Friday afternoon news dump! Those of you who were hoping to spend your weekend cuddled up with Mitt Romney's latest tax paperwork are in for a big disappointment:

Under pressure by President Obama's re-election campaign to release them, Mitt Romney's campaign announced Friday that the former Massachusetts governor had filed for an extension in his 2011 taxes.

A spokeswoman for the Romney campaign said that while the presumptive Republican nominee had asked for more time to prepare his taxes this year, he would release them before November's election...Romney will now have until mid-October — just weeks before the general election — to file his returns with the IRS.

I can't understand what the Romney campaign's motivation is in holding off on this. It seems like they'd just want to tear the Band-Aid off now, while the race is still heating up. Maybe they're afraid that releasing the 2011 taxes will incite more calls for previous years of Romney's taxes? But it seems like you'd want that controversy to happen as far away from Election Day as possible, wouldn't you? Maybe they're hoping the economy will flatline between now and then, because Romney's great personal wealth could again seem like a positive. Do they really think the press will forget about this? Why are they waiting to release these taxes?