Because then the argument would be, "good, let's just let rich people pay what they like extra, instead of raising taxes.".

That's someone else's argument. If Simmons is making an argument that he should pay a higher a rate, than he ought to pay the higher rate.

Another argument is, "let the rich decide to pay their own rate."

Another argument is, "let us decide that the tax rate is going to be similar to/less than/more than his secretary's"

Someone else could make that argument, bon, but that's not Simmons' argument or mine. It's not meaningless for Simmons to put his money where his mouth is. I think it's very meaningful. "we should pay it, we can pay it, and I did pay it" is meaningful.

25 nerdy watches that tech geeks will love

I think one of these will be one of my x-mas presents to myself....

25 nerdy watches that tech geeks will love

I've still got the Nightmare Before Xmas watch I got in a BK Big Kids Meal.

Why would you get this watch when you can do this?

Suri's burn book.

Why would you get this watch when you can do this?

Cool--I didn't know Apple added more watch faces for the Nano.

Tornado warning. Oh, joy. It sounds like it's going to stay a bit north of me.

David! Check out who Pen Ward would most like to cast on Adventure Time: [link]

David! Check out who Pen Ward would most like to cast on Adventure Time:

Is it me?! He should choose me!

eta: Oh. Tom Waits. Right. I could see that might work.

Also:

Fans really loved the gender-switched Fionna and Cake episode. Will there be more of them?

We’re thinking about it. If we did do another Fionna and Cake, it would be focused more on Marshall Lee the Vampire King. That’s about all I can say about it right now.

Nice. But since Adventure Time cast Kate Beaton's assassin pony, my stunt-casting wish list has dissolved into a puddle of helpless fangirlish squee. They can't ever, ever do any better than that.

Either pay your taxes at your secretary's rate AND give more to charities that fall in line with your ideologies, which you can clearly afford, or don't. But don't bitch about it when you can absolutely do something about it. It's disingenuous.

To the extent that these are business taxes, there are good reasons for someone who wants higher tax rates not to pay more voluntarily. To survive as a business you can't raise your expenses a great deal higher than your competitors. I don't know about Rodger, but Buffet who deliberately does not take advantage of loopholes would be putting his business at risk if it started paying higher taxes while his competition did not. Same way progressive business people often support regulations and higher minimum wage. There is a race to the bottom in competitive situations, and a lot of reasons to say "make me and everybody do this" rather than just voluntarily doing the thing.