ROMNEY WISHES HE WAS POORER...

From the Wall Street Journal:

If elected president, Mitt Romney might consider ending a tax break that helped the former Massachusetts governor accumulate his fortune, an aide suggested Tuesday.

The comments came as the Romney campaign made available more than 500 pages of tax-return data for 2010 and 2011 amid signs the issue was hurting him with some voters.

No, wait! He's happy to be richer.

Later in the day, in a signal of how the tax issue is roiling the GOP campaign, the Romney camp tried to step back from the aide's remarks, underscoring that the former Massachusetts governor didn't want to raise anyone's taxes.

Romney closed down his Swiss bank account but retains accounts in the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, and other tax havens.

How rich is Romney?

Also from the WSJ.

So rich, that he makes the one percenters look like the 99 percent.

According to a calculation from Emmanuel Saez, the economist at the University of California at Berkley, who has become the top expert on top incomes, Mitt Romney’s income of $21.7 million puts him well above the 1%.

In fact, his income puts him in about the 99.9975% income bracket. Put another way, Mitt is in the top 0.0025%.

Whoa! That IS rich. But we all knew Romney was extremely wealthy. He should have released the tax returns early on and not shown such reluctance. Who did he think he was kidding?

Picture from Wikipedia.

UPDATE: And further, I hear complaints that the Occupy Wall Street folks have no coherent message. Well, at least one coherent message seems to have been sent out that even the Wall Street Journal understood: the 1% compared to the 99%. I don't remember seeing the percentages mentioned in the media before the OWS movement. "We are the 99%," is brief, pithy, and quite easy to understand. Yo, everyone! OWS has a coherent message.

H/T to Charles Pierce, who sees evidence that President Obama also understands the message.

TOP 5 FACTS ABOUT THE WEALTHIEST 1%

From Think Progress:

1. The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Owns 40 Percent Of The Nation’s Wealth.

2. The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Take Home 24 Percent Of National Income.

3. The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Own Half Of The Country’s Stocks, Bonds, And Mutual Funds.

4. The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Have Only 5 Percent Of The Nation’s Personal Debt.

5. The Top 1 Percent Are Taking In More Of The Nation’s Income Than At Any Other Time Since The 1920s.

See the details and the charts and graphs, one of which is shown above, at Think Progress.

A reading from the Lectionary on the feast of St Francis of Assisi:

Jeremiah 22:13-16

Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness,
and his upper rooms by injustice;
who makes his neighbours work for nothing,
and does not give them their wages;
who says, ‘I will build myself a spacious house
with large upper rooms’,
and who cuts out windows for it,
panelling it with cedar,
and painting it with vermilion.
Are you a king
because you compete in cedar?
Did not your father eat and drink
and do justice and righteousness?
Then it was well with him.
He judged the cause of the poor and needy;
then it was well.
Is not this to know me?
says the Lord.

Thanks to Paul the BB on Facebook for the link.