From the Huffington Post:
Daschle's Premature Dash by Dylan Loewe

The only thing more implausible than believing that a multi-millionaire with national ambitions would willfully try to defraud the IRS of $140,000 is believing that a man like that actually does his own taxes. Of course, he signs his name to them and is, as such, legally responsible for their content. But morally reprehensible? It was an error on his taxes, most likely committed by his CPA.

Tom Daschle . . . was to spearhead an effort to bring real, lasting health care reform to a country desperately seeking it. He has unique relationships with the Senators he once led, an unmatched knowledge of legislative strategy and procedure, and was an eye-witness to what went wrong when reform was attempted in 1994. He is exceptionally qualified.
Click here for the complete text.
^^^
Maybe the 2nd paragraph above was the point all along. I'm certain there are parties who do not want health care reform. And, bank on it, many of those parties have certain Congress people's ears.

On a kind of related note: People are gnashing their teeth over the fact that Daschle knew about this oversight and did nothing for several months.
Here's a fairly comparable situation: Several months ago, I was mailed a check I was supposed to cash or deposit. Now, a check for $3.43 doesn't call a lot of attention to itself and I put it aside and forgot about it. I went to the bank several times over the several months it sat on my desk and never remembered to take it with me.
Last week, the bank that issued it needed to settle its books and sent me a letter asking what had become of the check. Today, I finally cashed it.
To my mind, for Tom Daschle, $146,000.00 is probably about the equivalent of $3.43 for me. I knew the check was there-- but kept on putting off doing anything about it. I'll bet the same was true for him.

Acourse, I wonder what I'd be thinking if this post had been about Cheney or Rove. Hmmmmm.

Multi-tasking

Yesterday I read, over on Morning Martini that the talking heads say that we can’t focus on more than one issue at a time.
So, now that the economy is tanking, they don’t need to give us any info on the wars or the state of D.C. or the upcoming elections or how NOLA is doing post-Katrina or what's happening regarding our educational or health care systems, etc. etc. etc.
Or the beginning, finally, of the ‘war-crime’ tribunal which opened against bin Laden’s driver today. [This is the man who was accused of being the ‘terrorist’ who helped bin Laden escape to Pakistan. Hello! He was bin Laden’s CHAUFFEUR, for God’s sake! He was the hired help. That was his crime.]*

Anyway, if what the media say were true, their jobs would be a heckuva lot easier, I’m sure.
But, I’m here to demonstrate that we’re ambidextrous and, what’s more, we can even walk and chew gum at the same time.
Here are 2 unrelated [or, at least, only peripherally related] articles—both of which are important in today’s world.
Timelines in the Sand -- by Eugene Robinson.
and
Throwing Honesty out the Window -- by Sebastian Mallaby.
I’ll bet you can read and think about both.
^^^
*By the way, the first thing the court did in the case of Salim Ahmed Hamdan was to throw out all evidence gleaned by ‘harsh interrogation measures’. Great News! Information based on torture will not be allowed to stand!
Now, all we have to do is arrest the people who arranged for the torture in the first place.
Yeah, yeah, I knew I should quit while I was ahead. It seems Congress can either curry favor with big business and raise funds to run for office OR govern-- but it can't do both.
Maybe that's where the MSM got the idea that we can't think about two things at once, huh?
^^^
See? We can even think about THREE things! [Four if you count impeachment for war crimes.]