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'Mad Dog' Harry Reid
Townhall.com ^ | August 9, 2012 | Cal Thomas

Posted on 08/09/2012 7:17:08 AM PDT by Kaslin

To call Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid a "mad dog," as Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank did, is an affront to the canine community and those suffering from legitimate mental illness. Reid was completely sane when he spread hearsay about an anonymous Bain Capital investor who allegedly told him Mitt Romney paid no taxes for 10 years.

Doesn't Reid, a Mormon like Romney, subscribe to the prohibition in the Ninth Commandment: "Thou shall not bear false witness"? He appears to pay no political price because he's a Democrat and unlike Joe McCarthy, to whom some are comparing him, no prominent fellow Democrat or top media figure has asked Reid the question put to the commie-hunting McCarthy by attorney Joseph Welch in 1953: "Have you no sense of decency, sir?"

Reid is a sideshow, a clown in a political circus that seeks to draw the public's attention away from President Obama's record. Romney's tax returns won't create a single job or revive the economy. Romney must change the subject by shifting the focus to where it belongs: to President Obama, his failed promises and his disastrous economic mismanagement.

If he wants to belabor the point, Romney can challenge Obama to release his college records and other information mentioned in his book "Dreams from My Father." He can offer to release more years of his tax returns in return for the transparency Obama promised.

Or Romney can reiterate that he has fully complied with the law, including the payment of all taxes owed. Would his critics prefer he pay more than his legal obligation? In addition, Romney has certainly made sizable charitable contributions, while Biden and his wife, according to USA Today, averaged just $369 in annual charitable contributions over a 10-year period.

What about the president? Here's what Washington Post Fact Checker Glenn Kessler wrote: "When then-presidential candidate Obama released his tax returns during the 2008 campaign, it was revealed that he began making significant gifts to charity after he started making serious money from his books -- and after he decided to run for president.

Here's what the numbers look like: 2005: $77,315 to charity out of income of $1.66 million (4.6 percent); 2004: "$2,500 out of $207,647 (1.2 percent); 2003: $3,400 out of $238,327 (1.4 percent); 2002: $1,050 out of $259,394 (0.4 percent)." In 2010, the number increased to 13.6 percent.

We can go tit for tat on contributions or income taxes forever. The tax returns issue is a smoke screen for the Obama administration's failures. The Romney campaign now appears to be doing what it should to reclaim and redirect the narrative. Romney can prevail if the issue becomes government spending.

People know that waste is a moral failure. Romney could go after Pentagon waste. Washington Post columnist Walter Pincus recently wrote: "How can the Pentagon keep $2.5 billion left over from a canceled program sloshing around for 'reinvestment by the Army' when Capitol Hill and the White House are worried about Pentagon budget cuts and national security?"

Romney has begun to press the president on his "reform" of welfare reform. The Department of Health and Human Services announced last month it will consider waivers to the work requirements for the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. Requiring welfare recipients to work was a hard-won provision of the landmark welfare reform law passed by a Republican Congress and signed by Bill Clinton in 1996. And it worked. Those receiving welfare benefits, instead of relying on government assistance, were compelled to transition themselves toward work or educational opportunities as a way of creating a better life for themselves and for their families.

Senator Reid is a stink bomb at the garden party. Let "Dirty Harry," as some have dubbed him, continue to demonstrate his flawed character. Romney should not descend to the gutter with him. He should ignore Reid and focus on what most Americans care most about: rebuilding our shattered economy.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: barackobama; campaign2012; harryreid; mittromney; transparency; welfarereform

1 posted on 08/09/2012 7:17:12 AM PDT by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin

I’m gratified to see our side finally attacking the messenger, like the other side always does, instead of trying to argue their specious premise.


2 posted on 08/09/2012 7:20:21 AM PDT by skeeter
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To: Kaslin
Reid is a (alleged) pedophile, government leach who has never released his taxes.

Willard has paid enough taxes to the Feds over the years to be shouldering Reid's load and that of a bunch of other leaches.

3 posted on 08/09/2012 7:24:07 AM PDT by Paladin2
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To: Kaslin

Two questions to this dumbass.

IF Romney didn’t pay his taxes for ten years then that tells me that the IRS isn’t doing it’s job. Right Mr Reid?

And...if Romney used loopholes in the tax code to “avoid” paying his “fair share” that tells me that the tax code is the problem. The very tax code that YOU helped create!

DUMP THER IRS AND DUMP THE TAX CODE AND WE WOULDN’T BE HAVING THIS ARGUMENT!


4 posted on 08/09/2012 7:25:55 AM PDT by unixfox (Abolish Slavery, Repeal The 16th Amendment!)
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To: Kaslin

5 posted on 08/09/2012 7:26:35 AM PDT by yefragetuwrabrumuy
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To: Kaslin
Reid is just drawing attention to himself to draw heat from Obama. The best thing to do is do ignore Reid and concentrate on Obama. Reid is not up for election, Obama is.
6 posted on 08/09/2012 7:26:56 AM PDT by MCF
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To: Kaslin

Harry and Nancy have both gone over the edge supporting their Kenyan messiah. Instead of hiring armies of lawyers, the DNC should be hiring armies of psychiatrists.


7 posted on 08/09/2012 7:27:09 AM PDT by FlingWingFlyer (The NRA did not create James "The Joker" Holmes. Harvey Weinstein's Hollywood did.)
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To: skeeter
I’m gratified to see our side finally attacking the messenger

Yeah, but not in the MSM. That is where we will get very little accomplished. I am pissed that on the floor of the Senate some ass hat must get up and call Reid a liar. Demand the source of the tax crap and call this ass a fool. Nothing will do any good unless the attack is a rebuttal and add accusations of Reid question past. Sorry, but all the rest is just blowing in the wind and reaching not one of the insane Democrats.

8 posted on 08/09/2012 7:28:58 AM PDT by Logical me
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To: unixfox

Excellent


9 posted on 08/09/2012 7:32:43 AM PDT by Kaslin (Acronym for OBAMA: One Big Ass Mistake America)
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To: Kaslin

The Progressives attract and nurture adolescent, psychotic, macho-men to do their dirty work and further the culture of the school yard.

The only difference is that the real schoolyard involves stealing lunch money and the Progressive schoolyard involves the “voluntary” contribution of income taxes
with the threat of jail if they’re not paid, at ever-increasing rates.

IMHO


10 posted on 08/09/2012 7:34:59 AM PDT by ripley
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To: Kaslin

Harry Reid D-Harrah’s!


11 posted on 08/09/2012 8:09:40 AM PDT by Dr. Ursus
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To: Kaslin

Reid was doing exactly what Obama, Jarrett abd Axelrod told him to do. He is supposed to be claiming to be acting on his own, but this is the way team Obama destroys his oponents.


12 posted on 08/09/2012 8:12:34 AM PDT by Wiser now (Socialism does not eliminate poverty, it guarantees it.)
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To: Kaslin
Harry Reid, grandson of infamous Nevada horse thief and cattle rustler, Rufus Reid (the last man hanged in Nevada for those “infractions”), is seen here replying to a reporter’s question.

The question? “Senator Reid, your unsupported accusations concerning Mitt Romney have caused some – including the Obama supporting Washington Post – to question your intellect. Just what IS your IQ?”

A man of few words – unless he’s slandering or libeling one of his many enemies from the legal safety of the Senate floor – Reid (whose alleged hobby involves live Gerbils and toilet paper tubes) displayed the universally understood symbol for the numeral “one”.

Photobucketp>

13 posted on 08/09/2012 8:55:18 AM PDT by Dick Bachert
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To: Kaslin
Romney should go on TV and say:

"Here, in this box, are the following:

* My tax returns for the last 20 years
* All of my college transcripts
* My current and expired passports, showing my travel history
* My birth certificate and social security card

All of these I will gladly make public when Mr. Obama will do likewise.
14 posted on 08/09/2012 9:31:42 AM PDT by zencycler
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To: Kaslin
Of course, depending on where Senator Reid made these comments, he may be open to a charge of slander (e.g., such as happened to Oscar Wilde long ago).

If the remarks were made outside of the "protected" space, like not on the floor of the US Senate, Mittens should keep open his options - that is, to bring suit against Senator Reid for mis-representation of fact, utterance of false charges, ...

Just saying ...

15 posted on 08/09/2012 10:07:44 AM PDT by jamaksin
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To: All

Unlike those who vote for obama, Reid and Pelosi aren’t dumb. They know obama has been a disaster for this country and they know he wants to destroy it. That can only mean they want to destroy it, too.


16 posted on 08/09/2012 10:22:37 AM PDT by Terry Mross (To my kin & former friends: Don't contact me if you still love obama- We got nothing to talk about)
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