Poor Tom Daschle it is obvious he never expected to be in the public arena otherwise he would have been more careful with his taxes.  There are many ways to avoid paying taxes some more egregious than others and some are even legal!  My accountant has told me many times that the worst possible tax avoidance is to hide income.  You can play around with deductions, credits, etc all you like,but hiding income is a no no.  Geithner failed to deduct SS taxes on his total reported salary—-the IRS is actually responsible for they should have verified this.  As long as you report your full income the IRS is responsible for verifying all deductions and credits an impossible job so its become a game of how much you can get away with!  Even Daschle’s failure to claim the car and driver as income is not particularly egregious because it was not a cash payment.  However, his substantial consulting fee, which he did not report is and that is why he’s out!

The question to be asked is how many other people in high government positions—-past or present are tax avoiders too!!!

When you pay taxes you buy civilization. You can’t have a decent health care system or any kind of system that exists for the benefit of the majority of the people if you don’t pay taxes. But for the rich in every country paying taxes is seen as optional. If you work in a coffee shop being paid a pittance you’ll find it hard to avoid paying but they don’t. It’s simply inexcusable to be so harsh on the average citizen and let the wealthiest avoid paying their taxes. All of these people should know better. Aren’t they supposed to be amongst the brightest people in the country? Surely paying their taxes should be easy for them to master. They should set an example-but not this example.

We should just get rid of the income tax anyway. Same can be said for “employment taxes”.

Having a politician write the tax code then not pay taxes is like having a business leader preach about incentives based on performance then turn around and take a bonus regardess of result

neither seems particularly moral, especially for those who hold leadership and role model responsibilities

Cyrena
I second both of your choices!

G. Anderson
I recently discovered that the IRS was set up by President Lincoln to pay for the civil war. What an inauspicious beginning!

Since I never thought Daschle was a good choice anyway, this could be a blessing in disguise for Obama’s admin, depending on who he taps as a replacement. Either Howard Dean or Dennis Kucinich seem like great choices to me. Howard Dean would probably be best. He’s an MD and he has experience in those all of the appropriate bureaucracies.

Does anyone else think that Daschle’s head would look good on the end of stick? Or maybe they should just stuff it somewhere else.

Barry is apparently not as smart as we think he is, or far more arrogent.

Well who dosent’ have tax problems?

The tax laws in this country need reform, and maybe just a flat tax to rid us of the IRS forever.

To put it mildly the tax laws are a gordian know, unfathomable to most Americans.

It seems that if someone does a little digging into the lives of the privledged they will find something like this.

Even with Accountants and CPA’s, to help them avoid taxes, what’s the excuse?

But if it happens to someone who works hard for a living, then there are few alternatives.

How does our ruling elite expect the average citizen to comply, when they don’t?

I wonder what will happen on April 15 when millons of American’s just don’t have the money to file?