Mitt Romney seems unclear on the concept of personal income tax.

“I did go back and look at my taxes and over the past ten years I never paid less than 13%. I think the most recent year is 13.6 or something like that. I paid taxes every single year,” Romney said…”Harry Reid’s charge is totally false. I am sure waiting for Harry to put up who it was that told him what he says they told him – I don’t believe it for a minute by the way – but every year I paid at least 13% and if you add in addition the amount that goes to charity, why, the number gets well above 20%.”

First of all, I checked my 2011 return and my actual tax rate was 17.7%. That’s how much the IRS expected me to pony up over the course of the year, with my various deductions, except I didn’t take enough out of my earnings as I went along and had to stroke a check to send in with my return for the remainder.

And I was happy to do it, if only to save those job creators like Mitt Romney from paying even more on their personal incomes, since it’s their personal incomes and not their businesses that they use to create jobs. At least, that’s what I’m told by every Republican ever.

But what really catches my ear in what Willard said today is the part about how, when you add in what he gave to the Mormon Church, why, the number gets well above 20 percent.

Except you don’t count what he gave to the Mormon Church. That’s not a tax, it’s a freaking tax deduction. And I’m thinking if Mitt considers what he gives to the Mormon Church to be a tax, then he must consider all the money he doesn’t get to spend as taxes, and his 13.6 percent figure is not what he paid the IRS but the difference between what he started with and what he ended with after he submitted his tax return.

And coming from a man who somehow grew his $2,000 annual IRA contribution to between a tax-deductible $20.7 million and $101.6 million (we’re not sure since we can’t see his tax returns) in ten years, we just don’t trust him. Even if he contributed $30,000 each year to a SEP-IRA, he’d have to have found an investment with a rate of return that would make Bernie Madoff’s offering look like a passbook savings account.

No Mitt, we don’t trust you. You claim 13.6 percent, which is bad (low) enough, but if you’re even talking about throwing in how much you tithed then your original calculation loses all credibility.

Here’s an idea. Since you obviously aren’t sure how this whole tax thing works, why don’t you release your returns and let us take a look-see?