What does Mitt Romney have to hide?

Mitt Romney provided 23 years of tax returns to the John McCain camp when the Arizona senator was considering potential running mates for the 2008 Presidential election.

Now, he’s balking at providing those same documents to Americans whom he is asking to support him.

Why?

Mitt Romney, Mr. 1% - Cartoon (Photo credit: DonkeyHotey)

Romney using ethics exception to limit disclosure of Bain holdings

By Tom Hamburger, Thursday, April 5, 1:10 PM

Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney, whose wealth has become a central issue in the 2012 campaign, has taken advantage of an obscure exception in federal ethics laws to avoid disclosing the nature and extent of his holdings.

By offering a limited description of his assets, Romney has made it difficult to know precisely where his money is invested, whether it is offshore or in controversial companies, or whether those holdings could affect his policies or present any conflicts of interest.

In 48 accounts from Bain Capital, the private equity firm he founded in Boston, Romney declined on his financial disclosure forms to identify the underlying assets, including his holdings in a company that moved U.S. jobs to China and a California firm once owned by Bain that filed for bankruptcy years ago and laid off more than 1,000 workers.

Those are known only because Bain publicly disclosed them in government filings and on the Internet. But most of the underlying assets — the specific investments of Bain funds— are not known because Romney is covered by a confidentiality agreement with the company.

Several of Romney’s assets — including a large family trust valued at roughly $100 million, nine overseas holdings and 12 partnership interests— were not named initially on his disclosure forms, emerging months later when he agreed to release his tax returns.

There is no indication that Romney is violating any rules, and his advisers note that his reports have been certified by the Office of Government Ethics, which reviews the disclosures required of presidential candidates.

Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul said

Alabama Gov. Bentley OKs Millions in State Executive Salaries during Proration

During a time in which Republican Alabama governor Dr. Robert Bentley has declared 10.6% proration statewide, he has simultaneously approved several million dollars in executive salaries & compensation for state employees whom are hand-picked by the governor and his cronies.

The total value of the compensation packages – which includes state taxpayer funded retirement, taxpayer paid health insurance & taxpayer paid Cost Of Living Adjustments – could be well in excess of $2,400,000.

Read on to see how & why.

Mitt Romney: “Ann drives a couple of Cadillacs, actually.”

Great.

Mitt Romney, official portrait, Governor of Massachusetts

You’ve worked diligently to earn some of your money, while you live off the interest income, and pay a lower tax rate than most normal, regular, hard-working, struggling families.

No one begrudges your wealth.

You should pay a higher rate.

I mean, really.

How many houses do you need?

Even if you have three – while most folks have one (the Census Bureau says that private home ownership rate is 66%) – why do you need a break?

Why not give a break to the little man who’s working to make ends meet, while yours wrap around several times?

C’mon, guy.

What’s the price of a gallon of milk, or loaf of bread?

It’s just that… Mitt, you’re out of touch with reality, and you continually demonstrate how much you’re out of touch every time you open your mouth.

 

Romney’s Wealth Emerges as Subtext in ‘Cadillac’ Remark

Feb. 24 (Bloomberg) — Mitt Romney is a wealthy man, as he keeps reminding voters, even if it’s unintentional.

In remarks today to the Detroit Economic Club, Romney highlighted his love of American-made cars by saying he owns a Ford Mustang and a Chevrolet pickup, while his wife, Ann, drives “a couple of Cadillacs.”

Cadillacs retail for $36,000 to $74,000, according to Edmunds.com., an online auto market. One reason the Romneys may need multiple vehicles is that they own homes in Massachusetts and California, plus a vacation place in New Hampshire.

Only TWO women testified. Others denied chance to testify. What’s wrong with this picture?

Only two women testified.

Wow.

Only two.

What’s up with that?

Agree, disagree. Let everyone have their say. It’s the – dare I say it? – democratic process.

 

All-male picture tells 1,000 words, say backers of birth control policy

By Sam Baker and Mike Lillis – 02/16/12 08:30 PM ET

Female Democrats staged a walkout from a GOP-led committee hearing Thursday after no women were allowed to testify in support of the White House’s contraception mandate.

Their protest, and the optics of an initial panel consisting only of men, underscored the difficulty Republicans are having in framing the issue as a fight over religious freedom. Democrats want to make it a debate over contraception and women’s health, a shift that could help the party win over female voters in an election year.

A: Gingrich, Bachmann, Santorum, Perry Q: Who’ll be crowned religious king, or queen of Iowa?

“We have determined that Michele Bachmann is Biblically qualified to be the president, to be a leader. She is capable. She is trustworthy. She fears God and she hates dishonest gain.”
– Danny Carroll, former Iowa State Representative, former board member, now lobbyist for The Family Leader at the Iowa statehouse

There you have it folks.

First, we have Constitutional qualification,

Is that clear enough?

The GOP is comprised almost exclusively of

Donald Trump-hosted Republican “debate” now has TWO candidates

Face it Don.

You’re an idiot, and the American public knows it.

The very fact that the NewsMax “news” organization hosted it and made their whacko choice should speak volumes.

And even if the TrumpDump weren’t such a blithering idiotic, grandstanding nincompoop, the very fact that

Silliness abounds in the GOP, even at local level

Regular readers of this blog recognize that critique of the GOP is neither absent, nor on vacation upon these pages.

This year’s cast of GOP presidential nominee wannabes are genuinely hilarious, but simultaneously saddening precisely because they are so cartoonish. There is little, if any, of what they say that can be taken seriously. Take, for example,

Extremists and Radicals in the GOP

Official White House photograph of Vice President Rockefeller, 1975

Tonight was another one for the history books.

It was either that, or one for the nearest comic book store.

There was another Republican “debate” among the GOP presidential nominee wannabes. It’s hilarious – not just in a comédie noir sense, but in a genuinely hilarious manner – because those folks actually believe what they say, and hope to foist it upon the American general public.

But from there, it gets dangerous, precisely because they genuinely believe what they say. And that makes it sad.

The crazy “debate” was held this evening with 8 GOP wannabes.

Starring were: