From: My Left Nutmeg
(Looney! - promoted by ctblogger)
(x-posted from
4th Street News!)
The painful truth is that Lee Whitnum's 2008 Personal Financial Disclosure reveals her to be essentially unemployed.
A quick break-down of Ms. Whitnum's 2007 earned income, in its totality. (less than $4,200 in all):
- $2,414 Board of Ed-- (substitute teaching)
- $ 285 Great Stuff
- $ 815 Home Depot
- $ 665 First Choice Staffing
Granted another blogger points out Ms. Whitnum brought in somewhere between $10-15,000 in unearned income. But I'm curious as to how she manages to afford Greenwich on seemingly less than $20,000/year? Is Lee hypocritically living off of inherited family wealth, at the same time she labels Jim Himes, "out of touch".
The blogging community should place bets as to when the Greenwich Time, the Stamford Advocate, the Norwalk Hour, and the Connecticut Post will share with their readers and soon to be voters the following pertinent information about Ms. Whitnum:
- 1) She's essentially unemployed.
- 2) The FEC has put her on notice for Failure to File her campaign finance reports.
- 3) She spent "a couple of thousand dollars" paying canvassers to help her collect signatures, (which explains #2, she's hiding that ugly truth.)
- 4) In reality LeeWhitnum2008 is a one-woman show, plus a website.
- 5) Cycle-to-date she's raised all of $200!
How can the 4th's print media continue to report as if Ms. Whitnam has genuine support and legitimacy? Well, as we head into the final two weeks before the August 12th primary, we must hope that the district's journalists will come to their senses and let their readers know the truth. Whitnum isn't ready to be dog-catcher, let alone handle the job of Congresswoman.
If the papers don't snap to, we may need to do a call-in campaign, directly to the editors. I mean imagine if Jim Himes or Chris Shays were cited by the FEC for failing to file their finance reports. Or if it turned out Himes resume was sheer puffery! The dailies would be all over them...
Comment:
THE SKY IS FALLING
Mean Spirited Democratic party loyalists are so scared of Ms. Whitnum that they need to organize a "call-in campaign" to the Greenwich Time, the Stamford Advocate, the Norwalk Hour, and the Connecticut Post editors.
Is Ms. Whitnum such a threat that vicious Democratic insiders need to make sure that "journalists will come to their senses" about Ms Whitnum.
It is amazing that a candidate with a few thousand dollars can cause this much panic and hysteria in the Jim Himes campaign.
What's Mr. Himes going to do when he goes up against the politically seasoned and well financed Christopher Shays.
These democratic advocates of the poor are screaming that Ms. Whitnum earned less than $20,0000 and is there for not rich enough to be qualified to run for congress.
The sad fact is that a Ms. whitnum could possibly be paying a hirer percentage of her total income to Uncle Sam, because she dosen't get the tax breaks that hedge fund guys get.
By Bill Van AukenThe Democratic Party leadership in the US Senate has effectively killed proposals put forward earlier this year to close a tax loophole that allows billionaire managers of hedge and private equity funds to enjoy tax rates on their income that are far lower than those imposed on average American workers.....
.....As recently as 1980, income over $215,000 was taxed at 70 percent, and throughout most of the 1950s and early 1960s, income over $200,000 was taxed at 91 percent.
The Wall Street executives have claimed that they are entitled to the 15 percent rate because of the risks they take on investments. In fact, the vast bulk of the money at risk is that of their investors, for whom they provide a service as money managers, and are compensated for it, just as others who pay ordinary income taxes.
The main legislative proposal put forward in the House of Representatives would have compelled the super-rich fund managers to report their earnings as regular income and pay the 35 percent rate. It has been estimated that the measure would have created at least $6 billion in additional federal revenues.
According to the Washington Post, however, the Senate’s Democratic leadership has already assured the billionaire and multi-millionaire financiers that would be affected by the measure that they have nothing to worry about....
....Behind all of this orchestrated hand-wringing, the Democrats’ climb-down on closing the tax loophole for the country’s wealthiest is merely one more confirmation that this party—no less than the Republicans—represents and defends the interests not of working people, but those of the ruling elite. Just as the Democrats in Congress have proven unwilling to carry out any action to end the war in Iraq, so too they will do nothing to ameliorate the unprecedented inequality that pervades every facet of American society.
Sunday, June 29, 2008.
BY LEO HINDERY JR. AND BOB KERREY. One of the bedrock principles of our free and open society is that all of us obey laws and follow rules as they are written. The more universally we as citizens voluntarily submit to the rule of law, the greater our security and the less costly the efforts to protect us from those who choose to ignore it.
One set of laws where voluntary compliance is critical involves the collection of taxes. Right now, we have the most efficient tax collection system in the world because most Americans scrupulously obey these laws. They do so even though:
Congress continues to pass laws that make taxes ever more complex while giving speeches about simplification.
An individual taxpayer's effective tax rate is often inversely proportional to his ability to hire tax lawyers.
An increasing number of Americans believe the tax laws are rigged against them.
Our political leaders, however, cannot expect such ready compliance to go on forever. And it is not an exaggeration to say that tax provisions that blatantly favor those with high incomes over the middle class now threaten to bring down the confidence needed to sustain our experiment of self-government.
One such provision that has garnered a lot of attention lately has to do with what is known as "carried interest." Highly paid tax lawyers discovered a provision in current law that allows the managers of special investment partnerships to pay a much lower rate of tax on the preponderance of their income than other type managers pay on all of theirs.
Much of the performance-based management income earned by these few thousand private equity and hedge fund managers -- which income is called "carried interest" -- is taxed as capital gains, when by form, substance and logic it should be taxed as ordinary in come, just like the management in come and bonuses of all other managers.
And because the 15 percent capital gains tax rate is less than half the 35 percent maximum ordinary income tax rate, the cost of this loophole to the Treasury is huge.
The annual loss of tax revenue from this unfair treatment of carried interest is about $12 billion a year, or $120 per American household per year. It really is as if Congress had decreed that each year $120 out of the income of every household is to be diverted to the bank accounts of some of the wealthiest Americans.
We believe this has to change, and we believe that it would be desirable to convert carried interest into public interest by redirecting this annual $12 billion tax break to people who actually need it, namely America's K-12 teachers.
That $12 billion is just about enough to waive all the income taxes on those who choose our most important profession, which is the teaching of our children. And it would also allow us to give refundable tax credits to K-12 teachers based on their qualifications and teaching specialties, in order to increase the pool of teachers in critically important areas such as languages, math and sciences, and instructing students who are economically disadvantaged or have disabilities.
Our country has a long and successful record of using the tax code to reward what we as a society determine are desirable social actions. In the 1960s, for example, we gave income-tax relief to VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America) and Peace Corps volunteers be cause their work was deemed so important -- and today we give substantial relief to our courageous and patriotic active-duty military personnel.
But teachers are just as patriotic and important, their contributions to our nation's vibrancy and economic well-being are exceptional, and vis-à-vis all other municipal professions (police, fire, general services) they are far and away the most difficult public servants to recruit and retain.
All informed citizens, starting with teachers themselves, want high teaching standards and accountability. But when asked, they also want the needed fixes to our nation's education travails to start with easing the economic plight of our K-12 teachers. Federal income tax relief for teachers would be a powerful response to this demand, and a powerful step toward assur ing the long-term vibrancy of our society, the health of our national economy, and our global competitiveness.
So let's remove the huge tax break going to those who don't de serve it, and give it instead to those who need it. We promise that kids everywhere will be the beneficiaries.
Leo Hindery Jr., is the managing partner of InterMedia Partners, a private equity firm, and a director and former chairman of Teach for America. Bob Kerrey, a former U.S. senator from Nebraska and earlier its governor, is president of New School University in New York City. =================================================
Please send your comments and cpoies of your tax returns to GreenwichRoundup@gmail.com
