Poor Mitt Romney only makes about 40 million a year much of it is except from taxes.
So Mitt Romney is definitely among the 1% and it is no wonder he doesn't want any real changes in taxation policies in America.
But it should be noted that President Obama and many of his friends and those in his administration are also part of the 1%
So Obama or Romney or Gingrich's claims to understand or feel the pain of average Americans is a bit dubious and disingenuous.
Mitt Romney's Tax Returns Show 13.9% Tax Rate, Highlight Challenges For Wealthy Candidates by paul Blumenthall, Huff Post, January 24,2012
WASHINGTON -- In an attempt to stop a steady stream of bad press over questions about his income, assets and tax rate, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney released one year of his tax returns and an estimate for his 2011 tax returns on Tuesday morning. The disclosure comes four days after Romney's big loss to Newt Gingrich in the South Carolina primary on Saturday and after weeks of escalating questions about when he would release his tax returns and why he would not promise to disclose them.
The returns show that Mitt and Ann Romney, who are worth from $190 million to $250 million, earned $21.7 million in 2010 and paid a 13.9 percent tax rate, lower than that of a person earning $50,000. The total amount the Romneys paid in taxes in 2010 was about $3 million.
Along with releasing their tax returns from 2010, the Romneys released estimates for their 2011 taxes, which have not yet been filed. The estimates show an income of $20.9 million, with the couple paying a tax rate of 15.4 percent, closer to the estimate that Romney gave at a January 17 press conference. The Romneys' income came entirely from investments, mostly from capital gains, which are taxed at a lower rate than other types of income.
Those investments are littered across a series of accounts in places stretching from America to the Cayman Islands and Luxembourg and even include a now-closed Swiss bank account. Many of these accounts hold few assets.
Also revealed in the tax returns is the amount the candidate gave to charity. In total, the Romneys in 2010 gave nearly $3 million to charity, with half of that going to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Mormon church.
Gingrich, Romney's chief opponent in the Republican primary, released his tax returns on January 19 during a Republican debate. Gingrich's tax rate, 31 percent, is more than double that of Romney. President Barack Obama last year released his 2010 tax returns, which showed a 23 percent tax rate. Both Gingrich and Obama, while earning in the millions of dollars in 2010, made just a fraction of Romney's income.
Rick Santorum and the other GOP candidates are anti-abortion and see nothing wrong with forcing a woman to give birth to a child even though the pregnancy is a matter of rape or incest.
Santorum and the pro-lifers believe life begins at the moment of conception and so believe that the Zygote the fertilized egg has all the rights of a person or even of a corporate entity ( ie Citizen United SCOTUS)
Rick Santorum On Opposition To Abortion In Cases Of Rape: 'Make The Best Out Of A Bad Situation'
So the woman who has been raped gets further punishment by being forced to carry the pregnancy to term. This is typical of the reasoning in a patriarchal society in which the rapist may never be made to pay for his actions while his victim gets to be a victim for the rest of her life as the child born of the rape is a daily reminder of the rape.
From the Pro-lifers view each child is sacred from the moment of conception because each pregnancy occurs in their view as due to God's Will.
If the Zygote and the fetus are given the rights of a person then there arises issues such as to what extent is the woman carrying the child responsible for its growth and well being.
So any behavior a pregnant woman engages in which might have a negative impact on the Zygot or the fetus is therefore a criminal act willfully endangering the person growing inside her body.
Another legal issue is that if a pregnant woman is assaulted and thereby loses her child though she herself lives should the person who assaulted her be charged with with murder or just assault causing physical harm. If the fetus and mother die should the person who assaulted her(them) be charged with a double murder.
Should insurance companies for instance be compelled to pay for the death of the Zgote or fetus in the same way they would the death of a child.
The legal entanglements created by guaranteeing the same rights of personhood to a Zygote and fetus are in fact far-reaching .
A woman who drinks alcohol or smokes tobacco or has a poor diet can she be arrested forced into some form of incarceration whereby she can be monitored in order that she not endanger the health of her child.
By extension has the child once born on becoming an adult have the righ to sue or press criminal charges against their birth mother for behaviors which have or may have had detrimental effects on the fetus which have created some physical, neurological or psychological problems for that Zygote which is now an adult. For instance born with fetal alcohol syndrome, or born a crack baby or because of the birth mothers poor diet deficient in nutrients which led to permanent damage. There are many such disorders which are possibly caused by the behaviors of the birth mother.
Is this the path the US and other countries are willing to follow with all of its legal and ethical issues.
Rick Santorum rejects abortions but is fine with the use of the Death penalty.
He says the death penalty should only be used in cases where there is certainty. Which may sound reasonable but the law is that in criminal cases including murder the rule is that the defendant must be found guilty based on evidence "beyond a shadow of a doubt".
So anyone on death row must have been found guilty beyond a shadow of a doubt.
To put it another way the defendant is found guilty given the evidence at the time of the trial and the sentencing and that no new evidence comes to light before the defendant is executed.
So Santorum's argument about certainty is merely stating what is already supposed to the law of the land in the USA.
If he wanted his argument to have some weight he should be arguing that the courts must be open to new evidence in any specific case especially when the death penalty is involved.
This is part of the problem in the USA as various states and governor's and attorney generals have different notions of what constitutes new evidence and whether it should be considered at all.
So what happens in the real world is that real flesh and blood human beings are executed even though there may be reasonable doubt but the court having made its decision refuses to look at new evidence.
This may be part of the state's rulings on new evidence or it could be just a matter of a particular judge who sentenced the defendant to be executed not willing to have any of his decisions questioned in any way shape or form.
So either there is a need to change how new evidence can be introduced and whether the judge's decision in a specific case was in fact justified based on what evidence was available at that time.
It is not just a matter on new evidence in the form of DNA testing but alos witnesses recanting in some cases claiming they were pressured by law enforcement agents or the crown to give false or misleading statements.
Because of such mitigating factors in the sense that we can never be 100% certain that it is therefore incumbent on the state to reconsider the death penalty in any case because the finality of the death penalty. Life imprisonment is therefore more reasonable since if new evidence appears and the accused is found to be innocent they can be freed from prison . But you can't free the accused after being executed.
So Rick Santorum and those who defend the death penalty in the end just want their pound of flesh from someone whether the guilty party or not since if they are innocent after their death God will know and allow them through the pearly gates I guess.
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