More on the tax-cheats (I'm even angrier this time)

I'd say I'm kicking a dead horse, but the Obama Administration keeps reviving it.

According to the Associated Press, Obama's Treasury Secretary — Tax-Free Tim Geithner — announced today that the Obama people will soon unveil a series of new rules to limit the ability of companies to avoid U.S. taxes by sheltering earnings in tax haven countries.

Any economist worth his salt would say Obama would do the U.S. economy more good by transforming this country into the world's greatest tax haven — thereby giving every company on the planet a substantial motive for shipping jobs here. But that's secondary today.

More importantly, the Obama Administration is attacking one of the most important things government can take on: people's money. Most surprising is the administration's willingness to bring up the issue on which it is the least credible.

When I see Tax-Free Tim and Co. at work, it doesn't take long before I'm furious. Geithner, who is in charge of the federal department that oversees the IRS, doesn't think he has to pay his own taxes but now he wants to ensure that everyone else gets sufficiently fleeced.

Today he described the (perfectly legal) efforts of companies to base their assets in financially beneficial locations as — his words — "tax evasion." It makes one wonder what harsh language he would use to describe his own illegal failure to pay more than $30,000 in income taxes — he claims he didn't know he was supposed to pay income taxes for about four years. I bet he was aware that everyone else is supposed to do so.

Picture Ted Kennedy lecturing us on safe driving, or Dick Cheney lamenting recklessness with guns.

As much as I dislike Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and as dangerous to the Second Amendment as I think Attorney General Eric Holder is, I thought the Senate should have voted to confirm most of Obama's cabinet nominees. I tend to think the president should get the people he wants and senators ought not stand in his way without a darn good reason. But I thought it was pretty obvious:

Not paying your taxes is a darn good reason.

Obama should have fired Geithner the moment he learned of the latter's tax transgressions, and then he should have ordered Holder to prosecute Geithner until Tax-Free Tim was sent to federal prison.

The irony is, if Obama wanted to really add stimulus to the economy, he would fight to declare a portion — say, half or maybe the first $50,000 — of all Americans' income to be tax-free for a year. I'd bet a month's pay that'd boost spirits and the markets.

But that income is not tax free. I have to pay the taxes on it. I work hard for my money and I don't have much of it. So when those jerks in the Obama Administration and Congress are caught having not paid their own taxes, they are caught in violation of a serious code of decency.

The legend of Robin Hood says that he robbed from the rich to give to the poor. That's erroneous. Robin Hood robbed from the corrupt Sheriff of Nottingham — the government — and returned to the poor the money that the sheriff had stolen from them in the first place.

That tale does not glamorize stealing from the rich, it glamorizes rebellion against tyranny.

Tax-Free Tim and Co. are not socialists. This is not robbing from the rich and giving to the poor. It's the rich robbing from you and I, and keeping it for themselves.

Only it's even worse than that. If they poked a gun into my nose and took my wallet, at least I'd have to respect the fact that they had beaten me by force. These toads are hiding behind the government and letting sniveling bureaucrats do the dirty work for them. They're enjoying the fat while taking away our lean portion, too.

If that isn't low-down cowardice, I don't know what is.