I will be regularly posting clips called “What the Right is Saying” and “What the Left is Saying” from time to time — particularly when there is a point either side is making that reasonable people could scratch their head and say, ‘hey, that makes some sense. . .’
From RedState.org’s Morning Briefing:
Tim Geithner Did What Leona Helmsley Did. She Went to Jail. Will He Go to Treasury?
Geithner is allegedly a brilliant career bureaucrat. He’s a political insider with his own ties to Obama, as Obama’s mother once reported to Geithner’s father. Having never worked in the private sector, he has cooked his personal books like one of the Wall Street swindlers Team Obama routinely excoriates.
Let us assume the oh-so brilliant Geithner – who does his own taxes because he is so smart – did innocently forget to pay the employer’s share of taxes related to an employee. That could happen; the Democrats sank Linda Chavez’ nomination as Labor Secretary over less.
Even so, there is the matter of Geithner’s own taxes. The International Monetary Fund sent notices to Geithner making clear he was responsible for his payroll taxes. He had direct knowledge that he was responsible, but he still refused to pay. He even accepted reimbursement from the IMF for those taxes and signed certifications that he’d paid them.
When he finally decided to pay, Geithner paid only enough to avoid potential criminal liability for failure to pay taxes. He willifully shortchanged the tax system even though he’d already been reimbursed for the taxes. There is no issue of mistake here. Geithner knew he had a tax obligation, took steps to pay his taxes, and deliberately paid only so much as to avoid criminal liability, but not so much as to pay his entire obligation.
Compare Geithner’s treatment by the media to Sarah Palin’s treatment.
— Steve Clemons
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