Posted on 04/18/2007 6:44:17 AM PDT by presidio9
You might remember the fact, reported ad nauseam in the mainstream press last year, that Vice President Dick Cheney's 2005 tax return showed he had a family income of $8.8 million. This was due in no small part from stock options from a variety of companies, including the much-vilified Halliburton Corp. This fact provoked howls of outrage from many of Mr. Cheney's critics, who claimed it was evidence of what one syndicated columnist has called an "autocratic, plutocratic regime."
Significantly less-frequently reported last year was this datum: Mr. and Mrs. Cheney gave 78% of their 2005 income to charity. That's not a typo -- the couple donated $6.9 million, including the proceeds from stock options and book royalties that Mrs. Cheney routinely gives away. Their giving went to three nonprofit causes in health, higher education and services for inner-city youth.
While the Cheneys might look like elite philanthropists, Mr. and Mrs. Bush were no charitable slouches either. Foursquare tithers, they gave away 12.2% of their adjusted gross income in 2005, and similar percentages in past years. Their giving tends to go to more middle-class causes, including their church, the American Red Cross and the Salvation Army.
How does the current administration compare with the previous one? In 1999, the Clintons gave away a solid 9.4% of their income, while the Gores gave 5.1%. Two years earlier, however, the former vice president's giving had earned some special attention. In 1997, the Gores only gave away $353 of their income of $197,729, or 0.18%. Mr. Gore's spokesman deflected criticism by pointing out that, "To truly judge a person's commitment to helping others, you need to consider what they have done with their lives and how they have spent their time -- and by that standard the Gores are extraordinarily
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Democrats donate to further their political careers, or in the case of thickheaded AlGore, because they make a mistake.
That $300 donation will always be remembered. Well, that and the extravagant lifestyle AlGore leads while claiming the moral high ground.
flying around in private jets and being shipped on the ground by monster suv’s to give speeches to the various worldwide global warming sects is the standard we judge algore’s charitable contributions.
Come on now, you're exaggerating the smallness by a considerable percentage.
It was $353.
I wish I hadn't needed to excerpt the column at that point. I'll mail it to you, but the jist of it is that Algore's spokesman defends Algore by saying that you can't put a price on the time and energy that he devotes to his pet cause of Global Warming (Theory).
BTW, if it weren't for Global Warming (Theory), is would there be anything else that made Algore even the slightest bit relevant? Maybe there is a method to the madness of SUVs and private jets and giant mansions.
Algore couldn’t be a pimple on the Vice President’s butt!!!
Vice President Cheney has so much more class than Algore will ever ever know!!!
She-it worth its weight in gold!
"Middle-class causes"? Sheesh. Send the writer back to "The Nation."
“Mr. Gore’s spokesman deflected criticism by pointing out that, “To truly judge a person’s commitment to helping others, you need to consider what they have done with their lives...”
What he really means is, you need to consider: “How much they have used the force of government to fund their own ‘generosity’.”
No, the AP is right, because Bush's unfair tax policies, which have awarded the biggest tax cuts to those who need them the least have eliminated the middle class. I know, because I used to be comfortably middle class and now I get my medical care from the Red Cross, and my clothing from the Salvation Army.
I am beginning to think that Al Gore is pushing the global warming ‘theory’ because it drives up the profits on his carbon credit trading enterprise.
What would not be middle class causes? Greenpeace and PETA?
LOL!
On top of giving to charities, the Cheney’s paid over $400,000 in income tax.
Maybe the writer thinks these are "upper-class causes."
And let’s remember how John Kerry gave almost nothing to charity during two years in the early 90s; and the recent study which showed that conservatives outgive liberals by 30% at every income level. Yes, Liberals are only generous with other people’s money, not their own.
I checked this out at www.snopes.com and http://edc.uoregon.edu/node/572 and it is true!!!
The Story of Two Houses
LOOK OVER THE DESCRIPTIONS OF THE FOLLOWING TWO HOUSES AND SEE IF YOU CAN TELL WHICH BELONGS TO AN ENVIRONMENTALIST.
HOUSE # 1:
A 20-room mansion (not including 8 bathrooms) heated by natural gas. Add on a pool (and a pool house) and a separate guest house all heated by gas. In ONE MONTH ALONE this mansion consumes more energy than the average American household in an ENTIRE YEAR. The average bill for electricity and natural gas runs over $2,400.00 per month. In natural gas alone (which last time we checked was a fossil fuel), this property consumes more than 20 times the national average for an American home. This house is not in a northern or Midwestern “snow belt,” either. It’s in the South.
HOUSE # 2:
Designed by an architecture professor at a leading national university, This house incorporates every “green” feature current home construction can provide. The house contains only 4,000 square feet (4 bedrooms) and is nestled on arid high prairie in the American southwest. A central closet in the house holds geothermal heat pumps drawing ground water through pipes sunk 300 feet into the ground. The water (usually 67 degrees F.) heats the house in winter and cools it in summer. The system uses no fossil fuels such as oil or natural gas, and it consumes 25% of the electricity required for a conventional heating/cooling system. Rainwater from the roof is collected and funneled into a 25,000 gallon underground cistern. Wastewater from showers, sinks and toilets goes into underground purifying tanks and then into the cistern. The collected water then irrigates the land
surrounding the house. Flowers and shrubs native to the area blend the property into the surrounding rural landscape.
So the answer is:
HOUSE # 1 (20 room energy guzzling mansion) is outside of Nashville, Tennessee. It is the abode of that renowned environmentalist (and filmmaker) Al Gore.
HOUSE # 2 (model eco-friendly house) is on a ranch near Crawford, Texas. Also known as “the Texas White House,” it is the private residence of the President of the United States, George W. Bush. So whose house is gentler on the environment? Yet another story you WON’T hear on CNN, CBS, ABC, NBC, MSNBC or read about in the New York Times or the Washington Post.
Indeed, for Mr. Gore, it’s truly “an inconvenient truth.”
LOL! I stand corrected!
It all depends on whose money they are using.
Rack the Cheney and Bushies they punk Al Gore BIG TIME on charities
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