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Billionaire investor Warren Buffett says that it's a "myth" that high taxes are "strangling" U.S. corporations.

In a Monday op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum called for the corporate tax rate to be halved from 35 percent to 17.5 percent to "[r]estore America's competitiveness."

CNBC's Andrew Ross Sorkin asked Buffet what he thought the highest rate should be.

"What the rate should be are rates that bring in about 18.5 or so percent of GDP [gross domestic product] as revenue," the Oracle of Omaha explained. "The interesting thing about the corporate rate is that corporate profits, as a percentage of GDP last year were the highest or just about the highest in the last 50 years. They were 10 and a fraction percent of GDP. That’s higher than we’ve seen in 50 years."

He continued: "The corporate taxes as a percentage of GDP were 1.2 percent, $180 billion. That’s just about the lowest we’ve seen. So our corporate tax rate last year, effectively, in terms of taxes paid for the United States, was around 12 percent, which is well below those existing in most of the industrialized countries around the world."

"So it is a myth that American corporations are paying 35 percent or anything like it. Incidentally, 1.2 percent of GDP or 12 or so percent of corporate profits actually paid, that is a rate far, far, far below what we've seen in the United States. ... Corporate taxes are not strangling American competitiveness."

Earlier this month, The Wall Street Journal reported that corporations in the U.S. paid only an average of 12.1 percent in taxes on the profits they earned inside the U.S in fiscal 2011, according to statistics from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO).

It’s the lowest percentage corporations have paid on those profits since at least 1972, and it’s less than half of the 25.6 percent they paid on average between 1987 and 2008.

Corporations saw their profits, however, reach an all-time high at the end of 2010. The $1.68 trillion in annualized profits in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2010 beat the previous record of $1.65 trillion in the third quarter of 2006.

(H/T: Think Progress)

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On this Wednesday evening's The Situation Room, CNN's newest anchor and Wall Street apologist Erin Burnett did her best to do a bit of concern trolling for the ultra-rich in America to try to convince the viewers that it really doesn't matter all that much if we raise taxes on the wealthiest among us, because it won't make a dent towards doing anything to solve our debt and deficit problems.

There are so many things wrong with this segment, it's hard to know where to begin, but I guess I'll start with just who Erin Burnett thinks should be responsible for solving the problems with our deficit. At a time when we've got record income disparity which has been getting worse for the last four decades at least, she doesn't think that we should fix that on the backs of the rich. The people she wants to solve it are our seniors and the middle class and the poor.

And no one is claiming that raising taxes on the rich alone would solve the problem, but it would be a huge step in the right direction to getting America back to a place where we still had a middle class and weren't just becoming a country where you've got nothing left but the ultra-rich and the very poor.

Blitzer asked Burnett about President Obama's statement in the State of the Union Address that millionaires should be paying a minimum 30 percent tax rate and that we should be following "the Buffett rule" where no millionaire or billionaire is taxed at a lower rate than their secretary. Burnett responded by saying that she asked some "experts" for their opinion on this and they claimed it would only "raise about $41 billion a year."

I sent this on to our group here at C&L and Jon Perr who has written so much on this topic sent me these items in rebuttal to Burnett's hackery.

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From Sunday's NBC-Facebook debate, Mitt Romney is asked by David Gregory whether he believes Warren Buffett or Grover Norquist knows more about the American economy. Romney refuses to answer but then immediately embraces Grover Norquist's policy on taxation.

GREGORY: Governor Romney, there's a lot of discussion-- a lot of discussion this morning on Facebook about taxes. And as we talk about taxes and spending, of course we talk about economic security and economic growth. There's been a debate in Washington and beyond, as you well know, between Warren Buffett and Grover Norquist. Grover Norquist, the anti-tax crusader, says, "No tax increases under any circumstances."

Warren Buffett says, "Hey, the wealthier in this country can pay more and they should pay more. Indeed-- balancing the budget is a way for more economic growth down the line." Who knows more about the American economy, Grover Norquist or Warren Buffett?

ROMNEY: Well, who knows more about tax policy? I'm not sure that we're gonna choose from the two of them, but I can tell you this. The right course for America is not to raise taxes on Americans. I understand that President Obama and people of his political persuasion would like to take more money from the American people. And they want to do that so they can continue to grow government.

The answer for America is not to grow government. It is to shrink dro-- government. We've been going-- over the last 20, 30, 40 years, government keeps growing at a faster rate relative to inflation. We've got to stop the extraordinary spending in this country. That's why I put-- a plan that reduces government spending. I'd cut-- I'd cut programs, a whole series of programs. By-- by the way, the number one to cut is Obamacare. That saves $95 billion a year.

Return-- this, as Rick indicated, return to states a whole series of programs, food stamps, housing vouchers, Medicaid and then set how much goes to them. And finally, with regards with entitlement, in the entitlement reform area, I do not wanna change Medicare and Social Security for current retirees. But for younger people coming up they have to recognize that in the future higher income people will receive less payments in the premium support program.

Naturally David Gregory didn't use the opportunity to point out that Mitt Romney's tax plan would greatly help ultra-wealthy individuals like himself and the fact that he opposes the "Buffett Rule" as Jon Perr wrote about here -- There's No Mystery About Romney's Taxes and Tax Plan.

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On Tuesday's morning call-in show on C-SPAN, Washington Journal, a caller from Texas demonstrates what happens to your brain after watching too much Fox News and paying attention to Red State's Erick Erickson and his ridiculous "We are the 53%" campaign he launched in response to the Occupy Wall Street protests.

SAMUAL FROM TEXAS: I think a lot of people are getting onto the whole 9-9-9 plan because it's something easy to remember and you know, we're just overburdened with the tax system we have. People lately are really talking the ninety nine percent verses the one percent. I think something more here is another number – it's forty six, fifty four. I may be a little off there but I believe those are the numbers.

Forty six percent of Americans or right around there pay no personal income tax. And the other fifty four percent pay all of it and I think that's the real number and you know, we're basically having to carry the rest of the country on our back. And I'm not saying, you know, all these ninety nine percenters out there are poor people or anything. I think a lot of them are just people who've been handed everything in their life. But I like the ninety nine plan. If nothing else, everybody starts to pay their fair share, instead of one part of the country carrying the rest who's not doing anything.

Listen to the caller try to respond after host Greta Brawner points out that under Herman Cain's 9-9-9 tax plan, billionaire investor Warren Buffett would likely pay no income tax at all as the Huffington Post reported here -- Warren Buffett Would Most Likely Pay No Income Tax Under Herman Cain's '999' Tax Plan: Analysis.

You can almost smell the hairs burning off their head through the television screen. Sadly, Brawner did not point out the the caller that even though many do not pay any federal income taxes, they pay plenty of other taxes and many of them are also Social Security recipients.

Solidarity Pizza Fund:

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While discussing President Obama's proposal to make sure that the ultra-rich pay some sort of minimum tax rate or as it's been described, "the Buffett rule", George Will offered up this explanation, which is one I usually hear repeated day in and day out of Fox, as to why it would apparently in Will's world, just be a horrible waste of time to raise taxes on the rich.

AMANPOUR: A centerpiece of the president's new -- new proposals is this so-called Buffett rule. This is what Warren Buffett had to say about it this week.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUFFETT: Well, it isn't to have the rich pay more taxes. It's to have the ultra-rich, who are paying very low tax rates, pay more taxes. Now, there's all kinds of ultra-rich who pay normal taxes, but there are -- there's a small segment -- but you can find them very easily -- who pay very low taxes, including me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AMANPOUR: Jake, how's this been received in the White House?

TAPPER: Well, they're pretending that there's no daylight between what Mr. Buffett said and what -- and what they laid out. The truth is that there is. Warren Buffett said that there's about 500,000 ultra-rich who would be hit by his -- what he actually conceived. Now, the White House, when they introduced their Buffett rule a few weeks ago, said the number was closer to 450,000. The idea is the same, that those who are very wealthy and are paying taxes below, say, 20 percent -- because they're paying the capital gains rate or whatever -- they should have -- there should be a minimum requirement that they pay. But there is a big difference there.

WILL: In 1916, before we entered World War I and federal spending exploded, the richest man in America, John D. Rockefeller, could have written a personal check and retired our national debt. Today the richest man in America, Bill Gates, could write a personal check of his entire net worth and pay two months' interest on the national debt.

AMANPOUR: Take this conversation into the green room, it's very important.

Yeah, why raise their taxes? It's not going to make any difference anyway, so just let them keep paying lower rates than those in the middle class. I hate to break it to Will, but saying we need to do more than just raising taxes on the rich to get our economic problems solved doesn't mean he and his ilk shouldn't be paying their fair share. We should still have a progressive rather than a regressive tax code in the United States -- and right now it's anything but that.

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One of the foremost business investors on the planet doesn't know much about capitalism, according to Governor Goodhair of Texas.

ANDREW SORKIN, CNBC: Governor Perry, real quick. Warren Buffett is going to be in New York tomorrow for an Obama fund-raiser. Curious about your thoughts on the Buffet Rule.

Gov, RICK PERRY: I think it's right down to the real problem that we've got in Washington, D.C. an administration that is listening to people who really don't have an understanding about what's going on out there in the real world. you think -- I respect -- I think Mr. Buffet is a really intelligent individual. I can promise you he doesn't know what's going on in places that where the job creation is at a zero because of overtaxation and overregulation. Dodd-Frank is strangling the small community banks across america. It needs to be repealed. We need to get Washington out of the business of overregulation. It's killing our country.

ANDREW SORKIN: Taxing millionaires? Do you believe ultimately is going to kill jobs?

GOV. RICK PERRY: I think taxing millionaires is such a fake way to talk about what's going on in this country.

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During a discussion on PBS's The McLaughlin Group where the panel of Tim Carney and Pat Buchanan on the right and weekly lonely representative of the left Eleanor Clift and someone that didn't belong there with her on the left side of the aisle as usual, billionaire Mort Zuckerman, I caught something unusual that we don't hear every day when Zuckerman is allowed on the air, and that's someone asking him just what he's worth.

John McLaughlin did just that during a discussion on President Obama campaigning on the co-called "Buffet rule" and asking millionaires and billionaires to start paying their fair share in taxes. Zuckerman really did not want to discuss just how much money he makes every year, but said he was more than happy to discuss Warren Buffett's finances if McLaughlin wanted to do so.

Zuckerman also resorted to the usual nonsense that we'd have actually gotten some meaningful "reform" on taxes done if President Obama had just gone to the Republicans in private and asked them kindly if they'd be willing to quit obstructing and trashing him in public on a weekly basis and kissed their rings to get some "bipartisan" cooperation on changing our tax code.

As Clift rightfully pointed out here, it's been obvious for a long time that they're not willing to work with him on anything, even when it's him embracing what were formerly their policies, so he's basically been left with no choice but to take his case to the voters for the next election.

Excuse me please if I share Clift's sentiments here that heaven forbid we hurt these poor rich people's feelings by asking them to think they should contribute to our society in America by some similar or greater percentages than the middle class and the poor are taxed right now.

Of course, Zuckerman claimed that he supports the rich, such as himself paying their fair share as well, but I'd be curious if anyone pushed him on the specifics of that support on just what those specifics would be just how well that claim actually holds up. Of course none of those specifics were asked for by McLaughlin here.

Zuckerman was a lot more interested in bashing the president for supposedly not trying to work with Republicans, when he has, and pretending like the Republicans in the Congress are ever going to work with him no matter what he does, and having a hissy fit about that supposed lack of cooperation during this segment.

How pathetic is it that we've got in the United States a network, PBS, that is trashed as being liberal by Republicans, when it's not and someone like a billionaire Mort Zuckerman allowed to supposedly represent the "left side of the aisle" of the political spectrum, instead of this show ever putting anyone that you could rightfully call a progressive on the air in one slot, much less two of them?

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If anyone thought Bill O'Reilly's carping about having his taxes raised was bad, just get a load of these three Fox contributors who I'm fairly sure are all making a boatload of money just like O'Reilly for propagandizing the American public day after day for Fox. Sean Hannity decided to have himself a little whine-fest with his panel members, former Bush spokesperson Dana Perino and Fox's sorry excuse for a business channel host, Stuart Varney.

Par for the course Hannity and his friends threw out the usual distortions about what the rich compared to everyone else actually pays in taxes.

As I linked to in my post back in April on Joshua Holland and his appearance on C-SPAN's Book TV, Holland laid out some much more realistic stats than Hannity and his crew did here on who's paying what and how much in taxes these days. And as to their argument that the rich are paying a bigger percentage in taxes than anyone else, well, that might just be because the rich are controlling more of that wealth as well, so of course they're going to be paying more.

And as Media Matters noted -- Right-Wing Media Defend The Rich Unless The Rich Person Is Named Warren Buffett.

Here's more from Holland's column at AlterNet that it would really be nice if Hannity's viewers had a chance to read, but I figure that will happen when hell warms over -- Tax Day Question: Who's Paying What?:

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Apparently Bill O'Reilly is terribly upset that President Obama might want to raise his taxes on capital gains, so much so that he actually threatened that he and his ilk of fellow investors who potentially could be taxed higher on their "sweat equity" might "pack it in" during his "Talking Points Memo" on this Monday's The O'Reilly Factor.

O'REILLY: Here's the unintended consequence of Mr. Obama's revenue enhancing plan, and I must tell you, I want the feds to get more revenue. I don't want to starve them, as some people do. We need a robust military, a good transportation system and protections all over the place. But if you tax achievement, some of the achievers are going to pack it in.

I'm not quite sure just where O'Reilly and his buddies are going to "pack it in" to, but let me be the first to say that if it means you not being on the air any more at Fox, please go... and don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out to wherever in the hell you plan on going.

And apparently O'Reilly has absolutely no idea what the term "sweat equity" means. I would recommend him spending a little time watching either HGTV or the DIY networks if he would like to get a clue on what that term actually means.

UPDATED: Steve Benen explains:

In Ronald Reagan’s first term, for example, the top rate was — you guessed it — 50%. Did Reagan’s “oppressive” tax rates prevent robust economic growth? Did “the achievers” decide to “pack it in”? No and no.

For nearly all of Dwight Eisenhower’s presidency, the top rate was 91%. That’s not a typo. Did this Republican president’s “oppressive” tax policy prevent the U.S. economy from growing in the 1950s? Apparently not. That said, if O’Reilly is contemplating retirement to avoid helping America pay its bills, I’m not inclined to discourage him

Hullabaloo

That's the best reason I've yet heard for raising taxes on these creeps. What's funny is that O'Reilly is under the illusion that he's one of the big job creators in our culture who can't be asked to give up even one penny of his massive income lest he lose all reason to wake up in the morning. Well sorry -- he's one of the entertainers, not one of the producers. He may be irreplaceable to curmudgeonly old FOX News, but it won't make a bit of difference to the economy. So, buh bye.

But that's not why I say he's a moron. He's a moron because he doesn't know how marginal tax rates work and when you make the ridiculous sums of money he makes, you really ought to. On the other hand, if he's so dumb that he thinks Obama is actually proposing a 50% tax rate and then whines publicly to a country full of poor people about it, then maybe we should just take his money

.

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During one of Wolf Blitzer's "strategy sessions" on The Situation Room on CNN, Wolf Blitzer brought on former Cheney adviser Mary Matalin and one of their regular contributors, Roland Martin to discuss President Obama and his recent push to get what amounts to an alternative minimum tax on millionaires, or the "Buffett rule" passed so that people like Warren Buffet aren't paying a lower tax rate than his secretary.

Naturally Matalin thought that is a terrible campaign strategy, and who does she think President Obama should be taking advice from? Mark Penn -- Hillary Clinton's former adviser that helped her lose the primary race to then Sen. Obama and who left her campaign with her still owing him hundreds of thousands of dollars for his lousy advice. I agree with Roland Martin here and Penn is the last person any Democrat should be taking advice from right now, or for that matter, ever.

I also agree with Martin that President Obama should be going out to every area of the country where poverty is terrible and hitting Republicans upside the head politically for wanting to protect their rich campaign donors so they don't have their taxes raised.

And on a last note, if I had a dime for every time one of these Republican talking heads used the term "class warfare" to mean heaven forbid don't raise taxes on the so-called "job creators", who aren't creating any jobs, I'd be able to retire early. I really hope most Americans are not silly enough to fall for their rhetoric after it's become very obvious after the Bush years that cutting taxes on the rich does nothing to create jobs unless you target those tax cuts specifically for hiring Americans, instead of rewarding them for shipping jobs overseas as we do now.

Sadly we're not yet hearing a conversation in our corporate media or from enough in the Democratic Party about doing something about our terrible trade laws and trade imbalances and fixing the tax code to quit rewarding companies for a race to the bottom with forcing American workers to compete with slave labor overseas.

Transcript via CNN below the fold.

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