A day after the post-Bush press conference cyber-frenzy, poli-bloggers as a group appear to have rolled over, sighed in exhaustion and reached for a cigarette. (Campaign Desk knows the feeling.)
But while the mood is markedly mellower, it is Tax Day so the topic of the moment is the IRS. Kos and other bloggers link to an Associated Press poll story with one of those maddening double-barrelled ledes that had us reaching for our own sedative-of-choice. “By almost 2-1,” writes the AP’s Will Lester, “Americans prefer balancing the nation’s budget to cutting taxes, even though many believe their overall tax burden has risen despite tax cuts over the past three years.”
Kos also uses the moment to recall (sort of) a Howard Dean poster — “Bush put $300 in your front pocket and took twice that out of your back pocket” — and to wish that Kerry would work that theme into a stump speech.
David Sirota offers some additional economic indicators, concluding (unsurprisingly) that the middle class is getting screwed.
Having sent off “a couple of thousand dollars” to the U.S. Treasury yesterday, Noam Scheiber says he’d feel a lot better if the Internal Revenue Service took its enforcement role more seriously. Like going after the $250 billion in unpaid revenues that the feds fail to collect each year.
Scheiber offers us a Washington Post editorial, laying the blame for a toothless IRS to “the extreme anti-tax rhetoric” of Sen. Trent Lott and his allies, who may have encouraged the idea that tax evasion is okay.” “IRS polls,” writes the Post, “suggest that the share of Americans who think it is acceptable to cheat has risen from 11 percent in 1999 to 17 percent in 2003.”
Scheiber, however, has no worries. He says he didn’t even take all the deductions he’s probably entitled to. That wasn’t out of concern for the burgeoning deficit or fear of aggressive Treasury agents pounding on his door. Nope, it seems that filling out the necessary forms, was just too much hassle.
–Susan Q. Stranahan
Susan Q. Stranahan wrote for CJR.