So you’re dishonest as well as stupid. No one said anything about funding one’s own retirement. Just to remind honest people of what you said:
(Emphasis added.)
One would think that a pedant, let alone a Chief Pedant, would know what an indefinite article is and what meaning it conveys. Where, in your screed, is there anything about a particular retirement fund? The rebuttal given to you was aimed at what you wrote, not what you’re making up now to cover up what you had written.
It is all one large retirement fund, and we all pay into it. If you were honest, you’d stand behind what you said now, even though it was wrong, rather than shift your view into something else. You’re cheating. You’re a liar. You’re dishonest. Obviously, any opinion you have about someone else’s honesty is worthless.
I’m not seeing the point here. If the IRS says you owe them money, you pay them. You hire a tax guy to figure out how much you owe them. On his advice, you pay them that much. If they audit you, you whimper, bend over, and pay them how much they say.
Then you say, “Hey, we quits?” And they say, “Yeah, you’re paid up, fine.”
So, Mr. Geither had his tax guy tell him how much to pay, and then he got audited, and the IRS told him how much to pay. And then both of them said he was fine.
I get the feeling from this interview that he more or less just went, “Fine, how much… okay.” and signed off, instead of double checking things. Amazing, but you’d be surprised how many financial professionals just don’t want to give a shit about their personal finances. It’s much like me not wanting to fix other people’s computers on my day off.
Then, when the Obama team went over his taxes, they saw this thing, pointed it to him, and he probably went, “Aw, man. Look at that. Plain as day.” and did the voluntary contribution thing.
It’s not that he carefully missed it. It’s that he got two other specialists, his tax guy, who missed it completely, and an IRS auditor specialist to look at it, and he missed it completely too.
The longer this goes on, the more it looks like much ado about nothing. I wasn’t convinced before that Geithner was a tax cheat gaming the system, and at this point in the thread I’m even less convinced.
I’m sure there is, but so what? There’s a serious financial crisis going on and people are suggesting Obama should have given more consideration to this tax issue than to who he felt was the best choice for dealing with that crisis. That’s absurd.
Also kind of absurd is that people get upset their politicians are out of touch and don’t relate to the public, and then they blow up every person failing from the politicians into a huge issue, which discourages them from engaging with the public in the first place. ‘There’s an error in his taxes - kill him! Human beings never make errors on their taxes or their parking tickets!’ Is there suddenly a shortage of politicians who are really taking advantage of the system, like Rangel?
ETA: When people went on and on during this election about wanting a president to be smarter than them, it made some sense. Now it sounds like people are asking Their Leader to be Better than Them. That sounds stupid and has a much more elusive definition.
I just want to emphasize a point here. Not only did the tax guy miss something, but the IRS agent with the adversarial relationship missed it. The IRS guy had every motive to find all the errors, it’s his job… and he didn’t.
No. There is no fund. Anywhere. Promises to pay out of future receipts, yes–along with the understanding that the delivery on those promises may change when we are no longer able to keep them. That’s not a fund unless you are in marketing. Or Bernie Madoff.
Nor is there an Easter Bunny.
All the money you pay to the Federal Government is going into what is functionally the same giant bucket, and various distributions along with chits borrowed from future generations is what comes back out. Now. The Feds don’t have a long-term savings “fund” anywhere. (The difference is called a “deficit” when you spend more than all the money you take in.) Unless by “fund” you mean borrowings against future revenues.
Open a legit thread somewhere if you are confused about it. Perhaps someone more inclined than I to spend time with the retarded can help you through it.
Word of caution: I am not sure anyone who understands the general working of the budget and deficit spending is going to be impressed by being referred to the “Official Social Security” site.
He made a gesture, mostly to appease idiots like you. He could not repay what he owed, it’s impossible. There is no-way, no-how you can pay into your social security fund after the SOL. Geithner made a voluntary contribution to reduce the national debt. That fund is not connected to Social Security.
You don’t understand how the Statute of Limitations work, nor do you even have the slightest grasp of Social Security- and yet you feel you can criticize others who can understand these things. :rolleyes:
I feel a little like a kid burning ants coming back here, so this’ll be it for me.
See, there is no fund. Contributions of real current money taken into SS are swallowed up into the rest of the overall budget. What’s in the SS “fund” are chits against future receipts…I know it’s kind of hard to understand when you are not working with a full deck, but when you fail to pay your SS taxes it’s not correct to imply that you have sort of cheated only yourself out of your own retirement.
But hey, you want to go to bat for your guy being uncriticizable even though he evaded taxes and didn’t feel he should repay the evaded taxes when he was caught evading them…go right ahead. Let’s make him Secretary of the Treasury, even. Maybe even let him be boss of the IRS. SOL and all.
SoL is more like it…Shit outta Luck for anyone demanding leaders with integrity.
Agreed, but somewhat controversial, with support to folllow.
This is a strong assertion of which I am wholly unconvinced. I do not believe they are infallible in this regard.
This is where the further argument with your second premise comes in. The IRS may well have penalized non-cheaters(meaning those who made honest mistakes) in its history. Given the billions of returns it has processed over the years and the millions of audits, the odds of it having applied penalties to those who made honest mistakes are almost certainly nonzero. Thus both “it uses them on cheaters” and “it only penalizes cheaters” are suspect. It is likely there have been times where penalties were assessed on non-cheaters.
Agreed as a point of fact.
Given the disagreements with the above premises, I’m afraid I can’t agree with this conclusion. It may be true, but the premises don’t get us there. The overriding premise is that the IRS is near omniscient. I’ll concede they are one of the most efficiently and effectively run of the bureaucracies, but it does not follow that their judgments are infallible and the final word. It seems certain that cheaters sometimes get away with tax fraud and given the responsibility about to be entrusted to Mr. Geithner, a more detailed evaluation was in order.
That having been said, I’m comfortable with the way things turned out. He was scrutinized, he made good. He was made aware he’ll be under a microscope in the future. Even if he cheated on his taxes all those years ago, he’s aware now that the skeletons can’t be hidden when he operates at this level, and I believe he’ll be a faithful public servant. I wish him well in the performance of his duties. I don’t find the case for refusing his appointment on these grounds compelling, but I can respect that others may and I don’t believe the IRS’s actions are incontrovertible proof of the matter in either direction. Strong evidence, to my way of thinking, but not incontrovertible proof.
I’ll admit that I was a bit liberal with my rhetoric. But the notion that Geithner seized upon an opportunity deliberately to risk his livelihood and liberty in order to snatch away from an agency legendary for its humorlessness not even enough cash to purchase a decent automobile is downright empty-headed in its conception.
Is it at all possible that a person could make an honest mistake in calculating his taxes? How are you so certain that this was not the case with Geithner? Particularly once you consider that he did not calculate his own taxes, but paid someone else to do it for him? It seems to me, particularly given the relatively small amount of money involved (compared to how much he makes overall) that the evidence points pretty compellingly towards this being a genuine oversight, and not deliberate malfeasance.
That made me literally LOL, since I probably still have unpaid parking tickets from when I was at Harvard. Jesus, the Cambridge police give those things out like candy, and parking is a frigging nightmare.
Geithner, Choice for Treasury, Questioned on His Tax Returns - The New York Times This article says the IRS assessed the taxes he neglected to pay and charged interest. The IRS waived the penalties. Waived. That does not mean he was not subject to penalties, only that he was a big shot and got away. You would not have had them waived.