Politico: 'Democrats' Whopper Of A Strategy Flop On Inversions ... Pretty Much A Massive Dud ...Almost No One Is Talking About [It] On The Campaign Trail'

Today in Washington, D.C, Sept 12, 2014:
The House is not in session today and will reconvene at 12 PM on Monday, Sept. 15, 2014.

The Senate also is not in session today and will reconvene at 2 PM on Monday. At 5:30 PM, three cloture votes are scheduled: on S. 2199, Democrats’ so-called “Paycheck Fairness Act,” (S. 2199), which would not actually do anything to address compensation for women, and on two nominees to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Yesterday, Democrats failed to get 60 votes to advance their Democrats’ radical constitutional amendment that would gut the core political speech protections of the First Amendment. S. J. Res. 19 failed a cloture vote by a tally of 54-42. All 54 YEA votes were by Democrat Senators including Democrats with close races. For Example Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas vote yes supporting Harry Reid efforts to amend the constitution to limit free speech. All No votes were by Republican Senators.

Warren Buffett's company Berkshire Hathaway is helping fund
Burger King's corporate move to Canada. Does it mesh with his
previous comments on taxes? ~ CNN Money Story & Video

In a must-read piece today, Politico reports, “President Barack Obama and his Democratic allies hoped to capitalize on the recent wave of companies ditching the U.S. to slice their tax bill as a populist issue to fire up the progressive base and bash Republicans as slaves to corporate interests. So far, rather than becoming the political whopper that Democrats dreamed of, the issue has turned out to be pretty much a massive dud. The one recent high-profile corporate name to consider the move, fast-food chain Burger King, did so with the stamp of approval from top White House ally Warren Buffett. Almost no one is talking about the issue on the campaign trail. And there is little chance legislation will advance or even come to a vote on Capitol Hill before the midterm elections. Meanwhile, some influential tax policy analysts suggest any of the administration’s possible unilateral actions could make the problem worse, be deemed illegal, or wouldn’t have much impact at all.”

Democrats have not succeeded in raising awareness of the issue. Politico writes. “[P]olls also show most Americans are not very aware of the inversion phenomena and don’t really understand it. A recent survey conducted by Morning Consult, a digital media company that conducts weekly national polls, showed 64 percent had an unfavorable view of ‘inversions’ when the transaction was explained in plain language. But only 40 percent had heard of the phenomena and 30 percent said they thought it was hurting the economy. ‘It hasn’t really broken through as an issue yet,  though the Burger King transaction could be a milestone in that it’s a very recognizable American company,’ said Michael Ramlet, founder and publisher of Morning Consult.”

And when the Burger King news broke, “the administration refused to make an example of Burger King, saying at the time the deal was announced that they would not get into specific companies’ plans. And Burger King’s deal to buy Canadian donut chain Tim Hortons and move the combined company’s headquarters to Canada came with financing from Buffett, . . . a close ally of the president’s. . . . Another prominent Democratic backer on Wall Street this week slammed the idea that inversions are a big problem for the U.S. economy. ‘This is one where the emotion and the noise and the rhetoric is wildly bigger than the issue economically,’ Tony James, president of the private-equity firm The Blackstone Group and a major financial backer of the president, said at a POLITICO event on Tuesday.”

Democrats seem to have a problem with their allies being either unmoved by the inversions issue or being involved in them. Last month, Bloomberg News wrote, “President Barack Obama won’t return campaign donations to executives, advisers and directors who have profited from offshore mergers that reduce corporate taxes using a technique he has called ‘unpatriotic.’ Responding to a Bloomberg News report that described connections between more than 20 Obama donors and the tax-cutting transactions, White House Deputy Press Secretary Eric Schultz said the president will keep the cash. . . . Donors involved with the tax deals include Blair Effron, an investment banker who hosted Obama for a May fundraiser at his two-level, 9,000-square-foot apartment on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. Others are Jim Rogers, co-chairman of the host committee for the 2012 Democratic National Convention; Roger Altman, a former senior Treasury Department official who raised at least $200,000 for Obama’s re-election campaign; and Shantanu Narayen, who sits on the president’s management advisory board. ‘It’s populist rhetoric,’ said former U.S. Senator Bob Kerrey, a Nebraska Democrat who advises clients at Carmen Group Inc., a Washington consulting and lobbying firm. ‘And at some point it’s sufficiently misleading that it draws the attention away from the difficulties involved with an agreement to lower the corporate tax rates -- that’s not an easy thing to do.’ . . . Effron is co-founder of Centerview Partners LLC, a New York investment firm. Centerview advised Abbott Laboratories, which is selling some of its non-U.S. businesses to Mylan Inc. in a deal that will let Mylan put its tax home in the Netherlands. Centerview also advised AstraZeneca Plc as the London-based company rejected multiple offers from Pfizer Inc. that would have led Pfizer to take a U.K. address. . . . Rogers is a director of Applied Materials Inc., which has a pending inversion transaction with Tokyo Electron Ltd. that will place the combined company in the Netherlands. . . . Altman is the founder and executive chairman of Evercore Partners, a New York investment firm that advised Shire Plc, which has a pending inversion deal with AbbVie. . . . Narayen is the chief executive officer of Adobe Systems Inc. and a director of Pfizer, which earlier this year proposed the largest inversion in history.”

Politico points out, “The issue is not exactly lighting up on the campaign trail. . . . The issue does not seem to have come up in any of the most hotly contested Senate races and most forecasters say GOP odds of taking the six seats they need to gain control have consistently risen in the months since inversions because a significant political topic.”

---

Tags: Burger King, Warren Buffet, inversions, taxes, democrats, rhetoric, no substance, Politico To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!