Exposing Mike Gravel: CHUMP of the People! The Emperor Has NO Clothes! Mike Gravel Stands Before the Electorate Naked. He Can Run from his Two Terms of Selling His Soul (if he ever had one) to Satan but He Can’t Hide. Mike Gravel’s Presidential Campaign Is Going DOWN!! Mike Gravel Sucks Eggs!
A google search shows that a search for “Mike Gravel” lists this blog on page one of searches. The stats page has been nonfunctional ever since the struat.com arena of blogs and webpages was moved to a different server, so I don’t know for sure, but I am fairly confident that a decent swab of traffic comes with the fact that I’m so high up on an obscure topic that has wide but not deep news mentions.
I should run with it. In the interest of picking apart a presidential campaign that is permanently affixed to “#10” in the horse race, where the candidate smiles and nods when asked if this is about providing a platform to advocate the National Initiative, I will proceed.
April 19, 1992. The Seattle Times. “‘Outsider Perot Knows Politics From the Inside”. Marc Gunther and Barbara Demick.
I think I figured out Mike Gravel’s motivation in advocating a 22 percent sales tax.
In 1975, Perot hired a silk-stocking Washington lobbyist to place a seemingly innocuous amendment in a tax bill that, before its defeat, would have given him the biggest personal tax break in history.
As the Wall Street Journal later reported in a front-page expose, the amendment would have provided “what may be the most gigantic tax break in history for one person. That person is H. Ross Perot . . .”
Had it become law, the amendment would have resulted in the Treasury writing a check for at least $15 million to Perot. Others would have benefited, too, but not to the same extent.
The amendment was drafted on Perot’s behalf by Sheldon Cohen, a prominent Washington lobbyist who learned the inside moves of tax-law politics as commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service under Lyndon Johnson.
Rep. Phil Landrum, D-Ga., who sponsored the amendment, received a $1,000 campaign contribution from Perot the previous October. On the Senate side, a similar amendment was sponsored by Sen. Mike Gravel, D-Alaska, who had received a $5,000 campaign contribution from Perot in 1974.
So, Mike Gravel wants to replace the current tax code with a high sales tax to stop Mike Gravel from taking a campaign donation from Ross Perot in exchange for advocating a bill written by Perot’s lawyer for the express purpose of lining Ross Perot’s pocket with more money.
That makes some sort of sense.