For all you forensic accountants out there, here’s the link to James R. Perry and M. Anita Perry’s 2010 tax return. 2010 tax return
From Houston Chronicle Blog 1
Taxes also were on the agenda of the Perry campaign late, late last week as Team Perry released Rick and Anita Perry’s 2010 income tax return at the end of the afternoon last Friday — after much of the Washington press corps had taken off for the weekend.
Ah, such a wily coyote. Doesn’t he realize that while he takes weekends off, the rest of the world is hard at work, scratching out a living?
The Perrys, who received an extension to file his 2010 return, reported $222,292 in total income.
There were a few other interesting tidbits. Texas’ first family paid a penalty to the IRS for unstated reasons. They also declared a capital loss on the sale of a rental property in Bryan-College Station. (Gig ‘em.) The Perrys also had some farm income, but not enough to require a detailed explanation.
Follow along below the tax loophole for the interesting stuff...
I’ll leave it to you do delve into the details. What interests me as a student of hypocrisy is how very little our Secessionist-in-Chief and his whiny wife donate to charity.
Houston Chronicle Blog 2
Gov. Rick Perry reported his largest donation to church since he became governor on his 2010 tax return, giving $10,000 to Lake Hills Church in the year before he announced for president...
Perry — who, with his wife, has put faith front-and-center in his presidential run — had previously reported giving a total of $14,243 to churches and religious organizations from 2000 to 2009, tax records show.
His largest previous donation to church was in 2008, when he gave Lake Hills Church $2,850, from an adjusted gross income of $277,667.
Perry’s church giving has come under scrutiny because of his emphasis on his faith as he seeks the support of evangelical primary voters, since many evangelical leaders support tithing, in which church members give 10 percent of their income.
Perry’s staff has said he began attending Lake Hills Church after a fire at the Governor’s Mansion made the home uninhabitable and the family moved to West Austin. He previously was with Tarrytown United Methodist Church.
Well, that was a very mysteeeeerious fire, but maybe it was the "burning bush" that Perry mistook for some sort of divine sign that he should (a) run for the presidency, and (b) change his affiliation to a more evangelical church.
Say what you want about Rick being a little slow on the uptake, but he’s smart enough not to waste money on charitable contributions to until his tax returns are likely to get some media scrutiny. So it’s no surprise that he waited until just before announcing his presidential run (well, presidential stumble, actually) before donating $10,000 to Lake Hills Church. Yeah, that’s right, less than half of a percent of his adjusted gross income of $222,292. I know he didn’t major in math at Texas A&M, but what part of “tithe” does he not understand? It doesn’t mean “a number divisible by 10”.
If you’re going to run a faith-centered campaign, you’ve got to keep up appearances. Then again,
Well, there’s no point in telling these evangelical ankle-biting Teabaggers that you’re a Methodist. That’s about as useless as telling them that you organized Al Gore’s campaign in Texas while you were a [gasp] Democrat. If you’re going to reinvent yourself, it’s going to take more than praying for the epic Texas drought to end and failing to disavow the inflammatory pronouncements of your rent-a-clergy surrogates.
A few more tax tidbits...
Perry, who received an extension to file his 2010 return, reported $222,292 in total income with his wife.
Their income came mainly from his salary as governor, listed as $132,995 after deductions, and his wife’s $65,000 pay as a contract employee of the Texas Association Against Sexual Assault.
Yeah, that's right. Anita collects this nice salary for facilitating donations from Rick's friends. She must not have made her quota last year, as their return showed a $2500 donation to this non-profit. Her recent remarks about being "brutalized" take on even greater hypocrisy considering the people served by this charity, who've probably endured much more horrific things than perceived slights in a political campaign.
The return also showed $23,050 in royalties and similar earnings, $4,174 in dividends and $73 in taxable interest. The couple took a $3,000 capital loss.
Pretty benign stuff, from the looks of it. Then again, we'll never see what really transpires in the pay-to-play world that Rick has built for himself and his cronies in the Lone Star State.
Maybe that's what he thinks is so appealing about the flat tax idea... no deductions, no need for secrecy...