Is Rahm Emanuel coming up with these candidates? I can't believe Obama is that dumb to pick some of these guys, this is like the 3rd cabinet gig with tax issues (I am not mentioning Richardson in NM.)

I was hoping he could start fresh instead of hiring payback people.

BTW - Where is Emanuel anyways? I am thinking he must be breaking major sweat over Blagojevich saying something.

I have seen both $ 120,000 and $ 140,000 reported as the total in taxes and interest Daschle paid.

I have not seen any report about penalties, if any, assessed.

Just doinga little back of the envelope calculating, and figuring a 298% marginal tax rate, a using $1000,000 as the t actual tax amount (figuring the extra $ 20 - 40 K paid was interest), the underlying income not reported on which the taxes were owed was north of $ 357,000.

($ 1000,000.00 x 100 / 28 = $ 357142.86.)

OI wonder how many of us would "forget" $357 K in income?

Obama's first mistake was hiring the same guys that vetted Sarah Palin to vet his cabinet appointments.

Nonny,

It wasn't income that he got as cash, it was not documenting benefits like a car and driver as income.

In other words very similar to what Sarah Palin did when she didn't claim her per diem or travel expenses for her family as income.

But if we point that out I guess we're loony leftists or something.

You are a moonbat. You are unhinged. You have Palin Derangement Syndrome, etc.

Tom just wants to spend more time with his accountant.

Well, I don't think "vetting" capabilities of either party is very good. And certainly Portland hasn't been good about vetting our local politicians.

We should stop slinging and start cleaning.

From the current washingtonpost.com stories, it sounds as if Daschle's bid was undermined as much by the news of his vast (and reported) income from pseudo-lobbying as his tax problem. What did Daschle do, if not lobbying, to earn millions from the law firm of Alston & Bird when he's not a lawyer?

Hard to put a guy like that in your Cabinet when one of your major campaign promises was to exclude lobbyists.

Oh well. At least Obama has figured out that Daschle's complete lack of integrity make him a flawed choice as a public official. Would that Sam Adams' supporters could come to the same realization.

OK, so maybe it was 3 years' worth of taxes, and thus the value of the car and driver was only $120K/yr. Wonder if that includes gas.

I was sort of hoping Daschle would hang in so Storm Large and Pink Martini could perform during the confirmation hearings.

Speaking of taxes, the SJ reported that over 18% of Oregon taxes goes unpaid every year.

So lets see, Oregon is $800M short for its budget and in 2006 alone, $1.247B went uncollected. That is JUST FOR 2006. Maybe the state should look into that.

here is the story

Or try here since that didn't work

http://www.statesmanjournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009901310319

Didn't any of these cabinet appointees have to fill out that 90-question (or was it 90-page?) questionnaire the Obama transition sent to every job applicant. You know, the one that asked if you ever said anything stupid on a blog, Facebook page or e-mail to your lover? Didn't that questionnaire ask about tax returns?

One would think that there is a question on the "job application" that asks if you have tax problems......

When one lives in a rarified atmosphere in which your well healed buddy lets you use his limo service, is Daschle's failure to mention this perk to his accountant a deal breaker? On the other hand, when you rake in far more in the private sector, do you need the headache? Aren't there some qualified health care administrative types to head Health and Human Services? Cest fini

One would think that there is a question on the "job application" that asks if you have tax problems......

I suspect that job applicants have to turn over their tax returns so that the FBI and its forensic accounts can do some "matching". None of these tax problems came to light *until* these guys were nominated. I think the mere fact that you're nominated exposes you to tax accounting and auditing that you'd get away with if you weren't an appointee. I don't think any of these guys and gals would have paid a dime until they were caught.

Maybe I'll just forget about reporting some income. My chances seem pretty good to be audited even though these guys seem never to be audited until .....

I think of the nominations as a public service. We catch all the tax crooks and cheats so much more easily. They are all low hanging fruit at that point.

Oh the hubris....

"What did Daschle do, if not lobbying, to earn millions from the law firm of Alston & Bird when he's not a lawyer?"

I think he made something like $400K lobbying for medical and health insurance companies and this is the guy who would run HHS?

Believe it or not, that would be harder for me to accept than the tax issue (even though both are pushing my credulity.)

I don't know, buy my gut tells me he is relying a lot on Clintonistas right now for decision-making. This kind of stuff is why I really think we need term limits on Congress.

Seems Nancy Killefer, the choice for "Performance Chief", dropped out over tax issues as well. So is this administration making some really bad appointments, or is it just that this kind of stuff is actually being checked for once?

We need to create a new cabinet level department called SITC "Skeletons in the Closet" The SITC Secretary should/would be empowered to use the full data resources of the federal government to make an assessment of political, moral, religious and econonomical risk prior to an applicants public exposure. The new SITC agency should/would give all Americans(Poor,middle class,rich) the ability to predetermine possible public outcry before they would volunteer (or be elected) to a public sector position.

heh, heh, heh...

...and the lesson is "We need better vettors"?

heh, heh, heh...

If Jack (and now Scott) hadn't asked WHY Daschle was being paid millions to ride around in a limo, I might have gone away thinking this was only about taxes.
As a true and early Obama believer I wouldn't want to think that an influence peddler, even one who was key in making Obama president, was in the "change" cabinet.
Daschle dropping out -- maybe Obama didn't ask him to but I bet Rahm mentioned it as a possible course of action -- somewhat restored my faith in what I hoped an Obama presidency would be. But I am not sure the president got it. He's still talking (maybe spinning?) about taxes, not about how Daschle was earning his living.

Oh, one more thing buried in the O today. The senator from NY (er, Oregon), Ron Wyden is BFF with Daschle.

He is grieving over his friend and how it will affect his health care reform. Great - A tax cheat and health insurance lobbyist as an influence in your life.

I think we've lost Wyden also.

To me it really looks like our politicians have trouble as a group paying their taxes. Looks like we need an investigation into all them. We shouldn't need to wait until one is nominated before finding out how much of their taxes have gone unpayed.

We lost Wyden when he married into big East money. All the sudden, he stopped talking about tax equity and started whining about 'death taxes'...which is the monied elite's code word for the despised inheritance taxes.

Now that he's got his sugar momma, he wants to protect his investment.

Hey, Jack. Looked in on your October link to the October alleged Palin tax flap. Why don't you wind up and apply that very same mindless, fact-free, context-irrelevant legal analysis to Obama and explain to your readers why his Barackness will now accrue Federal Income Tax liability based on the value of his kids travel on Air Force One and Marine One and their daily Secret Service chauferred round trips to Sidwell Friends. Or is Barack special????

Awesome post, godfry! This is exactly the kind of discussions we need to be having, rather than the rapes and murders that fill the 5 o'clock news. But is it true?