Ebenezer Obama: What Politico's Ken Vogel Doesn't Tell You About Mitt Romney's Tax Returns

George Soros’ disciple Ken Vogel wrote a front-page Politico piece laying out the left-wing site’s narrative-attack regarding Governor Mitt Romney’s tax returns. To say the Vogel article is contextually challenged would be quite the understatement, and charitable.

Ebenezer Obama

What Vogel wants you to know:

Mitt Romney and his wife earned more than $20 million in each of the last two years — including a total of $13 million from Bain Capital investments — and paid a rate of about 15 percent in federal taxes, according to tax information released by his presidential campaign Tuesday morning. …

They showed a tax rate far lower than those of his rivals, and foreign investments including a since-closed $3 million Swiss bank account and a Cayman Islands-based fund as well investments in Solamere Capital[.] …

In a conference call with reporters detailing the taxes, Romney’s campaign stressed the couples’ charitable contributions of about $7 million over the two years, and cast the tax documents as a window into the affairs of someone who has achieved the American Dream, and is intent on giving back. …

The Romneys’ tax rate was far lower than the 2010 rates paid by President Barack Obama, 26 percent, or Newt Gingrich, 31.5 percent.

Here’s the context Politico’s resident Soros’ disciple did not include in his story:

[T]he Romneys paid out 42 percent of their income in taxes and charity. …

Let’s compare this percentage to that of average Americans. A 2009 Urban Institute study found: “The average charitable contribution per return filed in 2009 was about 2.0 percent of [adjusted gross] income.”

As for the effective marginal rate, Jim Pethokoukis writes: “While Romney’s tax rate is — in his own words — ‘probably closer to 15 percent than anything,’ that’s still higher than the 8.2 percent average effective income tax rate (as of 2010) of U.S. households (once you factor in various tax credits). Indeed, nearly half of U.S. households pay no income tax at all. Their average effective tax rate is actually negative. Even if you add in the payroll tax, the effective tax rate of the middle fifth of U.S. taxpayers is 12.8 percent.”

So, yes, Romney is much wealthier than most Americans. But he also gives away or pays in taxes in absolute and percentage terms far more than most Americans.

Here’s more context Politico’s Soros’ disciple didn’t pass along (even though he’s aware of it): Obama’s inconceivable stinginess when it came to charitable giving:

And what about President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden in the run-up to their 2008 campaign?

USA Today broke it down here. In 2007, the Obamas gave more than $240,000 to charity, about 5.7 percent of their income. The Bidens gave an average of $369 to charity a year for the decade before he moved to the Naval Observatory – about 0.3 percent of their income. Back in 1997, then veep Al Gore and his then wife Tipper gave $353.

Since becoming veep, Biden hasn’t become much more generous. In 2010, he gave $5,350, about 1.4 percent of income.

And yet, over the last two years, Romney’s earned $42.6 million and voluntarily given about $7 million of that to charity. So on top of his taxes, Romney’s donated somewhere around 16.5% of his income.

You don’t judge a man by what he does when everyone is looking. Both Obama and Romney paid the legal amount of taxes they’re required to pay. There’s no virtue in obeying the law. You’re supposed to obey the law.

What you do judge a man by is what he does when no one is looking, and when no one was looking, Obama held on to his money like a miser while the Romney family donated millions and millions and millions.

But when you’re a Soros disciple like Ken Vogel, giving money to the private sector instead of to the government is not a virtue, especially when highlighting that number might make your Precious One look a little less precious by comparison.