This is just odd…

McCain is traveling with the U.N.’s World Food Programme, whose work she monitored in Southeast Asia and Africa this spring and summer. McCain plans to meet with Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili and to visit wounded Georgian soldiers. She would also visit representatives of the HALO Trust, which works to remove land mines and on whose board she serves. [...]

Cindy McCain said she has been trying to get into Georgia since the conflict started, but it took time to arrange the logistics. Her husband, she said, is “very supportive. As soon as he saw what was happening — he and I, we connect on many levels. I mean, he knew immediately [that I would want to go]. I’ve been to Georgia with him; I know the country.”

Imagine if Michelle Obama was taking this trip. Imagine the outrage on the right as they’d accuse her of turning a foreign policy crisis into a photo op. And you know what? They’d be right.

I mean, what else can this trip be seen as since Cindy is essentially going to be in the country for less than a day? Yes, I know she has worked with the UN before, but folks, this is not “monitoring.”

Again, just odd.

Apparently, the controversy of the day revolves around John McCain’s ability to accurately state how many houses he and his wife own:

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said in an interview Wednesday that he was uncertain how many houses he and his wife, Cindy, own.

“I think — I’ll have my staff get to you,” McCain told Politico in Las Cruces, N.M. “It’s condominiums where — I’ll have them get to you.”

The correct answer is at least four, located in Arizona, California and Virginia, according to his staff. Newsweek estimated this summer that the couple owns at least seven properties.

Which prompted this snarky response from Virginia Governor Tim Kaine:

Obama V.P. prospect and Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine mocked Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., on Thursday for not knowing exactly how many houses he owns.

“I understand that Sen. McCain was asked yesterday this question, ‘how many houses do you own?,’ and he couldn’t answer that question. He couldn’t count high enough apparently to even know how many houses he owns,” said Kaine.

And, as The Politco reports, the Democrats apparently think they have something here:

In recent weeks, Democrats have stepped up their effort to caricature McCain as living an outlandishly rich lifestyle — a bit of payback to the GOP for portraying Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) as an elitist, and for turning the spotlight in 2004 on the five homes owned by Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) and his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry.

Pro-Obama labor groups have sent out mailers highlighting McCain’s wealth, and prominent Democrats have included references to it in comments to reporters.

Twice in the past two weeks, those Democrats have focused on McCain’s houses.

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) told Politico’s Ben Smith that it was McCain “who wears $500 shoes, has six houses and comes from one of the richest families in his state.”

And David Axelrod, Obama’s chief strategist, referred in an interview with Adam Nagourney of The New York Times to an imagined meeting of McCain strategists “on the portico of the McCain estate in Sedona — or maybe in one of his six other houses.”

And the Obama campaign has gotten into the game with this ad which is one of the more balatant hate-the-rich appeals I’ve seen in quite a long time:

Will it work ? Only time will tell, of course, but the truth of the matter is that there is a segment of the population out there for whom an appeal to envy and class warfare will work, and that’s obviously what the Obama campaign is banking on.

The truth of the matter, of course, is that it doesn’t matter how many homes McCain and his wife — who happens to be an heiress and businesswoman worth quite a lot of money — own or have an interest in. No more than it matters how big Barack Obama’s Chicago home is, or that he took a week long vacation in Hawaii, something that most Americans couldn’t afford.

If you’re attacking the men because of their ideas, that’s one thing. If you’re attacking them merely because they, or their spouses, are successful, that’s quite another and its a sign of the kind of envy that, in the end, can come of no good.

Cross-Posted From Below The Beltway

With new questions about massive credit card debt and unpaid taxes, and questions still looming as to where Cindy invests her money and why she won’t fully disclose her tax returns, the McCain camp is becoming increasingly nervous that the lack of transparency may hurt them come this fall.

Politico points out why this matters…

During the 2004 presidential campaign, Teresa Heinz Kerry, whose fortune was estimated to be worth more than $750 million, eventually released comparably limited information about her finances after repeated demands from Republicans who asserted the public’s right to know because they said her finances were intertwined with those of her husband’s presidential campaign. The Kerry campaign had benefited from a $6.4 million personal loan John Kerry secured using, as collateral, equity in a Boston townhouse the couple jointly owned.

Likewise, John McCain’s presidential campaign benefited from Cindy McCain’s fortune, using a legal loophole to travel the country in a jet owned by her company for cut-rate fares. [...]

While John McCain’s campaign spending is a matter of public record, his family’s personal spending is not, and for the most part there’s only anecdotal information available.

For a guy who claims to be all about transparency, the lack of it when it comes to his family’s finances is troubling.

And yes, I know they don’t file taxes jointly, but there’s no way he hasn’t benefitted from Cindy’s vast fortune. In fact, many think McCain may never had made it into politics without her. The couple has been married for nearly 3 decades now, so some significant disclosure of their finances isn’t just appropriate, it’s necessary. We can’t be guessing where her money is coming from, especially after she divested herself of those mutual funds linked to Sudanese companies.

More as it develops…

Her 2006 returns are a good start, but as I’ve said in the past, full disclosure for presidential candidates is becoming a must. Especially since it’s obvious that nearly all of their assets are in her name and she recently sold off mutual funds linked to Sudanese companies.

From the AP:

Cindy McCain has released her 2006 tax returns, showing total income of more than $6 million. The wife of Republican presidential candidate John McCain paid more than $1.7 million in taxes.

McCain’s campaign said she had received an extension on her 2007 tax returns and planned to make those public when they are filed. [...]

McCain’s campaign only released the top two summary pages of Cindy McCain’s 2006 return. In them, she listed itemized deductions totaling nearly $570,000. Mrs. McCain is the heiress of a large Arizona beer distributorship.

Again, good start…but we need more.

This time from the decidedly conservative editorial board of the Washington Times:

Cindy McCain refuses to release her tax returns. This is not just a questionable political decision that threatens to haunt her husband’s campaign for the next six months. It is also the wrong decision. Mrs. McCain needs to change her mind and release the returns as quickly as possible. How Republican John McCain, the presumptive presidential nominee who rightly fancies himself the king of transparency on Capitol Hill, and his campaign strategists can permit this open sore to fester is unimaginable.

With a net worth estimated in the range of $100 million, Mrs. McCain would directly benefit from her husband’s pledge to permanently extend the top income-tax rate of 35 percent (which was lowered from 39.6 percent in 2001), the top capital gains tax rate of 15 percent (which was lowered from 20 percent in 2003) and the top dividend tax rate of 15 percent (which was lowered from 38.6 percent in 2003). Mr. McCain opposed those cuts in 2001 and 2003, but now wants to make them permanent. The McCains may also derive great benefit from his promise to completely eliminate the individual alternative minimum tax. Until she releases her tax returns, voters cannot know for certain.

From the revelation today that Cindy owned mutual funds linked to Sudanese companies, to the idea that McCain has very little personal wealth himself after nearly 30 years of marriage, it’s pretty obvious that she needs to release them. That’s all there is to it. The sooner the better.

Considering the ongoing state-sanctioned murders and rapes in Darfur, divesting from companies that do business in Sudan is a proper move for nations and for individuals who care about human rights. I’m glad to see the McCains finally did just that, with Cindy McCain selling off all shares of two mutual funds which included companies with business interests in Sudan.

Considering John McCain has been calling for action in Darfur for years, it’s a bit surprising his wife hasn’t divested before now – unless the McCains simply didn’t know until recently that the two mutual funds included companies doing business in Sudan.

Whatever the rationale for why the McCains waited until now to sell, the act is a positive one and will hopefully inspire more Americans to make the same choice.

“The candidate should get his wife to reconsider. The last thing the country needs in a new president is more secrecy.”
- from a Washington Post editorial published today about Cindy McCain’s refusal to release her tax returns.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll continue to say that Cindy McCain’s tax returns should be a matter of public record. The McCains have been married for nearly 30 years, and most of their financial gains have been realized under Cindy’s name, including home purchases, private jet travel, etc.

And if McCain values transparency as much as he says he does and claims to want to know where candidates’ money is coming from, it’s clearly contradictory to keep his wife’s financial filings private.

Check out some of our other posts for and against releasing her tax returns:
All Of McCain’s Investments Are In His Wife’s Name?
Do Cindy McCain’s Tax Returns Matter?
Cindy McCain Won’t Release Tax Returns

Okay folks, I’ve done a little bit more digging on this issue after my post calling for Cindy McCain to disclose her tax returns, and what I’ve found makes me really not buy any arguments that excuse the McCain’s lack of transparency.

Why? Well, it’s apparent that over the past 28 years they’ve made numerous investments in real estate and other areas and it’s always through Cindy. So to think we should all just sit idly by while he acts like their finances aren’t intertwined is a bit insulting.

From Slate:

As with Sens. Clinton and Obama, McCain’s personal wealth is dwarfed by that of his spouse. Cindy McCain has assets worth an estimated $40 million, based on information McCain has provided annually in Senate financial-disclosure reports. Compared with his wife, McCain is decidedly middle-class. Based on his tax return, he collects his Senate salary ($161,708), a Navy pension ($58,358), and some Social Security income ($23,157). The money he’s earned over the years writing books ($176,508 in 2007 and about $1.8 million since 1998), he gives to charity.

And that’s pretty much it. Aside from a Wachovia checking account, in which he keeps between $15,000 and $50,000 (wouldn’t some of that money earn more interest in a certificate of deposit?), all of the couple’s assets are in Cindy’s name. John McCain’s tax return is so anemic, so marginal to the couple’s actual financial situation, that he doesn’t even take a deduction for interest on his home mortgage. Presumably Cindy does, since disclosure forms indicate that she has several mortgages.

As with the Clintons, the McCains simply need to show the world what they’ve made…jointly. Because if they keep selling the idea that their finances should be viewed separately just because they file taxes separately, expect a big time credibility backlash.

Alan says no, but I say yes.

There’s no reason why the income of a candidate’s spouse shouldn’t be a matter of public record. Let’s face facts, just because spouses file separately doesn’t mean that they don’t jointly benefit from each other’s incomes. And I would have said the same about Bill Clinton if Hillary and him had filed separately.

But here’s a curious note…several right wing pundits decried Teresa Heinz-Kerry’s non-disclosure in 2004.

First, Robert Novak…

This becomes politically critical, because no previous presidential candidate relied so much on his spouse’s wealth. Without backing from Heinz ketchup money, it is fair to say John Kerry would not be his party’s presidential standard-bearer and probably would not even be a U.S. senator today. Thus, refusal to release his wife’s tax returns inevitably raises suspicions, however ill-founded, that the Kerrys have something to hide.

Then, National Review:

Trusts and income this large, even if only partly controlled by a potential future First Lady, matter. We’ve already seen how Teresa effectively helped finance her husband’s campaign, at least in its bleaker moments. How her money is generated is, therefore, of some interest as is its potential, particularly in the context of a campaign that has made so much out of “Halliburton,” for conflicts (or the perception of conflicts) of interest.

Even the Wash Post editorial board weighed in:

“IT WON’T DO.” That was our bottom line in 1984 when Rep. Geraldine Ferraro of New York, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, balked at releasing her husband’s income tax returns. “Though Rep. Ferraro says she will release her own tax return, she cannot treat her spouse as a separate entity for this purpose and still claim to be providing complete data,” we wrote. Ms. Ferraro eventually relented, providing five years’ worth of tax returns from her husband, John Zaccaro.

Twenty years later, in the midst of a similar controversy, we feel much the same way. Teresa Heinz Kerry, wife of the putative Democratic presidential nominee, should make her tax returns public. Ms. Heinz Kerry has been reluctant to do so; campaign spokesman Michael Meehan now says she is preparing to make summary information available, though not necessarily her return itself. That’s an improvement over no disclosure, but it is short of what ought to be done.

So, where are the calls for Cindy McCain from the right wing?

Don’t hold your breath.

(h/t: Nitpicker)

Should the spouse of a presidential candidate be expected to disclose his or her tax returns if the couple files separately? That’s the question now that Cindy McCain has declared she will never make her tax returns public. Opponents of John McCain are already criticizing this move but Mrs. McCain says it’s a matter of privacy.

A natural impulse might be to ask “what is she hiding?” But that’s a slippery slope of an impulse. We can’t assume anyone who wants privacy has something seedy to hide. Then again, the McCain’s have to know that such a refusal will raise questions. Wouldn’t it be easier just to release her returns?

Personally, I’m o.k. with her keeping her tax returns secret. She’s always filed separately from her husband and has business and family financial interests that have little or nothing to do with John McCain’s public career. Even though she is now a “public figure,” I don’t think the need for transparency in government should require her to disclose financial matters that she’s always kept separate from her husband. We aren’t electing Cindy McCain and unless there are convincing allegations that John McCain has been using his wife’s finances to funnel illegal campaign contributions, I think we should respect the woman’s choice to keep her tax return private.