I was disappointed, given all the rhetoric about bringing change to how Washington works, that President Obama did not tell Treasury secretary nominee Tim Geithner to take a hike when his transition team learned that the person he wanted to put in charge of the IRS had failed to pay his own Social Security taxes. It would be like an insurer naming a new head of claims who had once cheated on his own insurance claim.
The Democrats have the numbers to push Geithner through, and that's no doubt what they're going to do, sooner rather than later. And there is no doubt Geithner has the background and expertise President Obama sorely needs to get our plummeting economy back on track.
But Geithner can't possibly be the only qualified candidate out there, and to put someone in charge of Treasury who gave such a lame defense of his failure to pay Social Security taxes while at the International Monetary Fund is just unacceptable, in my humble opinion.
Indeed, pulling back on the Geithner nomination early on, when the vetting folks first learned about this "oversight," would have sent a clear message that President Obama is serious when it comes to restoring integrity to government.
Instead, by shrugging off his nominee's failure to pay his taxes, President Obama is sending the opposite message--that Washington remains just business as usual.
After all, would you place someone in charge of claims at your insurance company if you found that he'd handed in a false or incomplete insurance claim of his own? I would hope not.
What do you folks think?
