The Sunday edition front-page hit-piece story the New York Times did on Donald Trump's potential use of the loss of nearly a billion dollars on one year to shield taxes in other years was designed to persuade morons. There is no substantive scandal at all. The tax provision (a "scheme" when used by Trump) that Trump employed has also been used by Hillary Clinton and the New York Times (in which cases it is fully in accord with the law). Zero Hedge:
Well this is a little awkward. With the leaked 1995 Trump tax returns 'scandal' focused on the billionaire's yuuge "net operating loss" and how it might have 'legally' enabled him to pay no taxes for years, we now discover none other than Hillary Rodham Clinton utilized a $700,000 "loss" to avoid paying some taxes in 2015. (snip)
the NYT itself is also perfectly happy to take advantage of the US tax to minimize the amount of money it pays to the government: in 2014 the company got a tax refund of $3.6 million despite having a $29.9 million pretax profit, an effective negative tax rate for 2014, which it explained was favorably affected by approximately $21.1 million for the reversal of reserves for uncertain tax positions due to the lapse of applicable statutes of limitations.
The real purpose of the Times piece was to reinforce the Hillary campaign-generated meme that "Trump paid no taxes," regarded as persuasive to those who do pay income taxes. Of course, the Democrat base disproportionately includes the nearly half of Americans who do not pay income taxes. And Mitt Romney was pillaged as a snob and worse for noticing.
Incidentally, when the fact that the most burdensome tax of all exempts half the population, Democrats always insist that the exempt half pays Social Security and sales taxes, where applicable. Well, Trump pays gigantic tax bills for his many high-end properties. "He pays no taxes" is a lie.
But the Times, which likes to tout its readership to advertisers as smart and high income, wrote a major story that does not stand up to scrutiny, and is designed to appeal to the kind of readers it says it doesn't have. Except that Trump Derangement Syndrome is so widespread that most Times readers no doubt nodded their heads and ageed that Donald Trump is a terrible man.
And the tens of millions of viewers who get their news from TV heard all about the story all day yesterday, because of the Times' role as the pilot fish for the MSM, determining which stories get play and which do not.
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