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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsHillary double standard
Did people here complain about Ted Kennedy's wealth? Which was largely inherited, not earned. Or John Kerry, who married an heiress? Hillary was obviously comparing herself to Romney, whose fortune was made on the back of hard working people by depriving them of their jobs, and who shelters a huge percentage of those earnings in foreign tax havens. She and Bill did neither to earn and maintain their wealth. And if a movie star can make $20 million for a film that turns out to be a box office flop, surely the former First Couple can earn large sums in speaking engagements and book deals. You all are swallowing the anti-Clinton media Kool Aid. (And I'm not an unmitigated fan. Given a choice in a primary my vote would go to Biden.)
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)and other tax evaders.
Jenoch
(7,720 posts)tax rulings to avoid paying taxes, just like all wealthy people do. I'm not buying her, "we're not wealthy" or Chelsea's "money is not important to me". Who is advising them about this topic? It's not working.
joshcryer
(62,265 posts)They wouldn't be doing their job if they weren't making sure that their client was maximizing their income. It's the same reason Warren Buffet is in a lower tax bracket than his secretary. Neither the Clintons or Buffet, however, refuse to take advantage of the tax loopholes.
BootinUp
(46,924 posts)how does that fit your little narrative?
Walk away
(9,494 posts)I don't vote for morons but feel free to make that a condition for getting your vote.
Why don't you explain what "rules" you are talking about. Are you accusing the Clintons of having tax shelters out of the country? Tell us all about it.
How about next tax season you forget about those rules that let you take any exemptions at all. I'll keep using an accountant who gets me the best deal possible.
Jenoch
(7,720 posts)except that both Hillary, and for ubknown reasons, Chelsea, are attemting to say they are not part of the 1%.
Walk away
(9,494 posts)Apparently, you read somewhere that the Clintons were using "rules" (whatever they are) to avoid paying taxes. I assume you are referring to the recent articles about the Clintons and estate taxes. Possibly you didn't even read the article but latched on to a sound bite in one of the usual "I hate Hillary" threads. I am only guessing because you couldn't even back up your assertion with ANY information. Typical.
I get a big kick out of DUers who post something and then deny they posted it in their next response.
Romulox
(25,960 posts)For example, I don't bother with the home office deduction, even though I am eligible under the tax code. Moron am I?
And YOU--you aggressively take advantage of every tax break, every year? That means, most of all, that you must derive most of your income from capital gains, right? No???? Are *you* a "moron"? No, I don't think so. I think your premise is just wrong.
joshcryer
(62,265 posts)So the comments by Clinton are tone deaf because, simply, she didn't have to really worry to any significant capacity. They knew there was light at the end of the financial tunnel. It's not for the vast majority of Americans.
I liken their debt to someone getting an unexpected light bill and having to pawn something to pay it. Yeah, it sucks, but you have assets around or an expectation that you can get out of the hole. This is in stark contrast to someone getting hurt and not being able to work or even getting cancer and sending an entire household into bankruptcy.
JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)People who struggled to get into a home and then had the interest rate rise at a faster rate than their wages.
It was really insensitive of Hillary Clinton to even bring up her own financial situation. Doesn't she know anyone who was pushed into bankruptcy after the banks went wild following Bill Clinton's signing the repeal of Glass-Steagall? I was just stunned at her statement on that. That's like sticking a knife in the hearts of many Americans who ended up in bankruptcy court after 2008.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)Seriously.
laundry_queen
(8,646 posts)No? then not the same.
Look, I get that Bill and Hillary worked hard to get where they are. They were also blessed with brains and talent - and not everyone is no matter how hard they work. The issue here is that during these economic hard times, Hillary was lamenting about how she wasn't as rich as other rich people because at one point they were underwater (with a really bright future and nearly guaranteed income through speaking engagements I might add...as well as a presidential pension). She said it to try to appeal to people who are struggling, but instead it made her look out of touch. A much better way of doing it would be to own her wealth and admit that some of it is due to luck, and that she wants everyone to have a fair chance like she did. Not hard to come across as genuine if one actually is genuine. I don't remember a time when Ted Kennedy wasn't out there fighting for the 'little guy'...that's something Hillary is going to have to do to overcome the image her wealth has created.
Ms. Toad
(33,915 posts)I don't expect the democratic president to live in poverty, or not take every advantage of the tax code that is written to allow her to maintain her wealth.
I do expect here to have a deep understanding of her privilege rather than pretending that having having the luxury of having credit extended to you when when you are temporarily unemployed with empty bank accounts so that you can buy two very expensive homes and send your daughter to private elite schools is anything but a luxury.
I don't begrudge her any of her wealth, her homes, or her ability to send her daughter to the best schools. What raises my hackles is that her public comments recently try to place her experience as distinct from that of other wealthy individuals - and similar to that of Americans who are struggling to put food on the table. I find that offensive.
RainDog
(28,784 posts)and my dislike for political dynasties - including the Kennedy family.
Kerry most certainly lacked the "common touch." But people voted for him anyway. He didn't try to say he was broke - that's what was so offensive.
However, I am not a fan of the Clinton family, in general. Just my personal reaction - I'm tired of them and they seem like they belong to another era, not this one.
I don't prefer Biden, either.
I'd like to see who will step up from the west. I'm ready for some leadership outside of the northeast. I'm not too impressed with politicians from the region at this point concerning an issue I've been following. I'm not at all interested in any politician associated with the south (Clinton the ex-prez).
While democrats might not like to hear it, some democrats just don't like the Clintons.
AndreaCG
(2,331 posts)He's from out west.
I'm not a fan of good ole boys in general.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)Response to RainDog (Reply #7)
Warren DeMontague This message was self-deleted by its author.
RainDog
(28,784 posts)and he had the courage to open the door to gay marriage in this nation. I don't know his positions on many issues, however.
Response to RainDog (Reply #15)
Warren DeMontague This message was self-deleted by its author.
RainDog
(28,784 posts)I just think it's funny, not funny hah-hah, but funny to see the passive aggressive insult, above, from one of Clinton supporters when people state their honest opinion.
Yeah, that's sort of why people were disgusted with her campaign against Obama in the primary, too. I see we're in for the same old same old... again.
Response to RainDog (Reply #18)
Warren DeMontague This message was self-deleted by its author.
RainDog
(28,784 posts)Because I have taken issue with a woman posting right wing talking points for two days straight while pretending she's just so surprised to know others find her talking points straight out of a right wing playbook.
Here's something the professional pols need to realize. This place was named "democratic underground" and that designation attracted people with opinions that are not necessarily ones that validate the mainstream.
If they want to come here and browbeat people into support... well, good luck with that.
I know I'm motivated now to GOTV! lol.
Response to RainDog (Reply #20)
Warren DeMontague This message was self-deleted by its author.
RandySF
(57,632 posts)He has great ideas and has been ahead of his times on many issues. But he can't run a lunch wagon, much less a major city or the country. He's better suited for the senate than the White House.
Response to RandySF (Reply #26)
Warren DeMontague This message was self-deleted by its author.
RandySF
(57,632 posts)Basic services were neglected everywhere and as soon as he became Lt. Governor, he ran off to Marin. The only thing remarkable he did since I moved here in 2006 was boink his secretary, who was also his best friend's wife. I don't like Ed Lee much better, but I do see a marked improvement everywhere.
Response to RandySF (Reply #46)
Warren DeMontague This message was self-deleted by its author.
JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)presidential candidate.
We need someone who is not tainted by the corruption that is so prevalent in D.C. We need someone who will ask intelligent questions about all the sneaky trade agreements that are being negotiated behind our backs. Elizabeth Warren has spoken to these issues and shown that she supports what is good for most Americans and not just what is good for Wall Street and the corporations.
MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)What is a problem...
First off, their money comes in huge torrents from the people who Bill unchained so they could financially brutalize the 99%. It's blood money.
Second, saying that an ex-President is broke might be technically correct, but it's truly wrong. It's another "it depends on what the definition of is, is."
Finally, she and Bill have a history of prevarication. People easily assume that Hillary's trying to mislead them again, she doesn't get the benefit of the doubt.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Thank you.
joshcryer
(62,265 posts)While I can't disagree completely, it's absolutely certain that Bill Clinton profited off of these guys. Whether he intended to, I personally don't think so. Politics isn't that simple. It's not like he somehow decided one day he'd profit off of corps. But the end result of his legislative actions, be the due to override potentials or whatever, obviously resulted in it.
So while I can't say Bill intended to do it, I can say with certainty that that's what happened because of it.
Katashi_itto
(10,175 posts)Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)(an entire shit load)
DonCoquixote
(13,615 posts)honestly, it could be easy to spoin this into a whole OP, after all, it is not that the Clintons are rich. They certainly did more to earn their wealth than any Bush or Koch did, but HOW did they get that wealth.
MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)But in this case I'll make an exception.
leftstreet
(36,078 posts)They should shut up about there wealth or lack thereof - they sound like idiots
They're hoping to lead a nation of people sliding daily into the financial shitter - what are their plans for improving OUR conditions?
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)It is a creepy development in our politics, that politicians can now get through entire campaigns without giving specifics about how they plan to represent voters on the most important issues.
Campaigns have become eerily and sickeningly divorced from the idea that politicians owe voters a clear explanation of how they will represent their interests.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)JaneyVee
(19,877 posts)Hekate
(90,189 posts)Sometimes I think this place has lost its collective mind.
Hekate
*No, my 2016 ballot is not filled in yet
JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)As for Ted Kennedy, he rose to political position long before 1980. Back in his early days, the discrepancy in wealth was not so obvious. Wages were still rising. The Piketty problem was not so evident. Besides, the Kennedys have put their money and their political action where their mouths are when it comes to issues like poverty and the environment and other issues of great social importance.
Bill Clinton's presidency when I look back on it is troubling in that respect: The welfare program was changed to make it harder for single mothers to raise and provide for their children in recessions. The repeal of Glass-Steagall was a huge mistake with serious repercussions for the whole world.
Today, especially after the crash of 2008, it is obscene and highly questionable for Democrats to take money from Wall Street. Did Hillary Clinton miss the Occupy Wall Street movement? Is she so tone deaf that she does not realize that the Occupy Wall Street movement although no longer camping out in public parks changed the conversation in America, especially with regard to the growing wealth of the upper 1-10% and the growing poverty among the rest of us?
In her book, A Fighting Chance, at page 106, Elizabeth Warren told about a dinner she had with
Larry Summers (a Clinton friend and, I believe, appointee) some years ago. She wrote:
"Late in the evening, Larry leaned back in his chair and offered me some advice. By now, I'd lost count of Larry's Diet Cokes, and our table was strewn with bits of food and spilled sauces. Larry's tone was in the friendly-advice category. He teed it up this way: I had a choice. I could be an insider or I could be an outsider. Outsiders can say whatever they want. But people on the inside don't listen to them. Insiders, however, get lots of access and a chance to push their ideas. People -- powerful people -- listen to what they have to say. But insiders also understand one unbreakable rule: They don't criticize other insiders."
Hillary got rich fast because she was an insider. She and Bill made their money not by criticizing rich, powerful people, not by pointing out their greed and unethical business practices but by making the rich and powerful feel good.
The insiders have taken most of the wealth that productivity increases have brought to the world and to the US in recent years. Hillary has been taking a share of that wealth from those who have in turn taken it out of the economy and not passed it on to the ordinary working people whose work created a good portion of that wealth.
Hillary bemoans economic injustice and inequality, but to what does she attribute it to? Is she willing to point her finger at the insiders whose tax breaks and outsourcing and importing and low pay scales and at-will termination policies cause the injustice and inequality? And what does she propose to do to make the system fairer?
She not only doesn't blame the wealthy insiders. She takes a lot of money from them. $200,000 for one speech? The folks who are giving her that kind of money for a speech are not usually very generous with people who criticize them and are willing to follow up on the criticism with action like raising taxes and increasing food stamp allowances or funding housing for the homeless.
Our system and our government are corrupt. We need someone who will step on the toes of the insiders who benefit from the corruption. Hillary has taken too much from the very insiders on whose toes she needs to step if she wants to reduce the corruption, the cheating in our society.
We need someone in the White House who is not intimidated by the insiders.
That's why although it might not have been such a big concern in the past, now, with the 2016 elections in view, the wealth of the Clintons and how they got that wealth is a problem.
People don't just pay $200,000 (takes 13 years to earn $200,000 at 40 hours a week for federal minimum wage) for a speech because they like you or because they like your voice or because they think you are brilliant. They pay you that kind of money because they want to own a share in you. Hillary has allowed herself to be bought. It will take a lot for her to prove that she can be trusted to criticize the insiders who think they have bought her.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)cali
(114,904 posts)Proud Public Servant
(2,097 posts)The issue isn't her wealth; no one would begrudge her that, especially since its the product of a lifetime of hard work. The issue are claims like being "dead broke" in 2001 or the hair-splitting over "truly wealthy." Nobody ever complained about Kennedy or Kerry's wealth because Kennedy and Kerry made no attempt to deny or downplay that wealth; it's the borderline mendacity that makes people angry (as well as concerned about having such a tone-deaf candidate as the party's standard-bearer).
So what should she be saying? This: "You know, Bill and I have worked hard, and we've also been very lucky -- blessed really. We're very, very comfortable now, and we're a long way from where we started -- Bill in particular. And we've been able to give our daughter a start in life better than any we had. The thing is, what we need to do is make sure everyone in this country has the same chances we had. We need to make sure all Americans who work had and play by the rules get the opportunity to advance themselves and provide a better life for their children. That's the country we once were. That's a way in which we used to lead the world. We don't any more -- there's more social mobility in Europe, Canada has a more prosperous middle class -- but it's not to late. We can be that country again. I truly believe that."
That's not perfect, but I tossed it off in a couple of minutes, before my first cup of coffee, having spent exactly 0 years in politics. What's Hillary's excuse?
Ms. Toad
(33,915 posts)deutsey
(20,166 posts)davidpdx
(22,000 posts)Someone ought to hire you.
I agree her answers show how out of touch she is. It's not that I hate either of them. I actually voted for Bill Clinton twice and campaigned during 1996.
magical thyme
(14,881 posts)and coming acrosss as totally insensitive and out of touch.
The simple fact is that if she wasn't pretending to care, she wouldn't be making the gaffes.
There are any number of ways she could have said what she "meant." But words are a funny thing. They have a way of telling people the truth...even if you think you're saying something else. And the truth is that the Clintons are way out of touch with what's going on for the rest of us as a result of certain of Bill Clinton's policies.
HereSince1628
(36,063 posts)According to my family -ALL- the Kennedy family's money was made off the illegal boot-legging of booze.
I can't say that was a generalized meme in No. Illinois at the time, but in my childhood home it was a predictable descant to every conversation about JFK and his administration.
Really, I think that for Hillary she has an unfortunate penchant for over-statement. What's being played up as a poor-poor me story about being broke when she left the White House grew out of her own comment. If she hadn't made it, folks would be forced to get filthy searching for something in the desert of ashes from the Whitewater and Rose Law Firm investigations.
LWolf
(46,179 posts)I didn't drink the kool-aid back in the 90s when I first saw and heard HRC on 60 minutes, telling the world she wasn't a "stand by your man" kind of woman while she stood by Clinton and defended his cheating...long before Monica. She lost me then, and frankly, never regained my respect. SHE did. That was long before there was anyone on DU to defend her for that, lol.
If there is one thing that DU has taught me, it's that Democrats are no better than the rest when it comes to hypocrisy and double standards.
Still, did TK or JK deny their wealth? In this case, that's what has sparked the flames. I don't think you can claim a double standard unless Democrats were okay with other wealthy Ds denying their wealth.
Scuba
(53,475 posts)Romulox
(25,960 posts)Once is a mistake. When they sent Chelsea out to do her "I TRIED to care about money!" routine, I nearly did a spit take.
Team Hillary is doubling down on this hamfisted attempt to impress the hoi-paloi. Unfortunately, rather than dealing with her biggest weakness and neutralizing it, Hillary has presented her jaw for socking, then bristled and whined through her usual proxies when she took her inevitable blows.
4Q2u2
(1,406 posts)I believe Romney got rich by using NAFTA and Glass-Steagell repeal.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-white/bill-clintons-true-legacy_b_1852887.html
Erich Bloodaxe BSN
(14,733 posts)But then I'm a socialist, and have advocated on multiple occasions for a strict cap on inherited or generationally-transferred wealth.
MisterP
(23,730 posts)Dawgs
(14,755 posts)Nice try though.
nadinbrzezinski
(154,021 posts)Kerry's wealth became an issue. To claim otherwise...
As to the Kennedy's, in 1960 that was a different standard, and Teddy was elected in another era, but his family's wealth has become an issue with the other kids who have run more recently.
FSogol
(45,356 posts)See the point now?