# Can the President Eliminate Capital Gains Taxes On His Own? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 22, 2012, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971 "2012-06-22T18:35:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/61 "2012-06-25T14:37:47Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > They couldn’t, they totally painted themselves in a corner. There were numerous signs of economic trouble for some time, and they had just put a humongous war debt on the credit card. How many times did you see these questions posed to Bushiviks and hear the answer “Hey, the housing market is doing great! Everybody is making buttloads of money! Home ownership through the roof!” It was all they had. They had no real choice but pretend the housing bubble wasn’t a bubble. > > Except, of course, going to the big banks and financial institutions and saying “Hey, you know that stuff you’re doing making you all that money? Stop doing it.” Bush would have been excommunicated from the Republican Church. Absolutely correct exect it was the Dems and not Bush. [Cite that the fault was not Bush’s](http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/11/business/new-agency-proposed-to-oversee-freddie-mac-and-fannie-mae.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm) ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/62 "2012-06-25T14:55:39Z")
> [@Saint\_Cad](#): > > Absolutely correct exect it was the Dems and not Bush. > [Cite that the fault was not Bush’s](http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/11/business/new-agency-proposed-to-oversee-freddie-mac-and-fannie-mae.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm) That’s an interesting cite about Fannie and Freddy, but doesn’t say anything about the big banks and the mortgage related derivates that were the crux of the crisis. ---
**Author:** ![StusBlues](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@StusBlues](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StusBlues)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/63 "2012-06-25T14:57:34Z")
I was under the impression that certain administrations HAD suspended certain taxes at the discretion of the President–either Bush II or Clinton. This is just from memory, though. ---
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/64 "2012-06-25T15:35:56Z")
I apologize for my absence. Sometimes, real life intrudes on my SDMB time. It would seem that [8 U.S.C. § 1229b](http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1229b), as posted by **Really Not All That Bright** , would satisfy the requirement. I apologize if my word “explicit” complicated things. As I read through Title 8, I see an awful lot of “the Attorney General may” language, indicating to me that he/she has lots of discretion in enforcing the law. Given that 100% enforcement is a practical impossibility, it would seem that such discretion would be critical in the proper operation of the law. It seems to me that Obama’s directive is more fair than the previous system. He has set down specific criteria to be met and invited those who meet those criteria to apply. That has to be better than arbitrary enforcement and hiding in the shadows. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/65 "2012-06-25T15:43:38Z")
> [@Drum\_God](#): > > It would seem that [8 U.S.C. § 1229b](http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1229b), as posted by **Really Not All That Bright** , would satisfy the requirement. I don’t think that citation is on point. That provision of law gives the Attorney General discretion on whether to remove a permanent or nonpermanent residents, who by definition are in the country legally. I don’t know and can’t find what provision of the immigration code relates to the removal of those who are not in the country legally, so I have no clue if the AG has discretion there. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/66 "2012-06-25T16:18:18Z")
As I said, I’m not playing paperchase with Terr, but I’ll do it for you. > [@](#): > > The Court does not find 8 U.S.C. § 1103 to be analogous to the statute referred to in Japan Whaling that imposes a specific duty, in that section 1103 allows for the Attorney General’s discretion in determining whether to deport an illegal alien. Rather, in reviewing 8 U.S.C. § 1103, the Court finds it to be analogous to the duty imposed on each United States attorney under 28 U.S.C. § 547. Section 547 states in part: > Except as otherwise provided by law, each United States attorney, within his district, shall— > (1) prosecute for all offenses against the United States; … > 28 U.S.C. § 547 (1993). Although § 547 appears to require each United States attorney to prosecute all offenses against the United States, no such duty exists. It is well established that the Executive Branch, and therefore the United States Attorney, has exclusive authority and absolute discretion to decide whether to prosecute a case. United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 693, 94 S.Ct. 3090, 3100, 41 L.Ed.2d 1039 (1974). See also Confiscation Cases, 7 Wall. 454, 19 L.Ed. 196 (1869). This recognition of prosecutorial discretion is attributable in no small part to the general unsuitability for judicial review of the attorney’s decision to refuse to prosecute. See Heckler v. Chaney, 470 U.S. 821, 831, 105 S.Ct. 1649, 1655, 84 L.Ed.2d 714 (1985). > > \ > > Like 28 U.S.C. § 547, the Court concludes that the Attorney General’s decisions under 8 U.S.C. § 1103 not to deport are unsuitable for review. A decision of this sort requires a complicated balancing of factors which are peculiarly within the Attorney General’s expertise. The Attorney General must consider many factors including whether deportation best fits the agency and the Federal Government’s overall policies, and whether the political climate of an alien’s native country makes deportation unsuitable. Thus, the Court finds the Attorney General’s decision not to deport presumptively immune from judicial review. See Heckler, 470 U.S. at 831–32, 105 S.Ct. at 1655–56.In Heckler v. Chaney, 470 U.S. 821, 105 S.Ct. 1649, 84 L.Ed.2d 714 (1985), the Supreme Court defined circumstances in which judicial review of agency inactions is appropriate. Heckler dealt with the Federal Drug Administration’s refusal to take enforcement action concerning the use of certain drugs. The Supreme Court concluded that under 5 U.S.C. § 701(a)(2) there is a presumption of unreviewability of an agency’s decision not to undertake enforcement action. This presumption may be rebutted where the substantive statute has provided guidelines for the agency to follow in exercising its enforcement powers. Id., 470 U.S. at 832–33, 105 S.Ct. at 1656. In a footnote to its opinion, the Supreme Court stated that it expressed no opinion on whether, where an agency has ‘consciously and expressly adopted a general policy’ that is so extreme as to amount to an abdication of its statutory responsibilities, such decisions are unreviewable under § 701(a)(2). The Court stated that in those situations the statute conferring authority on the agency might indicate that such decisions were not “committed to agency discretion.” Id. fn. 4.In the instant case, Florida alleges that the Attorney General’s inaction has resulted in an abdication of her statutory responsibility. As stated in Heckler, under 5 U.S.C. § 701(a)(2) there is a presumption of unreviewability of the Attorney General’s decision not to undertake enforcement action. Florida has failed to identify any guidelines contained in the statutes that would rebut this presumption.As for Florida’s allegation that there has been an abdication of the Attorney General’s responsibility, the Court can identify nothing in 8 U.S.C. § 1103, which confers the power to enforce the immigration laws, that would indicate that the Attorney General’s decision \*1341 not to undertake enforcement action in certain situations is not “committed to agency discretion.” Id. fn. 4. Therefore, the Court must dismiss Count II. > > Chiles v. United States, 874 F. Supp. 1334 (S.D. Fla. 1994), aff’d, 69 F.3d 1094 (11th Cir. 1995) > [@](#): > > This case presents the Court with a question of pure statutory construction. Does Congress confer discretion upon a federal official when it says that he “may” act as he “deems,” but does not specify, as it does elsewhere in the same statute, that he can act “at his discretion”? > > The statute in question is the Immigration and Naturalization Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1101 et seq. The official in question is the Attorney General of the United States acting through his designee, the Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (“INS”). > > \ > > Plaintiffs argue that legal review is foreclosed only when the INA specifies that the Attorney General acts in his discretion and that, in light of the 51 examples cited in the margin, it is necessary to use the word “discretion” to impart that executive authority in the context of the INA. The Court finds otherwise for three basic reasons. First, the language at issue connotes discretion: the use of the word “may” creates a presumption of discretion under normal rules of statutory interpretation. > > Zhu v. I.N.S., 300 F. Supp. 2d 77, 78 (D.D.C. 2004) ---
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/67 "2012-06-25T16:39:59Z")
So, perhaps **Terr** ’s objection is based solely on my use of the word “explicit” in my earlier post on this subject. Instead, this discretionary power can be found explicitly in case law and it is only implied in the actual code. In any event, Obama is not ignoring the Constitution or choosing not to enforce a law duly passed by Congress. Instead, he is exercising the discretion that is written into the Code and supported by relevant case law. In other words, just as he said. Go figure. ---
**Author:** ![TonySinclair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@TonySinclair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TonySinclair)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/68 "2012-06-25T16:48:59Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > May 2013, Romney speech: “I am ordering the IRS to immediately stop collecting capital gains taxes, cease any enforcement actions against anyone who doesn’t pay, and ordering all US Attorneys to drop any tax evasion cases where the tax at issue is capital gains. It’s the right thing to do.” You left out the best part: “Everybody knows that taxes are for little people. Coal miners and other grubby types need to pay taxes on their wages. But we’ve gone a long way toward eliminating taxes on people who inherit money, and now it’s time to eliminate taxes on people who sit around and collect dividends.” This space reserved for the disingenuous responses about how Republicans are only thinking of the children of people whose retirement funds are invested in stocks. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/69 "2012-06-25T17:14:31Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Wait a sec. The claim was, and I quote: “The immigration law in question\*\* explicitly gives the executive\*\* (in the body of the Attorney General) **the discretion to choose which cases to prosecute**. It is written in the law.” > > Can you point the language in the section you cited that “\*\*explicitly \*\*gives the executive” such discretion? :rolleyes: :dubious: I have already cited _Jay v. Boyd,_ which is a Supreme Court case. You are free to argue that opinion was wrong; but not WRT to whether Obama is exceeding his authority – for those purposes, the SCOTUS’ intrepretation of the law trumps yours. Find me a later SCOTUS opinion reversing _Jay v. Boyd_ and you might have a point. But you won’t. Furthermore, **Bricker** appears to be [ > [@](#): > > Imagine: A Republican president submits to Congress a bill abolishing the capital gains tax. Congress rejects it. The president then orders the IRS to stop collecting capital gains taxes and declares that anyone refusing to pay them will suffer no fine, no penalty, no sanction whatsoever. (Analogy first suggested by law professor John Yoo.) > > It would be a scandal, a constitutional crisis, a cause for impeachment. Why? Because unlike, for example, war powers, this is not an area of perpetual executive-legislative territorial contention. Nor is cap gains, like the judicial status of unlawful enemy combatants, an area where the law is silent or ambiguous. Capital gains is straightforward tax law. Just as Obama’s bombshell amnesty-by-fiat is a subversion of straightforward immigration law. [url=[http://www.lawfareblog.com/2012/06/oops-charles-krauthammer-gets-detention-law-wrong/](http://www.lawfareblog.com/2012/06/oops-charles-krauthammer-gets-detention-law-wrong/)]Krauthammer is wrong,](]channelling Charles Krauthammer:[/url) and is also a dishonest, disengenuous creep. And **Bricker,** as a lawyer, should know that perfectly well. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2012, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/70 "2012-06-25T17:58:10Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > :rolleyes: :dubious: I have already cited _Jay v. Boyd,_ which is a Supreme Court case. You are free to argue that opinion was wrong; but not WRT to whether Obama is exceeding his authority – for those purposes, the SCOTUS’ intrepretation of the law trumps yours. Find me a later SCOTUS opinion reversing _Jay v. Boyd_ and you might have a point. But you won’t. > > Furthermore, **Bricker** appears to be [[url=[http://www.lawfareblog.com/2012/06/oops-charles-krauthammer-gets-detention-law-wrong/](http://www.lawfareblog.com/2012/06/oops-charles-krauthammer-gets-detention-law-wrong/)]Krauthammer is wrong,](]channelling Charles Krauthammer:[/url) and is also a dishonest, disengenuous creep. And **Bricker,** as a lawyer, should know that perfectly well. Wait a second. What the hell are you even talking about? As a lawyer, I should know that some columnist is a dishonest, disingenuous creep? You seem to be jumping a few key steps in your argument. 1. I made an argument similar to Krauthhammer’s. 2. Other parts of Krauthhammer’s arguments are dishonest. 3. Every lawyer should know that those other parts of Krauthhammer’s arguments are dishonest. 4. Therefore, I should too. But… which argument of his did I make that is disingenuous and dishonest? Why am I responsible for other arguments of his that I never made? I never said a damn thing about the status of unlawful enemy combatants. And I hadn’t read Krauthhammer’s column when I made my post. I HAD read [The Corner.](http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/303038/executive-overreach-john-yoo#) I have written not a single word endorsing or supporting Krauthhammer’s theories. So – what the hell is your point? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2012, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/71 "2012-06-26T17:27:59Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Wait a second. What the hell are you even talking about? As a lawyer, I should know that some columnist is a dishonest, disingenuous creep? > > You seem to be jumping a few key steps in your argument. > > 1. I made an argument similar to Krauthhammer’s. Yes, you did. > [@Bricker](#): > > 1. Other parts of Krauthhammer’s arguments are dishonest. That is not a necessary step. > [@Bricker](#): > > 1. Every lawyer should know that those other parts of Krauthhammer’s arguments are dishonest. Yes, if he presumes to repeat them in a forum like this. > [@Bricker](#): > > 1. Therefore, I should too. See above. > [@Bricker](#): > > But… which argument of his did I make that is disingenuous and dishonest? That there is any equivalence, WRT to abuse-of-discretion or constitutional/legal-overreach, between Obama changing deportation policy and Obama refusing to collect capital gains tax. That **is** what this thread of yours is about. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2012, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/72 "2012-06-27T01:52:31Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > As I said, I’m not playing paperchase with Terr, but I’ll do it for you. Your first quote says: > [@](#): > > It is well established that the Executive Branch, and therefore the United States Attorney, has exclusive authority and absolute discretion to decide whether to prosecute a case. United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 693, 94 S.Ct. 3090, 3100, 41 L.Ed.2d 1039 (1974). See also Confiscation Cases, 7 Wall. 454, 19 L.Ed. 196 (1869). This recognition of prosecutorial discretion is attributable in no small part to the general unsuitability for judicial review of the attorney’s decision to refuse to prosecute. See Heckler v. Chaney, 470 U.S. 821, 831, 105 S.Ct. 1649, 1655, 84 L.Ed.2d 714 (1985). That seems to indicate that the Executive branch has discretion on whether to prosecute any case, not just deportation cases. So wouldn’t that discretion extent to the decision to prosecute a case of tax evasion? Meaning that Bricker’s proposal is exactly equivalent to what Obama did? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2012, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/73 "2012-06-27T02:49:19Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > That there is any equivalence, WRT to abuse-of-discretion or constitutional/legal-overreach, between Obama changing deportation policy and Obama refusing to collect capital gains tax. That **is** > what this thread of yours is about. Yes, that’s what this thread is about. So make that case. You say that there is no equivalence between Obama’s changing deportation policy and a future president refusing to collect capital gains tax? 1. Why? 2. Why is that something every lawyer should know? ---
**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2012, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/74 "2012-06-27T03:57:06Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Yes, that’s what this thread is about. I really wish you’d tell us what the thread is about in the first post. (Isn’t there a rule about that?) Instead, you made no mention of immigration in your OP. Were you hoping to trick people into offering an opinion that you could use against them when the secret debate topic was finally revealed? ---
**Author:** ![al27052](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/41988e/32.png) [@al27052](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/al27052)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2012, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/75 "2012-06-27T04:15:36Z")
> [@tim314](#): > > I really wish you’d tell us what the thread is about in the first post. (Isn’t there a rule about that?) Instead, you made no mention of immigration in your OP. Were you hoping to trick people into offering an opinion that you could use against them when the secret debate topic was finally revealed? It’s really horrible of you to accuse Bricker of lawyerly trickery. Oh wait… And yes, Bricker, for about the 1000th time, arguing like we’re all in court, when we’re just NOT, does tend to piss people off. The stakes just aren’t high enough to warrant this sort of thing, and there are kinder ways to communicate. ---
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2012, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/76 "2012-06-27T04:44:54Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > Your first quote says: > > That seems to indicate that the Executive branch has discretion on whether to prosecute any case, not just deportation cases. So wouldn’t that discretion extent to the decision to prosecute a case of tax evasion? Meaning that Bricker’s proposal is exactly equivalent to what Obama did? Suppose you’re right (and I’m not conceding that point, just supposing). What difference does that make? With regard to immigration, Obama has directed that certain cases need not be prosecuted. He described in detail what those cases would be. Given that the people he described are being productive (in getting an education), behaving themselves (not criminals), and came to the US through no action of their own (they were kids at the time), once could argue that their infraction is so small as to be negligible. Better to devote ICE resources to going after the illegal aliens who are a drain on society, misbehaving (as in being criminals), and actively sought to sneak into the country. With regard to capital gains tax, wouldn’t the same rules apply (in your scenario)? Joe Schmoe owes $2 in capital gains taxes and fails to pay it. Richie Rich owes $2 million in capital gains taxes and fails to pay it. The executive has the resources to prosecute one of these miscreant taxpayers. Who are you going to go after? Obama did not through out all immigration law and say he would not pursue any immigration-related prosecutions. He just said that these certain cases would not be pursued. So, if President (God forbid) Romney were to issue a similar directive, it would not be to eliminate the pursuit of capital gains taxes. It would be more along the lines of “The IRS will no longer go after taxpayers who fail to pay capital gains taxes in amounts less than $1000.” ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2012, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/77 "2012-06-27T15:02:46Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > Your first quote says: > > That seems to indicate that the Executive branch has discretion on whether to prosecute any case, not just deportation cases. So wouldn’t that discretion extent to the decision to prosecute a case of tax evasion? Meaning that Bricker’s proposal is exactly equivalent to what Obama did? The executive branch has discretion on whether to prosecute any _individual_ case. It seems to me that falls under ordinary prosecutorial discretion. However, in the specific arena of deportation, Congress has extended additional specific statutory discretion to the Attorney General (or since most of that case law came about, the Secretary of Homeland Security.) The difference is that the DoJ can say, “we’re not going to prosecute this guy,” but the DoHS can say, “we’re not going to deport this group of people.” Somewhere in the middle is Obama’s policy on federal enforcement of drug laws in states where medicinal marijuana is legal. It’s worth noting that the DoJ recently made an about-face on the issue (ie., abandoning its prior policy of not raiding licensed growers.) In any event, **Bricker** finds the discretion issue to be the most compelling argument. I don’t. For me, the most compelling argument is that illegal presence is not a _crime_, while tax evasion is. That said, you’re the expert - If I’m incorrect, and not paying capital gains taxes is something more akin to a regulatory infraction, I might well change my mind. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2012, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/78 "2012-06-27T15:11:40Z")
> [@tim314](#): > > I really wish you’d tell us what the thread is about in the first post. (Isn’t there a rule about that?) Instead, you made no mention of immigration in your OP. Were you hoping to trick people into offering an opinion that you could use against them when the secret debate topic was finally revealed? :smack: You know, this utterly gob-smacks me. When my fictional President Romney announces he’s doing it [“because it’s the right thing to do”](http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/obamas-immigration-policy-thing-16581730) I have trouble imagining how the analogy wasn’t immediately crystal clear. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2012, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/79 "2012-06-27T15:14:46Z")
> [@al27052](#): > > It’s really horrible of you to accuse Bricker of lawyerly trickery. > > Oh wait… > > And yes, Bricker, for about the 1000th time, arguing like we’re all in court, when we’re just NOT, does tend to piss people off. The stakes just aren’t high enough to warrant this sort of thing, and there are kinder ways to communicate. [“Kinder ways to communicate?”](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=15145547&postcount=4) Gotcha. Thanks for the tip. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2012, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971/80 "2012-06-27T15:16:11Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > [“Kinder ways to communicate?”](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=15145547&postcount=4) > > Gotcha. Thanks for the tip. Fixed link: [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=15145547&postcount=4](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=15145547&postcount=4) [QUOTE=al27052] Oh my, now the goddamn cowboys are showing up in that thread. People who fantasize constantly about killing the “bad guys” with guns and then get concealed-carry permits scare the shit out of me. At least Bricker is a calm, measured bigot. These cowboy types are fucking frightening. So eager and enthusiastic, in a really unsettling way. [/QUOTE] [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-president-eliminate-capital-gains-taxes-on-his-own/625971.md?page=5)