Donald Trump Must Release His Tax Returns

Robert Reich. (photo: unknown)

By Robert Reich, Robert Reich's Facebook Page

25 May 16
readersupportednews.org

 
onald Trump is still refusing to release his tax returns, claiming that “there’s nothing to learn from them.” But voters deserve to decide that on their own. In the interest of a transparency and a fully informed electorate, Donald Trump must immediately release his tax returns for public scrutiny. There's no excuse to keep hiding this information from the public. Trump wants to conduct the people’s business from our nation's highest office -- so we deserve to see how he’s conducted his private business too.

Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have already released their tax returns, and Donald Trump is the only candidate left in the race who's holding out. 

Please join me in signing this petition:

https://secure2.convio.net/comcau/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=1564&s_src=1564&s_subsrc=reich

Comments

+56 # danireland46 2016-05-25 09:20

F. Scott Fitzgerald in his classic, The Great Gatsby, says simply "The rich are not like us." This simple sentence is the essence of people like Trump. They've been separated from the life experiences of the common man, and vaccinated against the pain of ordinary life by virtue of their wealth. They get what they want while we have trouble getting what we need. They do what they want, while we dream about that possibility. Our dreams keep us going, they don't understand dreamers.

Unfortunately, dreams are all we have, so we read about "The Secret" and we think that if we believe hard enough, if we vibrate in harmony with the rich, we can become rich. We've seen Trump stomp all over common competitors in his reality show and we think, "He doesn't sound any smarter than me, I could be him." So we accept him as a model and we're willing to forgive his foibles, including weak excuses about not releasing his tax returns.

Wake up people; this isn't Oz and the guy behind that curtain isn't God, it's a poor little rich boy who never grew up.

+15 # tingletlc 2016-05-25 09:40

Quoting danireland46:

F. Scott Fitzgerald in his classic, The Great Gatsby, says simply "The rich are not like us."

Not unless you have a page citation. I think you're referring to a maybe apocryphal anecdote about a conversation between Fitzgerald and Hemingway, in whose canonical version Scott says something like "The rich are different from us" and Ernest replies "Yeah, they have more money."

+17 # rocback 2016-05-25 11:22

Tax returns expose a lot of things like:
1. How aggressive bordering on illegal were you in taking deductions
2. What nefarious people were on your payroll who you gave 1099's to
3. Whether you gave a fair share to charities.
4. How did you cheat by using IRA's for different levels of stock ownership like when we foudn out Romney had over $100 million in his IRA
5. Who did you give money to like when it showed Obama giving so much to Jeremiah Wright
6. The actual income from the assets Trump claimed in his federal disclosure ( He estimated his "brand name of Trump was worth $3 billion whereas Forbes said it was only $125 million)
7. Clinton's whitewater land deals got a lot of scrutiny including her gain of $100,000 on cattle futures

Every President since Nixon who by the way was under audit at the time has released their returns. What is he hiding?

NRA Tells Parents To Keep Guns In Kids’ Rooms

265 people were accidentally shot and killed by kids last year.

By Kira Lerner -

May 31, 2016

Nation of Change

During a seminar on “home defense concepts” at the National Rifle Association’s annual meeting in Louisville, an instructor encouraged gun owners to store firearms in their children’s bedrooms.

Rob Pincus, who owns the popular firearm instruction company I.C.E. Training, paced across a conference room stage as he repeatedly warned against the threat of violent home invasions. After establishing that filling one’s home with weapons is the only solution, he then recommended that gun owners store firearms in their kids’ rooms for easy access.

“Why would you consider staging a firearm inside a child’s room?” he told the few hundred NRA members in attendance. “It’s the first place I’m going to go! As I’ve said…many times, if your kid is going to break into the safe just because it’s in their room, you have a parenting issue, not a home defense issue.”

Why would you consider staging a firearm inside a child’s room? It’s the first place I’m going to go!

Pincus then posed a question to the audience (respondents received a copy of his book, Defend Yourself: A Comprehensive Security Plan for the Armed Homeowner): Describe your responsibility as gun owners, in terms of access.

A woman toward the front raised her hand and discussed her duty to “ensure” that unauthorized people don’t get their hands on her firearms. Pincus immediately toned down her response.

“Ensure is a strong word,” he said. “So I’m going to say we have an obligation to try to prevent unauthorized access.” He added that hidden, instead of locked or secured, is a perfectly appropriate way to secure a gun.

Researchers have found that only 39 percent of gun-owning families keep their firearms locked, unloaded, and separate from ammunition, as recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics. For those that do not, the consequences can be terrible.

Everytown for Gun Safety reports that the U.S. has one of the highest rates of unintentional child gun deaths in the world. At least 265 people were accidentally shot by kids in 2015, and so far in 2016, there have been at least 96 accidental shootings by children. In one week in April, four toddlers accidentally shot and killed themselves, according to a New York Times report.

During the three days of the NRA convention, a three-year-old girl accidentally shot and killed a seven-year-old girl in Beverly, Illinois, less than 300 miles from where the leaders of the country’s most powerful gun lobby gathered to discuss their opposition to any type of gun safety legislation. And just over 700 miles away in LaPlace, Louisiana, a five-year-old girl accidentally killed herself while playing with a gun in her home.

Meanwhile, the threat of a violent home invader is far less likely than Pincus claims. Not only is the national rate of household burglary decreasing steadily, but so is the rate of violent crime during a home invasion. Less than one percent of homicides in the U.S. occur during a home invasion, according to a Bureau of Justice Statistics report from 2010, the most recent year the issue was studied. The roughly 100 homicides per year that occur during household burglaries is far dwarfed by the number of shootings by kids who accidentally get their hands on firearms (not to mention the staggering number of unintentional shootings committed by adults every year).

“If the NRA is really are a gun safety organization, they should be lobbying for stronger laws that will protect children,” Shannon Watts, the founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, told ThinkProgress. “Instead, they are trying to promote and sell guns in a way that actually puts them in danger.”

Bowling Green, Kentucky-resident Haley Rinehart is all too aware of the very real danger of young children getting their hands on guns. In 2002, her then-four-year-old son, Eli, was at a relative’s home playing in a bedroom when he found a loaded gun laying between children’s books. He picked it up, his hand slipped and hit the trigger, and he shot himself through the eye.

Luckily her son recovered from his shooting, and the 18-year-old will graduate from high school next week. But for months, Rinehart said her family was unsure if he would pull through.

Haley Rinehart and her son, Eli.

CREDIT: Haley Rinehart

Now a mother of four, Rinehart told ThinkProgress she has recently become an advocate with Moms Demand Action because she is willing to do whatever it takes to make sure more families do not have to go through what she did.

“It’s not something anyone should have to experience,” she said. “I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy, gun lover or not.”

When she heard about the NRA’s recommendation that parents store weapons in children’s bedrooms, she was shocked.

“In my opinion, that is almost child negligence,” she said. “I would never advise to keep a gun, be it loaded or unloaded, in a child’s room, because if it’s in there, the child will eventually find it. That’s just irresponsible.”

Eddie Eagle

Across the convention’s “seven acres of guns and gear,” thousands of NRA members perused the assault weapons and gear racks while pushing strollers or with small children trailing behind. Some older children took part in the action, trying out guns and gear alongside their parents. Other children dragged their parents to one vendor, which set up a candy station with some containers filled with candy and others filled with bullet casings.

n Friday, a sales associate helped 12-year-old Ciara Palermo, from Fort Wayne, Indiana, look at a bright pink carrying case for her automatic rifle. “I like looking around and trying out all the different guns and stuff,” she told ThinkProgress, wearing a pink NRA t-shirt and matching pink bandana. “I own two guns, personally.” Her dad, Tom, interrupted: “Well they’re hers but obviously she can’t title them.”

I have a 22 that I use quite a bit,” Ciara continued. “I haven’t shot my AR that I got for my birthday last year.”

Her father, Tom Palermo, told ThinkProgress that he buys his children guns because he wants “to teach them responsibility and not to be afraid of them if they ever come across them.”

Though Ciara’s parents were more of the target demographic at the gun lobby’s annual meeting, the NRA did not shy away from welcoming children. The group hosted events for NRA youth on Saturday of the convention weekend, offering free six month NRA junior memberships for all attendees. Face painting and coloring stations were advertised alongside a “3 gun experience AirSoft” competitive shooting match.

A booth by the convention center entrance handed out materials for kids advertising the “Eddie Eagle” program, a curriculum designed by the NRA to advise children how to handle firearms safely. Children across the building carried Eddie Eagle-branded activity books and bags. 

While the NRA is eager to extend its reach to children, it is not willing to provide resources for effective gun safety programs. Studies of the Eagle Eddie program have found that it is entirely ineffective at teaching children how to safely respond to an unsupervised firearm in a real-life situation.

And in states across the country, the group has lobbied against gun safety laws designed to help cut back on the high number of violent shootings involving children. In Tennessee, for example, the NRA was the most outspoken opponent against MaKayla’s Law, a bill that would have made it a crime to leave a loaded firearm unattended and readily accessible to a child under 13 years of age.

“If anti-gun legislators were serious about keeping kids safe, they would know that the key to reducing firearm accidents isn’t about prosecuting after the fact,” an alert issued in March by the NRA-ILA, the group’s lobbying arm, said. “It’s about educating children and parents about the safe use of firearms.”

Secret Compartments

Parents at the convention told ThinkProgress they agree that teaching “firearm safety” is the best way to keep children safe. One of those parents, shooting instructor Mark Schreiber, traveled to Louisville from Columbus, Ohio with his wife, seven-year-old son, and seven-week-old baby.

“He’s been shooting since he was three,” Schreiber said, pointing to his son sitting next to him, swinging a toy sword. “I have my own rifle!” Mark Jr. declared.

Mark Schreiber and his son, Mark Jr.

CREDIT: Kira Lerner

Among the hundreds of vendors at the convention, a few dozen targeted people who want to hide firearms in their homes. One vendor sold artwork that slides to the side to reveal a hidden compartment, and another, Secret Compartment Furniture, displayed tables and other household items with hidden compartments for weapons.

Founder Jill Herro, from Akron, Ohio, showed NRA members how the top of her company’s armoire can flip open to store a rifle and how a coffee table was configured with a secret sliding drawer for a smaller firearm. “I can put a lock on if somebody wants,” Herro told ThinkProgress. “I offer locking mechanisms if people want them.” But she said only about 50 percent of buyers request locks.

Though Herro was clear that she would never want a buyer to leave a firearm unsecured in their home, the reality is that there will be parents who do not take the necessary precautions to protect their children, Watts said.

“Two-thirds of unintentional shootings are the result of guns storage like that furniture,” she said.

Gun control advocates like Watts and Rinehart, whose son still has flashbacks to his accident when he hears loud noises, say that effective gun safety programs are incredibly important because we will never be able to eliminate the risk that children come across firearms.

“Accidents can happen,” Rinehart said. “We’re not against guns. We’re not against the right to bear arms. All we want is for people to properly secure their guns and be responsible gun owners.”

Though Schreiber said most of his family’s firearms are locked away, he added that he has some “defensive firearms strategically placed for safety purposes,” making his son one of the more than two million children living in homes with unsecured guns.

“He does not know where they are, and even if he does know where they are, he would not touch them,” Schreiber said.

“I know where the guns are! In the basement!” his son chimed in.

David Brooks Has Finally Figured Out Why People Hate Hillary Clinton

New York Times columnist David Brooks. (photo: PBS)

By Jessica Roy, New York Magazine

26 May 16
readersupportednews.org

 
n a stunning feat of investigative journalism, New York Times columnist David Brooks has finally determined exactly why the American people find Hillary Clinton so unlikable.

It's because she doesn't have any hobbies.

Hmm. That doesn't seem right.

"What exactly do so many have against her?" Brooks wonders. "I would begin my explanation with this question: Can you tell me what Hillary Clinton does for fun? We know what Obama does for fun — golf, basketball, etc ... But when people talk about Clinton, they tend to talk of her exclusively in professional terms."

Yes. Hillary Clinton's likability problem does not stem from the fact that we inhabit a society still influenced by subtle sexism, but instead that she just doesn't seem all that fun. Maybe if she didn't take the job of running for leader of the free world so damn seriously, she'd have more time for knitting, or Ping-Pong, or binge-watching old episodes of Gilmore Girls.

Of course the kind of fanatical work ethic that's valued in men is scorned in women: Because she's a woman, Clinton's dogged dedication to her job becomes a hurdle to overcome instead of a strength. But even if his theory is true and people wish Hillary would show us her softer side, exactly why they expect that of her does not factor into Brooks's column. In fact, the word woman doesn't appear once in the article.

Naturally, all this leads to the question ... what does fellow Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders do for fun? No freakin' idea.

Climate Change Could Wreck Yellowstone, Statue of Liberty, Other Cherished Sites

Yellowstone National Park. (photo: John Kalla)

By Katie Herzog, Grist

29 May 16

readersupportednews.org

lobal warming isn’t just bad news for beach babes and polar bears: It could also be devastating for UNESCO World Heritage sites across the globe.

According to a new report, there are 31 World Heritage sites in 29 countries at risk due to rising temperatures and sea levels, melting glaciers, and intensified storms, droughts, and wildfires. These include major tourist attractions like Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado and the city of Venice, Italy.

“Some Easter Island statues are at risk of being lost to the sea because of coastal erosion,” said Adam Markham, lead author of the report. “Many of the world’s most important coral reefs, including in the islands of New Caledonia in the western Pacific, have suffered unprecedented coral bleaching linked to climate change this year. Climate change could eventually even cause some World Heritage sites to lose their status.”

There is, however, one place conspicuously absent from the report: Australia. The Guardian reports that the Australian government requested that a chapter on the Great Barrier Reef — which is at risk from increased temperatures, ocean acidification, and coral bleaching — be removed from the list, fearing that its inclusion would hurt tourism. Australian climate scientist Will Steffen told the paper that the reef’s omission was “frankly astounding” and reminiscent of “the old Soviet Union.”

See photos of some of the at-risk sites below — minus, of course, the Great Barrier Reef.

Easter Island.

Djenne Mosque, Mali.

Stonehenge, England.

Advice for Divided Democrats

Former Clinton Labor Secretary Robert Reich. (photo: Steve Russell/Toronto Star)

By Robert Reich, Robert Reich's Blog

29 May 16

readersupportednews.org

 

ith the Democratic primaries grinding to a bitter end, I have suggestions for both Clinton and Sanders supporters that neither will like.

First, my advice to Clinton supporters: Don’t try to drum Bernie Sanders out of the race before Hillary Clinton officially gets the nomination (if she in fact does get it).

Some of you say Bernie should bow out because he has no chance of getting the nomination, and his continuing candidacy is harming Hillary Clinton’s chances.

It’s true that Bernie’s chances are slim, but it’s inaccurate to say he has no chance. If you consider only pledged delegates, who have been selected in caucuses and primaries, he’s not all that far behind Hillary Clinton. And the upcoming primary in California – the nation’s most populous state – could possibly alter Sanders’s and Clinton’s relative tallies.

My calculation doesn’t include so-called “superdelegates” – Democratic office holders and other insiders who haven’t been selected through primaries and caucuses. But in this year of anti-establishment fury, it would be unwise for Hillary Clinton to relay on superdelegates to get her over the finish line.

Sanders should stay in the race also because he has attracted a large number of young people and independents. Their passion, excitement, and enthusiasm are critically important to Hillary Clinton’s success, if she’s the nominee, as well the success of other Democrats this year, and, more fundamentally, to the future of American politics.

Finally and not the least, Sanders has been telling a basic truth about the American political economic system – that growing inequality of income and wealth has led inexorably to the increasing political power of those at the top, including big corporations and Wall Street banks. And that political power has stacked the deck in their favor, leading to still wider inequality.

Nothing important can be accomplished – reversing climate change, creating true equal opportunity, overcoming racism, rebuilding the middle class, having a sane and sensible foreign policy – until we reclaim our democracy from the moneyed interests. The longer Bernie Sanders is on stage to deliver this message, the better.

Next, my advice for Sanders supporters: Be prepared to work hard for Hillary Clinton if she gets the nomination.

Some of you say that refusing to fight for or even vote for Hillary will show the Democratic political establishment why it must change its ways.

But the “Democratic political establishment” is nothing but a bunch of people, many of them big donors and fundraisers occupying comfortable and privileged positions, who won’t even be aware that you’ve decided to sit it out – unless Hillary loses to Donald Trump.

Which brings me to those of you who say there’s no real difference between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

That’s just plain wrong. Trump has revealed himself to be a narcissistic, xenophobic, hatemonger who, if elected, would legitimize bigotry, appoint Supreme Court justices with terrible values, and have direct access to the button that could set off a nuclear war.

Hillary may not possess Bernie Sanders’s indignation about the rigging of our economy and democracy, or be willing to go as far in remedying it, but she’s shown herself a capable and responsible leader.

Some of you agree a Trump presidency would be a disaster but claim it would galvanize a forceful progressive movement in response.

That’s unlikely. Rarely if ever in history has a sharp swing to the right moved the political pendulum further back in the opposite direction. Instead, it tends to move the “center” rightward, as did Ronald Reagan’s presidency.

Besides, Trump could do huge and unalterable damage to America and the world in the meantime.

Finally, some of you say even if Hillary is better than Trump, you’re tired of choosing the “lesser of two evils,” and you’re going to vote your conscience by either writing Bernie’s name in, or voting for the Green Party candidate, or not voting at all.

I can’t criticize anyone for voting their conscience, of course. But your conscience should know that a decision not to vote for Hillary, should she become the Democratic nominee, is a de facto decision to help Donald Trump.

Both of my morsels of advice may be hard to swallow. Many Hillary supporters don’t want Bernie to keep campaigning, and many Bernie supporters don’t want to root for Hillary if she gets the nomination.

But swallow it you must – not just for the good of the Democratic Party, but for the good of the nation.

RIM COUNTRY GAZETTE BLOG IS BACK FROM VACATION

Photo: Granddaughter Fern terrorizing pigeons in France.  
 
We appreciate your patience.  We were in France visiting children and grandchildren in the countryside with very limited internet access.

While we were away, Donald Trump clinched the GOP nomination, so we have work to do.  Let's get at it.  Our first post is below.

Elizabeth Warren Is Emerging as Leading Democratic Voice Against Trump

Senator Elizabeth Warren. (photo: Andrew Harper/Bloomberg)

By Annie Linskey, The Boston Globe

28 May 16
readersupportednews.org

 
lizabeth Warren was working on puzzles with her three grandchildren on a trip to Los Angeles a couple of weeks ago when she checked her laptop and saw that Donald Trump had gone after her on Twitter.

“I got a notice that he’d attacked me,” Warren said.

Trump called Warren a “flunky” and — after months of deploying devastating nicknames for his political rivals — debuted one for her: “Goofy Elizabeth Warren.”

“I laughed out loud,” Warren recalled when she saw the nickname. She sought out a quiet place to respond. “I left the kids and went to the other room and wrote the tweets,” Warren said.

Thus began a highly unusual digital debate between two of the most prominent politicians in America. It stretched more than four hours — with Warren and Trump sparring in personal terms in near real time. She called him “a bully” who “spews insults and lies.” He called her a “fraud” who is “weak and ineffective” and “not Native American.”The two picked up where they left off on Wednesday with a new series of exchanges.

The Trump vs. Warren tweets attracted massive amounts of news coverageand are a potent reminder of Warren’s ability to harness social media for a cause or a candidate. They thrust her back into the national political spotlight after months of being overshadowed by fellow progressive Bernie Sanders, who is also an able communicator on social media.

Warren’s ability to effectively confront Trump — rare among politicians — is also fresh evidence of the edge she brings as a surrogate for the Democratic Party and the strength she could offer the national ticket, particularly given how Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton’s campaign struggles to come across as authentic and is failing to connect with younger voters.

Warren’s name has been floated as a potential vice president for Clinton, and even Vice President Joe Biden considered asking her to be on his ticket when he was thinking of mounting a bid last August.And though Warren has deep ideological differences with both Biden and Clinton, her willingness to engage so aggressively with Trump has been widely seen as an audition for the attack dog role usually filled by vice presidential candidates.

In some ways, both Warren and Trump benefit from the Twitter tussle. They each seem to relish the exchange, which has rallied both parties’ bases.

“The more Donald Trump thrusts Elizabeth Warren in the middle of the national spotlight, the better it is for Democrats this November because her ideas are enormously popular,” said Adam Green, c0-founder of the liberal Progressive Change Campaign Committee. “Of all people, it’s surprising that he’s willing to give her such a platform.”

Clinton’s campaign stays in touch with Warren’s camp on a regular basis.

“We are grateful to see leaders of all stripes calling him out for his divisive comments,” said Christina Reynolds, a Clinton spokeswoman. “As a leader and major advocate in holding Wall Street accountable, Senator Warren’s voice is particularly important and we are glad she’s helping lead the fight.”

A Trump spokeswoman didn’t comment.

Warren combines a measure of Internet-friendly snark with policy-heavy attacks that — so far — push back at his antics without making the mistake of overshooting, as some of his Republican primary opponents did.

The most recent burst of exchanges began May 3. The US Senate was in recess for a Mother’s Day break, and Warren was in California visiting her daughter’s family.

Warren and her family watched television together as Indiana primary results rolled in, seeing Trump prevail in 85 of the state’s 92 counties. Then, shortly after polls closed, word spread that Trump’s main competitor, Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, would drop out.

“The kids had gone off to bed,” Warren said in a brief interview with the Globe. “And I just thought, ‘This man is truly dangerous. He is reckless and he is dangerous.’ ”

Warren said she fired up her laptop and “wrote some posts calling him out.”

These messages, some posted on Facebook and others on Twitter, were shared widely and viewed by more than 45 million people, Warren’s staff said. She has nearly 420,000 followers on her personal Twitter account.

Trump didn’t respond until three days later, when Warren was again with her daughter’s young family.

“I expected he’d punch back,” she said.

“This felt very much like Donald Trump,” Warren said. “Way too many people have spent way too much time brushing him off. I’m not going to brush him off.”

Trump, for his part, is relying on lines of attack used by former senator Scott Brown during the 2012 Brown vs. Warren campaign: The presumptive Republican nominee has called her “ineffective” and focuses on her unsubstantiated claims of Native American ancestry.

“Goofy Elizabeth Warren, Hillary Clinton’s flunky, has a career that is totally based on a lie,” Trump wrote May 6. “She is not Native American.”

Warren quickly shot back.

“We saw when Scott Brown attacked my family & his staff made tomahawk chops & war whoops. They lost big. MA voters knew better.”

They picked up again a few days later with a series of exchanges.

In fact, a scroll through Warren’s campaign Twitter feed shows that the only topics Warren has tweeted about this month are Donald Trump and the Republican primary.

It’s all the more surprising given that Warren has yet to endorse in the Democratic race, which has stretched much further than anyone believed possible last year. Out of the 14 female Democrats in the US Senate, Warren is the only one who hasn’t yet endorsed Clinton.

Warren is closer to Sanders on the big issues, including regulating Wall Street. But it’s not out of the question that she’d join with Clinton if asked.

Nine months ago, Warren sat down with Biden as he was considering a presidential bid.

Biden, like Clinton, has close ties to the financial services industry that Warren rails against — but she was open to being on the ticket with Biden.

The vice president never officially offered Warren the job. But after the pair met last Augustin the lush quarters of the Naval Observatory, he asked Warren to look around.

“If I have my way,” he told her, “you’ll be living here.”