Symmetry required it: 2012 american general election thread #2

Unless this is all build-up for his eventual book How To Not Pay Anything In Taxes The Mitt Romney Way

http://redstaterevolution.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/dvdevery.jpg

so i trolled NRO a little. i wrote a brief description of myself (editing out certain details):

I'm a father, husband, and son employed in a small family business. I am religious, and deeply concerned about the economy and foreign affairs (particularly the threat that nuclear Iran represents to Israel). I live in a swing state (kinda - PA). I, and almost every other employee in my company, plan to vote for Obama.

i got a big response! here are some choice responses.

Gees, for a minute there, I thought you were a reasonable, responsible guy...then I read your last sentence and my bubble was burst. Dare I ask why? Or do I really already know the answer?

I'm a father, husband, and son employed by a Fortune 100 company. I am religious and deeply concerned about the economy and foreign affairs (particulare the threat that nuclear Iran represents to Israel). I live in a swing state (NC). I and almost everyone I know won't be voting for Obama.

Get worried yourself, hypocrite.

So you like having your money stolen and you want to force more people to give up what they have worked for.

I would tell you that you are an idiot, but I suspect that you already know.

I'm a OWS organizer, a welfare layabout, and an illegal immigrant. I am an atheist, and want to smash the capitalist system. I am deeply concerned about whether it's OK to use the term "illegal immigrant". I live in a swing state. I, and almost every other member of my anarcho-syndicalist commune plan of voting for Romney.

Get worried.

(Hey, if he can invent a backstory for the purposes of drama, so can I.)

I particularly like this last one bc it assumes that no one fitting my description could possibly vote for Obama in reality. This is true epistemic closure - the inability to imagine another POV that might meet one's approval regarding lifestyle but not regarding politics. Anyway, I thought it was interesting. Obv there are things I could've mentioned that would make my position more understandable (like if I mentioned I was Jewish - 80% of whom are expected to vote for Obama despite otherwise having many social-economic conditions shared by Republicans - or if I mentioned I had a graduate degree, also a high correlation to left wing voting patterns).

I'm seriously excited for how Harry Reid will respond to Mitt's 2011 tax release.

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/romney-artificially-inflated-2011-taxes-after-decrying-idea

Mitt Romney's trustee said in a campaign press release that Romney artificially inflated his own effective tax rate so it would remain above 13 percent by deferring $1.75 million in charitable deductions. Romney had previously said that none of his last decade of tax returns dipped below that 13 percent threshold.

In an interview with ABC News in July, however, Romney dismissed the idea that he would ever pay more taxes than legally owed, saying if he did so he wouldn't be "qualified" to be president.

"I don't pay more than are legally due and frankly if I had paid more than are legally due I don't think I'd be qualified to become president," Romney said. "I'd think people would want me to follow the law and pay only what the tax code requires."

Did they honestly think revealing this would be better than not

maybe he'd prefer talking about his taxes to talking about the 47% video

there's been theories ranging from voter fraud to assets in iran to yr standard money in caymans/switzerland to boring old tax fraud but even if these don't bear fruit the headline at best is 'romney releases tax returns' which looks like capitulation and further panic and more likely the headline is 'romney rich as fuck, paid lower rate than avg american' which makes him further look like part of the problem, not the solution. if somehow the media acknowledges that he paid a lower rate than eitc earning leaches and maggots still pay in payroll taxes than it hurts him more.

then again maybe internal polling is showing alot of ppl bought reid's 'romney doesn't pay taxes period' trolling, in which case something is better than nothing

pwc is notarizing the summary - figured they'd HAVE to get some kind of credible source. still such a stupid move.

at the same time why release it on a friday? fridays are for news dumps. but why try to discreetly bury something you've made a point of not releasing and don't have to release at all? or if yr polling is telling you you need to release but discreetly maybe wait for a friday when yr tax rate isn't going to play into the recent narrative against you? ie last friday when you rattling yr swords at half of north africa and the middle east?

the idea of distracting people from a current albatross around their neck by waving a previous one is just stunning

what is the average tax rate for Americans anyway

are they just trying to distract the sunday shows w/ some shiny keys? do they think the sunday shows matter that much at this point?

it's just his '11 returns; reid was trying to bully him into, what, 10 years worth? maybe this is an attempt to call the tax return thing over and hope nobody gets the difference.

sorry if somebody said that already

To repeat a point made earlier, he said he'd release his 2011 taxes 'when they became available', ever since he released his 2010 taxes. This is just... oh look! A puppy!

the summary thing won't even shut up reid - there are still so many x-factors and curiosities. if you have a secret vault, and someone says "i hear there are dead bodies in there!" having an accounting firm announce they found no dead bodies WHILE STILL REFUSING TO LET ANYONE SEE YOUR VAULT only calls attention to your secret vault.

I'm just glad Obama hasn't been hiding thing anything important from 2009-12

heavens! tell us what you know, and when you knew it

tempted sometimes to go on baseball threads and write "it's all bullshit" every day or two

ha, i see some conservatives are going conspiratorial about this:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/21/eurozone-greece-report-idUSL5E8KLKQ320120921?type=marketsNews

BRUSSELS, Sept 21 (Reuters) - An EU-IMF report into whether Greece's debt is manageable looks set to be delayed until after Nov. 6 because policymakers want to avoid any shock to the global economy before the U.S. election, EU officials and diplomats said.

...

"The Obama administration doesn't want anything on a macroeconomic scale that is going to rock the global economy before Nov. 6," a senior EU official told Reuters, adding that previous troika reports had also slipped.

The European Commission's representative on the troika, Matthias Mors, denied that the report could be delayed, and an official at Greece's finance ministry said he had been assured that there would be no slippage.

A U.S. official said the United States had made clear to European officials that it wanted to avoid any "downside" economic surprises because of the fragile U.S. recovery, but denied that it had anything to do with the U.S. election.

...

But one source said EU leaders' motives went beyond macroeconomic stability. They also had political reasons to avoid rocking the boat before the U.S. election.

"As far as European leaders are concerned, they don't want Romney, so they're probably willing to do anything to help Obama's chances," said the source, an EU official involved in finding solutions to the debt crisis.

The problem for Obama is that if Europe's leaders are seen, implicitly or otherwise, to be working to bolster his reelection chances, it could provide ammunition for the Romney campaign.

European leaders have repeatedly been accused of acting too slowly and in a confused way to resolve the crisis, with a knock-on negative impact on the United States. If they are now seen to be allying with Obama, it could dent his popularity.

bud selig has a secret kill list

Well, if Netanyahu can stonewall to hinder Obama (he thinks/wishes) and that's OK with the GOP, then they can damn well swallow Hollande and Merkel manoeuvring to Obama's advantage a teensy-weensy bit. I'm sure even David Cameron, who is a loathsome right-wing class bigot, hates Romney. That trip in May did *not* go well.

stonewall ??

haaay

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/OTUS/netanyahu-obama-backing-romney/story?id=17289324

Man I read that URL wrong.

Leaving my own opinion of Bibi very much aside, the GOP seem to think he's got it in for Obama and that's just FINE with them. When the shoe is on the other foot, maybe, someplace else, not so much.

Obama paid 19% in 2011.

Any such glee over bibi's semaphoring must be formally denied by both sides as so much misguided media chatter. However, they will do whatever they can in off the record remarks to encourage such chatter.

lol typo

http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2012/09/chris-wallace-doubts-peggy-noonans-conservatism-136283.html

In an interview with POLITICO today, Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace questioned Peggy Noonan's "conservative bona fides," following her recent editorials criticizing of Mitt Romney's campaign.

"Peggy Noonan has bashed George W. Bush, based Mitt Romney, wasn't crazy about McCain. So, [her] conservative bona fides I'm not sure I take too seriously," Wallace told POLITICO's Patrick W. Gavin. "[Columnists] like Peggy Noonan, sometimes they're New York City's idea of conservatives."

#based

Peggy Noonan, sometimes they're the Beltway's idea of a person.

welp

http://www.mittromney.com/blogs/mitts-view/2012/09/note-trustee-brad-malt

Regarding the PWC letter covering the Romneys’ tax filings over 20 years, from 1990 – 2009:

In each year during the entire 20-year period, the Romneys owed both state and federal income taxes.

Over the entire 20-year period, the average annual effective federal tax rate was 20.20%.

Over the entire 20-year period, the lowest annual effective federal personal tax rate was 13.66%.

Over the entire 20-year period, the Romneys gave to charity an average of 13.45% of their adjusted gross income.

Over the entire 20-year period, the total federal and state taxes owed plus the total charitable donations deducted represented 38.49% of total AGI.

I was just reading a Maugham bio the other day and when he was sent to the US to try and propagandize us into the war (subtly 'cause it was illegal!) he privately noted that there were Republicans he met who encouraged or remained impassive to anglophobia in the US since they perceived that FDR was an anglophile and they were still smarting from losing in '40. The whole "politics stops at the border" may be good poltical rhetoric but it's utter balderdash and always has been. (Jay vs Jefferson) The only letter I ever got published in a newspaper (old!) was a reproach to Clinton for encouragement for Peres against Bibi in the elections for PM. I think it pernicious and blowback-worthy to mess with democratic nat'l elections and I think if Bibi is seen as too obvious, it will be very bad for Israel in the long run.

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mao0j5TPqq1qzpxq3o1_500.gif

(not mine)

#basedromney

Herman Cain would like to remind you that he told you so.

Herman Cain jabbed Mitt Romney while talking to the Gainesville Sun saying that he would have been doing better if he was the Republican presidential nominee, claiming he'd probably have a "substantial lead" on President Obama at this point.

Said Cain: "The reason is quite simple: I have some depth to my ideas."

Symmetry required it: 2012 american general election thread #2

hm?

DJP posted that link this morning.

oh whoops

2 nits about the otherwise lol (i think) new yorker article: cain's statement about planned parenthood isn't baseless (sanger was ragingly pro-eugenics and PP was supposed to be instrumental there) and there's nothing inaccurate about mitt's star spangled banner statement, unless i'm missing something?

the idea of distracting people from a current albatross around their neck by waving a previous one is just stunning

― da croupier, Friday, September 21, 2012 2:47 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

srsly u spend months wishing people would stop talking abt the tax returns and now they have

"The Romneys’ generous charitable donations in 2011 would have significantly reduced their tax obligation for the year. The Romneys thus limited their deduction of charitable contributions to conform to the Governor’s statement in August, based upon the January estimate of income, that he paid at least 13% in income taxes in each of the last 10 years."

Lol at his own campaign phrasing it this way

YOU CAN'T MAKE THIS STUFF UP

and fuck his 'charity' - its mormon tithing.. if you dont pay you're not a member in good standing.

giving charity is giving charity no matter what 'compels' you

like on my shortlist of things i like about romney, being generous w/ charity is one of those things

I'd like to know if any of that mormon charity went to the flood of mormon money that went into California to fight prop 8.

yeah I kind of don't count giving to religious institutions as "charity", particularly when those religious institutions are money-grubbing rightwing asshole-machines