A Look at How the Left Hit Romney From All Sides Over His 2011 Tax Returns
As you may have heard by now, Mitt Romney released his 2011 tax returns this afternoon along with a brief summary of the federal taxes he says he paid dating back more than two decades. The release—at around 3 p.m. ET, or a few hours before a typical Friday document dump—was met quickly, and in some cases preemptively, with a blitz of criticism from those on the left, who, together, managed to hit the GOP nominee from nearly every imaginable side, including opposing angles at once.
In short, taken as an whole, his critics managed what on its face would appear to be an impossibility: arguing that Romney managed to both pay too much in taxes, and at the same time too little. For good measure, they also pulled off a second, smaller political sleight of hand, accusing Mitt and his wife of giving both too little to charity and too much.
We'll walk you through the flurry of seemingly-but-not-necessarily contradictory shots thrown Romney's way in one second, but first here's a pair of quotes that are the foundation of much of the criticism that poured out over Twitter and the rest of the Web:
"I don't pay more [in taxes] than are legally due and frankly if I had paid more than are legally due I don't think I'd be qualified to become president. I'd think people would want me to follow the law and pay only what the tax code requires." — Mitt Romney to ABC News at the end of July.
"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." — Mitt Romney during a South Carolina campaign swing in mid-August.
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http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2012/09/21/romney_s_2011_tax_returns_a_roundup_of_how_the_left_is_bashing_mitt_over_his_tax_returns_.html
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