Some senators have made a big fuss about the tax problems of Obama appointees Tom Daschle, Timothy Geithner and Nancy Killefer, but quite a few of them have had the same kinds of problems themselves.
Politico.com sent all 99 sitting senators (the Minnesota Senate election is still up in the air) a short questionnaire about their personal tax situations, including whether they or the IRS had ever discovered an error in any of their tax returns and whether they’d ever had to pay back taxes.
A majority of the senators – 57 – either haven’t responded yet or refused to participate. Among the 42 who did respond, 12 said they either had errors or had to pay back taxes, or both. That’s about 29%. Maybe we’re being too cynical, but we have a hunch an equal – if not higher – percentage of those not responding had tax problems too.
What about Oregon’s two Democratic senators, Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley? Neither of them responded to the survey.
Perhaps not surprisingly, only two members of the Senate – which is often described as a millionaires’ club – said they prepared their taxes themselves: Richard J. Durbin of Illinois and Patty Murray of Washington, both Democrats. And they both said they’d never had an error in their return or owed back taxes.
This article appears in Feb 12-18, 2009.
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Stop with the excuses!
Mr. Obama has made it very clear that he would like transparency in the government. He ran on a platform of change and holding government accountable. So, why is it that now that he’s been elected we have to begin making excuses for those in our government?
Maybe it’s about time that we begin holding them accountable and if they cannot pay their taxes like the require of the rest of the citizens, then they not be given the office. Transparency is what we have been promised, lets start somewhere. God knows we aren’t getting transparency when it comes to the “Stimulus” and “banks”.
Who’s making excuses? I’m just pointing out what looks an awful lot like hypocrisy.
There are Dems as well as Republicans who have had tax problems. Go to Politico.com and check it out.