Pot Stirrers

18 Comments

1. 

   Anonymous on August 10, 2012 at 11:26 am

   A thing of beauty.

2. 

   cfaller96 on August 10, 2012 at 11:33 am

   As I watch Kevin Drum, Josh Marshall (albeit in a less dickish fashion), and various internet commenters all over the place flail around in disbelief at Harry Reid’s source’s assertion, I have to ask:

   Do people not realize how easy and common it is for high finance professionals to avoid taxes?

   Seriously, this has been going on for decades, it’s not unusual or difficult. Once you have money flowing internationally (as you inevitably will when you set up an investment fund), there are plenty of opportunities to dodge taxes.

   Do people generally not realize this? Is that why everyone is so shocked and in disbelief?

3. 

   mainsailset on August 10, 2012 at 11:42 am

   It is indeed fascinating how the Mormon connection factors in. Sr.’s my bet but doubtful that Jr. hasn’t been aware.

   This is a reasonable pot to stir and hey, the polls are showing the people are paying attention so stir baby stir!

4. 

   sherifffruitfly on August 10, 2012 at 11:51 am

   It’s funny because last night drum tweeted how glenn greenwald supported him and his asymmetric reid-hate. i lol’d.

   • 

     BooMan on August 10, 2012 at 11:59 am

     It was Greenwald’s supportive tweet that triggered this post.  

     • 

       BooMan on August 10, 2012 at 11:59 am

       More accurately, last night’s post.

5. 

   MomSense on August 10, 2012 at 11:52 am

   Some speculation that it may be Robert Gay.

   http://www.fourfreedomsblog.com/Blog.php?Act=ViewBlogPost&BlogID=2040

6. 

   TarheelDem on August 10, 2012 at 12:22 pm

   Here’s a WAG to answer your question.  Whichever is closest to the LDS leadership.

   If you accept that hypothesis, then speculate on why the LDS leadership might want to sandbag the Mitt.

   • 

     shan on August 10, 2012 at 12:50 pm

     Some in the LDS may believe that Mitt has not been under tithing to the church.  

     • 

       Marie2 on August 10, 2012 at 1:40 pm

       Could be a motive but a very weak one.  Institutions, both secular and religious, first protect and promote “their own.”  Individual failings wrt to institutional teachings and practices are a distant second, and if dealt with at all are done internally unless or until such failings jeopardize the institutional standing outside the institution.  LDS seniors would no more try to scuttle the POTUS ambitions of Romney over something as minor as not forking over his full tithe than the RCC would have thrown JFK under the bus for being a philanderer.    

7. 

   TarheelDem on August 10, 2012 at 12:56 pm

   OT, just to reiterate this.

   Parliament Takes Over in Libya’s First Peaceful Transfer of Power.  Less than a year after the fall of Gadhafi.

8. 

   Oui on August 10, 2012 at 1:34 pm

   Robert C. Gay is still close to Mitt Romney and has renewed his 2007 campaign ad of his missing daughter Melissa in N.Y. Huntsman Jr. is not a friend of Willard but is not a Bain Capital insider so he would not have first hand knowledge of the tax returns. I just found the article where Robert Gay quit the Huntsman Gay Capital Group. I would place my bet on Huntsman Sr.

   Bob Gay leaving Huntsman Gay

   (CNN) Apr. 2, 2012 – Robert Gay is stepping down as CEO and managing partner of private equity firm Huntsman Gay Global Capital, Fortune has learned. He will go to work full-time at The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, where he has been called to a position titled First Quorum of the Seventy.

   Gay co-founded Huntsman Gay in 2007 alongside Jon Huntsman Sr., founder of chemicals company Huntsman Corp. (HUN) and father of former presidential candidate Jon Huntsman Jr.

   Gay’s departure could present major challenges for the firm, which should be gearing up to raise its second fund. For starters, it will have to explain why its eponymous co-founders are no longer involved on a day-to-day basis. Huntsman was always more of a figurehead than active partner, which is why Gay took the CEO role.

   Moreover, Gay has far more private equity experience than anyone else at the firm, having been a partner with Bain Capital for 15 years. He left Bain in 2004 to serve in a volunteer role as his church’s mission president for the countries of Ghana, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

   Upon forming Huntsman Gay, both he and Huntsman said that they would donate 100% of their carried interest to philanthropic organizations. Gay also is a major supporter of Mitt Romney, having once cut a campaign ad about how Romney shut down Bain Capital’s office so that everyone could help search for Gay’s teenage daughter, who had gone missing in New York City (she was later found).

   Romney said he can’t escape some of the images he carries with him from his week in the New York underworld. ‘It was a shocker,’ he said. ‘The number of lost souls was astounding.’

   Fearful Kin Seek Missing Teen – July 1996

   • Jon Huntsman’s endorsement of Mitt Romney: A cold embrace
   • 

     Marie2 on August 10, 2012 at 1:51 pm

     Begs two important considerations:

     1. Is it reasonable or even plausible that Gay would have knowledge of Mitt’s tax returns?  

     2. No evidence of a rift between Mitt and Gay, much less one large enough that Gay would actively attempt to scuttle Mitt’s campaign.

     • 

       Oui on August 10, 2012 at 6:04 pm

       Robert C. Gay has been a partner of Bain Capital for 15 years and it is logical he uses the same tax deferrance and investment funds through tax havens. After a brief stint as Mormon bishop/missionary, he started his investment company HuntsmanGay with Huntsman Sr. Even from the press statement it lists the agreement to donate 100% of their carried interest to philanthropic organizations. It’s a legal escape to avoid taxes, unless there are other agreements made …

       Carlyle Group, Bain Capital, And The Tax Treatment Of ‘The Carry’

       (Forbes) – Carlyle’s disclosure opens a small window into how this works. In 2011, its three founders were each paid about $140 million. But they received just $275,000 in salary and another $3.5 million in the form of a bonus (also taxable at ordinary income rates). But each also got $134 million–or 96 percent of their compensation-from investment profits. Much came from the carry and is taxable at 15 percent.

       It is difficult to know exactly how much of that compensation was performance-based and how much came from fees. But if all of it were taxed as capital gains, and assuming the partners pay at the top ordinary income rate of 35 percent, they’d each save $27 million.

        The story gets more complicated thanks to the reason why Carlyle disclosed the compensation of its founders. It did not do so, it is fair to say, with enthusiasm. But disclosure is the price the firm’s owners must pay to go public, which is their intention.

       That raises the high-stakes question of how to tax the proceeds from the sale of a partnership interest in one of these firms.  This would apply where the entire partnership dissolves, as Carlyle soon will. It may also apply when an individual partner in a firm, such as Romney, cashes out. The New York Times reports that Romney continues to receive a share of investment profits from Bain, although he retired almost 13 years ago.  

       • Quite A Retroactive ‘Retirement Deal’ with Bain
       • 

         Marie2 on August 10, 2012 at 7:35 pm

         Huntsman has already denied begin Reid’s source.  Your argument for Gay as the source remains weak: First, he’d be calling attention to the practices at all the Bain type vulture capital operations including his own.  Second, he would have been guessing as to how Mitt handled his taxes.  

9. 

   Brendan Skwire on August 10, 2012 at 1:45 pm

   I don’t care who told Reid, and frankly I don’t care.  I’m just enjoying the show, and looking forward to Reid revealing everything a day or two before the GOP Convention. Pass the popcorn!

   • 

     hz on August 10, 2012 at 4:30 pm

     Will the words “October surprise” for once be connected to an event with positive consequences?  It’s too much to hope for.

10. 

    panhuwu on August 10, 2012 at 8:30 pm

    What about Huntsman’s daughter, Abby. She writes for Huffington Post. She was the one who wrote the article a few weeks back claiming Romney didn’t expect to have to release his tax returns:

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/18/mitt-romney-tax-returns_n_1682539.html

    The article even opens similarly to Reid’s statement:

    “Mitt Romney has been determined to resist releasing his tax returns at least since his bid for Massachusetts governor in 2002 and has been confident that he will never be forced to do so, several current and former Bain executives tell The Huffington Post. Had he thought otherwise, say the sources based on their longtime understanding of Romney, he never would have gone forward with his run for president.”