Dan Primack of Fortune lowered the boom on Reid’s effort to slander Romney with weaponized gossip: “One of two things has happened: (1) Reid is simply making the whole thing up, in order to pressure Romney into releasing tax returns for years prior to 2010, or (2) Reid’s investor pal lied, and the Senator didn’t bother to conduct even a mild vetting before sharing the accusation with reporters. Either way, shame on gossipy gentleman from Nevada.”
“Let me make this crystal clear,” Primack continued. “Investors in private equity funds do not receive, nor are they entitled to request, personal tax returns for fund managers. Not just at Bain Capital, but everywhere. For example, ask the person managing your 401(k) for their personal tax returns. See how far you get.”
Primack went on to note that Romney hasn’t even been managing Bain funds for the past ten years, and that Bain doesn’t prepare tax returns for its partners in-house, so Reid’s source couldn’t be someone who just happened to find Romney’s tax returns lying on a fax machine. Not that it seems terribly likely that a prosperous executive risking gigantic penalties, and possibly jail time, by cheating on his taxes for ten years would leave the evidence that could destroy him lying on a fax machine at the office.
Amusingly, when Primack rang up Harry Reid’s office to challenge his wild claims, a staffer told him to interview Reid’s anonymous source… who, of course, Reid will not identify.
I engaged in a little bit of hash tag fun last night. #Harryreidrumors, I think it is.
One can wish shame on progressives all one wants to, but it won’t work, because progressives have no shame.
Yep, I was same fun hashtag. A few lefties tried the “but all Romney has to do is release 10 years of tax returns to prove his innocence!”
Cuz that’s what this country is all about … proving our innocence
I’m all for it. One year of Romney tax returns in exchange for one year of college transcripts. (Or, alternatively, 10 questions from Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh answered on live TV for each year. Follow-ups permitted in the event of non-responsiveness.)
I think Reid should pony up his own tax records, especially those involving Nevada real estate over his career. How could a guy living on a Senator’s salary become a multi-millionnaire?
And I keep circling around to my favorite question: “Does the left know the kind of world they are building?”
The last year I’ve settled on the answer being “yes” and the understanding that they truly, truly desire tyranny. They assume they would be holding the whip hand, because they assume they are superior.
It’s a good question Rob, the best sort I think. And the provisional answer you give is good too, insofar as it reflects the twofold nature of the position of the left, i.e., yes to the extent they think they know, and no to the extent that they don’t in fact know. Which makes for very bad ju-ju for everyone alive on the planet. And worse, Mitt Romney appears to be entirely unfit to the task the left has created.
No, sdferr, I think they’re really, really OK with constructing a tyranny that would make the government of Orwell’s dystopia crap itself. They’re conducting themselves in precisely the ways that lead to tyranny by their own criteria. I don’t think there’s blindness, I don’t think it’s a two-sided thing — I think they’re up-and-up pushing for tyranny.
Look at the number of Dems and their press cheerleaders who have been holding China out as a shining example of “good governance”.
Pushing for tyranny in and of itself doesn’t mean that they know what will result should they achieve it, is the problem. Yes, on the hypothesis tyranny results if they’re successful — but many other things besides. It’s these latter effects I’m getting at with regard to their ignorance.
The best part about being a democrat is never having to worry about the consequences of lying your ass off.
Well, that’s the case when there is the rule of law in effect, Matt. Yet, everyday they strive mightily to take away those protections.
To merge two themes in this thread we can say that leftists don’t have to worry much about consequences in a republic. In a tyranny, all bets are off.
Or, in other words, we can compare the retirements of Jimmy Carter and Mussolini.
Contra-argument: Caesar did have to worry about consequences in a republic, which is why Rome ended up with a tyranny.
(Although you could argue the Republic was gone before Caesar’s career even started; however, the “big question” that led him across the Rubicon was whether he could serve in two different offices back-to-back without a period — however short — between them in which he’d not have official immunity. Caesar said no, there didn’t need to be such a period; his opponents said, yes, there did have to be one.
But Caesar only faced private lawsuits, not a Proscription.)
I suppose we’re talking about different consequences. Being removed from public office is a consequence but so is being stabbed to death by republicans.
I should phrase this better as I do take your point. Yes, the inherent consequences that follow in a republic do motivate these people to try and dismantle those structures.
My thrust here is simply that if I was to weigh being peacefully removed from power so that I could continue my private life against being violently murdered so that my corpse could be abused in the public square then I’d have some serious thinking to do.
One wonders what Gaddafi thought of his previous life choices as he discovered this difference by way of angry men jabbing sharp objects into his ass.
That’s giving them rather a lot of credit. Some, I fear, don’t want to build anything, they just want to see it all burn, but don’t have the guts to buy an AR-15 and go shoot up a crowd.
bh, the left wants the consequences to fall only on their political opponents; what they always forget is that when people notice this, they start handing out the consequences evenly whether they are done in legal form or not.
Laws, like any other standard, either apply to everyone, or eventually they apply to no one.
This , +1, and damn straight, SDN.
Oh, BAMA, the world over.
I just had me a little chat with the anonymous informant (who has asked to remain anonymous), and she said she was put up to it by someone else who will remain anonymous, because that anonymous person had pictures of Harry and her 10-year old son in the hot tub together.
Do I get to be a visigoth yet? I’m willing to settle for a vote for ostrogoth, ’cause I don’t think I’m ready to be a renegade quite yet.
Or am I?
“Does the left know the kind of world they are building?”
Did Castro, Pol Pot, or Mugabe ever show any signs of hesitation when things started to go to shit ? Hell no. The left don’t much care who they hurt. They all think they will be some of the special folks in the big house with a gulf-stream 5 parked out back in the middle of Yellowstone national park.