Tonight's guests:
- Chris Hayes, host of the MSNBC weekend morning show "Up with Chris Hayes," and author of "Twilight of the Elites: America after Meritocracy"
- Karen Finney, MSNBC political analyst and columnist for "The Hill," former communications director for the Democratic Party.
And here's executive producer Bill Wolff with a look at what's to be covered. And by the way, Jimmy McMillan, the "The Rent Is Too Damn High" guy, was running for New York governor (you'll see what I"m talking about): ...cue soundtrack
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SCHEDULE B
(Form 1040A or 1040)
Part iii
7a
At any time during 2011, did you have a financial interest in or signature authority over a financial account (such as a bank account, securities account, or brokerage account) located in a foreign country?
No __X__
Where did Sankaty go?
http://whateverworks4you.blogspot.com/2012/07/dear-mr-romney-what-about-global-tech.html
When I was back in my private equity days, we went to China to buy a factory there. It employed about 20,000 people. And they were almost all young women between the ages of about 18 and 22 or 23. They were saving for potentially becoming married. And they work in these huge factories, they made various small appliances. And as we were walking through this facility, seeing them work, the number of hours they worked per day, the pittance they earned, living in dormitories with little bathrooms at the end of maybe 10 rooms. And the rooms, they had 12 girls per room, three bunk beds on top of each other. You’ve seen, you’ve seen them? And around this factory was a fence, a huge fence with barbed wire and guard towers. And we said gosh, I can’t believe that you, you know, keep these girls in. And they said, no, no, no. This is to keep other people from coming in. Because people want so badly to work in this factory that we have to keep them out.
Is this Global-Tech?
Is this the future that Romney envisions for the American Worker?
Am I just grasping at straws?
Am I the only one that sees this connection between Global-Tech, the Chinese Factory, and the disappearing investment in Sankaty?
Off topic I must say I find it astounding how the right sees the use of Professor in regards to Warren as a slur. I gues they truly hate educated people. I see no common sense in treating knowledge as a bad thing myself but then I am not a republican.
This also is off topic, but have been listening to discussions many times of how George Romney was born in Mexico. How was George Romney qualified to run for President if he was not born in the US?
he was born to american parents.
The same as Barack Obama. Even if he was born in Africa, his mother held a US passport, thus giving him citizenship where ever she was when he was born. The birther racism is that the 14th admendment was passed to over rule Dred Scott and was meant to protect African-Americans. It doesn't apply to Obama.
The question that dogged George Romney in 1968 was that his grandfather had 'self deported' his family from the Arizona Territory in 1885 to escape persecution for having five wives.
Regarding Mitt Romney's 47% video, I am wondering why nobody is discussing what I see as the biggest news out of it--Mitt Romney is admitting that there is no reason to vote for him, other than the incentive of a tax cut bribe. "If they don't pay taxes, they don't care about the tax cut, so they will never vote for me." Of course.
That letter from PWC is very interesting, and can be construed to mean almost anything. Here are the problems I have with it after a five minute read, and without even looking at the 2011 return:
1) In general, whenever someone uses percentages where actual numbers would be more appropriate, they are trying to hide something.
2) "Each year during the period there were federal and state income taxes owed." Big deal. If he paid $1 to the IRS and $1 to some state, this would be a true statement. It is meaningless drivel.
3) "The lowest of any annual "effective federal personal income tax rate" for any year during the period is 13.66%. As you requested, we computed each annual "effective annual federal personal income tax rate" as total taxes owed divided by adjusted gross income as shown on the federal income tax returns as prepared." A couple things are interesting to note here. First, they use "total taxes", which includes the self employment tax (social security and medicare taxes for those people who are employed by someone else), which he derided as not really being a tax in his infamous 47% remark. In fact, it is likely to be almost completely self employment tax. Consider someone with $10 million of investment income, $10 million of business losses (such as you might get from leasing out your Gulfstream part time) and $200,000 of speaking fees, resulting in net AGI of $200,000, which could easily be completely offset by deductions for charitable contributions and real estate taxes. Their "effective tax rate" would be in the range of 13-15% (of the $200,000). Without knowing the dollar magnitude of AGI, this statement is meaningless to anyone who has ever prepared a complex tax return.
4) The average of the annual "effective federal personal tax rates" as computed based on the returns as prepared during the period is 20.20%. This is a derivative of a derivative. Anyone remember the Triple A rated mortgage bonds that blew up a couple of years ago. They got their rating based on calculations like this. An average of meaningless numbers cannot give you a meaningful number any more than combining a pool of ultra low grade mortgages can give you a bunch of high quality investments.
5) The statements about state tax rates are as meaningless as the ones about federal taxes.
6) What is with the terminology talking about the rates on "the returns as prepared"? Were there later audits that modified the statements? Were there aggressive positions taken on the returns that had little chance of holding up on audits that never happened? Did he have returns prepared that weren't filed? Or is PWC just saying that they only prepared the returns and gave them to Romney, and therefor they can't make any statements about what happened to them after that? Given the rest of the misleading statements in the letter, I am disinclined to give him the benefit of the doubt.
7) The average of the average rate he gave to charity was 13.45%. I'm no expert on the Mormon faith, but I do understand that all members are "required" to give 10% of their income to the church. Interestingly, to my knowledge, they don't define income, but rather depend on each member to truthfully come up with the number. I doubt things like tax shelters, overseas accounts, deferral strategies, etc. are meant to be taken into account. I wonder if Romney tries to pay his church the minimum number he can argue and not a penny more, or whether he does a completely separate calculation.
8) "Total federal income taxes owed, total state taxes reported[why reported and not owed?], and total donations deducted during the period represent 38.49% of your total adjusted gross income for the period." Again, without the details, this is just a pile of meaningless numbers combined together.
The bottom line for me is that it is apparent that this letter is intended to convey a scenario that is completely different from what is actually in the missing returns. If this weren't the case, he would have released the returns, a long time ago, or at a minimum this letter would have used dollar figures and not percentages.
The other thing that most people don't understand is that it is almost impossible to really audit a return such as Romney's. The aggressive positions are almost never on the individual return. They are buried several levels deep in partnership and other business returns. To do a proper audit, you would need to audit every one of those entities. Additionally, even if you do an audit, you are fighting every step of the way with attorneys and accountants whose function is to delay you and point you in the wrong direction, give half answers or statements such as this letter that are factually true, but meaningless (it depends on what the meaning of "is" is). Even if there is an adjustment, to a guy like Romney it is just a loan from the government with a slightly higher than normal interest rate. This makes it reasonable to take every aggressive position, even if it has only a 5% chance of surviving if it went to court, because at a minimum you can use it as a bargaining chip in settlement negotiations.
Chris, Rachel, did you know that Brad Malt has a large home/land holding in Peterborough NH, just 12 miles from Rachel's mother-in-law?
if his aveage payment is 20 %, and he paid 14% in 2011. Then he must have paid 26% one time during the 20 years to arrive at the stated average.
I wonder when he paid this amount. I'm going to assume they had to go back 20 yrs, just to get the numbers where he paid a high enough percentage to bring it up to he stated average percentage.
i bet if you just took the last 10 years (and not 20 yrs), his average payment would be alot less.
Obama will have a tough time in Florida with older voters in spite of his avowed protection of Medicare and Social Security. That's because a lot of those older voters are also Jewish, and the Republicans have done a good job of painting Obama as anti-Israel. Do any of the polls account for that? I grew up in a town that was 70% Jewish, and I can tell you that support for Israel was the biggest single vote-getter for prospective office holders.
Opened this one by accident. Sorry
Obama will have a rough time everywhere. What can he run on? I paid $5 a gallon today in San Diego. The middle east is burning and this administration just spent $70,000 on a apologetic add to run in the region, unemployment is skyrocketing despite the stimulus, the "fast and furious" cover up is now being exposed with two justice officials being fired, obama care is crippling our economy. Americans will be able to stop the madness soon at the poling booths!!!
What does "apologetic" mean and what advertisement are you referring to? How is the Executive Office the United States responsible for gas prices? How are they even remotely tied? Has unemployment gone up or down since Obama took office? How is the Obama Administration responsible for what takes place in other countries? How was "Fast and Furious" a cover up? How is it being exposed and what do the officials being fired have to do with this cover up and exposition? Was Fast and Furious an operation that took place under Obama or under Bush? How is Obamacare crippling our economy? How will an election change these things? Provide evidence for all of your claims.
So why do you blame Obama for high gas prices? Even the Republicans in GW Bush's day said the president has no control over gas prices. It's disgusting now how no matter what it going on, it's Obama's fault. It the republicans cared about our country they would quit taking recesses, obstructing everything the dems do and work towards getting this country back on track. I fully blame them for the majority of our problems. Even with all the money they are throwing at the campaign, they still can't pin down a win. Thank God!!!
All I heard last year was the DEMS are tring to divide the people. Tring to split the country. Just what is it when Willard say " He doesnt care about the 47% . Just who is really tring to divide the country into ?
where is the new 47 percent video? Did you go time-heavy again? Or did I miss it when I went to the bathroom???? Somebody guide me to it :)
Why is media not focusing on what is likely the REAL reason Mitt is refusing to release more tax returns?? This video shows:
If you have to vote for a "cult" member the country would probably be better off it you voted for Charlie Manson!
If you have to vote for a "cult" member I would rather take my chances with Charlie Manson!
Seems that no one has jumped on Ann Romney's interview Friday when she said, "Yes, Republicans everywhere consider themselves very lucky to have someone as clearly competent as Romney for their candidate now." Is this not the epitome of arrogance?