 On Monday, Bernie Sanders released 10 years' worth of his tax returns and, predictably, this did not silence his critics. Who would thunk it? Because what's happening now is we're seeing a lot of goalposts moving. The critique has just evolved. Because now, since he released his tax returns, they're no longer questioning where his tax returns are. They're now criticizing him because he's a millionaire. And the idea that they're trying to pitch to you is that since he's a millionaire, and he's previously railed against the greed of millionaires, that must make him inherently hypocritical. Now, the problem with this argument is that it's a straw man because Bernie Sanders, he never once said that wealth in and of itself is inherently bad or evil. He's always been very clear about the fact that he doesn't want millionaires to be greedy. He doesn't think it's appropriate for them to hoard their wealth. So, so long as he doesn't participate in that greed, then I don't see how you can possibly frame him as hypocritical, but nonetheless, this is exactly what media outlets are trying to do. Now, if you're genuinely interested in hearing what Bernie Sanders actually believes when it comes to wealth, I think he did a pretty good job explaining his position at the Fox News Town Hall. So if you have an open mind, then definitely check that out. But nevertheless, the media is using his newfangled status as a millionaire to harp away at his ostensible hypocrisy, which again, I challenge you to look up any video over the last 30 years. It doesn't matter, pick any random one. And when he talks about the millionaires and millionaires, he talks about their greed. He talks about them buying politicians and essentially rigging elections. He's not talking about them just existing. He's talking about a very specific issue he has with millionaires, their greed. But nonetheless, when he releases tax returns, just to kind of give you a little bit of a taste before I get to a really quintessential example of them shitting on him for this, this is what they chose to focus on when talking about his tax returns. New York Times, Bernie Sanders released his tax returns. He's part of the 1%. The Washington Post. Welcome to the 1% Club, Bernie Sanders BuzzFeed News. Bernie Sanders' last 10 years of tax returns shows he's now among the millionaires. Breitbart. Bernie Sanders releases 10 years of tax returns confirming millionaire status. So understand, the headlines aren't reading, Bernie Sanders released 10 years worth of tax returns as promised. Bernie Sanders sets a new standard ahead of 2020, releases tax returns before Donald Trump does. Those aren't the headlines. The headlines are, he is a millionaire. He's part of the 1%, therefore, you should probably think he's hypocritical. Now, I want to show you a clip from CNN. I believe the host's name was Aaron Burnett. And this serves as a quintessential example of a biased hit piece because she was so excited to attack Bernie Sanders for his newfound millionaire status that she literally stumbled over her own words in the process of doing so. Breaking news. 2020 presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has released his tax returns. I got very excited. I started getting ahead of myself. Bernie Sanders is a millionaire. Over the past three years, Sanders made nearly $3 million, which makes him, of course, one of the wealthy people that he himself targets on the campaign trail. We are going to ask the millionaires and billionaires of this country to start paying their fair share of taxes. Billionaires and millionaires have poured hundreds of millions of dollars into the political process supporting Republican candidates, and today is payback time for them. Okay. Sanders tonight, though, insists he is not out to make enemies out of the rich. It's not vilifying to say that people have a whole lot of money. In some cases, billions of dollars of wealth, they should pay their fair share of taxes. Okay. Rob Basterinos with me, member of President Trump's 2020 re-elect advisory council, and Jess McIntosh, former director of communications outreach for the Hillary Clinton campaign. Okay, Jess, so, look, as I have been saying, Sanders is so lucky to live in a capitalist society because he wrote a book about being a socialist, and people bought it, and so he got to make all this money, and he's now made, you know, a few million dollars over the past few years because of his book. What do you make of the numbers? Obviously, the past year, his numbers fell, half a million dollars, but, I mean, all in, he's making a lot of money. I actually don't see too much of a contradiction between being a millionaire and railing against a class that produces millionaires. Where I'm totally dumbfounded is that he has had two years to come up with these, so now I'm a millionaire message, and his message is capitalist. He's literally saying, I made a product that the market wanted, and I got rich off of it, and all of you can do that, too. That's not his message. I would have suggested that maybe this is a moment to talk about how the system is rigged for people like him. White male privileged with a platform and that he would want to work to make sure that the system works for everybody, but instead he just did this really defensive, it's not a crime to write a book, and I don't know where that's coming from or how that serves him. Well, okay, so Rob, he was just asked why he did not pay, because you know, this whole thing about fair share. Oh, yeah. Okay, so he was asked about, now he's a millionaire, and his fair share, and let me play the exchange. Your marginal tax rate was 26% because of President Trump's tax cuts, so why not say, you know, I'm leading this revolution, I'm not gonna take those? Come on. I am, I paid the taxes that I owe, and by the way, why don't you got Donald Trump up here and ask him how much he pays in taxes? Okay, the other guy's doing it, so I'm doing it too is not a good answer. Okay, I think we all can agree that was not a good answer. But he should have been ready for that. And by the way, I don't know how a millionaire's paying 26%, he's got a good accountant. What do you make of this response? Well, first of all, I was shocked that he actually combed his hair, which was great, that's a great start for a millionaire. Okay, that was not necessary. No, look, here's what he needs to do and what they need to do at the University of Vermont. They need to teach a course, and Bernie can be Professor Bernie again and talk about the virtues of the free market versus socialism, which he espouses, which has collapsed everywhere. Socialism destroys wealth. It destroys freedoms. Here he made, as Jess said, and it was a perfect example. He worked hard. I don't envy Bernie Sanders. I'm proud. I'm happy for him that he made $2 million on a book sale. But here's what I would suggest, with that $2 million. Now, here's what he should do because in Vermont, they pay the highest monthly premiums for health insurance. He wants to give away free health insurance. He could buy the free health insurance for 350 people in Vermont with that $2 million. So that's the thing, because he scoffs, I pay the taxes I owe. By the way, that's the rule. The problem is when you're Bernie Sanders and you rail against people paying their fair share and you don't have the huge charitable donations and you're not donating money to the IRS, you are a hypocrite. I think that that clip speaks for itself. It's shameless. This is a supposedly objective, nonbiased news lady. And she literally just called him a hypocrite when she didn't fully demonstrate that he's hypocritical. Now, I love how they played clips of Bernie Sanders talking about the millionaires and millionaires, but what issues does he specifically raise when it comes to the wealthy in this country? He talks about them not paying their fair share. He talks about them buying elections. The same stuff I told you that he's been talking about. But yet, if you look at the CNN host's smug little face, you know after she played those clips she was thinking, got him. I fucking got him. Owned. I just destroyed you, Bernie Sanders. But you didn't destroy him because you're not showing him talking about wealth being inherently bad or evil because he didn't say that. So you have no reason to be smug and purport that he's hypocritical when he has been saying the same shit. He's been saying for decades. But she then brings on Trump and Hillary campaign alumni who already hate Bernie Sanders and then they proceed to attack him. I mean, you know exactly that she wasn't trying to aim for objectivity or even neutrality. She just brought on people who she could shit on Bernie Sanders with and it was downright shameless. But here's what Aaron Burnett says. Sanders is so lucky to live in a capitalist society because he wrote a book about being a socialist and people bought it and he got to make all of this money. Now she says that as if it's confirmation that the American dream is still alive. No, this doesn't prove anything because statistically if the average American wrote a book if they were even able to publish a book to begin with the chances of them making it on the best seller list is still basically non-existent. They're still statistically unlikely to be successful. And first and foremost they'd also need the education to be able to write a book. So by simply claiming here that this is proof that capitalism works and that this is proof that the American dream is alive and well and they didn't explicitly say that but it was heavily implied you're not making a very persuasive argument. Bernie Sanders is a United States senator who ran a very successful insurgent 2016 presidential campaign. The chances of somebody replicating that success is next to 0%. Maybe one or two other people in our lifetimes will be able to do that again. So the point is that capitalism is not working because the average American cannot do what Bernie Sanders managed to accomplish. He recognizes that. The CNN host does not. Now the Hillary Clinton alumni she claims that Bernie Sanders has a capitalist message. She just does because now he's saying that capitalism is good. If you want to be successful you can write a bestselling book too. But she says that he should be talking about unrigging the system so more people can be successful except what are you talking about? That's the crux of his message. Have you not been paying attention? I mean these people are so disingenuous it's like they're plugging their ears not listening to what Bernie Sanders is saying and then they're criticizing him and not saying things he's been saying throughout the course of his career. It's absurd and for the more of course he's a capitalist he's a social democrat that means he believes in a mixed economy. He's not saying that we should nationalize the entirety of the economy he's saying what we do is we socialize the sectors of the economy that provide us with basic necessities healthcare education and we simply leave industries that are not essential goods to the private market. That's what he's saying. That's been his philosophy throughout the course of his career. Now towards the end of that clip the Trump stand-in he basically you can tell he was biting his tongue because he was trying so hard not to say the words Venezuela. He really wanted to say Venezuela but he knows that if he said that we're gonna make fun of him relentlessly we're gonna meme him so he didn't say it but nonetheless he still attacked Bernie Sanders. And you know she claims since he's not donating more of his wealth to the IRS or to charities Gotcha. That's a really silly proposition because the point of wanting to pay higher taxes is to expect a return on that investment. I don't just want millionaires and billionaires to pay higher taxes because it's intrinsically good. No, it's a means to an end. When Bernie Sanders says that we should be implementing a 52% marginal tax rate which I think is too charitable. I think it should be higher. What he's expecting is a return on that investment. He's saying that we tax the rich to fund a social safety net but if we currently don't really have a strong social safety net then if you willingly give up that money to the IRS all you're doing is you're funding the war machine. You're giving that money to Donald Trump where he's then going to subsidize oil and gas companies. So it's pointless to do that now. Now you can make the case that he should be donating more of his money to charities but he already is donating 3%. You can say that he should donate more but I mean if he donated 10% you're still going to criticize him. There's no way he'll be able to adequately satisfy his critics here because you're just going to attack him no matter what and you'll keep moving that goalpost because the goal ultimately is to defeat Bernie Sanders so you're going to do that with whatever means necessary. Now this next clip I'm going to show you a short clip. One last clip where they're going to essentially tell you to not believe your lying eyes. Not believe what Bernie Sanders said because they're going to argue the Hillary alum will argue that he actually did in fact change his message. Now are we going to get a direct quote? Are we going to take a video footage? Nope. And then towards the end of this clip I'm going to show you, before I even show you a take a guess as to who they're going to try to compare him to. Just take a guess. Let's watch. When he spent the weekend attacking a liberal outlet for correctly citing that he has changed in his speeches railing against millionaires and billionaires to railing against multi-millionaires and billionaires the defensiveness just shows that it really defines the integrity of his message. And the integrity of his message was what Bernie Sanders had. So can I just play who he's starting to sound a lot like, right? I pay what I owe. By the way, Donald Trump says that and is completely unashamed. I pay what I owe and why would I pay a dollar more? Okay. That's right. Every American should hear. Here are Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump talking about their books. I don't apologize for writing a book that was number 300 York Times that read the five or six languages I wrote the art of the deal which is in all fairness I think the number one selling business book of all time. Sorry. I mean it is funny. It is funny. Well look why are these guys so alike? Oh look it's the old Bernie is the Trump of the left argument that all of a sudden every single journalist in that DC bubble is trotting out you know, it's almost as if there's this cabal of journalists that secretly meet to all agree on one message that they're going to use so that way when they attack Bernie Sanders they do so with a message that is uniform. That's what it seems like. Now it's probably just DC groupthink and you know since Dana Milbank of the Washington Post published a relatively popular article that was shared by elites they're all just parroting what they hear but for the most part if they don't want us to think that they're all meeting and agreeing on the way in which they want to specifically attack Bernie they need to do a better job at thinking for themselves and not just parroting what everyone else has to say because that's what it seems like you're comparing him to Donald Trump when he's literally the antithesis of Donald Trump. Now in case you were wondering what the Hillary Clinton campaign alumni went on to say about this she invoked identity politics instead of Bernie Sanders or she said if a woman said what Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump said they would be criticized Elizabeth Warren said what Bernie Sanders says here she would be criticized these people are one trick ponies they're one trick ponies if you are from Team Trump you're gonna fear monger about socialism and say Venezuela or come close to saying it you're from Hillary's team you're just going to weaponize identity politics to use that against the left in order to prove that you actually are liberal and you're not just a conservative economically speaking so this is obviously a hit piece it was really shameless and I think this is the quintessential example of modern media bias because they don't really even care how it looks they've really given up this notion that they're even trying to maintain the facade of objectivity or even neutrality I mean it's that brazen it's that shameless so obviously it's the case that Bernie Sanders being a millionaire does not prove that he's a hypocrite but nonetheless expect them to continuously try to convince you over the course of the next month or so it is in fact a hypocrite and they'll only move on from this attack and really this smear once they find something else that they think will actually land it's really downright disgusting and disingenuous but it's what we expect from the corporate news media who's trying to protect the status quo from a Bernie Sanders presidency that would destroy the status quo you could support the humanist report at patreon.com patreon.com slash humanist report but trust me I'd have way more supporters at patreon if that was my podcast sad