Maddow: Romney deliberately, retroactively inflated taxes to avoid hypocrisy

[TroyD]

Saturday, September 22, 2012

Maddow dug up a clip of Romney discussing his taxes earlier this year in which the Republican presidential candidate claimed that had he ever paid too much in taxes, he didn’t think he would be “qualified” to be president. Turns out, according to Romney’s 2011 tax returns, the 14.1% effective tax rate he paid was actually slightly higher than he was legally required to shell out.

Romney accidentally “disqualified” himself from the presidency in an attempt to make another campaign-stop claim true, Maddow argued, pointing to Romney’s past statement that he’s never paid under 13% in taxes. Since Romney could have paid a rate below that threshold in 2011, Maddow claimed Romney’s accountants tinkered with his filings specifically to boost him over that mark.

“In order to make that statement from last month retroactively true, Mr Romney’s accountants went back and artificially inflated his tax rate so it would comport with what he said,” Maddow argued.

“They artificially inflated his tax rate to more than it needed be, and in doing so, Mitt Romney unwittingly declared himself to be unqualified to be President of the United States,” she added. “This is nuts.”

Good 10-minute video clip summary by Rachel at the link:

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/09/22/maddow-romney-deliberately-retroactively-inflated-taxes-to-avoid-hypocrisy/

[davidn3600]

1. And then he can file an amended return after the election and get a refund

[librarylu]

2. Well, he's a busy man.

He can't be expected to keep track of the truth.

Good catch, Rachel.

[orpupilofnature57]

3. I'm hearing that song by three dog night " LIAR LIAR LIAR LIAR "

Mitt Romney is the person Thomas Jefferson was talking about, the opportunist that took the place of the British and French as our enemies , he has nothing in his bio that points to civic leader or altruist, neither did Shrub which should have been a clue.

[freedom fighter jh]

4. Not necessarily retroactive

As long as you're paid up by April 15, you don't really have to file your taxes until 10/15.

It's possible that Romney had not filed his 2011 taxes when he claimed that he always pays at least whatever percent. So he may not have had to revise anything.

But he's still on the hook for claiming he would be disqualified if he paid more than he was legally obligated to pay -- and then paying more than he was legally obligated to pay.

[Igel]

10. Which agrees with other things he said.

Such as that he couldn't release his full return in July and August because it wasn't prepared. People knew this until it was necessary to never have known it. Such is the Google generation, in which knowledge is outsourced and critical thinking abounds in inverse proportional to knowledge.

"Retroactively" here has the contextual meaning "earlier than it was possible to do so." And "hypocritical" means "conforming to what you said was true", an odd sort of keeping your word. Such is American politics. Under this Constitution, at least.

[freedom fighter jh]

11. I'm seeing this differently now.

I think I was wrong.

He may not have filed his tax return for 2011 until just before he released it, but he would have had to be caught up on his payments back in April. There are three possibilities that I can think of:

1) He was planning to pay 14% all along, and by April 15 14% of his 2011 earnings had been sent to the IRS. This would be the case if he is being honest.

2) The amount that he'd paid by 4/15 was less than 14%, and he made up the difference recently, most likely last week, just to back up his 14% claim. In that case, the 14% would indeed be retroactive.

3) He originally paid less than 14% but that was an oversight. The 14% would then still be retroactive, but the intent to pay at least 14% could have been there all along. I think this is the least likely case, because Romney must have enough people working for him so that an oversight like this would not happen.

I don't know how to tell for sure which is the truth, although that business about not claiming all possible charitable deductions does seem fishy. Why would anyone do that, especially someone who has overseas account just to help him get his taxes down? So #1 is not likely to be true.

[NoMoreWarNow]

5. wow-- another incredibly damning video on old Willard

he is just positively unfit to be president, and a borderline criminal. It would be so freaking surreal if he somehow manages to win.

[tk2kewl]

6. Doesn't that disqualify him from the presidency according to his own criteria?

[JimDandy]

7. Romney: The Retroactive Candidate

Presidents must govern in the moment. They don't get second chances to get it right the first time. (Bain retirement, releasing his taxes, tax rate paid...) He's like the kid who keeps yelling "do overs" every time he loses. You can't say you're the best candidate to take charge of our country's future, when you're always governing in the past.

[HopeHoops]

8. K&R - Rachel nailed him to the wall.

[Grammy23]

9. Romney doesn't need Obama or anyone else to defeat him.....

He does quite well with his own words to come back and haunt him. Remember his 1994 quote about blind trusts being a "well known ruse"........???

Romney acts like there is no such thing as an audio or video vault....those great repositories of all things oral and visual. I sometimes marvel that a man of his education and background could be so clueless. I would have thought that there would be at least a staff person or TWO OR THREE that would automatically go and check for previous comments on the subject by Mitt whenever he includes something in a speech or statement given to the press that just might be fact checked or cross checked. Is it possible that this has been an oversight on the way they have chosen to staff his campaign?? If that is so, he is worse at being the director of his campaign than any of us ever thought. I can only imagine how he would lead this country and respond to a crisis.