{"id":15256,"date":"2008-04-18T13:28:02","date_gmt":"2008-04-18T17:28:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/15256.html"},"modified":"2008-04-18T13:28:02","modified_gmt":"2008-04-18T17:28:02","slug":"mccain-releases-tax-returns-at-least-some-of-them","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/mccain-releases-tax-returns-at-least-some-of-them\/","title":{"rendered":"McCain releases tax returns — at least, some of them"},"content":{"rendered":"

For all the talk in recent weeks about Hillary Clinton’s initial reluctance to release her tax returns, John McCain’s identical reluctance has gone largely ignored. The difference is that the media devoted considerable attention to Clinton’s returns, and gave McCain a pass<\/a> on his.<\/p>\n

The good news is, McCain finally released his tax materials today. The bad news is, he’s chosen to be less than forthcoming<\/a>.<\/p>\n

John McCain made nearly $420,000 in taxable and non-taxable income in 2007, according to the Arizona senator’s tax returns just released by his presidential campaign.<\/p>\n

McCain’s 2007 income includes his approximately $162,000 Senate salary, over $176,000 in book royalties, $23,000 in Social Security income, and over $58,000 from his Navy pension.<\/p>\n

The filing does not include his wife Cindy’s much larger income — the two have long filed separate tax returns.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Hmm. The Clintons released returns for both Bill and Hillary. The Obamas released returns for both Barack and Michelle. But Cindy McCain’s tax materials will remain private.<\/p>\n

I have a hunch I know why.
\n
\nThe Wall Street Journal noted yesterday<\/a> that McCain’s second wife is very, very wealthy.<\/p>\n

She heads one of the nation’s largest beer distributorships, an Anheuser-Busch Cos. franchise inherited from her father. She has sported “MS BUD” on her license plate, and from the campaign trail she uses her BlackBerry and cellphone to oversee this region’s rollout of Bud Lite Lime and to expand her corporate empire. […]<\/p>\n

In 2000, when Mrs. McCain’s father died, she inherited the beer distributorship…. Mrs. McCain assumed her father’s position as chairman…. Since James Hensley’s death eight years ago, the distributorship has nearly doubled, holding a significant portion of the Phoenix-area market share. It has 700 employees and annual revenue of about $300 million. Mrs. McCain has approved the buyout of another distributorship, helping bring sales last year to 23 million cases of beer.<\/p>\n

Mrs. McCain (who can tell a beer’s freshness by tasting it, according to her daughter Meghan) declines to say what percentage of the company she owns or its value. Industry experts estimate her stake at about $100 million.<\/p>\n

She owns a private jet, which Sen. McCain’s campaign pays to use on the trail.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

You know, someone might even be tempted to call the McCains “elites.”<\/p>\n

To be sure, are Cindy McCain’s tax returns especially significant? Not really. In fact, I’m not surprised that someone of her wealth would want to keep her returns free of scrutiny.<\/p>\n

But it’s worth noting that in 2004, the Republican National Committee spent quite a bit of time and energy demanding<\/a> that the Kerry campaign release Teresa Heinz Kerry’s tax returns.<\/p>\n

The situation is comparable. John Kerry made less money than his wife, who inherited most of her fortune. The McCains are in a similar boat. In 2004, Teresa Heinz Kerry resisted calls for disclosure, just as Cindy McCain is now. Republicans insisted that all materials, relating to Kerry’s income and his wife’s, be publicly released, and the Kerrys ultimately agreed. Will Cindy do the same?<\/p>\n

In other words, if we hold the McCains to the standards set by the Republican Party, today’s disclosures by McCain are inadequate and incomplete. We’ll see if the media chooses to follow up.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For all the talk in recent weeks about Hillary Clinton’s initial reluctance to release her tax returns, John McCain’s identical reluctance has gone largely ignored. The difference is that the media devoted considerable attention to Clinton’s returns, and gave McCain a pass on his. The good news is, McCain finally released his tax materials today. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15256"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15256\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}