When Democrat Alan Grayson made his way back into the U.S. House of Representatives, the lowest of low-hanging fruit was restored to the tree of liberalism. The Tampa Bay Times decided to take a bite on Wednesday, and found its juices both bitter and mildly hallucinogenic.
Times political editor Adam Smith sets the stage with a very understated summary of Grayson’s fiery class-war rhetoric, and rather incongruous actions:
U.S. Rep. Alan Grayson, the outspoken, populist Democrat who thunders against Wall Street fat cats,and used to to joke about Mitt Romney’s low tax bill, incorporated a couple hedge funds in the Cayman Islands so investors could avoid taxes.
Grayson Fund Ltd. and Grayson Master Fund were incorporated in 2011 in the Cayman Islands, a well known tax Haven that Romney used as well, records show. That was the same year he wrote in the Huffington Post that the IRS should audit every Fortune 500 company because so many appear to be “evading taxes through transfer pricing and offshore tax havens.”
By the way, in case you’re keeping score, Mitt Romney’s “low tax bill” in the year of his presidential campaign worked out to an actual rate of about 30 percent, with millions of dollars per year donated to charity.
As for Grayson, he had all sorts of excuses for why he set up his own little Clinton Foundation in the Caymans, ready to receive foreign cash just like Bill and Hillary. He also agrees with the Clintons that aristocratic Champions of the Little Guy such as himself shouldn’t have to answer questions about their financial dealings.
Grayson is, if you can believe it, even less adept at expressing such resentments than Hillary Clinton, although he is also much more entertaining:
“When I set up my investment funds I set it up like everyone else,” Grayson said, complaining about theTampa Bay Times looking for “some stupid, bull—- story. … You want to write sh– about it, and you can’t because not a single dollar of taxes has been avoided,” he snapped.
Grayson’s financial disclosure statements indicate he has between $5-million and $25-million invested in the Grayson fund, and he lists no income from it.
Asked whether it was appropriate for a member of congress and potential U.S. Senator to set up an investment fund with an eye toward soliciting foreign investments in the future, Grayson scoffed.
“Are you f——- kidding? I set up a fund that might solicit foreign investors….I have no present intention of soliciting foreign investors,” he said. “Your perception issue is bull—-.”
“This is even worse than Grayson’s girlfriend might run for congress 18 months from now,” referring to a recent Politico story attributed to no named sources. “This is a whole nother level of bull—-….Are are you some kind of sh—–g robot? You go around sh—-g on on people?”
Grayson said he is “probably going to run” for the U.S. Senate and will make a final decision within 60 days. Every time “some bull—- artist calls you up and tries to stick a knife in my gut” makes him more inclined to run, he added.
Please do run, Rep. Grayson. Never go away.
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