SPECTRUM: Should Trump Publish His Tax Records?

While a significant number of my friends have reported to me that they have given up on following this election, I, however, cannot remember having more fun keeping up with a presidential lineup. I say that because these candidates are no longer just throwing mud. Now they seem to have stepped over the ropes and have started wresting in it. This is not just a campaign. It has turned into a cage match in the dirt and the Media has turned the hose on them. This is a grudge match.

I have to rewind the tape here a bit. Before we were married my wife tried to corner me with this question, “Tell me the truth,” she asked, “Have you ever been to one of those bars where they get two women to take off their clothing and wrestle in some mud?” I could tell it was a deal breaker, yet I had an answer that was both templated and true, “Nope, not yet. Do you have a business plan in mind that you want me to look at?” That ended that line of questioning.

I mention this because I wonder if I could say no to that question after having followed this election as if it were a horse race. After all, are these two people running against each other or am I witnessing live proceedings at a divorce hearing? At this point I am confused. I thought Hillary was married to that serial-flasher, saxophone player guy while I thought Don was married to that walk-into-the-room-and-melt-all-the plutonium lady from Slovenia. Sorry, but to me, Don and Hillary no longer look like rivals – now they look like they have been passed all that and now are in couples’ court.

Anyway, that is not what is getting under my skin. For me, the gauntlet on the chock-board in the Media backdrop static is this call for Mr. D to lay bare his tax records. Oh, I have heard some dumb as a bag of hammers ideas come out of the Media before, but that one is as gold plated as Trump’s toupee.

First of all, as far as I have read, Trump has never received a salary from US tax payers. He is a private citizen, so unless the IRS has been after him before he announced his bid for the Oval Office it is his money and thus his business. Unfortunately there are so people who have grown accustomed to professional, career, Vaseline-greased politicians who have lived off the tax payer’s sweat and tears most of their adult lives that many folks cannot tell the difference when a private citizen decides to give it a go. Yes, in many situations the salaries of public officials is often public information. However, Trump is not a public worker yet and never has been. Thus public employee, tax funded job, transparency, freedom of information guidelines have nothing to do with the earnings of this private citizen.

That issue, entirely aside this demand to see Trump’s tax records, is still black-belt level dim-witted. I am sorry, but let’s look at the numbers. It sounds to me as if someone wants to see Donald’s W-2, his 1040, and all his 1099s. Excuse me, but Mr. Trump owns about 515 separate subsidiaries, which means individual but not separate companies in his Trump Corporation portfolio. Imagine, if you will, a local journalist demanding to see all the tax records of something like ASRC, with but 7 large subsidiaries, or something like NANA, with about 40 somewhat smaller, but more diverse subsidiaries. Can you imagine a corporation like ASRC being directed by as newspaper to bring all their shoeboxes down to the paper so their journalists could go through them? Donald owns about 515 of these things and some of his corporate tax records are in Korean and Turkish.

He is a private citizen. His corporation was not under federal investigation, and any examination would require the international cooperation of about 20 different governments, and one of those governments would be ours. Pardon me, but our government cannot cooperate with itself to go out and get a cup of coffee. Should Trump be required to publish his tax records? Well, it would be a great barrier to keep people out who were not already in. If you had enough money to run as a private citizen then your tax records would be so huge and complex that it would be a physical and logistical impossibility to present them within the time limits of a presidential campaign. I would guess that the people who proposed this brilliant idea probably already knew that.

Timothy Ahern is a resident of Chugiiak