COMMENTARY | Urged by his competition, former governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney has finally decided to release his tax returns for 2010-2011. The controversy sprouted several weeks ago during one of the numerous GOP debates. The first person to bring up the subject was Texas Governor Rick Perry, who recently dropped from the race and has endorsed Newt Gingrich. Gingrich has been one of the most vocal about Romney releasing his taxes. He stated that the person to run against current president Barack Obama needs to be trustworthy and transparent. The more honest a candidate is, the more likely they will be able to defeat the incumbent. Gingrich and Romney are the two current front-runners in the race and have been clashing heads as of late.
Also entering the discussion was Senator Rick Santorum who urged the former governor to release his taxes, saying if there is nothing to hide, it should not be a problem. Along with Santorum, the only current Republican candidate to not release hits tax returns is Ron Paul, who said it was trivial and ultimately yet another non-issue that seems to be taking up most of the time during the debates.
Mitt Romney is in the top tax bracket, or as the Occupy Wall Street protestors would say, the 1 percent. He mentioned in the debate on Monday that if it were not for the capital gains tax, he would not have paid anything. Romney is set to pay around $6.2 million for the 2010-2011 year. Last week, it was brought to the public’s attention that Mitt has offshore bank accounts in the Cayman Islands with millions of dollars to avoid taxes in the United States.
Personally, this does trouble me. Mitt insists that he knows what is like to be a worker. He famously stated in a debate that he knew what it felt like to fear getting pink-slipped. If anything, he knows what it feels like to hand out a pink slip. Romney’s appeal to emotion is nothing more than an attempt to persuade voters for their endorsements. On the other hand, I can also see Ron Paul’s perspective that this is a non-issue. The Republican Party should deal with things that would decrease the size of government and work to substantially reduce the national debt.
A paradigm shift is occurring in the United States. To avoid becoming yet another failed global empire, perhaps concern should be more focused on domestic issues concerning underemployment, an increase in the cost of living and ever growing debt.