Other than going on a fishing expedition, you have no reason to want to see any of this shit. You think you might find something that you can use against him.
I agree he should have released his tax return but mostly I think they’ll just show he isn’t as rich as he claims to be.
Yes, it is a betrayal of the public trust. It actually ought to be a legal requirement that a Presidential candidate release this information. Probably the only reason it hasn’t been made one is that convention seemed to be working fine up to this point.
And, the first duty of the press is to inform the public. It is in the proper purview of news analyses to discuss with experts what can be gleaned about a Presidential candidate from looking at their tax returns and what possible reasons a candidate might have for hiding these from the public. To do otherwise is to leave the public in complete ignorance.
I for one feel that I am pretty ignorant as to the questions of what we might learn from Donald Trump’s tax returns and it was refreshing to have Maddow and David Cay Johnston at least fill us in a little bit. We shouldn’t have to rely on the alternative press as the only means of dispelling our ignorance.
Op Cit
Here is a list of all the Presidents and major candidates that have released their tax returns back to FDR. You will notice some gaps.
Speculation is fine for talking heads, fox 'news" and talk shows. Presenting speculation as news is not ethical journalism. Its called yellow dog journalism.
OK, so what did Rachel Maddow and David Cay Johnston specyulate about Trump’s tax returns? Unless you think he actually cheated on his taxes, the only thing you are likely to find is an embarrassingly low level of business income for someone who is supposed to be a multi billionaire. I think his Apprentice and licensing income might actually constitute a significant portion of his income and wealth. This puts him in the Kim Kardashian category but we sort of already knew that.
We also learned that the Alternative Minimum Tax personally cost him over twenty million dollars, which is interesting when evaluating his proposal to get rid of the Alternative Minimum Tax.
What position is that a cite for?
This tax return thing is worth making some political hay over because Trump is breaking with tradition but you are not going to find a smoking gun there. At best you are going to find embarrassing shit.
And once again, who gives a shit who he owes money to? how is that relevant to anything?
Lets say you are Russia and Trump owes you money and he gets elected POTUS. How does that give you leverage over him? You really think no one is willing to lend money to his projects right now? Do you really think he would have trouble refinancing anything right now?
The funny thing is that it is mostly Democrats that want to get rid of the AMT because it hits hardest in states with high state and local taxes. So the majority of AMT income comes from places like California, DC and NYC.
I don’t thin it is funny at all that he wants to get rid of the AMT. The problems associated with the AMT were largely addressed when we instituted the passive activity loss rules in the 1986. There might still be room for improvement but the AMT is probably the single most complicating aspect of the tax code that we have.
You pretty much don’t read or care what anyone else says, right?
If you could say one thing that wouldn’t also sound good from a russian twitterbot it would help the dialog.
The difference between Trump’s tax returns and your tax returns is that Trump is now a man of grave national importance whose primary obligation is now to promote the best interests of me and you, and not himself anymore.
You can tell a lot about someone from their return.
For example, from the two pages that David Cay Johnston found in his mailbox, Johnston was able to tell something about the 150 million Trump earned. Johnston said:
" …the dividends he gets are primarily not what are called qualified dividends that suggest they come from not big companies like ExxonMobil but privately held enterprises.
They show almost no tax-exempt interest, about $49,000. That would imply
at the time maybe $900,000 of municipal bonds. Not much – I mean, lots of
college professors out there my age who have $900,000 in municipal bonds…"
Now, I don’t find how much Trump has in municipal bonds to be particularly interesting. I did find it interesting that without the alternative minimum tax, Trump’s tax bill would have been on 3.5%.
But what I would find the most interesting would be the sources of Trump’s income (and the details of his “negative income” of 103 million).
There are plenty of questions to be asked about from where Trump’s income originates especially in light of all his ties to Russia. And would Trump’s personal financial dependency on huge loans from foreign banks affect Trump’s ability to work with these countries in good times or bad?
Mother Jones (A Guide to Donald Trump’s Huge Debts—and the Conflicts They Present – Mother Jones ) reported that Trump owes Deutch Bank over 350 million (and 100 million to Ladder Capitol on his Trump Tower, which he does not own).
Trump borrowed 640 million (in personal,not business, loans) from Deutch to finance his Chicago tower.
During the market crash of 2008, Trump was had a 40 million payment due on that loan that he couldn’t pay. He tried to sue Deutch Bank to get out of the payment, blaming them for their role in the economic downturn that caused him to be unable to make the payment.
This is the same year when Dmitry Rybolovlev bought Trump’s Palm Beach mansion. Trump paid $41.35 million for the property in 2004 and sold it for 95 million in 2008.
(Who has properties double in value in so short a time And during an global economic downturn?)
According to The Seattle Times (http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/why-did-a-russian-pay-95m-to-buy-trumps-palm-beach-mansion/ ), Rybolovlev never made any effort to have the property inspected or valued, never lived in it, and denied the purchase and then tried to hide the property during his divorce in 2011. During the divorce procedings, Rybolovlev gave a variety of reasons for the purchase that included ‘for the kids’, ‘for an investment’, and for ‘equestrian’ use.
Rybolovlev is the same guy whose private plane just happened to land in cities where Trump just happened to be both during his campaign and into his presidency, but Trump says he’s never met the guy.
I wonder if this guy that Trump has never met gave Trump any more money recently.
If you wonder why Rachel Maddow is a liberal favorite, watch her show tonight (I think it will be repeated in the wee hours, or you can get it on her website). The other news stations mentioned that Trump’s son-in-law had talked to some Russian, and gave it about 15 seconds. Maddow took ten minutes to explain who the Russian was, and why it is significant, with such clarity that my 85-year-old mom, who has trouble understanding the scoring on Dancing With the Stars, followed every word of it. And yet, one of her guests, a Stanford prof and former ambassador to Russia, said that he learned some things he didn’t know by watching it.
That’s what she does, and that’s what the news stations are supposed to do. Some of my pals find her repetitive when she’s covering a long-running story over a period of days or weeks, and that’s fair, but THAT’S WHAT LONG FORM JOURNALISM SHOULD DO. You can’t assume that all your viewers remember, or even watched, what you covered yesterday, so you have to give some background each day. That may make you long-winded and repetitive, but it also informs the audience.
They say that the best way to give a lecture is to assume that your audience is intelligent, but is ignorant of the subject, so you lay it out in a way that an intelligent person can understand from first principles.
On the other hand, Fox News assumes that its audience is dumb, but already knows all it needs to know about the subject. Hannity and his pals don’t inform the viewer, they confirm the viewer’s uninformed, but set-in-concrete, opinion.
You should seriously re-evaluate your opinion of Rachel Maddow. She’s a lying fake-news creator, who doesn’t even attempt to hide it. In fact, would you do me a favor?
Show your 85-year old mother this video of Rachel Maddow and then please let us know what her opinion was, and whether your mother was able to follow every word of it:
She lies openly, blatantly and with reckless disregard for truth. That piece of paper she waves in her hands (with “legitimate methodology!!”, “real polling firm”)…One can’t even laugh at the fakeness of her propaganda.
You know what’s the worst part of it is? Her complete and utter lack of moral fibers and anything approaching shame. Any self-respecting journalist would already resign (in order to avoid being fired by MSNBC for blatant incompetence), but, of course, we’re talking about Rachel and MSNBC…
I don’t really like Maddow that much; however, out of curiosity, do you get your news from: 1) Fox, 2) Breitbart/Infowars or 3) Sputnik News/RT?
I’d say she hid it very well indeed. I’m pretty sure you are the only person smart enough to have discovered that it was actually Maddow who was behind all those polls, including Fox News, that showed Clinton ahead by 3-5 points right up to the election.
Right-wing wankery. If you have some examples of Maddow’s mendacity, let’s see them.
Do restraining orders count? 'Cause they are at least very unfair!
Rachel can be verbose, even pedantic, a bit over-emphatic at times. But a liar, she is not.
True, she does tend to exaggerate the importance of this stuff. Like its a big deal, or something.
Welcome to the board! Let’s hope all your posts are as spirited as your first.
However, if you feel you cannot meet such a daunting standard, you should not feel obligated to try. We are a very forgiving Board and will not resent it.
Didja see it last night? Her piece on the number of awesome appointments Jared Kushner has been assigned? The latest being to restructure the nature of reality from first principles? Nah, just kidding, but only just. My jaw dropped, as she listed the various assignments, beginning with point man on Middle East peace and restructuring the Federal government in his spare time.
Did anyone else even notice this?