At his Town Hall in Grand Junction Colorado, where Romney's stiff performance reminded us why he does this so infrequently, a supporter asked a question that he, and the audience thought was such a zinger they stood up and cheered. There may not be a better example of classic wingnut mouth-breathing troglodyte wisdom.
40:50
So why is the Obama team and the liberal media want us to think that we should be more angry with what you do with your money then what Obama has done with mine?
There is only one video available of his entire speech and is not even embeddable, so here is the
link and fast forward to 40:50 to hear the wingnutty goodness and wild applause.
Um, because in all probability Mitt has avoided paying US taxes? If not outright illegally he has certainly skirted the law and used the services of highly paid tax advisers to shield money in off-shore tax havens. As Romney's campaign tells us, he has paid every penny legally owed and would not owe any more if these holdings were kept in the US. Right.
Kevin Madden, a spokesman for Mr. Romney’s campaign, said on Fox News Sunday that the Republican candidate “hasn’t paid a penny less in taxes by virtue of where these funds are domiciled.” He added, “His liability is exactly the same as if he held the fund investments directly in the U.S.”
So why shelter them in the Caymans, Bahamas, and Switzerland? Why go through all that trouble? Well, as Nicholas Shaxson
explains, to escape the 'unrelated business income tax'.
If you invest in the US directly you will get hit with this tax at a high rate - 35%. But if you are a foreigner or tax exempt you can invest through an offshore jurisdiction you can get around this tax. The Romney campaign has never given a direct answer about this.
As the NY Times said in an
editorial:
The 2010 tax return showed that the blind trust held by his wife, Ann, included a $3 million Swiss bank account that had not been properly reported on previous financial disclosure statements. (The account was closed by the trust manager in 2010 who feared it might become embarrassing for the campaign. He was right.) It also showed that Mr. Romney had used a complex offshore tax shelter, known as a blocker corporation, to shield the investments in his I.R.A. from paying an obscure business tax.
The use of that technique by wealthy taxpayers and institutions, long been blasted by Congressional tax experts as abusive, costs the treasury $1 billion a decade.
Well, I care about costing the treasury one billion dollars.
And, as Nicholas Shaxsonhas told us, there is a huge gray area here. There may be a difference between tax evasion (illegal) and tax avoidance (technically legal), but there is little doubt that Romney has used complex tax techniquest to his benefit.
He explains how an obscure technique enabled Romney to score a 20,000 percent return on his IRA investments. He may have engaged in what Shaxson calls 'using Wall St Juice' playing special tricks to increase your return.
You create two share classes and artificially relocate value between the two classes. You assign a very low value to one, inject that into the IRA and once it's inside it can grow very quickly.
I have no idea what that means either.
So yeah, dude, Romney screwed America with his tax avoidance schemes. So sure, if you want a President who has so little faith in America, go ahead and vote for him. Instead of President Obama who you are so worked up about what he is doing with your money. And what would that be anyway, that you find so objectionable? The way he has lowered your taxes at least 17 times since he's been in office? The way he has reduced trillions in spending by drawing down the Iraq war, and soon to be Afghanistan wars? The way hundreds of thousands of government workers have lost their jobs since he's been in office? Or the way he has lowered government spending the most of any president since Reagan? Oh and by the way, just a reminder, he was democratically elected by a majority of Americans (wink, wink) who thus gave him the power to decide how to spend 'your' money.
As the NY Times further says
The campaign says Mr. Romney has received no tax benefits from his offshore shelters, a dubious assertion but one impossible to check without more disclosure
Firms like Bain park money in the Caymans because the islands have no taxes on capital gains, profits or income for foreigners. But just because it’s legal doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do.
Yeah, I care. The Obama campaign is starting to hit this issue. And I believe ordinary Americans, will indeed care.