in reply to a previous posting, "debate:fact check" there was reference made to the delcp/delphi employees and their pension fund. i'd like to direct anyone who's interested in that story to the current issue of "the nation" which has a cover story entitled "mitt romney's bailout bonanza". it details how the romneys, using ann romney's blind trust, invested in a hedge fund named elliot management. elliot management began buying up delco/delphi's debts in 2005 after the company declared bankruptcy. the romneys, because of the blind trust, are not obligated to disclose how much profit they made due to the auto industry bailout but estimate run from 10.2 million to a whopping 115 million dollars-all at the taxpayers' and company pension holders' expense. the hedge fund was able to keep almost all of the profits untaxed by moving delco/delphi's incorperation from troy, michigan to the isle of jersey, a tax haven off the coast of france.
read the story and see what you think.
Barney290 -
I respectfully disagree with your comments bud... here is why:
(1) "asking for taxes is not moral..." is NOT what I suggested, inferred or said. What I said is (a) disclosing one's tax return is not required under the law, and (b) whether disclosed or not the information in a tax return has nothing to do with whether the individual is qualified for ANY office (the office of President is considered a "high" office)...
(2) "blind trusts are a scam..." is absolutely untrue. This is simply not supported by any objective standard. Trusts are a creation of state law. There are 50 varieties of such laws but they are all created under state law. Again, the fact that somebody has one does (a) not make the person unqualified for public office and (b) is not relevant to his/her ability to serve in office...
(3) referring to Ryan's "buddies about rape..." is wrong on two counts: (a) the comments about rape made by two candidates for office are by people who are NOT Ryan's buddies; (b) associating those two nitwits with Ryan is unfair merely because they share the same party designation... lumping everyone with one generalization is patently unfair.
Don't mean anything personal, but just responding to your comments...
rae121452
If you read closely earlier posts I made it clear that some of what I posted was NOT with reference to THIS particular blog but, rather, to other such postings generally over some period of time. Again, nothing personal in any of my comments.
FWIIW
we are a nation of laws. so was nazi germany. laws are tools, not the word of god.
would you please reference for me anywhere in my post where i asked to see anyone's tax return or where i stated that anyone's financial worth dictated their fitness for public office. and again i reference nazi germany...following the laws doesn't in any way indicate a person's moral worth. you keep making note of financial worth and i don't know how to state any more plainly that we're not discussing finances but moral responsibility. i get the impression that you think anyone whose income is above a certain level is above responsibility. sometimes the emperor really DOESN"T have new clothes.
using the system to make money is not a bad thing, though you've indicated in the past with your welfare cadillac posts that you find it a bad thing for people below a certain income level to do so.
the romney investments were made in 2009 which means that as early as 2010 he knew that he was making profits from the delco mess. in 2012, he's running ads using the people who were bilked out of their pension funds by the company he invested in to slam the auto industry bailout. if you find that morally acceptable it say more about you than i care to know. have you read the article, by the way?
and erly, babycakes:
let me just reference a quote from the mitt to ted kennedy... "the blind trust is an age old ruse, if you will. which is to say, you can always tell a blind trust what it can and cannot do." i take it you haven't read the article so, actually, whatever you have to say in this case is uninformed and irreleveant. read the article, then we'll talk, toots.
My life doesn't "revolve around tax law..." though I am knowledgeable about that area.
The point is that we are a nation of laws. There is nothing "moral" about asking to see one's tax return any more than asking whether he/she is gay... It is NOT relevant to the ability to hold public office. Sorry, bud, you either missed the point or ignored the matter.
By the way, whether one has money (lots of it) or not so much does not determine fitness for public office. Whether that person abides by the law certainly does.
Beating up on somebody because of their politics is without merit if one assumes because they "have money" they must be bad or "not morally fit" for public office. The tax laws in this country are regressive - while I know that and I abide by the law it does not mean I think we have a good tax system. Far from it! We have the most unfair system man could devise (my opinion). But the IRC is not the creation of any one man - Romney OR Obama - it is the creation of our democratically elected Congress. As with ALL OTHER LAWS we are obliged as citizens of the Great Republic to comply. Period.
Because someone made their money using the system that exists is not a bad thing. And it certainly does not make them any less "moral" to serve in public office.
FWIIW
are you cognizant of the idea of sins of omission vs sins of comission?
it doesn't matter where someone makes their money or how much they have, true. what does matter is using a situation as a cudgel to beat your opponent over the head, all the while using the same situation to improve your fortune. it matters if you're are beating the public up about paying their fair share of taxes, meanwhile squirreling your own huge fortune away in an off shore account so that you don't have to pay taxes on it. there's such a thing as integrity. if it's lacking in a candidate's character, then i question his fitness for the office he runs for. it doesn't matter what the tax laws say. what matters is how they are used by the very people who are making an issue of how they apply to others. a candidate DOES have the obligation of disclosure, not legally but morally, and if he has nothing to hide, it's not an issue. in this case, it IS an issue. is that really such a foreign cocept to you?
and with all due respect, at this point we've gotten the message that your life revolves around tax law. but as mahatma ghandi once said, "just because you obey a bad law that doesn't automatically make you a good citizen". there are other concrns at play BESIDES what is "legal".
First, there is no legal requirement to disclose one's tax returns. The fact that one candidate did that in the distant past does not establish precedent to require any candidate thereafter to disclose. It is the Congress who makes rules with respect to candidates for Federal office. Under the law there is no obligation. Just like being presumed innocent before a verdict we cannot presume there is something nefarious about a candidate who does not disclose his/her tax return.
For those who belabor the point about a candidate who does not do this I suggest that we work to change the law.
I work with trust tax returns all the time. A trust is a tax entity just as individuals who file a personal tax return is a tax entity. A trust tax return is a Form 1041 and like Form 1040 for individuals there is no requirement under the law that information on such tax returns be disclosed.
To my knowledge current law requires "full disclosure" of information filed by non-profits. The most common form of non-profit are those who qualify under Section 501(c)(3) of the IRC (Internal Revenue Code). Because this is a special recognition by the Federal government the Congress specifically requires such non-profits to disclose their income, their payroll, their expenses and their donors. These documents are often available online. This is public information because, under the law, Congress requires it. This is useful for people who, for example, might choose to donate to a non-profit whose "administrative expenses" are a small percentage compared to the solicitation of funds for a specific cause. I have seen, for example, non-profits whose admin expenses were 80% whereas their use of donated funds (for the "cause") was 20%. I would sure want to change my selection of a non-profit if I wanted my money to actually make it to the cause that motivated me to donate in the first place!
I think it is safe to conclude, by even a cursory study of presidential history in this country, that (for the most part) candidates for the Office of President had "extensive resources." We can wish it were otherwise but the facts suggest that to endure the election process one needs extensive resources - often those resources are personal. There is a difference between wishing things one way and facing the reality of things in another...
One individual of note comes to mind - President John Fitzgerald Kennedy. Where did JFK get his money? The Kennedy family came into money because of the business dealings of his grandfather (an immigrant from Ireland). This is a fascinating story. JFK did not "get his money" except through legacy and inheritance. There is nothing wrong with that - it is just fact.
Why, therefore, do we assume that Romney did something he wasn't supposed to do with respect to how he got his money? In my opinion IF he (or any other taxpayer) made money through some nefarious manner I submit that we have adequate governmental bodies with the authority to investigate such things. These cannot be investigated through the media. Such agencies include the IRS, the FTC, SEC and so forth. Assuming that because there was a "blind trust" or that investments were made to "offshore accounts" and that, therefore, he is unworthy of high office is patently absurd.
While all of what I write here was not discussed in THIS blog these sentiments have been discussed elsewhere...
We are wise, I think, to separate myth from reality, eliminate uninformed opinionization stated as fact from that which is not fact. One's opinions are respected but not when they are overtly biased as they then lose credibility.
FWIIW
Definition of BLIND TRUST
: an arrangement in which the financial holdings of a person in an influential position are placed in the control of a fiduciary in order to avoid a possible conflict of interest