My SDP colleague, Jason Heppler, has been following this story. Here is the gist, from the Washington Post.
After a quarter-century in Congress, Thomas A. Daschle will return to Capitol Hill today in an unfamiliar role, summoned by former colleagues on the Senate Finance Committee to defend his reputation and his nomination to be secretary of health and human services amid revelations that he did not pay more than $100,000 in back taxes…
Daschle, a former Senate majority leader from South Dakota, will head to the Capitol today "ready and willing to answer any questions," said Jenny Backus, his spokeswoman. He will also inform lawmakers that in addition to the $140,000 in back taxes and interest he paid on Jan. 2, he intends to send the U.S. Treasury an additional $6,000 to cover Medicare taxes on the driver.
Just for the record, a hundred and forty-six thousand smackers is a lot more than a hundred thousand.
My esteemed Keloland Colleague and NSU Colleague Emeritus, David Newquist comments on the story. Apart from the hysteria, hyperbole, and exaggerations that are his MO, he gives what looks like an honest look at Daschle's problem. I say "looks honest" not to cast doubt on Professor Newquist's account, but merely to qualify my own grasp of the details.
Professor Newquist also notices SDP's attentions:
Of course, the Dementia Sisters at South Dakota Politics have termed it an outright case of tax fraud, and we needn't bother to find out the actual circumstances.
That "Dementia Sisters" thing is pretty good. Jason plays the saxophone, if I remember correctly. I play a pretty mean blues harp. If we can train Professor Schaff in the bongos or something, The Dementia Sisters may be the next YouTube hit. But I humbly submit that this is sensible and moderate blog, and that "dementia" is really unfair. See "hysteria and hyperbole" above. And I note that Jason hardly accused Daschle of tax fraud. See "exaggeration."
I note that until now only one of us sisters has mentioned the story. I would also note that a lot of what Professor Newquist says about Daschle's defeat and subsequent career has been said here by yours truly. I agree that Daschle has suffered from local resentment over his national stature, and that this resentment was one reason he lost his 2004 reelection bid. I have said as much, and I have said that I didn't think this was a good reason to have voted against our former Senator. So on these matters, David Newquist and I are in agreement. I especially liked this paragraph:
South Dakota has dumped a number of incumbents: Sen. Abdnor, Sen. George McGovern, Sen. Larry Pressler, and Sen. Tom Daschle. We assume that politicians understand that they serve only at the behest of the electorate, but what do we do with politicians when we are through with them?
Well, yes. I might not agree with all the reasons that my fellow South Dakotans voted against Tom Daschle, though I hardly disagree with their decision. I also think that Daschle lost the 2004 Senate election because he faced an opponent who was as good a politician as he was. But if an unfair resentment of Daschle was one of the factors that encouraged the good people of this state to unseat the Senate Democratic leader, that resentment was nonetheless a profoundly democratic passion. Unlike Professor Newquist, we did not "assume that politicians understand that they serve only at the behest of the electorate [my emphasis]." We apparently think that politicians need to be reminded of that fact. I suspect that this would be clearer to Professor Newquist, and perhaps less clear to me, if the party decals were reversed. See Todd Epp for a thoughtful treatment of this question.
I agree with Professor Newquist that the life of politicians after they leave office is a problem. If you don't believe the two of us, ask Barack Obama, who has had to relax his own standards against recent lobbying to get one of his chosen appointees.
But I think that the real question of this story is something else. Two of Obama's cabinet appointees have now run into trouble over a failure to pay taxes that they should have known were due. Daschle has consistently refused to release his tax returns, as John Thune did. So how seriously should we take this? On the one hand, it is important for the President to get the people he wants into these posts. There is a real danger here, and Professor Newquist hints at it, that too exacting a standard will result in mediocre appointments. On the other hand, saying that these posts are too important to let little things like obeying the law get in the way surely encourages contempt for the laws. There is a real danger in the view that indispensable people shouldn't be held responsible for their past affairs. Of course it's possible that the tax code is so complicated that scrupulous people often can't get it right. If so, then maybe a flat tax would solve the problem?
I am not sure how to resolve this, but I don't think it's demented to want to bring attention to the facts. That is what SDP has done.
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