President Obama
speaking on the Buffett Rule.
President Obama is intensifying his
campaign for the Buffett Rule, hitting the themes of tax fairness and income inequality, with some back-up from millionaires.
The president met with Abigail Disney, president of the Daphne Foundation, Whitney Tilson, managing director of T2 Partners LLC, Frank Jernigan, a retired software engineer from Google Inc. and Lawrence Benenson, partner at Benenson Capital Co., according to an administration official. They were accompanied by their assistants at the event. [...]
Tilson, 45, said in an interview at the White House that he and his assistant Kelli Alires, 47, were "a little shocked" after they calculated their comparable federal tax rates for 2010.
While his adjusted gross income was 39 times that of Alires, Tilson said, he paid a rate of 24.6 percent while Alires paid a rate of 33.4 percent. "It struck both of us as unfair and ridiculous," he said.
"I would agree with that," Alires said.
As would Preside Obama, who
said:
At a time when the share of national income flowing to the top 1 percent of people in this country has climbed to levels we haven’t seen since the 1920s, these same folks are paying taxes at one of the lowest rates in 50 years. In fact, one in four millionaires pays a lower tax rate than millions of hardworking middle-class households. And while many millionaires do pay their fair share, some take advantage of loopholes and shelters that let them get away with paying no income taxes whatsoever—and that’s all perfectly legal under the system that we currently have.
As it's perfectly legal for Mitt Romney to pay just
15 percent on $21 million in income, but as the President says, that doesn't make it fair.
Speaking of Romney, his campaign wants you to know that tax fairness and income inequality are just an attempt to "distract Americans from the real issues.” Does that sound familiar to you? It should, since we just heard Gov. Nikki Haley say precisely the same thing about Romney's problem with women.
The Republican South Carolina governor, whose national star has risen over the past few weeks as speculation grows about her vice presidential prospects, told "The O'Reilly Factor" guest host Laura Ingraham that the recent focus on women's issues is a "distraction" tactic by President Obama.
"Distraction" is now the go-to word for the things the Romney campaign would really rather not talk about.