The October surprises are coming faster than usual this year...

It's entirely on message for this week that it would end with the announcement that the current couple living in the White House have both tested positive for COVID-19 (which will be known in future histories of 2020 as the #TrumpVirus).

Monday morning saw the detailed exposé of Trump's taxes in the print edition The New York Times (released online on Sunday), in which we learned that he paid $750/year in federal income taxes in the years when he wasn't paying absolutely nothing.

Tuesday night saw Trump's self-immolation at the first Presidential debate, a debate that will be remembered for his constant interruptions, his complete lack of empathy for Beau Biden, his mask-free family flouting debate rules, his sweaty orange complexion, and especially for his telling the Proud Boys to "Stand Back and Stand By" when asked if he would denounce those violent white supremacists. 

Wednesday saw the online release of the results of a five-month investigation from the Times' Magazine about the depth and breadth of Trump's "Voter Fraud" lies and how they fit into a continuing GOP project of voter suppression, which now seems to be Trump's only remaining election strategy.

Thursday night saw the release of a recording of First Lady Melania Trump saying "Who gives a fuck about Christmas stuff and decoration" and "they said 'Oh, what about the children that they were separated?' Give me a fucking break." Melania's war on Christmas and refugee children got approximately ten seconds of media attention before the news broke that Trump's closest aide Hope Hicks had tested positive for #TrumpVirus after spending all week traveling in close contact with her boss to the debate and Trump superspreader rallies.

Friday morning we woke up to the news that the POTUS and FLOTUS were positive for the virus named after them, which leads to our True Blue Liberal poll question of the day.

POLL:
Which of these other blockbuster stories of the week is Trump most happy to distract us from with his #TrumpVirus announcement?

— True Blue Liberal - #BidenHarris2020 (@TrueBlueLiberal) October 2, 2020

POLL: Which Trump Crime Family Member Will Be the First to See the Inside of a Jail Cell?

After today's historic front page of The New York Times on the Trump Crime Family's tax returns and financial crimes, it seems clear that somebody connected with the Trump Organization is going to be found guilty of a financial misdeed, but which member of the family will be the first one we see in a perp walk? 

 

POLL:
Which member of the #TrumpCrimeFamily will be the first to see the inside of a jail cell for financial crimes?

— True Blue Liberal - #BidenHarris2020 (@TrueBlueLiberal) September 28, 2020

POLL: Sex, Lies, and Videotape

It's been too long since the last @TrueBlueLiberal Twitter poll, so here's one that will run for the next week. Again, I hope this doesn't have an obvious answer.

POLL: If he were forced to choose, which would @realDonaldTrump prefer to keep hidden forever, the #PeePeeTapes or #TrumpsMissingReturns?

— True Blue Liberal (@TrueBlueLiberal) September 21, 2017

POLL: The "Death Tax" or Deaths In Texas

Yesterday afternoon, while victims of Hurricane Harvey were still dying and being rescued by helicopters and boats in Texas, President Trump spoke in Missouri about the more pressing issue (for him) of tax reform.

This leads to a new Twitter poll.

POLL:
Which issue is closer to @realDonaldTrump's heart, repealing Estate Tax to help his kids or empathizing with Hurricane Harvey victims?

— True Blue Liberal (@TrueBlueLiberal) August 31, 2017

How the GOP TrumpCare Bill Would Affect Me

There's nothing dramatic to my story, but since the Republican attempt to "repeal & replace" the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will affect every American if it passes, we should probably all share our stories.

I'm one of the lucky ones. I'm not quite as lucky as those the GOP health care bills are written for, those who earn over $250,000 a year who will get tax cuts if the Senate version of "WealthCare" passes. But still, I'm one of the lucky ones. I've never been seriously sick as an adult and I have consistently had health insurance from an employer since 1978. I'm less than four years away from becoming eligible for Medicare, but I may not make it that far in an industry and a corporation that are both undergoing regular job reductions. I've also thought about retiring voluntarily before my 65th birthday, but the only thing that keeps me from doing so is health insurance. Even though I have been a very light user of my health insurance (I've made it through the past forty years with one broken arm, a few stitches, and two 'annual' physicals), I don't feel I could let myself go uninsured. I wouldn't like paying for a private health plan under the ACA to close the gap before Medicare, but I could afford to do so. If I lose my job and the Senate version of TrumpCare (the Orwellian-sounding "Better Care Reconciliation Act") passes, my annual premium would rise from $6,800/year under the ACA to over $20,000/year to give tax breaks to millionaires. At that price, I probably would go without insurance until Medicare kicks in and hope for my health luck to hold out (even though I know that I'd have the first serious illness of my life as soon as I became uninsured). That, in a nutshell, is my undramatic story.

But this isn't a collection of individual stories; it's a national tragedy. Unfortunately, for many Americans it's a devastating story of life and death. For many others its a harrowing matter of personal bankruptcy caused by a single unforeseen accident or illness (an exceptionally American problem). For others, it's a common American story of feeling chained for life to a boring corporate job one hates when one would rather be taking a chance being a writer or artist or freelance plumber or food-truck entrepreneur, all because of our health insurance trap. Why can't the party that claims to love FREEDOM! more than any other value see that a modern (c.1948) government-run single-payer health plan would free companies large and small from acting as insurance agents and free the rest of us from our greatest financial uncertainty and from our dead-end bullshit jobs, freeing us to be more fully ourselves and worrying less about piling up money for that inevitable rainy day? I would have gladly gotten out of the way and given my desk to a young go-getter by now if we had a National Health Service, but US corporations are full of burnt-out pieces of dead wood hanging on for our Aetna or Cigna cards, hoping we never have to use them.

Even though Mitch McConnell had a setback today, keep contacting your Senators and Representatives and tell YOUR story, which is probably more compelling than mine. Let them know that Obamacare isn't perfect but it has insured millions more and greatly reduced medical bankruptcies; TrumpCare in both its House and Senate versions would increase the number of uninsured, increase the number of medical bankruptcies, reinstate lifetime coverage caps, etc. We should always be moving toward universal coverage, not further away.

One more April Saturday in Washington, D.C.

Here's one update to the American Spring calendar I posted last week.

I saw a tweet from George Takei with a link to the Twitter page of @FIRE_THE_FOOL promoting their gathering on the National Mall on April Fools' Day (which falls conveniently on a Saturday this year, just like all these other anti-Trump actions).

Click to sign up for at least one or two, either in D.C. or at a local satellite location!

• April 1   Fire The Fool.
• April 15   Tax Day Marches.
• April 22   March for Science.
• April 29   People's Climate March.
• May 6   The Immigrants' March.

American Spring, or, We Can Do This Every Weekend!

Is your calendar also filling up with plans for the American Spring demonstrations and marchs in Washington, D.C. and around the nation in April? If not, here are links to some of the major events happening every Saturday starting on April 15th.

• 4/15 Tax Day Marches.
• 4/22 March for Science.
• 4/29 People's Climate March.
• 5/6 The Immigrants' March.

When I was in high school, I put up posters and handed out flyers for the upcoming Student Mobilization Committee/National Peace Action Coalition protests against the Vietnam War. I no longer have permission from any administrators to use Scotch tape on the walls of their school hallways, but I do have this blog and a Twitter account to keep spreading the word of new protests in the Age of Trump.  I hope to see many of you doing the same. And I hope to see many of you out in the streets.

Earth Day or Tax Day? The TrueBlueLiberal Poll of the Week.

As a follow-up to yesterday's post about the potential for attracting millions to Washington, D.C. (and to cities around the nation and the world) on Earth Day, April 22, 2017, I posted the following poll on Twitter a few minutes ago. It will be up for a week.

Which of these Saturdays holds more potential for a record-setting turnout against Donald Trump in D.C.? https://t.co/ZLC97qsWBG #EarthDay

— True Blue Liberal (@TrueBlueLiberal) January 25, 2017

If you have strong feelings about your choice, I'd love to hear them in the comments below (or in a response to the poll on Twitter).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
UPDATE 1/28/17:
THERE WILL BE A PEOPLE'S CLIMATE MARCH IN D.C. ON APRIL 29TH. BE THERE!

Will I See a Few Million of You in D.C. on April 22nd?

Earth Day Flag
By John McConnell (flag designer) NASA (Earth photograph)
 - The Earth seen from Apollo 17, Public Domain,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32330734

There's an effort to follow up last Saturday's Women's March with a protest about Donald Trump's missing tax returns on April 15th, but there seems to be a more obvious target with mass appeal, Earth Day, which occurs exactly one week later on Saturday, April 22. This seems especially appropriate today, when the new resident of the White House is signing executive orders in favor of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access Pipelines.

The first Earth Day in 1970 not only attracted the support of over 20 million people worldwide, but it led to actual results. A Republican President, Richard Nixon, signed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act, and established the Environmental Protection Agency by the end of that year. Every single one of these important environmental protections is now under challenge by the current president and the increasingly right-wing GOP Congress.

As much as some of us have been concerned with Donald Trump's missing tax returns (search for #TrumpsMissingReturns to see how often @TrueBlueLiberal tweeted about them), they will not attract millions of people to Washington, D.C. They will not attract interest around the world. And even if April 15th demonstrations goaded Trump into releasing 30 years of complete returns (and they won't), what concrete effect would that have now? We already know that he's used every trick and loophole to pay as little as possible. His voters don't care that he's a con man and a tax cheat, and neither do a lot of non-partisan or low-information voters.

1970s Ecology Flag
Public Domain,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2111203

An Earth Day backed and organized by all the major environmental groups would definitely attract millions from around the world. It would not necessarily be seen as a partisan attack by disappointed Hillary voters. Climate change and sustainable sources of energy are major international issues, pipelines and fracking are combustible national issues, many conservative suburban voters are concerned about the welfare of songbirds and monarch butterflies and bees, and Earth Day's universal stress on the Earth seems a perfect foil for the current president's parochial stress on "America First."

Imagine the size of the protest that could be generated by a coordinated effort from Greenpeace and the Sierra Club and the NRDC and Audubon Society and the Earth Day Network and Nature Conservancy and WWF and National Wildlife Federation and the Environmental Defense Fund and the Humane Society and Defenders of Wildlife and Sea Shepherd and the Ocean Conservancy and the Earth Policy Institute and the thousands of other national, international, and local environmental organizations founded since the first Earth Day in 1970. It could easily make the impressive Women's March look small by comparison.

Let's get started. Given a choice between returning to D.C. on April 15th or April 22nd, I choose Earth Day! See you there.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
UPDATE 1/28/17:
THERE WILL BE A PEOPLE'S CLIMATE MARCH IN D.C. ON APRIL 29TH. BE THERE!

This Week's True Blue Liberal Twitter Poll Is Live...

With Newsweek releasing a major story about the Trump Organization's foreign entanglements today, and New York Attorney General announcing a probe of the Trump Foundation's shenanigans last night, it seemed like a good time to ask the following question:

Which of these is most likely to deal a blow to @realDonaldTrump's golden dreams of redecorating the White House?

— True Blue Liberal (@TrueBlueLiberal) September 14, 2016

"When a man's frauds have been enormous there is a certain safety in their very diversity and proportions."

At this point, about two thirds through Trollope's The Way We Live Now, shadowy London financier August Melmotte is making his first foray into the political world, running for Parliament and finding out that one of his recent shady real-estate transactions might be exposed publicly right after he had hosted a dinner in his home for the Emperor of China attended by the great men of England and Europe.

My current pleasure reading takes a political turn.

...I think he took some pride in his own confidence as to his own courage, as he stood there turning it all over in his mind. Very much might be suspected. Something might be found out. But the task of unravelling it all would not be easy. It is the small vermin and the little birds that are trapped at once. But wolves and vultures can fight hard before they are caught. With the means which would still be at his command, let the worst come to the worst, he could make a strong fight. When a man's frauds have been enormous there is a certain safety in their very diversity and proportions. Might it not be that the fact that these great ones of the earth had been his guests should speak in his favour? A man who had in very truth had the real Brother of the Sun dining at his table could hardly be sent into the dock and then sent out of it like a common felon. (page 472 of Penguin Classics paperback)

With legal cases about Trump's so-called "University" still pending, his complicated tax returns still unreleased, a history of bankruptcies, thousands of "minor" lawsuits, and more, the "diversity and proportion" of Trump's financial shenanigans put August Melmotte's to shame (though Melmotte did it from nothing without being given a head start by his father). If we do see any of Donald Trump's tax returns before November 8 (unlikely at this point as he continues to thumb his nose at the voters and the media), the chances are that, unless he gave nothing to charity or paid no taxes, the rule-bending in those thousands of pages would be so financially arcane that it would take teams of forensic accountants to root it out and another team to try to reduce it to layman's terms. It's only "the small vermin and little birds that are trapped at once."

If I entertained any notion that Donald Trump might have the attention span to tackle it, I might think that he had modeled parts of his life on The Way We Live Now.

Today's Bible Verse for Willard "Mitt" Romney and Donald "J." Trump

As long as taxes, their routine avoidance by rich American businessmen, and hidden tax returns are back in the news, this quotation from the Gospel of Mark seemed to be the appropriate True Blue Liberal bible lesson for the day.

Mark 11:13 And they send unto him certaine of the Pharises, and of the Herodians, to catch him in his words.
14 And when they were come, they say unto him, Master, we know that thou art true, and carest for no man : for thou regardest not the person of men, but teachest the way of God in truth. Is it lawfull to give tribute to Cesar, or not?

15 Shall we give, or shall we not give? But he knowing their hypocrisie, said unto them, Why tempt yee mee? Bring me a penny, that I may see it.

16 And they brought it : and he saith unto them, Whose is this image and superscription? And they said unto him, Cesars.

17 And Jesus answering, said unto them, Render to Cesar the things that are Cesars : and to God the things that are Gods. And they marvailed at him.

This is taken, of course, from the 1611 King James Version, known here at trueblueliberal.org as "The Real Bible For Real Christians."

#MittsMissingReturns Redux

Trump Endorsing Romney.
Las Vegas, 2 February 2012

I don't feel I need to add anything to this, but Willard "Mitt" Romney, the last uberrich Republican businessman who ran for the White House while going to great lengths to hide his tax returns, is now asking the current uberrich Republican front-runner to come clean on his taxes:

"We have good reason to believe that there's a bombshell in Donald Trump's taxes [...] I think there's something there. Either he's not anywhere near as wealthy as he says he is, or he hasn't been paying the kind of taxes we would expect him to pay. Or perhaps he hasn't been giving money to the vets or the disabled, like he's been telling us he's been doing."

You don't need an essay from me on irony, do you? All I want to add is to suggest that you review some of the many classic 2012 installments in the #MittsMissingReturns saga that appeared here on True Blue Liberal Dot Org:

• #MittsMissingReturns [part one], July 3, 2012 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Two), July 6 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Three),  July 10
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Four) -- In a Nutshell, July 14 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Five) -- In Which Mitt Romney Gives a Typically Squirrelly Response, July 16
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Six) -- Herman Cain Weighs In, July 25
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Seven) -- Romney Finds One Issue on Which He's 100% Consistent, July 26
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eight) -- Another Lesson in Mitt's Lying Laugh, July 31
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Nine) -- Mitt Romney vs. Harry Reid, August 4
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Ten) -- In which Paul Ryan makes Mitt Romney throw up in his mouth a little, August 13
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eleven) -- Fox & CNN are ready to move on already, August 15
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Twelve) -- In which the privileged candidate tells the small-minded press which questions they are allowed to ask, August 16 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Thirteen) -- Romney may not know how to treat a dog, but he knows how to blow a dog whistle, August 24
• #MittsMissingReturn (Part Fourteen) -- False Equivalency from The Wall Street Journal, August 30
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Fifteen) -- The Donald's "Major Announcement," October 24, 2012

The Word of the Day is (once again) "Terrorism"

Is there any doubt that a person with hundreds of rounds of ammunition and a semi-automatic rifle entering an international airport to kill as many TSA agents as possible should be labeled a terrorist? Apparently there is, because I saw the ABC news story about this murderer tonight and have been looking at many other videos online and I have yet to see any reporter refer to this "shooter" or "gunman" or "assailant" or "suspect" or "perpetrator" as a "terrorist".

Is there any doubt that the t-word would be used immediately if the LAX shooter's name were Abdul Muhammad rather than Paul Anthony Ciancia and if he were carrying a Koran rather than a note that included references to Janet Napolitano and the New World Order and talked about how he wanted to attack TSA officers and "instill fear into their traitorous minds"?

This is about more than language, and it's a pattern. Here's a link to a post from February 18, 2010 about another white male Christian terrorist suicide bomber who flew his plane into a building containing an IRS office in Texas. He, of course, was not a "terrorist" to the government or the press, but simply a troubled 53-year-old businessman with tax problems. Why? Simply because his name was Joseph Andrew Stack III rather than Mohammed Atta. But if we don't use the word terrorism for terrorist acts carried out by our home-grown murderous right-wing nuts, then we shouldn't use it for anyone. It becomes a word devoid of meaning.

This Will Be The Only Time I Post on the IRS "Scandal"

There seems to be only one difference between the IRS scrutiny received by political groups on the left and right when they applied for tax-exempt status. One side went into the full Fine White Whine of spoiled privileged children and the other side knew they were asking the Internal Revenue Service for a special favor

The Gaspin' Flag commemorating the
2012 Total Collapse of Teaparty (a.k.a. #TCOT)

and were willing to endure the extra questioning to support their claims that they were "social welfare" organizations (probably an exception that shouldn't have been given to any of these political [or religious, but that's another argument] organizations) rather than purely political entities. 

One side fed Darrell Issa's televised Obama Witchhunt Committee with hours of sob stories about how their constitutional right to not pay taxes was interfered with by government questions, reaching an apex with a tearful Wetumpka (Alabama) Tea Party President Becky Gerritson proclaiming that she was not a 'serf or vassal' willing to answer too many questions or fill out lots of forms for her organization's tax-exempt status (which was not, after all, denied).

My favorite quote from the other side comes from the (non-whiny) executive director of one of the progressive groups that was also forced to fill out IRS paperwork (the horror):

“If you’re going to ask for exceptional treatment, you should expect to go through exceptional screening. We all play by the same rules, and if they don’t like the rules, they don’t have to play.”
--Ed Espinoza, Progress Texas (quoted on Politico, 7/22/13)

#MittsMissingReturns (Part Fifteen) -- The Donald's "Major Announcement"

Donald Trump's "major announcement" has been the subject of twittering speculation this week, and now he's announced his major announcement on YouTube and Facebook. If you can't stand his voice, the gist of the following video is basically this: If President Obama releases all of his college applications and records and passport applications and records by October 31, America's self-anointed Birtherist-in-Chief Donald J. Trump will donate $5 million dollars to a charity of the President's choice.




Of course this is as meaningless -- and as racist -- as the campaign for the "long-form birth certificate."

How much is Donald Trump offering to Willard "Mitt" Romney to release as many years of tax returns as Barack Obama has released? What if The Donald offers Willard one million for one year? He won't. And we won't even see 2009, let alone any tax returns from any of Mitt's years in the private sector. The press is playing dead and it's obvious that the richest man to ever run for the Presidency is going to give us the least financial information, even though his financial expertise is supposedly his main qualification for the office (Slogan: "Elect Me for My Business Experience, but My Business Experience Is None of Your Business."). Maybe Mitt's plan involves cheating America back to prosperity.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Review this past list of installments in the #MittsMissingReturns saga by clicking on any of these links:

• #MittsMissingReturns [part one], July 3 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Two), July 6 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Three),  July 10
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Four) -- In a Nutshell, July 14 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Five) -- In Which Mitt Romney Gives a Typically Squirrelly Response, July 16
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Six) -- Herman Cain Weighs In, July 25
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Seven) -- Romney Finds One Issue on Which He's 100% Consistent, July 26
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eight) -- Another Lesson in Mitt's Lying Laugh, July 31
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Nine) -- Mitt Romney vs. Harry Reid, August 4
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Ten) -- In which Paul Ryan makes Mitt Romney throw up in his mouth a little, August 13
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eleven) -- Fox & CNN are ready to move on already, August 15
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Twelve) -- In which the privileged candidate tells the small-minded press which questions they are allowed to ask, August 16 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Thirteen) -- Romney may not know how to treat a dog, but he knows how to blow a dog whistle, August 24
• #MittsMissingReturn (Part Fourteen) -- False Equivalency from The Wall Street Journal, August 30

And keep up your small-minded tweeting with #MittsMissingReturns on Twitter.

#MittsMissingReturns (Part Fourteen) -- False Equivalency from the Wall Street Journal

Mitt Romney will be giving his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention tonight and we can be pretty sure that he won't be saying, "I've got nothing to hide and I'm proving that by having my campaign release a dozen years of tax returns to independent news organizations as I address you here tonight." OK, we can be more than "pretty sure" he won't do that. It's as certain as death and (the fact that most of us will pay) taxes that we won't be seeing #MittsMissingReturns that easily.

I stumbled upon the following video this afternoon in which even the formerly staid and sober Wall Street Journal joins the racist "Obama's Sealed Records" chorus, equating school records from 30 years ago with Mitt Romney's business records from 2 years ago.

Watch the talking heads above repeat the same hypothetical "trade" that Donald Trump proposes:

Female WSJ Talking Head at 1'28": "Has the Romney campaign caught onto this, this kind of tit for tat fairness. 'If you want me to release the tax returns, you gotta release the transcripts.' Or no?"

1) There is no "tit for tat fairness" here.
2) Mitt Romney would not honor his side of this trade if Barack Obama's records from Columbia and Occidental and high school and kindergarten were all released tomorrow.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Keep up with the lengthening list of installments in the #MittsMissingReturns saga by clicking on any of these links:

• #MittsMissingReturns [part one], July 3 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Two), July 6 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Three),  July 10
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Four) -- In a Nutshell, July 14 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Five) -- In Which Mitt Romney Gives a Typically Squirrelly Response, July 16
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Six) -- Herman Cain Weighs In, July 25
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Seven) -- Romney Finds One Issue on Which He's 100% Consistent, July 26
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eight) -- Another Lesson in Mitt's Lying Laugh, July 31
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Nine) -- Mitt Romney vs. Harry Reid, August 4
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Ten) -- In which Paul Ryan makes Mitt Romney throw up in his mouth a little, August 13
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eleven) -- Fox & CNN are ready to move on already, August 15
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Twelve) -- In which the privileged candidate tells the small-minded press which questions they are allowed to ask, August 16 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Thirteen) -- Romney may not know how to treat a dog, but he knows how to blow a dog whistle, August 24

And keep up your small-minded tweeting with #MittsMissingReturns on Twitter.

#MittsMissingReturns (Part Thirteen) -- Romney may not know how to treat a dog, but he knows how to blow a dog whistle

Just watch the rise he gets out of this crowd earlier today when he says, "No one's ever asked to see my birth certificate. They know that this is the place that we were born and raised."



Sorry Mitt, we don't care about your birth certificate, but we'd love to see the missing tax returns from 1998 -- 2009 (and the missing pieces from 2010 and 2011) that would give us some more realistic ideas about that fantastic business experience that you keep touting as your main competency and reason to be President (other than the fact that you're a white guy from Michigan who will never be asked for his "long-form birth certificate" by a billionaire publicity hound with a bad hairpiece).
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Keep up with the lengthening list of installments in the #MittsMissingReturns saga by clicking on any of these links:

• #MittsMissingReturns [part one], July 3 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Two), July 6 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Three),  July 10
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Four) -- In a Nutshell, July 14 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Five) -- In Which Mitt Romney Gives a Typically Squirrelly Response, July 16
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Six) -- Herman Cain Weighs In, July 25
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Seven) -- Romney Finds One Issue on Which He's 100% Consistent, July 26
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eight) -- Another Lesson in Mitt's Lying Laugh, July 31
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Nine) -- Mitt Romney vs. Harry Reid, August 4
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Ten) -- In which Paul Ryan makes Mitt Romney throw up in his mouth a little, August 13
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eleven) -- Fox & CNN are ready to move on already, August 15
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Twelve) -- In which the privileged candidate tells the small-minded press which questions they are allowed to ask, August 16 

And keep up your small-minded tweeting with #MittsMissingReturns on Twitter. 

#MittsMissingReturns (Part Twelve) -- In which the privileged candidate tells the small-minded press which questions they are allowed to ask.

Now that Mitt Romney has come out today and called the press and the American voters "small-minded" for asking about his tax returns, I'm sure that we'll all just leave him alone.

Who are we to distrust him and ask for written details?

“Y'know, y'know given, I just, I just have to say, given the challenges that America faces – 23 million people out of work, um uh Iran about to become nuclear, uh one out of six Americans in poverty – the fascination with taxes I’ve paid I find to be very uh small-minded compared to the broad issues that we face. Uh but I did go back and look at my taxes and over the past 10 years I never paid less than 13 percent. I think the most recent year is 13.6 or something like that. So I paid taxes every single year. Harry Reid’s uh charge is totally uh false. I’m sure waiting for Harry to put up who it was that told him what he says they told him. I don’t believe it for a minute, by the way. But every year I’ve paid at least 13 percent and uh if you add in addition the amount that goes to charity, why the number gets well above 20 percent.” -- Mitt Romney, 16 August 2012

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Keep up with the large list of small-minded installments in the #MittsMissingReturns saga by clicking on any of these links:

• #MittsMissingReturns [part one], July 3 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Two), July 6 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Three),  July 10
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Four) -- In a Nutshell, July 14 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Five) -- In Which Mitt Romney Gives a Typically Squirrelly Response, July 16
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Six) -- Herman Cain Weighs In, July 25
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Seven) -- Romney Finds One Issue on Which He's 100% Consistent, July 26
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eight) -- Another Lesson in Mitt's Lying Laugh, July 31
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Nine) -- Mitt Romney vs. Harry Reid, August 4
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Ten) -- In which Paul Ryan makes Mitt Romney throw up in his mouth a little, August 13
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eleven) -- Fox & CNN are ready to move on already, August 15

And keep up your small-minded tweeting with #MittsMissingReturns on Twitter. 

#MittsMissingReturns (Part Eleven) -- Fox & CNN are ready to move on already

Watch (courtesy of Media Matters for America) a video showing how two of the major cable news channels are willing to ignore the fact that the Republican Presidential candidate is obviously hiding something seriously wrong in his financial history:

Why the business and financial history of someone whose main qualification for President is his self-proclaimed (but unverifiable) business and financial acumen should be considered tangential or a distraction is beyond me. His tax returns seem central to understanding who this candidate is. The demand for more than the two partial returns from 2010 and 2011 is not a case of Birtherism Redux, though that is certainly the way the GOP, Fox, and (maybe) CNN, would like to portray it, and us.
We'll keep up the call for 10-12 years of Mitt Romney's tax returns here on TrueBlueLiberal.org and with the #MittsMissingReturns hashtag on Twitter, but the media won't necessarily be working with us. I'm not looking forward to Candy Crowley's role as the impartial moderator for the single debate between Joe Biden and Paul Ryan.

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Catch up with the lengthening list of installments in the #MittsMissingReturns saga by clicking on any of these links:

• #MittsMissingReturns [part one], July 3 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Two), July 6 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Three),  July 10
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Four) -- In a Nutshell, July 14 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Five) -- In Which Mitt Romney Gives a Typically Squirrelly Response, July 16
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Six) -- Herman Cain Weighs In, July 25
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Seven) -- Romney Finds One Issue on Which He's 100% Consistent, July 26
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eight) -- Another Lesson in Mitt's Lying Laugh, July 31
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Nine) -- Mitt Romney vs. Harry Reid, August 4
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Ten) -- In which Paul Ryan makes Mitt Romney throw up in his mouth a little, August 13

And keep tweeting with #MittsMissingReturns on Twitter.