Tuesday on The Last Word, Lawrence O’Donnell reminded viewers that Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney has filed for an extension on his 2011 tax returns, and remains evasive about what they contain.
But O'Donnell, Democratic strategist Karen Finney, and Reuters columnist David Cay Johnston all reserved extra spite for the campaign reporters who failed to press the candidate on the issue.
"The problem is the beat reporting, the ordinary day-to-day reporting," said Johnston. He went on:
The failure to ask the tough question, to keep pressing it, and to then raise the question: why won't you answer the question? What are the reasons you’re not willing to deal with this? This is a job where the only test is your judgment . . . In Governor Romney, we are not seeing good judgment in dealing with this issue.
Finney suggested that the Romney campaign's stance on his tax record is intentional. "Clearly the Romney campaign has made the political calculation that what's in there is more dangerous than the political risk of not releasing them," she said. "And that is really the crux of where journalists should be asking those questions."