Tax Day Test
By Fleaflicker on April 15, 2008 at 11:39 AM in Barack Obama, Current Affairs, PACs & Lobbying Groups, Tax Day, Transparency
From: The Clinton Campaign
Is Sen. Obama As Transparent As He Claims?
For all of Sen. Obama’s rhetoric about the need for tax return transparency, you’d think he’d have released all of his tax records. Guess again.
For weeks, Sen. Obama and his campaign relentlessly demanded that Hillary release all of her tax returns even though 20-years of them were already publicly available. His campaign held an endless string of conference calls, issued press releases and flooded the airwaves with surrogates attacking Hillary for not immediately releasing the returns for the last few years she has been in public life.
Sen. Obama said the American people “deserve to know where you get your income from,” stressing the need for “full transparency” and bragging that his campaign has “set the bar.”
Well, Hillary released tax returns earlier this month and is now the only candidate in this race who has made thirty years worth of tax returns public.
But despite his rhetoric, Sen. Obama doesn’t abide by the standards he sets for others.
Sen. Obama has refused to release his tax returns for 1997, 1998 and 1999, even though he was in public life as a state senator during those years. During this period of time, Sen. Obama was accepting contributions from special interest lobbyists, PACs and even directly from corporations.
In fact, Sen. Obama has a habit of demanding higher standards of transparency for others than for himself. The National Archives has released hundreds of thousands of pages of documents from Hillary’s years as first lady, including her entire schedule. Throughout the campaign, Sen. Obama has demanded Hillary release more documents, even though they are not under her control. Meanwhile, Sen. Obama refuses to release any documents that are more than three years old. At first, Sen. Obama and his campaign told the press that he had records from his state senate years. Later, he said he threw them all out.
Whether it’s tax returns or legislative records or his relationship with indicted political fixer Tony Rezko, Senator Obama seems to take “the dog ate my homework” approach to disclosure.
When it comes to transparency, the only thing transparent about Senator Obama is his claim to be transparent.
(small, medium and large sizes; for both dogs and cats)
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Love it! I’m glad they are nailing him with this, especially after all his bellyaching about Hillary’s papers. Further, why is his excuse always, “I didn’t know,” “A staffer did it,” or “I threw the papers out” - this guy couldn’t even be a proper secretary. At some point you have to take responsibility, and Obama doesn’t seem to get that.
Once again, Fleaflicker - you are on the money (no pun intended).
What is it with this guy?
Flea(scratch)flicker, Obama throughout his entire political life has used the same tactics, blame or instill the illness upon the other candidate and deflect upon himself approach, the sort of thing used in those TV reality shows where someone lays in a corner of a place, says all the right things, instills all the ideas to everyone else and sits back and watches the fighting going on!
Obama will never release his schedules, they will damge him outright! Obama has managed this entire campaign on the ability to cast shadows on others and give excuses as to himself, thus he figures people to rely on his memory, which based upon his books has proven to be flawed totally with his description of his father being in the Kennedy Airlift, when his father was already in Hawaii when the Kennedy’s got involved, but it looked better I guess than folks like Belafonte and such Black folks bringing his dad to America, in Obama’s mind anyhow!
Don’t forget, Obama is a slick Chicago trained politician, so you need to be a dentist to get anything out of Obama!
He was in Chicago trying to catch up with folks who have dirty politics running in their veins. This stuff is there somewhere. Like the video from San Francisco, it only needs that one brave soul to leak it. Then the game is over.
Yes I remember reading that he withheld some returns. What a hypocrite this jerk is. He howled for Hillary’s returns and when that turned nothing notable up except that they make way more money than Obama the Entry Level Jerk, it all died. But I recall sites asking for HIS returns that he refuses to divulge. Who the hell does he think he is anyhow? Nevermind. I already know.
I would also like to know if he has a mortgage on that house he got from Rezko. Has anybody seen his recent returns to confirm that?
Pritzker (ms?) probably financed it at 0% interest since she was able to collect enough from others to cover the loss on his. *Smirk*
Finally, Camp Clinton is starting to kick a$$.
You make excellent points here. His Teflon has to be picked off at some point.
If I gave that many excuses to the Doctor I work for, I wouldnt have the job.
It’s really not fair to expect Democrats to put their reputations on the line and support a man who won’t even release a piece of paper more then three years old!
I’ve been thinking, this is a lot like being asked to carry a stranger’s suitcase thru airport security. I’m not that blond, if I don’t what the hell is in the bag, I’m not carrying it for you.
If the Democrats nominate Obama, they’re going on this trip without me.
On CNN, when the Obama campaign was crying out for the Clinton’s tax returns, the self-satisfied-Obama-supporter-disguised-as-a-Democratic-strategist Jamal Simmons was on a panel discussing this and the Clinton supporter was saying that they’d be happy to release them, but where’s Obama’s? Jamal was making all the excuses, and finally the Clinton supporter said, the records are coming, but there’s nothing in there. The segment was coming to a close, the moderator said, “Thank you, Jamal,” and instead of saying “Thank you for having me,” or whatever, he quickly barked, “Library!” I laughed out loud! He was trying to imply that Bill had taken dirty money or something for the library. Can you say desperate, grasping at straws, looking for something that’s NOT THERE? Jamal Simmons creeps me out…just like someone ELSE I know…
The ONE is not bound by the laws and ethics of mere motrals.
‘Mortals’, not ‘motrals’. It would help if I could type.
I’m not a lawyer but even I know that if the IRS wanted to audit me, they can go back 7 years. Why would anybody throw out documents after 3 years? Maybe the IRS should start looking into this fool.
Fact: Blacks were throwing whites off the trains in Korea. Blacks were shooting whites in Viet Nam. I guess by now you konw that at one time I was a soldier. For thirteen years I had to work and get along with them. That is one of the reasons I didn’t finish my twenty year career as a soldier. I just hope that if Obama is nominated and elected, the people that elect him know what they are doing.
Paul
I am sorry that those things you say happened. When my husband was in Korea a black man saved his life. I have met good and bad in all races. Judge people by who they are not what color they are.