get what you want.

@Bree-14: You were not debating. You were casting unrealistic assumptions as fact, possibly out of ignorance, that people like Romney require much more time to file a tax return due to the huge amounts, complexity, and magnitude of the deductions relative to the return. Such is flat out wrong. Even if it is, It would have nothing to do with His past returns. As you said about those who criticize Romney for His refusal to release his tax returns, you were offering your version of claptrap to justify your intent to vote for Him. You want to vote for Him? Fine. Just say so. Not necessary to tell those of us who aren't, we are misjudging Him because we don't understand His problems, then post claptrap to prove it. When you do such you become worthy of name calling.

Mac Forrester - I was only speaking of Romney's last two returns no more - many people file extensions for what ever reason - most do it because of not having all their paperwork in the hands of the people who do their returns or there is something that is needed to complete the form - I have had to file one a few years back because I could not find a statement from a mutual fund (I had moved and they sent it to the wrong address). How is that unrealistic? Not everyone rushes to file their returns.

Romney has had problem in the past when one of his prepares put down wrong information on his return and had to go into federal court and explain why he messed up (bet that guy no longer does his returns). As I am sure that you know there are two returns that must be filed state and federal and those are not whipped up at the blink of an eye.

I am sure you have never read any of my post and I have not read read any of of yours and yes I am a Romney supporter (this is not great surprise for those who I have spoken to in the past on this blog) like I take from the little bit of what I have read you are not and guess what that is is ok with me, but I would never call you a name nor insult you for your opinion. Even though I do not know you I do respect you as a fellow American. I do not always agree with many of this blog but each and everyone of us have the right to voice what we think is right. From your post I take it you are an Obama supporter and I even thou I am not I will fight tooth and nail for you to have that voice even if I do not agree like I did with the birther issues. I am just sad that you do not feel that I have that same right.

And yes we were talking/debating that that just because he does not have his is forms done he is hiding something.The debate is his not releasing more tax returns that is not required - it is as simple as those who do not wish to release other parts of their records.

@Bree-14#16.16: Of course I support the President. While I do stand by my statements in contention with yours, I, in no way disrespect you. Best regards

Bree: Sorry, I didn't prove anything for you. As I stated providing returns from earlier years is what I'd prefer to see. Clearly having to delay to release the current returns to meet the minimum requirement of 2 years returns just makes me believe he's hiding something. Limiting himself to releasing returns he knows will be released might not look anything like returns in years he knew would be kept private. Submitting returns he knew would be made public as his father stated could be manipulated to make a candidate appear better than they are. I want to know what kind of a man who would be POTUS really is.

In 1967, Michigan Gov. George Romney set the bar high for tax disclosure by presidential candidates. While running for the Republican nomination, he was "badgered" by a writer for Look magazine to release his most recent tax return.

Romney refused. Releasing a single return wouldn't prove anything, he told the magazine's senior editor, T. George Harris. It could be a fluke, or even a cynical manipulation designed to make the candidate look good. What really mattered was how a candidate managed his personal finances over the long haul.

"Stumped by his argument," Harris wrote in the magazine, "I was not prepared for the move that it eventually led him to make: He ordered up all the Form 1040's that he and Mrs. Romney had filed over the past 12 years -- including those profitable ones when he saved the American Motors Corp. from bankruptcy and became a millionaire on the company's stock options."

...."What I want to see is BO's school records,...."

As Radar O'Riely used to say....... "ah, yes. That's HIGHLY significant".

How are you sure they pay a lot? What is "a lot"? Are you ok with a capital gains rate that is lower than most income brackets? Do tax rates matter to you at all?

Stultifying false equivalence and racism

Have you seen Romneys school records? He hasn't released them, why is that?

Obama is a bright man, after all, he discovered 7 states no one else knew we had. Here they are in no geographical order:

1. State of consciousness(Obama can't locate but knows it exists)

2. State of confusion (v.p. Joes residence)

3. State of emergency(U.S. citizens if Obama is re-elected)

4. State of coma(v.p. Joe visits here often)

5. State of shock(Obama after election day, my favorite)

6. State of Welfare(Obamas favorite)

7. State of FAILURE(Obamas accomplishments)

Obama still can't figure out why his budget proposal got voted down 97-0. After all, Math is hard!

Yesterday I could not spell President, today I are one. way to go Barry.

Obama leave the math to the adults: Romney/Ryan 2012

Mitt Romney has no policy, Paul Ryan has a LOT of recorded policy. Mitt Ryan introduced Paul Ryan as the next President not Vice President. I think it's safe to say Paul Ryan is being attacked because the man is the real brains of the Republican Ticket and Mitt Romney is just the appealing case it is being presented in. Bush/Cheney was the same way. Cheney was supposed to find Bush a VP and Cheney chose himself then proceeded to be the real brains of that operation. Remember how fantastic Bush/Cheney was?

Actually quite the opposite. None of Romney's positions have changed so the argument about them is no less relevant. It's just that Ryan's baggage is turning out to be more excessive than most ever imagined. 7th day as the VP choice and he's been getting caught in lies at a rate of more than 1 per day. Only a republican can spin that into a positive outlook for the coming weeks. I think that republicans who've now started doubling down on even more ways this past week to hinder voting by continuing to make even more changes to voter laws shows the real effect of adding Ryan to the ticket.

I'm curious what are impressed with? He constantly contradicts himself in ways that many people would define as outright lying. An Objectevist Catholic? That is not possible. He refuted the stimulus then outright asked for stimulus money to create jobs. He wrote the Sanctity of Life Act while saying his moral views were defined by a Russian Atheist who told people to not vote for Ronald Reagan as he supported banning abortion. Paul Ryan even made reading Ayn Rand a requirement of being a staff member or intern in his office and this week he claimed to not know Ayn Rand's philosophy. Ryan wrote a Budget Bill twice and each time it took the same amount of money out of medicare that Obama's Act takes from medicare but Ryan's proposal cut the money entirely while Obama's moves the funds from Medicare to the Medicare portion of the Affordable Care Act essentially moving the money from one file to another within the same office. Ryan attacks Obama for the $716 million medicare "Cut" and then does not say he himself wanted to do the same thing only worse. Which of these things do you like?

I always though it curious that Ryan was raised a Catholic and yet an Ayn Rand follower. Mittens is as well. As mentioned before, Ryan also received Social Security Survivor Benefits after his father died. Funny his family was well to do and yet the family benefited from a government hand out? Curious guy that Paul Ryan.

stop please

I always thought it was curious that Obama claims to be Christian and yet sat in the Church of hate listening and worshiping Rev. Wright for 20 years. Curious guy that Barry Obama.

You do realize if you are under 18 and a parent(s) die you are entitled to Social Security benefits until the age of 18. Of course you already knew that. Just because you are a hard working family does not always mean you are well to do. Obama claims you did not create that yourself, someone else did.

Badger: First Ayn Rand was well known from writings decades ago, not due to Paul Ryan or Mitt Romney, but to her (as I see it) unAmerican beliefs in superior humans and downtrodding of those, you know, the tired, the poor, those yearning to be free, and inferior by her standards. Anyway, Rev Wright's tirades were released to the public solely due to the Obama family attending the church. He never came out with a belief supporting eugenics. Hardly a comparison.

As far as Paul Ryan receiving Social Security benefits as a teen and college student, is it a case of "I got mine to heck with the rest of you"? He received help (apparently when needed) and is one of the group that is determined to eliminate that same help for others. You don't find that distressing? I do.

And, no, he didn't get to his position by himself. He was assisted substantially by the funds from Social Security Survivor Benefits.

Great points on Paul Ryan, a person in fact who perfectly fits the mold Rev. Wright was correctly railing against in his famous sermon. If you haven't read it in full you need to do so. The theme of the sermon is that IF America doesn't behave in a godly fashion then in fact we WILL NOT be blessed by God. It's a difficult thing for any honest person of faith to disagree. Here is the FULL text to the session used so successfully by Conservatives in sound bite. It makes clear his meaning;

And the United States of America government, when it came to treating her citizens of Indian decent fairly, she failed. She put them on reservations. When it came to treating her citizens of Japanese decent fairly, she failed. She put them in internment prison camps. When it came to treating her citizens of African decent fairly, America failed. She put them in chains. The government put them in slave quarters, put them on auction blocks, put them in cotton fields, put them in inferior schools, put them in substandard housing, put them in scientific experiments, put them in the lowest paying jobs, put them outside the equal protection of the law, kept them out of their racist bastions of higher education and locked them into position of hopelessness and helplessness. The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law, and then wants us to sing “God Bless America.” No, no, no. Not “God Bless America”; God Damn America! That’s in the Bible, for killing innocent people. God Damn America for treating her citizen as less than human. God Damn America as long as she keeps trying to act like she is God and she is supreme!

http://www.sluggy.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=315691&sid=4b3e97ace4ee8cee02bd6850e52f50b7

Badger: "Obama claims you did not create that yourself, someone else did"

Romney said it first at the 2002 Olympics. At best that makes them both wrong, right?

ROMNEY: You Olympians, however, know you didn’t get here solely on your own power. For most of you, loving parents, sisters or brothers, encouraged your hopes, coaches guided, communities built venues in order to organize competitions. All Olympians stand on the shoulders of those who lifted them. We’ve already cheered the Olympians, let’s also cheer the parents, coaches, and communities.

Yea I ikno...I wish I could pay a 13%tax rate...mine was around 27%

Bill: The better question is why do they need to pay less? If people making the amount that Romney and Ryan make are only paying around 14% in actual taxes what would they be paying if they lower the top rate from 35% to 25%?

Guess the same way it happened for Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi.

Same reason why people voted for him, Ryan is a scheisser he spreads the manure thick and does it with such a convincing grin most people don't bother to think logically about what he said they just go along because how could a guy "like that" be wrong? The man made reading Ayn Rand a requirement for all interns and staffers. Going into Janesville is a bit like driving into the belly of the beast he's been poisoning the well down there for years! Spreading Rand's word and getting people to believe that her Objectivist morality of capitalism is a conservative value and not a fallen child of communist extremism. He is the kind of person who picks and chooses what he likes out of a book and throws the rest of it away. Many people read the Bible like that and they are not at all very Christian people. It seems impossible to me that anyone can find a ground where they can marry Catholic values from the word of Christ and Objectevist values from the word of Ayn Rand. The two concepts are complete polar opposites! Frankly I've thought the man was insane for years.

What god appointed you to judge others? It wasn't GOD.

It's plain that you didn't even read the Cliff Notes on Atlas Shrugged.

dawn v -- I've worked since I was 11. In one of my jobs I spent 10 years defending the freedoms of scumbags like you just so you could type crap on the internet. Now I asked an honest question. If your to dumb to be able to rationalize your support for this guy maybe you shouldn't comment these boards.

Research the IRS Tax Exdtension. It's perfectly LEGAL. If YOU paid taxes, you could get one.

Amanda: But it's perfectly fine to have another multi-millionaire as a president, and it's fine if that multi-millionaire has worked diligently to keep all of his records sealed. No college papers, transcripts, writings, thesis, admissions records, college financial records, passport records, or explanation of how he has an SS number that is from Connecticut when he was born in Hawaii.

No, you wouldn't be curious about any of those things would you? Of course not.

But I will give you this: If Romney was smart, he would go on TV holding up copies of those tax returns liberals are frothing at the mouth about, and then tell Obama he will release them as soon as Obama releases all of the records I mentioned above. I bet Obama would shut up about Romney's tax returns really fast. But I don't think Romney has the guts to do that.

I'd like to see those Romney tax returns as well. I'd like to see Obama's records even more.

Oh, and for the record, I'm not a Romney supporter. I'll be doing a write-in.

Conserv, in 2010, Romney made more than 10 times Obama's income! Yet, Obama pays 26% tax rate and Romney only 14% tax rate! That is a huge difference!

Romney, making 21 million dollars in 20110, could afford to pay his fair share in taxes, but he paid the same percentage as a typical middle class American making 60K-80K per year. Get it? Romney is making 280 times more in income than the typical middle class American, but paying the SAME tax rate! ...and to make matters worse, Ryan's plan calls for middle class to pay more taxes, just so the super wealthy can pay less. Still, there is not balancing of the budget.

Obama has shown his tax returns several years back. You can find all documents online.

Romney has only shown 2010 and promise to show 2011 before the election - but Romney refuses to show pre 2010 tax returns, thus it is obvious that Romney cleaned up for the 2012 election. I find this behavior highly suspicious. Your suggestion to look into Obama's young (as a student) private life is not on the same level as asking a Presidential candidate, like Romney, for his tax returns, during his adult life. Let us see if Romney paid taxes as the American law intends for them to paid, or if Romney pushed the law into the gray - I bet he did - and that is why Romney don't want to show them.

And Ryan cannot outshine Romney, so Ryan does what Romney does - shows recent cleaned up returns....and I still say: Where are your tax returns Romney - 15 years back - let us see. Edwards smelled fish back in 2008. Romney smells fish in 2012.

I'm a moron. I've been paying 35% for years. I need these guys in office now to show me how it's done.

Conservativenotrepublican: Hopefully you do realise that neither Romney nor any past president or candidate has ever released any school records nor prior to Obama have any questioned the need. Some school records of Bushs were released to embarrass him but not by him and doing so was a felony. Why do people like you not see the absurdity of demanding president Obama release information that Romney hasn't? Obama has released 8 years taxes, Romney hasn't nor has he released his school records. Sounds like Obamas ahead.

You are a true idiot if you actually believe Mitt Romney hasn't paid any taxes at all. The IRS would have been all over him like flies on poop if that were the case. Especially the crooks who are in charge of it these days. Personally I am still waiting for Obama to "cough up" his college transcripts. Two years of Mitt Romney's tax returns is still TWO YEARS MORE THAN OBAMA'S OWN COLLEGE TRANSCRIPTS. This President is the biggest hypocrite our country has ever seen. For the first time in my life I am ASHAMED OF AN AMERICAN PRESIDENT.

Comparing recent tax returns to 20 year-old transcripts is a silly comparison. This is as dumb as the birth certificate nonsense, which did not end well for Trump and other birthers.

As for Romney not paying ANY taxes. Well, we don't know, because he won't show us. What I do know is that General Electric had something like $3.5 billion dollars in revenue last year, and their CEO was on TV back around April 15th defending the fact (he did not deny it) that GE paid NO taxes on those billions in revenue. Why? They employ an army of tax lawyers that are good at finding loopholes. Even if Romney paid some taxes, the odds are good he did not pay what reasonable working people would think is fair. And he probably has tax shelters overseas that would not look good. Face it, Amerigirl, Romney has something he does not want you to see.

Has Romney released his college transcripts. He did receive two degrees from Harvard...allegedly.

Well, EC, you said it right there. TAX LOOPHOLES. Who created those loopholes? CONGRESS, that's who. I am sure President Obama used those same loopholes. He would be stupid NOT to.

BTW, what would be fair? What would be a "fair" percentage of tax? 10%? 20%? 50%? 75%? Back when the top percent bracket was around 75%, there were some really outragous loopholes. I pay around the minimum, with very few loopholes. I paid around $4,000 in 2010 and received around $800. I owed my state (Iowa) an ADDITIONAL $7 on top of the state taxes I already paid. In 2011, I was deployed for half the time, so my return was unusual compared to other people who make what I make. 2012 will probably be close to 2010. Politics is a dirty business.

Most of you are wrong! You're confusing effective tax rate with marginal tax rate. On the Ryan's 2011 return, they paid an effective tax rate of 20%, but their marginal tax rate was 28% alternative minimum tax (AMT). (If you factor in the phaseout of the AMT exemption, their marginal tax rate was actually 35%!) So, stop comparing your marginal tax rate with the Ryan's effective tax rate. P.S. it's nice to see the Ryan's donated almost $13,000 to charity in 2011.

Excellent post, thanks for the breakdown on his tax rate. Not that this will help change the minds of those on the left that see Ryan and Romney as evil regardless of what they do, but for those of us that understand how to budget and pay taxes, these two are the real candidates. And I hope they clarify for the American People what is really going on in Government.

Kerry, A Democratic Candidate in a past election, very wealthy big time 1%er, didnt complain or make comments about his fiscal worth! Did he ever pay his taxes of did state Mass. confiscate his yacht?

Decibella: Your position encompasses in a nut shell what is wrong with liberalism. Listen to this and hear it well:

The damn Federal Government, and the POS tax code we have does NOT EXIST to make things "Fair" (hear the word "fair" in as whiny a voice as you can) GOT THAT? The tax code is to fund the functions of government, NOT to make liberals feel better about themselves because it gives them a sense of power by being able to take something someone else has.

What a pathetic existence liberals lead. Always sitting around wringing their hands worrying if the putrid Federal Government is taking enough of what someone else has earned. It makes me wanna vomit!! How much more meaningless a life can someone lead to than incessantly obsess over what someone else has that they don't. Liberals are master of that trait.

EC, Larry: It's really funny that the same logic you use to demand Romney's tax returns suddenly is not applicable to Obama when it comes to his records.

It's really quintessential liberalism. Every situation must have it's own set of rules formed for the support of a single argument. That same set of rules can not be used for any other argument because of the likelyhood that the set of rules formed for one argument will completely contradict the rules for the next argument.

That is EXACTLY what you just did, and I'm laughing my a$$ off about it.

By the way, it is not the grades I'm looking at, it's the other information contained on the forms that I want to see. You can bet that there is something there Obama does not want seen. Funny how you only apply that logic to Romney but not Obama. As I said, I want to see Romney's returns too.

But whereas I'm being consistent, you're making excuses at to why Obama should get a pass.

Its those Pesky little Double Standards again!

No, it is not about Double Standards as much as it is about Hypocrisy being promoted by the Left.

CNR, hate much? Let me ask one question;

Should we not fund the government in a fashion that can be perceived as fair? You seem to be arguing that as long as the government is funded we have no right to fairness.

But even in that you're wrong. The government is NOT funded...not even close. Since tax breaks given preferentially to those at the very top of the economic pyramid over the last 30 years are a big part of that inadequate funding it is only logical to reverse that. Trickle down hasn't worked. It didn't work in the Roaring 20s, when it only resulted in an enormous economic bubble that collapsed into the Great Depression. It didn't work in the Robber Baron days of the late 1800s, when a series of economic panics impoverished huge numbers of people, leading to the Grange Movement and the birth of modern Liberalism.

So take your demands for President Obama's proctology exams back to the wingnutosphere where they belong. Those of us who wish to vet candidate Romney have only one simple request...pony up the same level of tax information that has become THE NORM for presidential candidates. It's something that was actually pioneered by George Romney. Clearly Mitt isn't the man his father was.

John B: Only if you define "hate" as objecting to the government using the tax code as an excuse to confiscate the wealth of someone simply because they were successful. If that's the definition, then yeah, you're damn right I hate a lot.

The only role of fairness that the government has any obligation to perform Constitutionally is to ensure a level playing field for all. That is not done via the tax code.

The only fair tax is a tax that is paid in the same percentage by all. The person making ten million is still paying far more in taxes than the person making ten thousand. But when the left says "fair" they don't mean fair or equal percentage, what they mean is an arbitrary number set by someone else that will determine how much someone gets to keep of what they earn.

The government is NOT funded...not even close

On this we agree, but the problem is not taxes, the problem is spending. You could take every last dime of everyone making over 500K a year....every dime, every asset, every house, stock, bond, savings account, everything, and it still wouldn't cover even the deficit of over one trillion for this year alone. That's just for THIS YEAR. That doesn't even include the 16 Trillion official number, much less the 100 plus trillion in unfunded mandates.

But now, you've already taken EVERYTHING the rich have. What are you going to do next year? Take it all again? And if so, how long before those that know how to produce wealth, just pack up and leave? You gonna stop them from doing that too?

I don't exist to serve the state. I am NOT the personal ATM of the Federal Government. America is NOT the Federal Government. My world does not revolve around worrying if the Federal Government is taking enough of what someone else made.

Get back to Article 1, Section 8, of the Constitution and start limiting spending to those 18 enumerated areas. If the states wish to do more, then they can figure out a way to fund it, NOT the Federal Government.

Why doesn't, GE, GM and the likes pay taxes on the BILLIONS they have earned?

First of all, if you define needed provision for the infrastructure required to support a modern society as "confiscating the wealth of someone just because they're successful" I'm probably going to have little success speaking to you from a world where the sky is blue and the ground is down.

Secondly, since you believe government has no obligation to be fair you must be open to the concept that government is capable of making the wealthy even wealthier. That's certainly been the case since the days of Reagan. http://www2.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html The question, then, is why the majority should tolerate a system that's rigged against us? THAT is what Conservatives fear more than anything...that enough of realize we're being screwed by the Right and demand a stop to it.

Next, "the problem isn't revenue, it's spending" is just a Conservative talking point, meaningless and empty. Republicans have in fact created virtually our entire debt problem. http://zfacts.com/p/318.html Without the "Reagan Revolution" our WWII debt would have been entirely been paid off years ago. GW Bush made it even worse by building in such a systemic debt that eliminating the entire non-defens, discretionary budget WOULD STILL LEAVE US A DEFICIT. So much for Republicans being the party of "fiscal responsibility."

Now, on to your Conservative talking point that we could take everything the top 1% owns without covering the deficit for a year...that's simply a lie. Total US personal income was nearly $13T in 2011. http://bber.unm.edu/econ/us-tpi.htm Of that $13T the top 1% were paid 50% (!!) or $6.5T. That is a staggering amount of money!! In point of fact the top 1% not only makes more than 50% of income but controls 90% of all wealth.

You lost the "enumerated powers" argument with the Louisiana Purchase. That doesn't make you some slave of the state, it just makes you a whiner with a FYIGM complex. Deal with it.

Where is your demand for Harry Reid to show his??? He is one of the wealthiest Senators in office and started with basically nothing. How did he aquire all of those millions??? Oh tharts right, you dont care because your a hypocrite liberal.

And let's talk about Pelosi, Kerry.