# Is Romney hiding immorality, criminality, both, or neither? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [July 9, 2012, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740 "2012-07-09T22:57:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2012, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/101 "2012-07-15T21:43:53Z")
Heh… Taegan Goddard of Political Wire is calling the Romney campaign’s new defense of “Romney retroactively retired from Bain” the “worst talking point ever”. ---
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/102 "2012-07-16T03:40:45Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > That said, my point above illustrates that the chatter about his finances is a lot of irrelevance blowing in the wind. It _is_ entertaining, though, and I won’t complain if his finances turn out to be a factor in his ultimate defeat. I disagree that it is “a lot of irrelevance blowing in the wind.” Romney himself made it relevant by citing his experience at Bain as qualification for the White House. Then, when people ask him about that experience, he says that he wasn’t there when the nasty stuff happened. So, what experience does he have at Bain that would make him a good president? Damned if I know. ---
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/103 "2012-07-16T04:01:48Z")
> [@BigAppleBucky](#): > > My ongoing assumption had always been that Romney didn’t want to disclose his past tax information because it would reveal that he had not been tithing to the Morman Church as required by that group. That wouldn’t be illegal, but it wouldn’t look good either. > > But this business with his supposed very large IRA balance is scary. I’ve read several figures. $105 million, $102 million and $35 million. Given the variance, I’m not sure any of them are true, but if one of them is, it is very hard to believe that a $30,000/year contribution over 10 years could lead to any of those balances without some very very special circumstances. How were his contributions valued and how did he garner 10X greater than Bernie Madeoff rates of return? trust me Romney is not hiding the fact that he didn’t pay his full tithing. Fact is he will probably get a lot of flack for donating to the church at all like they did when he released one year. Heck he couldn’t even go on a his mission without people saying he dodged the draft. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/104 "2012-07-16T04:20:27Z")
Ministering to the pagans of Paris? Not exactly Albert Schweitzer fending off tsetse flies, now is it? ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/105 "2012-07-16T04:23:53Z")
I think that Romney’s tax returns pass the IRS scrutiny test. That said, I don’t think they would pass the Joe Sixpack test. For example, how did he get so much money in is IRA? One explanation is that his Bain Capital stock were put in there at nominal value. Speaking of Bain Capital stock, how did Mitt get 100% of it? I mean there were other founders and they leveraged Bain to a certain extent. I mean, it would be like the Koch Brothers or Bechtel letting someone set up a hedge fund on their coattails and not getting a cut from it. Doesn’t make any sense. I used to work for Swiss Bank Corporation and am a little familiar with why people use off shore bank accounts. I’d be shocked, shocked I tell you, if Mitt didn’t have a numbered account set up back in the 80’s when it would have been child’s play. But I digress, you set up an offshore account primarily to obfuscate what you are doing. It may be perfectly legal, but there are advantages. Otherwise, you would back through a US bank. ---
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/106 "2012-07-16T04:37:40Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Ministering to the pagans of Paris? Not exactly Albert Schweitzer fending off tsetse flies, now is it? might seem strange to you but it is a very important part of the lds faith and has been since it’s founding. If the practice had just begun during the Vietnam war maybe you could make a case. ---
**Author:** ![greenslime1951](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e9bcb4/32.png) [@greenslime1951](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/greenslime1951)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/107 "2012-07-16T06:49:03Z")
> [@Ca3799](#): > > The gutting of companies for purely personal profit falls into the immoral realm for me. If you don’t care that hundreds or thousands (or more) of people lose their jobs and life savings so that you can stash pockets of money around the world, you are evil. Also, he is running on a platform of his ‘business experience’. Is it too much to ask to have you prove your ‘success’ and how you got it? He said he wants everyone to be rich (LOL! How stupid is that?). So, show us the way. Well, LOL, it’s just about as stupid, LOL, as wanting to hunt down and kill all the evil, immoral rich guys. Once again we see the populist fallacy that life is a zero-sum game, and that the rich couldn’t have gotten that way without exploiting the poor. It was bullcrap when Marx said it, and it’s bullcrap now. ---
**Author:** ![Esox\_Lucius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/848f3c/32.png) [@Esox\_Lucius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Esox_Lucius)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 12:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/108 "2012-07-16T12:12:39Z")
> [@Drum\_God](#): > > I disagree that it is “a lot of irrelevance blowing in the wind.” Romney himself made it relevant by citing his experience at Bain as qualification for the White House. Then, when people ask him about that experience, he says that he wasn’t there when the nasty stuff happened. So, what experience does he have at Bain that would make him a good president? Damned if I know. Actually, kaylasdad99 was talking about Romney’s offshore bank accounts, not his time at Bain. Or not at Bain. Or retroactively not at Bain. Or…😕 ---
**Author:** ![Ca3799](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9f8e36/32.png) [@Ca3799](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ca3799)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/109 "2012-07-16T13:37:33Z")
> [@greenslime1951](#): > > Well, LOL, it’s just about as stupid, LOL, as wanting to hunt down and kill all the evil, immoral rich guys. > > Once again we see the populist fallacy that life is a zero-sum game, and that the rich couldn’t have gotten that way without exploiting the poor. It was bullcrap when Marx said it, and it’s bullcrap now. Ok, if you say so… It’s all bullcrap. There was never any cheating. The rich would never cheat or exploit anything. Silly me for even questioning someone so obviously superior. I’ll return to my place now, sir, and not hunt and kill the rich like I was planning, now that you’ve shown me the light. Or you could prove it. ---
**Author:** ![GrandWino](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grandwino/32/67_2.png) [@GrandWino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrandWino)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/110 "2012-07-16T14:54:12Z")
I read something interesting this morning about this whole Bain issue and why the Obama campaign is hammering so hard on it. They know that it’ll likely be old news in a week or two and everybody will have moved on to the new “shiny thing.” What the Obama campaign is really trying to do is to make it so you can’t think of Bain without thinking of things like “retroactive retirement” and the like… basically making it an easy late night punchline. If they can turn Romney into a joke going into the conventions, it’s going to be hard for him to turn around that narrative and to get people to take him seriously. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/111 "2012-07-16T17:27:16Z")
> [@Bob Ducca](#): > > They know that it’ll likely be old news in a week or two and everybody will have moved on to the new “shiny thing.” It won’t be. We won’t be talking about this issue forever, but there should be plenty of ads about Bain and Romney’s finances in swing states as the election approaches. Romney can’t make people stop talking about it because his business experience is central to his campaign, and he evidently feels that releasing his tax returns would be even worse than this, which guarantees people will keep talking about it. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/112 "2012-07-16T17:34:45Z")
Since he must have figured that releasing the returns would be more damaging than not releasing them, it must be that there is a treasure trove of damaging fodder that he doesn’t want Obama to get his hands on. For once I have to hand it to the Democrats- if you want to win you have to define your opponent before he can define himself and turn his strength into a weakness. There has been significant damage done to Romney last week. I predict the polls will start showing that shortly. The best thing that Romney has going for him is that the Olympics will give us a two week break from the campaign. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/113 "2012-07-16T17:40:21Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > The best thing that Romney has going for him is that the Olympics will give us a two week break from the campaign. Yea, good thing there isn’t anyway for pundits to tie discussions about Romney into their Olympic coverage. ---
**Author:** ![Gangster\_Octopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a8b319/32.png) [@Gangster\_Octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gangster_Octopus)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/114 "2012-07-16T17:50:35Z")
I have a question. If you wanted to come up with the most stereotypical 1%er (i.e. the bogeyman that the Occupy movement rants about), could you come up with anybody better than Mitt Romney? ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/115 "2012-07-16T17:51:41Z")
> [@greenslime1951](#): > > Well, LOL, it’s just about as stupid, LOL, as wanting to hunt down and kill all the evil, immoral rich guys. Do you think that the ridiculous straw-manning that you are prone to actually helps your case? Or do you actually think that anyone who levies a critique at a wealthy person actually wants to take their wealth away, or thinks that we should murder them? Really, it simply makes you look foolish. ---
**Author:** ![LavenderBlue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e95f7d/32.png) [@LavenderBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LavenderBlue)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/116 "2012-07-16T18:05:27Z")
Romney’s whole argument is that he’s qualified for president based on his business acumen. Yet he won’t tell us exactly what he did as a businessman. It’s pretty clear that he would do as president what he did as a businessman: ship jobs overseas, raid pensions meant for ordinary people and then lobby to lower already low taxes more on really rich people. And not much else. I’ve had my issues with Obama but the last weeks have done much to convince me to go to the polls and vote. If the Dems are smart they’ll keep it up. Romney is every asshole boss we’ve ever had. He’s every jerk who laid off some people, asked others to work harder to make up for it and then turned around and rubbed the fact that he paid a lower tax rate than we do in our faces. He’s every boss who told us there was no money for raises or health care coverage for our kids yet there was company money to buy him a new car. That’s not a good image for the Reps to project. ---
**Author:** ![Knorf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/58956e/32.png) [@Knorf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knorf)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/117 "2012-07-16T18:27:00Z")
> [@Gangster\_Octopus](#): > > I have a question. If you wanted to come up with the most stereotypical 1%er (i.e. the bogeyman that the Occupy movement rants about), could you come up with anybody better than Mitt Romney? Hmmmmm. Dick Cheney. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/118 "2012-07-16T18:35:54Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > I’m positive there is nothing illegal in there - remember, we may not have these returns, but the IRS does. I’m betting what is in there are investments or tax dodges that are going to stink to high heaven. Remember the talk about how little he paid in taxes? That was last year when he and the blind trust administrator had a chance to clean up the balance sheet a bit. If he released enough returns, we’d see what was really going on. All legal, all possibly standard for someone with his money, but hard to explain to those scraping by who pay a higher tax rate than he does. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were years where he didn’t pay one cent in taxes. Explaining that it was perfectly legal would actually make that worse, because it puts the spotlight on wheeler-and-dealer loopholes and utterly undercuts the Republican narrative that the “job creators” need tax relief. There’s just no way to spin that. Stand his ground and defend the loophole abuse, and he cranks his out-of-touch zillionaire image up to eleven. Offer mealy-mouthed platitudes about reining in the abuses, and he cranks his phony panderer image up to eleven. Credibly promise to end the abuses, and he betrays his big-money constituency. ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/119 "2012-07-16T18:37:15Z")
> [@greenslime1951](#): > > life is a zero-sum game, So, how isn’t it? Can two people simultaneously own and operate the same yacht? ---
**Author:** ![Fiveyearlurker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/da6949/32.png) [@Fiveyearlurker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiveyearlurker)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740/120 "2012-07-16T20:05:25Z")
Just a speculation. What if Romney participated in the [offshore voluntary disclosure initiative](http://www.forbes.com/sites/janetnovack/2011/02/08/irs-offers-new-amnesty-for-offshore-tax-cheats/)? Presumably that would show up in his previous tax returns somewhere? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-romney-hiding-immorality-criminality-both-or-neither/627740.md?page=7)