Earlier this month the Chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee “amended” his 2007 financial disclosure form—to the tune of more than a half-million dollars in previously unreported assets and income.
When you’re a powerful Congressman and working diligently to increase tax rates to pay for President Obama’s health-care plan, we suppose it’s easy to lose track of one of your checking accounts. That would be the one at the federal credit union with a balance somewhere between $250,001 and maybe as high as $500,000. And when you’re crunched for time and pulling together bills to pass in a rush, we guess, too, that you might overlook several other investment accounts, even if some of them are sizable, such as the ones Mr. Rangel missed at JP Morgan, Merrill Lynch, Oppenheimer and BlackRock.
Oh, and those vacant properties in Glassboro, in southern Jersey? Everybody in Manhattan tries not to think much about New Jersey, so those lots and their as-much-as-$15,000 value must also have slipped down the memory hole. (The New York Post reported yesterday that Mr. Rangel failed to pay property taxes for two of the lots, according to the county clerk’s office.) The Chairman probably isn’t doing a lot of dining at KFC, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell or Long John Silver’s, either, which may explain why he didn’t disclose the $1,001 to $15,000 in stock he owns in Yum Brands, the conglomerate that runs those chain restaurants. Compared to his undisclosed portfolio stake in PepsiCo—$15,001 to $50,000—that’s practically a rounding error.
Cut the guy a break, I’m always misplacing things, car keys, sunglasses,…….. it’s just stuff.
It makes me wonder how many other members of congress “forget” their taxes until someone looks hard enough?
Cue MJ, Never Can Say Goodbye.
How many terms has he served?
Why is he still in Washington?
If these a-holes just knew when to quit, term limits would not be necessary—but they are.
No problem. He has a “D” behind his name.
Charlie Rangel? What a shock!
Hubris, Entitled, Senile, overworked, forgetful, crooked, corrupt, not overseeing delegated duties?
VOTE ALL INCUMBENTS OUT OF OFFICE!!!!!
Well at least he’s qualified to be in Obama’s cabinet.
Kick them all (Repubs and Dems) out – and their inbred staff too.
This blog post needs a BS meter.
People amend tax returns all the time — especially people with complex assets.
You think it is just a coincidence that The Fox Street Journal is “exposing” Rangel just as he battles the big insurance companies?
Why do people continue to elect these old corrupt farts?
This is an old story. I wonder why it’s coming up now? What is it with these guys? Why don’t they get CPAs to do their books and then blame them? Dopes.
I think it’s be said before: if only members of Congress would pay their own fair share of income tax, maybe we’d be a bit closer to a balanced budget.
Here’s an idea:
Require our representatives to actually follow the laws they write (but don’t read). And while we’re at it, require them to use the same health-care system, school system and pension plan.
>> Jägermeister said,
>> Why do people continue to elect these old corrupt farts?
Not long ago, these same conservatives had Bill Richardson blindfolded for the firing squad over charges that ended-up being a big-fat nothin’
Big-money goes after elected leaders who side with the folk. (And The GOP rank-and-file inexplicably let big-money lead them around by their noses.)
When the attack-dog is the Rupert Murdoch media, it almost surely is crap.
#11 Man, you sure made me laugh. And to boot, you had to bring Sneacky Richarson up. Yes, there are toxic corporate scum, but what the hell does that gotta do with corrupt and inneficient public officials? Am I missing the national CEO elections or something?
#11 – Greg Allen
Imagine a normal person withholding $500k from the tax office… o’boy… that probe would go places you never imagined…
#7 – I could not find a mention of Rangel’s party. Do you think if he was a republican, it would also have been suppressed?
Go on believing that Fox is biased and in the republican’s. But, they will tell you when a republican F’s up. Can’t say the same for the democrat’s media.
In fact, I hear more crackpot leftest theories on Fox than on CNN or the big three.
bet he can tell you how many watermelons he has
Layer upon layer of corruption in their leadership, and the Democrats just accept it.
What is wrong with you people? Wake up, take back your party and throw out these criminals.
I don’t know the details, and I doubt anyone else here does.
Rangel doesn’t do his own taxes. None of these guys do. They all have accountants do them. From the sounds of it, you are looking at several hours of form filing with all those investments.
Are mistakes made? Yes, all the time. Is Rangel still responsible for his taxes? Yes. Do Republicans make the same errors on their taxes? Yes, and all the time.
The standard method of notifying the person is to have the IRS notify them of a discrepancy. The matter is usually taken care of without issue. Since these issues are confidential, It is a little questionable how the Fox Street Journal got the records.
As to the rest of the insinuations, let’s wait until all the facts are in before jumping to a conclusion.
I wonder if I made that kind of “mistake” if the IRS would accept “oops, sorry my booboo” Or “hey, other people do it too”, or “someone else did my taxes, not me” as excuses?
Hey, it’s worth a shot. I’d promise to have my coworkers form an “ethics committee” that would thoroughly investigate. And I can’t believe they’d be so crude as to suggest any wrong doing until after that committee cleared me.
Unless, and I can’t believe this is true, Congressmen are not treated the same way as us normal citizens. Nah, that can’t be.
http://foxnews.com/politics/2009/01/28/gop-congressman-intros-rangel-rule-eliminating-irs-late-fees/
Did the Rangel rule pass?
No Way! A corrupt Democrat? Must be some kind of GOP plot.