Let's look at some things we know about tax returns and politicians:
We know that George Romney(Mitts dad) was the first politician to release multiple years tax returns because “One year could be a fluke, perhaps done for show".
We know that when Mitt was desperate to be John McCain's running mate he gave the Senator over 23 years of tax returns!
We know that Mitt will NOT release his tax returns to the general public:
We know that Ann Romney says they have given us all of the info "that you people need to know".
We also know that Washington DC resident, Eric Hovde has no interest in releasing his tax returns!
We know that the republicans think that releasing tax returns is a non issue and has nothing to do with the upcoming election.
NOW, thanks to some very good reporting from Jason Rae, we know that when it comes to their opponents, tax returns are a very significant issue.
From June 27 to July 16, 2012, the Republican Party of Wisconsin, through its political director Jonathan Wetzel, filed an open records request with the Wisconsin Department of Revenue for the tax returns of 26 Democratic candidates for the Assembly. The requests varied from ten years worth of filings to just one year’s return.You see, unlike federal tax returns, state tax returns are subject to open records. It’s just one more aspect of the Wisconsin tradition of transparency in government that has been under assault by Governor Walker and the GOP led legislature in the last year and a half. But don’t get me wrong, even if they don’t like the transparency, they will use it when it benefits them.....
I just don’t understand how they can deny releasing their own returns saying it shouldn’t matter and that it’s an attempt to, as a Hovde spokesman said, “incite class warfare,” and yet go and seek tax returns from other candidates.Here again we have Republicans talking out of both sides of their mouth. It is actually making me wonder what Tommy, Mark, Eric and Jeff are all hiding if they refuse to release theirs? Its classic do as we say, not as we do.
Hypocrisy, thy name is Republican.