I Don't Trust CNN, But Dana Bash Has Staked Her Entire Reputation On The Line, Possibly Even Career

[JaneyVee]

"I have to tell you that, uh, I did speak to one source who's very close to Senator Reid who claims to also know who this Bain investor is that Reid spoke with, and insists that this is a credible person, and this person, if we knew the name we would understand that they would have the authority and the ability to know about Romney's tax returns."-Dana Bash

I do trust Harry Reid though, and with Dana Bash throwing herself into the middle of this, I believe this means we're about to receive SHOCKING revelations about Mitt Romney's taxes. Notice how he said he would release one more year, then files a tax extension so that this ONE SINGLE YEAR wouldn't be made available until October 2012.

The REAL reason is because his accountants are scrambling to come up with something, ANYTHING to make this ONE SINGLE tax return seem even somewhat normal, presentable to the American people.

The truth is, is that Romney's tax returns will not only read like a blueprint for how billionaires regularly defraud the U.S. Govt year after year, but his tax returns will prove EVERY SINGLE THING Pres.Obama has staked his campaign on and said about the rich paying their fair share will become truth to power. The jig will be up, and Romney's taxes will be the rat/turncoat to this organized crime syndicate.

Not only will the middle class despise him, but he will be shunned by every millionaire/billionaire in his precious business community and at the country clubs for "giving up the goods". The Romney name will be forever tarnished, from his church, to his business reputation.

They're only screaming class warfare louder now because they are finally backed into a corner <---Enough to pay off the entire Global National Debt.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. I hope she's got a solid source - look what happened to Dan Rather.

[Kurovski]

2. Same thought here. Nt

[SnohoDem]

32. +1

I don't doubt that the Romnoid is evil and greedy enough to do this, but is he stupid enough?

We probably give Karl (Lex Luthor) Rove too much credit as an evil genius, but I swear this shit stinks like Rove.

[MADem]

31. Dan Rather had "bad paper." That was his downfall. Dana Bash will never have to reveal her source.

I'd look at John McCain, and/or the members of his staff who ran his Presidential bid in 08, specifically, the "inner circle" responsible for vetting the VP candidates.

I hear hoofbeats; I'm thinking horses.

It could well have been a conversation in the Senate Cloakroom that got this party started!

[spanone]

3. don't underestimate their hate for the President.

[NYC_SKP]

5. Comment and quote from the article:

Jeff Mowatt 1 week ago

As President Clinton was informed in 1996:

“Capitalism nevertheless remains the most powerful economic system ever devised. The problem is not with the construct. The problem is with the output of the construct, wherein imaginary constructs – numbers, and currencies represented symbolically by numbers – are left to control real human beings to the material benefit of relatively few people and to the exclusion of many others. Classical capitalism has reached equilibrium in this regard. However, and consequently, many and growing numbers of human beings are excluded in the realm of finite resources hoarded by those most adept with manipulating numbers/currencies. ”

http://www.slideshare.net/JeffMowatt/principles-of-people-centeredeconomics

[DrewFlorida]

6. What if that Bain Capital investor turned out to be John McCain?

We know he and his wife are very wealthy and have the means to be investors in Bain Capital. We also know that McCain has seen all of Romney's tax returns from the VP vetting process in 2008. we also know that McCain has called for Romney to show the public his tax returns, and finally McCain has recently spoken out against the extreme right (even though he has courted the Teaparty).

I think that would be quite ironic if it turned out to be John McCain who is Harry Reid's source.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

7. I wonder....

It's true that McCain is a bitter old SOB. Would he kneecap Mittens to be sure he lost to Obama, thereby making McCain's own defeat (and idiotic decision to choose Palin as his running mate) a bit less humiliating? Otherwise I can't think of a motive.

[DrewFlorida]

11. McCain's motive could be a fear of the extreme right being in power!

McCain had always been a moderate Republican until he ran for President at which time he had to pander to the extreme right. What if he is afraid of the extreme legislation and platform of today's republican party and what that would mean for America if Romney were elected? This could be motive enough for McCain to secretly provide the needed evidence to take Romney down, and McCain may be getting close to retirement and doesn't want to have a legacy like George Bush.

I'm just posing a possibility here, I'm not sure if I believe it, but it does seem plausible.

[tomm2thumbs]

23. plus McCain has to be bitter over losing and to see Romney buy his way in, it must drive him nuts

McCain has always come across as a very angry, nasty old man. This would just fit him to a T to make sure someone who has crossed him in the past has their retribution.

That or the missus...

[Politicalboi]

33. And Rmoney says

John McCain only showed 2 years of his taxes. Being a Senator, I'm sure McCain's taxes have been seen each time he ran for office. And it wouldn't surprise me if McCain cheats his taxes.

[JaneyVee]

9. Could be why McCain was first to his defense today.

He could have saw Romney's tax returns, mentioned it to someone in passing on the McCain team, and BOOM!

[JI7]

15. not Mccain, but who was involved in McCain's VP Search ?

or anyone else who would have seen that.

[calimary]

21. Steve Schmidt.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

36. What if it turned out to be Sarah Palin?

Think about it - yeah, she's not a Bain investor, but maybe she's Dana Bash's separate source. She could have found out about Mittens' returns after McCain hauled her off the tundra. Far-fetched, maybe, but cui bono? In the bat-infested belfry that is the brain of Sarah Palin, if Mitt goes down who will the GOPers turn to at the convention? The half-governor of Alaska, of course.

You never know...

[cleduc]

8. When one is in the sort of business Mitt was in with Bain,

it takes big dough to flip companies. The more money a company can get their 'mitts' on, the more company flipping a company like Bain can do and the more money they can make.

A big hunk of money for Bain came from investors. But financial institutions would be involved to help with the purchase, leveraging and cash flow. Financial institutions are adverse to risk as those who have borrowed any money would know. Romney wouldn't be exempt from that. Bigger bucks attract bigger scrutiny. I'm sure there were times when those financial institutions wanted to see the tax returns of the principles before turning over $100 mil to Bain/Romney to flip a company. So that's why there would be a better chance than normal people like you and I might expect that folks close to Bain would be in a position to see Romney's tax returns.

If one of those people is a risk to step in front of a camera without subjecting themselves to legal risks like violating confidentiality agreements, the Romney campaign might be getting more nervous tonight.

[JaneyVee]

10. The source would have to have steel balls. The RW blogosphere would be digging through his garbage.

BUT, not entirely impossible. Maybe it's someone with a conscious that decided enough was enough. Like a whistleblower, or that guy that quit Goldman Sachs and penned a letter.

[cleduc]

12. For sure

When you are in the business of flipping companies like Mitt was and making absurd amounts of money in a short period of time, that money has to come from somewhere. In most cases, it wasn't like Mitt built these things up from the ground and nurtured them into being valuable for 10-20 years. This was largely hit and run transactions with slight of management hand. Sometimes, that money came at the expense of workers or the government. And sometimes, someone else wound up with the short end of the money stick - maybe the guy Mitt fleeced when he bought a shell of a company from Mitt that Mitt represented was a good company (even though he'd ripped the core out of it to fabricate a healthy bottom line that would fizzle in the coming years without the core).

There would likely be some people who really hate Mitt's guts for cleaning them out because it is a pretty heartless and cutthroat business. Maybe one of those victims or someone who witnessed behavior that turned their stomach when they considered the how badly the victims lost to fund Mitt's Swiss bank account is talking to Harry Reid. If Mitt really cleaned them out, maybe at this point they have little to lose.

Something like that wouldn't surprise me in the least.

[DallasNE]

13. CNN Has Purged Bash's Twitter Messages

Have they thrown her under the bus already? Or just scrubbed it pending better documentation?

This is the big leagues now and some people are going to come out of this very damaged. Right now we just don't know who it will be. One would assume that Reid had something very solid before going public but the verdict is still out. What I don't want is a Dan Rather outcome where a key document caused the entire story to backfire.

[JenniferJuniper]

14. Well, Dana Bash is no Dan Rather and

I doubt she's done any actual investigative journalism. It seems more likely one of her trusted sources knows the problem with Romney's returns which makes me wonder if it's someone who was involved in the McCain VP vetting.

The only way anyone can actually be proven wrong here is for Romney to release the records. He's made it clear he's not going to do that. Now what?

[DallasNE]

24. Now What? How About Drip, Drip, Drip

Reid slowly gets more specific so it keeps the story in the headlines. Romney has already blamed Obama for feeding this data to Reid then telling Reid to put up or shut up so he has shot his wad. Each minor detail Reid releases can be billed as "putting up". Drag this out right through the start of the Republican convention. Reid can be a big time loser if this story ends up not having legs and Romney is dead meat if the story has legs -- it is as simple as that. Right now Romney is probably looking for dirt on Reid -- a fellow Mormon.

[JenniferJuniper]

27. Reid is just the messenger though

Romney's shadow boxing with an unknown source right now. Assuming he really has no idea where its coming from, the Dana Bash confirmation of said source's credibility must have him incredibly paranoid right now. Which probably will provide the added benefit of more gaffs from Romney and more angry outbursts from his staff.

[MADem]

34. She's CNN's Senior Congressional Correspondent. She knows her way around the Hill. nt

[Samantha]

16. What about Steve Schmidt, the head of McCain's 2008 Presidential campaign?

He helped vet the short list of candidates to be McCain's running mate. He certainly would have seen those tax returns.

The last time I saw him, he was a commentator on MSNBC, and I assume he still is. I think it is within the realm of possibilities that he might comment in private on this subject to someone like Dana Bash or maybe even someone on Reid's staff.

My impression of Romney is that many insiders of the Republican party can't stand him and would have zero loyalty toward protecting him. None for the sake of continuing to function within the party would say something like this publicly, but during happy hour on the Hill Friday nights ... maybe.

Sam

[JaneyVee]

18. Yeah, or that one girl Nicole something that couldn't even bring herself to voting for McCain/Palin.

[DallasNE]

25. Nicolle Wallace

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/18/nicolle-wallace-palin-jus_n_361933.html

She may well have motive. She was close to Steve Schmidt so she may have had access to those tax returns. McCain has only said that there is nothing in the returns that would "disqualify" Romney. That is an odd way of saying it -- hardly a ringing endorsement, along with his earlier comment that "Palin was the better choice".

[cleduc]

20. She might have a GOP connection to the McCain group

I think she's largely reported on the GOP and followed the McCain campaign around in 2008.

[JenniferJuniper]

26. I thought I heard Schmidt say on MSNBC last week

or maybe the week before that there was nothing that concerned the McCain camp in those tax records and they were not the reason Romney was rejected.

Not that I believe him. He is the asshole who brought the Palins into our lives after all.

[uponit7771]

37. But Schmidt would have to be lying to the GOP too, the GOP doesn't trust rMoney cause he's a mental

...case level liar and Schimdt would HAVE to come out with something to calm them down.

If there's something in rMoney returns then Schmidt is finished too...

[0o.Imagine.o0]

17. Where's the IRS..

Wouldn't they know if he's filed or not..

[JaneyVee]

19. It's not about whether he filed, but how he gamed the system, albeit legally, but very un-ethically

Especially for someone running for highest office in the land. Imagine someone in charge of tax reform policy decisions who is a tax evader. On top of it, it's not as if he is the genius mastermind behind this due to his incredible grasp of knowledge on this subject, instead he is so unqualified to even do and understand his own taxes that he has others architecting the shady business.

Same with his success, he claims to be proud of his success yet says he's not in charge of his own money its a blind trust. So even there, not the mastermind.

[uponit7771]

40. During his Mass run he did NOT "game" the system legally. TRMS had it on Wed, he lied about his

...resident state and during the time of inquiry tried to change it on his returns vs just coming forth and saying a mistake was made.

rMoney is a mental case level liar

[JaneyVee]

42. Yikes! Did not know that. What a mess. Romney is one big lie after another.

[uponit7771]

39. +1

[SoapBox]

22. It's all interesting and stuff BUT

to the old, angry, white Thug, Bully and Bagger Party members it won't matter because...

Mittens ain't black. Period. And to the racist (and ClusterFuks crowd) that is all that matters.

[JenniferJuniper]

28. But it's angry white males for the most part

and they also happen to be the maroons who post most often on right wing sites so I think they appear more powerful than they actually are. Americans are getting darker with each passing election cycle - which of course is really the source of the fury and vitriolic hatred from the angry white guys. And when you factor in Obama's advantage with single women, they are all the more marginalized.

[RandySF]

29. And she is no leftie.

[canEHdian]

30. Mitt is Meat

On Nov. 7th, dogcatcher is going to look good to him.

[Enrique]

35. she has not staked anything

She did good normal reporting and reported something interesting but not earthshattering.

Daily Kos made it sound like she found someone that corroborated the claim about the taxes. That is not true, that would be a bombshell, it would not only have led the AC360 piece, it would have been reported everywhere.

[closeupready]

38. DAMN, you nailed it, Janey, and welcome to DU!!!!

Enthusiastic K&R

[just1voice]

41. A career at CNN = total bullshit anyway

It's propaganda. Of course you're correct, billionaires do regularly but totally legally defraud us -- due to the "laws" written for them and by them -- but, idiotic, propagandized and criminal Americans think that's just fine and only wish they could do it too.

Issues and answers to the issues should be discussed instead of some repuke's list of totally legal yet immoral actions. Americans want universal health care, a real economic infrastructure, and end to illegal wars and torture and drones and domestic spying.

Discussing some spoiled fratboy's financial dealings is so beyond anything that matters to 99.99% of everyone.