Yes, we can.

[Kevy Baby]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

But less than 1% on 1.2 million dollars in income? That's lame. Sorry, but for a couple to make that much and give so little is lame.

Usually we agree on politics Leo, but I have to disagree with you on this one.

This is too small of a microcosm to make a judgment by. First, as stated in follow-up articles/posts, the $10K/$1.2M figure was at a time where they had other financial obligations. I put my family before others and I will not fault someone else for doing so. Second, donating money is not the only way to make charitable contributions. There are other actions that one can make that are more valuable to charities that are not monetary. For example, I provide services that are worth about $3K-$4K per year to the MS Society. However, other than mileage and a couple of other small amounts, it isn't tax deductible. If you were look at my returns, the percentage of charitable contributions would be about 1% as well.

But most importantly, I am not in favor of telling people what to do with their money. But making public their charitable contributions and attempting to shame them for it, people are trying to tell the Obamas what they should do with their money.

Whether someone contributes X% of their income to charity is not a measure of what kind of a person they are.

(In fact: in a small sense, I like the idea that a potential president is not in favor of giving away money right now. However, I do not believe that Obamas charitable donations are indicative of how much of my [a taxpayer] money he will give away.)