So, Friday afternoon, Hillary Clinton, whose strength among Dems lies among lower- and lower-middle income blue collar types, finally heeded the calls for openness, and released her and her husbands’ tax returns since they left the White House.
During that time, they show income of $108 million.
I won’t begrudge anyone’s success…but I’m sure that I’m not alone in thinking:
Both the Clintons’ and Obama’s tax returns are available for download from several locations, including the Washington Post.
A couple of thoughts come with seeing that level of income:
First, it’s a little harder to wonder whether relatively low pay for political leaders is keeping the country’s best and brightest in private industry. True, there is still better money to be made by being a pointy-haired white collar type high upon the totem pole, but the ancillary income associated with being a politician or an ex-politician doesn’t seem too shabby either.
Second, while I tend to agree that the Bush tax cuts were horribly irresponsible, and that reversing them would be one way to begin to address that fiscal madness…wouldn’t it be nice to see some of the politicians who call for the tax’s reversal to voluntarily donate any benefits they see from those tax cuts back to the U.S. Treasury?
Maybe the IRS ought to start including a line item for voluntary contributions. It’d be interesting to see who among the folks who disclose tax returns would make such a contribution.
At least it looks like the Clinton’s voluntarily contributed to the public presidential campaign funds (the $3 checkbox which I thought nobody ever checked…). Obama didn’t even do that.
So, when do we get to see McCain’s returns?
