The problem with this is that it still gives no compelling reason to release the returns. Presidents find themselves under automatic audit, but previous presidents (since Nixon) have done it to give the illusion of transparency - it's a PR move, not an actual mechanism to ensure accountability.
Any transparency is better than "Fuck all."
For Trump it is worse than worthless as a PR move, as I've argued in my previous posts, and publicizes an element of his personal life he would apparently prefer remained private.
You say that like we're talking about a tragic family illness, or cheating on his wife, or banging countless women in a bungalow.
Oh wait, two of those three happened numerous times and we know more about them than his goddamn tax returns. You're mistaking his "personal life" with "his wealth", and sidestepping the continued reality that a serial liar, unapologetic tycoon and nepotism overlord is sitting at the head of our economy and policy making. After all this shit this man has done and said, are you really going to just "give him the benefit of the doubt" that he won't try and leverage all the power of his office to make himself richer at the country's expense? (I seem to recall you're not American. If you are, that'd be your expense too.) Are you really going to swallow all that because he's (hamfistedly) ramming through some policy you agree with? At some point it just seems like cutting off the nose to spite the face.
I have no illusions that he's mainly if not solely keeping it private so he can appear as rich as he claims to be rather than as rich as he is, wherever those two numbers may lie, but ultimately its his prerogative.
As though the president is just a private citizen, and not the person with their hand on all the levers. I don't care how he presents his wealth. What I want to know is that he's not enriching himself at our expense. I'm sure many presidents have, but no president has rubbed our noses in his shit and smirked while he does it. Tax returns may not even be the entire truth, but it's a damn sight more than we have now.
Trump doesn't have a positive reason to release his tax returns, you're right. Proof that you're lying all the time and possibly using the office of the president to make yourself rich tends to remove reasons for releasing information. The fact he was in bed with the Russians on one level or another just prior to the election alone should be reason enough to want to know more, forget propriety or "the illusion of transparency." I like how in one breath you assert the IRS would be all over anything fishy, and in the very next dismiss everyone else's filings as smoke and mirrors.
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Topic: AmeriPol thread (Read 4202527 times)