Supposedly, Huntsman's father was the source of the story that Romney paid no income taxes and he would be in the know through his connection with Romney's Bain Capital.

http://gawker.com/mormon-shivs-mormon-with-mormon-and-other-headlines-fro-1456725296

Just thinking of TBM I know living check-to-check thinking he knows Mitt "No Taxes" Romney. And he believes Romney and he have the same interests and concerns.

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/home3/57072351-200/bagley-cartoon-facebook-lake.html.csp

And here I thought it was Harry Reid acting as "The One Mighty and Strong" and fulfilling the White Horse Prophecy (keeping Mitt from the White House), and now we see it might've been Huntsman, Sr.

I'm guessing they side with Huntsman. Romney lost. Maybe they'll want to side with who they perceive as more of a winner: Huntsman? I'm still wondering how they feel about the cursed one trumping the blessed one?

Mitt all the way. John Huntsman Jr. has a child who married outside the church, and while Governor he attended various non LDS churches. They'll never side with a "backslider". He's shown signs of being a free thinker.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/02/2013 02:20PM by crom.

I think it was Huntsman Sr.

Huntsman Jr. - he's not any more mormon than I am. And his family.

Yeah it's Sr. He was very anti-Romney in an interview during the primaries, kept calling him a "flip-flopper" and "he will say anything and everything to get elected, how can you trust someone like that?". It was sorta nice to see disunity among the faithful.

Maybe they could call Mitt to be an apostle, he seems real "church broke" to me. No shreds of independence from the church mindset that I can see. When he talks about the second coming he's even more deluded than that woman with the youtube channel "What Mormons believe". He doesn't preface it with "we believe" or "the church teaches" its outright fact when he tells it.

I get the sense that nobody much cares, Romney is last year's news, and we won't be hearing from him again.

I find the story completely credible. He took a big hit by not releasing his returns, especially when it was his own father who started the tradition. There had to be something in them he simply could not release for him to voluntarily take that much damage.

I am a little surprised at JH Sr as the source. Assuming it is true, I am sure it will be spun either as vindictiveness, or the triumph of integrity over loyalty.

"I get the sense that nobody much cares, Romney is last year's news, and we won't be hearing from him again."

Oh Jerry. I wish I had your rose colored glasses. Romney's building another house in SL. He just bought one in Park City. He's speaking this week at the Sports Expo. People in Utah will buy Romney's squeaky clean image & not question his questionable finances, taxes & offshore accounts. The "church" loves Romney & I have a feeling he's going to be their poster boy in future endeavors. I wouldn't be surprised if Romney ran for Governor in Utah- he can't stay out of the spotlight. And Utah voters will bow their heads & vote yes.

It's frustrating that a large percentage will vote for him simply because he's a clean cut and successful mormon. When all you have to do is look at his record as governor of Mass. where he only served one term, which ended with him having absolutely terrible approval ratings and no chance of re-election. To the point that he didn't even try for it. Then you see his stance on nearly every issue has shifted from one extreme to the other multiple times since then. Utah is the only place he's still relevant and it's all due to ignorance.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/02/2013 02:07PM by Frightened Inmate #2.

If he does become governnor of Utah, I wonder if that will make him the first person to be governor of two different USA states. If so, he'll make the record books. It's not quite as good as being president, but it will soothe his wounded ego a bit.

Let's not forget too that Romney would be governor of Massachusetts -- the most liberal and educated state in the country to which he will use in his campaign in Utah -- and running for governor in Utah -- a conversative and socially backward state. The fact that he can speak two different audiences is lost on Utahns.

TBM I know excuses Romney's penchant for shifting positions for votes as him "being a politician."

Nope. Sam Houston was governor of two states and the president of a country.

I don't think you will see him as Governor, that office is not befitting a man aof his stature, I will bet money he runs for Orrin Hatch's senate seat in the next election. Being a Senator with all of it's prestige and perks is very much befitting a man of his stature.

Oh, I'm sure Mittster could be elected in Utah. Donny Osmond could get elected in Utah. I meant we won't be hearing from him on the national stage again.

I think Mitt had the Park City home for some years, probably back to before the 2002 Olympics. That is up for sale. His new place in Holladay is within walking distance of my place. I am so going to go trick or treating as JS and ask for 10%.

Utah is shedding the shackles of Mormon conservatism a lot quicker than some realize. As more "outsiders" move in (especially to metro SLC), the LDS dominance continues to erode.

I have absolutely nothin to back this up with, but I think TSCC gave him a break on his tithing for a while (or he shorted them) and they told him that under no circumstances was to release his returns. If the general population of the cult saw that he was getting off with 5% and they had to pay 10%+ some, there would be massive problems.

I agree, there was something major in the returns that he knew was worse than releasing them.

I'm so glad he didn't win. Not a 100% fan of Obama, but I loathed mittens. Smarmy dick.

I just wish Romney would accept his defeat gracefully and fade into the sunset.

But no.
He perpetually feels the need to comment.

Doesn't he get it? HE LOST.
If the voters wanted him as POTUS they would have voted him in.

A different perspective. I live far away from the Morridor but am presently visiting my family in Salt Lake. My parents, who have slid further and further into Foxdom in recent years, are watching this like hawks.

Their view, tinted by a hint of jealousy and anger at how Huntsman, Sr has used his wealth to advance Huntsman, Jr's career, is that Romney is the True Mormon. Junior, after all, is not a self-made man and is known for doing the least possible when given any public assignment in Utah. He seeks maximum credit, cynically, at minimal effort. Equally badly, Junior is now quite open about not being Mormon. And Reid? Reid is "evil" for implying that Romney went years without paying much taxes and for saying that Romney's father would have been ashamed of him. Reid's Mormonism is obviously a sham, like Huntsman's.

As for whether Senior was responsible for the tax accusations in the first place, I must say it sounds logical to me. We know that the source was an investor in Bain Capital, and I'll bet the Huntsman family fits that description in a big way. Senior has also done many questionable things, used huge sums of his own money, to help Junior in the past. So it would be perfectly reasonable for him to have damaged Romney. In addition, there is the sudden announcement of Senior's new, massive donation to charity. Senior is trying to change the subject, to draw attention away from the new book. If he were innocent of the charges, he would have put that money into lawyers to clear his name.

To the TBM, President Romney is the true Mormon. Everybody else is a traitor.

I agree. Romney is more TBM.

How is Mittster a "self-made man?" He came from a very wealthy family and spent all his young years in private prep schools. His dad was wealthy enough to keep him out of Vietnam, too.

As far as matching up the size of ones TBMism, one should remember that it was Huntsman--not Romney--that gave the use of his private jet to the LDS GAs to fly around in so that they wouldn't have to worry about airline bookings.

One should look at what both families do with their earnings. Huntsman has spent billions supporting cancer research. Romney has spent his billions the old-school Mormon way--on himself.

I'm not saying Romney is a self-made man. I am saying that that is what my parents say. So you and I are in agreement there.

As for Huntsman, I think you are being too generous. There is a difference between donating money to good causes out of philanthropy on the one hand and in order to promote your own family interests on the other. A big part of Huntsman's charity is self-interested. Evidence? As soon as the truth about the origins of the tax critique of Romney comes out, Huntsman announces $100 million in new donations as a means of shifting attention.

Senior has done an immense amount to promote his son's career. I just don't think Romney is any better.

I would think Romney since he's more conservative and a TBM. Huntsman is more liberal and from I've heard not even an active Mormon, or at least doesn't seem like it.

Huntsman, Jr. doesn't even make a pretense of being Mormon anymore.

On the question of Romney, I have no doubt what happened. The year for which he did release showed an income tax rate of about 11%, meaning that at least half of Americans paid more of their income than he did. Why not follow his father's example and release everything? Because 11% was high for him. The tax laws work, private equity investors can postpone taxes until they realize their capital gains - and then pay a very low rate. Any losses, on the other hand, can be realized early since the private equity firm controls when they are recognized. The result is that his tax rate for several or all of those years would have been much lower than 11%--just as Huntsman, Sr claimed. Huntsman would know because the investors in Bain Capital would see the financials for that company, including how much in losses and gains the fund was reporting for each year.

I seriously doubt the church ordered Romney not to report. The church knows that Romney pays far less than 10% in tithing. The reason is that he runs almost all of his money through companies, including Bain but also family trusts and probably some LLCs as well. Those are the same mechanisms that lower his taxable income. Since he must tithe his gross income, he simply uses the figures he reports on his federal tax returns. There is nothing unusual in this; virtually every rich Mormon investor uses the same strategies.

Tithing is only 10% for people too poor or unsophisticated to work the system. The income tax system is the same. Romney had to hide his returns because they would have revealed that he paid less taxes than virtually the entire American middle class and probably much of the working poor as well.

I made $19,000 last year and paid a higher rate than him. What a bastard

I didn't say clearly what I meant to. What I intended to say was that the church did not need to give Romney a break in the form of a lower tithing rate, as Levi mused. Why? Because the way he structures his assets lowers both his tax rate and his tithing rate. If he can use shelters to lower his gross taxable income to the point where his effective tax rate is one-third of what most people pay, he can use the same strategy (which the church allows) to lower his tithing rate by the same proportion. If you took his actual tithing payments and divided them by his pre-tax-shelter income, I'll bet you get 3% or less.

More generally, since the church takes tithing on the gross you report to the government (that's how most people calculate it), Mitt and his lawyers and accountants can choose any tithing rate thay want. Too high? Keep more income in LLCs, defer distributions from Bain Capital, etc., and your annual income decreases - as does your tithing bill.

The original tithing rule was paying on your "increase." Since most people were farmers, they would take their income, deduct their business and family expenses, deduct investments in seed, equipment, etc., and then pay 10% on whatever was left. The new tithing rule is 10% of everything before expenses and investment. Tax shelters and private equity rules mean that rich Mormons can set up independent companies that hold their investments and income, deduct the expenses incurred by those companies, defer the distribution of wealth from those entities, and pay on whatever is actually distributed. In other words, the wealthy are in virtually the same position as the farmers of the 19th century: they pay on their "increase" as defined by themselves. The rest of us pay 10% on gross.

For what its worth, I'm sure Abby Huntsman shows up here on occasion.

... the story I heard was that one of Mitt's sons, Josh, was going to run for office (Hatch's Senate seat when he retires?) in Utah, and presumably Mitt will have a base to be nearby to help campaign.