Tales of Hoffman: senator reads actual article about Maryland tax refugees, makes things up

Yarn teller Gretchen Hoffman is at it again, inventing her own private geography and history.

Earlier this year, Bluestem debunked a standard Republican talking point about rich tax refugees in Glenn gone wild: Gruenhagen's baseless talking point about tax refugees fleeing OR & MD and Whatever the game may be, Parry borrows tax refugee fear talk from Glencoe Glenn Gruenhagen.

On Chris Berg's radio show on Thursday, Hoffman out-barked them in the conservative woofing contest, claiming not only that Maryland's so-called "millionaire tax" drove a third of the state's wealthy filers away, but that the tax was repealed after a year.

No and no.

Here's the audio:

As BSP posted back in May:

Since the Republicans have decided that recycling talking points, regardless how debunked, is the game plan (whatever the game may be), Bluestem will go back to the debunking cited in the May post.

Over at BlueOregon, Executive director of the Oregon Center for Public Policy Chuck Sheketoff noted in Facts Go Missing: The Unsubstantiated Tale of the Fleeing Maryland Millionaire:

. . .Instead of circulating stories founded on supposition, the Senate Republican Office would do better to distribute the analysis by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP),Where Have All of Maryland’s Millionaires Gone? Nowhere – They’re Probably Just Not Millionaires Anymore. (PDF).

ITEP examined the preliminary tax return data released by the Maryland comptroller — who acknowledged that not all the data is in yet, particularly for high-income earners — and found that the data fail to support the Wall Street Journal’s claim...

A subsequent report released this summer came to similar conclusions.

Hoffman, who claims to have "read an actual article," outdoes her conservative colleagues by telling Chris Berg that Maryland repealed the tax after a year.

In fact, the Maryland millionaires' tax was temporary and was allowed to sunset in 2010.

Photo: Senator Gretchen Hoffman.

Comments

[charlieq]

And it wouldn't make much sense to flee the state and leave everything behind over a temporary tax increase, would it?

[Phoenix Woman]

What is it with conservative Republicans and lying like rugs? Earlier this week, Pam Spaulding of Pam's House Blend caught North Carolina state senator James Forrester lying about his alleged medical credentials: http://pamshouseblend.firedoglake.com/2011/09/29/breaking-anti-gay-n-c-senator-forrester-falsifies-credentials-and-an-open-letter-to-the-lawmaker/

Now that Kvetchin' Gretchen's been caught lying, will she do the right thing and own up to it -- or will she make like James Forrester and put on her Little Red Victim Hood outfit (Mike Parry model), whining about all of her enemies pickin' on her?

http://pamshouseblend.firedoglake.com/2011/09/30/qnotes-interview-with-nc-sen-james-forrester-homosexuals-are-out-to-discredit-me/