Mitt Romney released his 2010 tax returns, and says he'll eventually disclose his 2011, at which point we're simply out of luck. At least for now, he refuses to even consider making additional information available.
George Will said over the weekend, "The cost of not releasing the returns are clear. Therefore, [Romney] must have calculated that there are higher costs in releasing them." That's true, but it's also obvious -- of course he knows he's taking a hit, so he clearly believes this embarrassment is less severe than the embarrassment that would come with disclosure.
The next question, then, is why Romney refuses to do what even his allies have urged him to do. There are competing explanations, and CNN's Erin Burnett noted some of them in a segment last night, concluding with the possibility that the Republican presidential candidate might be, as she put it, "stupid."
Clearly, answering the question is speculative for those of us outside Romney's inner circle, but I think there are probably five main possibilities to explain this strange secrecy.
1. Romney may not have paid any taxes. As Kevin Drum suggested yesterday, "[T]here are probably multiple years in which Romney paid no taxes at all. This would very definitively be a Bad Thing, so he really doesn't have any choice but to take the heat instead." This would also apply if he paid almost nothing in taxes, thanks to various tax-avoidance schemes.
2. Romney may have made even more money from Bain. Before his "retroactive" retirement, Romney made "more than $100,000" a year from his firm for, according to him, doing absolutely no work whatsoever. But as Michael Tomasky noted, we don't know how much more than $100,000 he made in compensation. If it's significantly more, that could be awfully embarrassing.
3. Romney may have had to pay fines. If he tried to skirt American tax laws in the past and got caught, the returns might show penalties, fines, and/or back tax payments.
4. Romney may have additional offshore investments. We know about the shell corporation in Bermuda, the cash in the Caymans, and the Swiss bank account because of the one year's worth of returns. If Romney considered himself an International Man of Mystery for a long while, there may be other foreign holdings he'd prefer to conceal.
5. Romney may have taken some problematic deductions. Did he give money to controversial charities? Did he take deductions on his family's fancy horses? Something else?
Of course, it's worth noting that these aren't mutually exclusive -- the returns, if we ever see them, may include some combination of these concerns, or perhaps even all of them.
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Romney, in 2002, according to his SEC filing, received "Over $100,000" from each of FIVE different Bain entities.
We don't know how much over. And we don't know about 1999, 2000, 2001, all from the time he had no responsibilities for Bain, et al.
We also don't know if he gave back the over half-million dollars for 2002 after he retired in 1999 retroactively. But, shucks, that's not much money when he reports 48 million in income for another year. We also don't know how many millions he made in dividends and distributions from all those Bain entities he had no responsibility for.
Yes, Romney should release his tax forms. Then, so should President Obama be willing to release his 'Total' school records. There are so many items in these records that could be for or against his being reelected. Also, how could a student and two of his friends afford to take a trip half way around the world.
So "Tricky Mitt" says we should celebrate success and prosperity. What better way for him to celebrate than to let us all throw some confetti over his tax returns. We can toast to dressage horse deductions and hundred million dollar IRAs.
I bet you wonder how Mitt could get $100 million in an IRA? How about stealing the Defined Benefit Pensions (Deferred Income like an IRA) with Merger and Aquisition schemes. This comes from the investigative Reporter Ellen Schultz "Retirement Heist" that explains how Bain and others, thanks to an accounting rule change in 1981, right after Reagan became President with the help of Investment Banker Donald Reagan of Merrill Lynch, opened up the door to Defined Benefit Pension plans (deferred income for retirement that Corporations received a tax writeoff of the contributions since WWII) that allowed the Corporations to raid those DB funds.
So, how is it, Bain and others with "Downsizing, Rightsizing, Merger and Aqusitions, Leveraged Buyouts, and other takeovers, got to the Pension funds. The "Accounting Rule" change allowed the Executives of Corporations access to the Defined Benefit Pensions in violation of the law. (Ellen Schultz explains this in her 10 year investigation in "Retirement Heist".
The Corporate Executives raided the plans for "boosting Profits" to "Boost Stock Prices" which the Executives were paid 90% in stock. They also used the employees defined benefit plans to create "top Hat" Supplemental Executive Retirement Plans for the Corporate Executives that they never contributed to with wages, that fell outside the defined benefit rules and IRA contribution rules of $6000 annually.
Bain identified Companies to take over, after determining the value of the employees Defined Benefit Pension Funds.
Here is an example, Dade Company was taken over with $85 million from Bain and Goldman Sachs. The Executives (paid 90% in stock) were the main receivers of the $85 million. Then a CEO and Board of directors were put in place by Bain to drive the Dade company into bankruptcy over a 60 month period(a guideline as not to be too suspicious). Downsize key employees (customer satisfaction goes to heck), sell as many assets and use the Defined Benefit Pension fund to pay back the $85 million takeover loan, fire the employees, throw pension fund obligation over the fence to the Pension Guarantee Corp(taxpayers), and bankrupt the company. In this case, Goldman Sachs and Bain made $280 million Profit.
How did they do that? How do you drive a Company into Bankruptcy and make $280 million Profit? Answer; the Defined Benefit Pension funds
In 1985, the assets of the USA according the the Federal Reserve was $80 Trillion.
Pension Reserves: $10.3 Trillion.
There were 128,000 defined benefit pension funds covering Millions of employees established right after WWII in 1985. Today, there are 26,000 defined benefit pension plans (Federal, Military, Public Employees, Unions, and Congress) worth $2.6 Trillion.
Not all of it went to Bain but other companies like IBM used the "DB fund" to boost profits as did most of the Fortune 500. Human Resource Companies "taught the Corporate Executives" how to "steal the DB plan funds" nationwide skirting the law.
So, how did MItt Romney wind up with $100 million in an IRA? He converted the Defined Benefit Pension plans of the Companies he took over to an IRA. (Both are tax deferred and that way, he avoided paying taxes and has the "miracle of Compound Interest".
You can confirm this with the Ellen Schultz book "Retirement Heist".
After the Defined Benefit depletion and raiding was compete by the end of the 90's, Wall Street and the banks looked around to see what other Asset they could raid. How about Home Equity?
Home Equity according to the Federal Reserve in 1985, $10.7 Trillion. Then came the housing fraud, the liars loans and loss of over $3 Trillion in Home Equity(might be more than that).
The "Shadow investments" of Derivatives, Credit Default Swaps, Collateral Obligation Swaps, were vehicles to "hide the theft" of those assets. There is no transparancy of these investment instruments so pushing DB plans through them is not a problem).
The Bottom line, most of the savings of the average American has been robbed by Banksters like Mitt Romney.
We need to bring back the Glass-Steagall, Incentivize Corporations and individuals with higher taxes like Denmark to help make the lives of Americans improve instead of this drive to "Become the Richest in a Poor Country".
We have done it before, we just need the will and the right people in Congress and the White House and the US Supreme Court to make it happen.
It is not Mitt Romney or the Republican Party that will make it happen. They got us in this mess.
Romney's tax returns? WHO CARES?! Where are the Fast and Furious Documents, Obama? What happened to "the most transparent administration?" This, like just about everything MSNBC whines about, is just an attempt to distract people from how lousy a president Obama has been.
"WHO CARES?!"
The answer to your question is the great majority of Americans. I just saw a poll where 75% of voters wanted Romney to release his tax returns. That includes many conservative voters. Also, many Republican politicians and commentators have called on Romney to release his tax returns. We all know he must be hiding something pretty bad to prefer to take this heat instead.
That should read a majority of voters 56% to 34% want Romney to release his taxes. The 75% comes from another poll saying 75% don't care how rich Romney is, they just want to know what he's hiding.
http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattlepolitics/2012/07/17/surveys-message-to-mitt-show-us-your-taxes/
A very important point is that the only two years for which Romney will release tax returns are the two years during which he knew he would be running for president and they would come under scrutiny. Romney has said he will only release two, but why do we have to wait for the 2011 returns to be complete before he will release the second one? If he only wants to release 2, why can't the second one be for a year that's already complete, like 2009? The only answer is because the returns for the two years he knew he would be running for president are cleaned up--and even they contained questionable things. And the ones from before he knew his returns would come under scrutiny are damning.
Romney has a thousand pound albatross called Tax Returns" hanging around his neck. Until he let's that baby go, nobody will be paying any attention to anything he or his pals have to say. Romney's refusing to release his tax returns to the voters, is one of the few genuine scandals of this political season. The American voter has rightly seized on it like a bone, and wont be letting go until Romney's tax returns are taken out of hiding.
Romney just hasn't grasped the reality that the decision of whether or not to release his tax returns is no longer in his hands. Release of his tax returns has become the tipping point on which his election succeeds or fails.
Highly unlikely but another possibility is that Romney is holding out to misdirect the left into chewing on the wrong bones of contention. In other words, there is not much embarassment in his withheld filings, but he is doing so to make everyone wonder what he is hiding. Later when he discloses more years, the liberal speculations will be ridiculed by the GOP megaphone. This would be a cunning maneuver, but not something Mitt has been known for.