(Crossposted from The Field.)
I find it tiresome that a country with such an archaic and confusing set of overlapping and often conflicting tax laws then makes a scandal out of anyone that runs awry of them. And in the case of Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, I see his own much-reported tax problems as a net plus: as head of the department that includes the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), he'll hopefully have a good dose of empathy for the average citizens that are plagued by the vast powers of that agency after making mistakes or confused presumptions on their taxes. And here's hoping that new-found empathy translates into making the tax system simpler and less punitive for the average Jane and Joe.
All that said, the circumstances surrounding former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle's nomination to the cabinet and his own problem of unpaid taxes were qualitatively different in that Daschle violated the "no drama" credo of the Obama organization...
Whereas Geithner disclosed his back-tax problem to transition team vetters before he was nominated, Daschle waited until after his nomination as Secretary of Health and Human Services to confess.
And it shouldn't matter that Daschle was among the earliest supporters of Obama's presidential campaign and helped orchestrate his success particularly in the midwestern and western plains states. No matter who you are, no matter what good you've done, the "no drama" rule is and ought to be a commandment.
Now, of course, will come many petulant blogosphere demands that former Governor Howard Dean get the HHS post instead. I'm agnostic on that: not a believer nor a disbeliever. If that happens, great. If that doesn't happen, just as great. I can think of good reasons, pro and con. But I think that most of the calls for it (and the overall Dean fetishism reflected in those calls) are quite silly: the idea that anyone is "owed" a cabinet post is one of those "childish things" from the President's inaugural speech that adults ought to put away.
Obama's political debt to Daschle - which is gigantic - obviously didn't trump all else in the steps leading to Daschle's exit this morning. (Daschle not only withdrew his name from consideration for HHS Secretary, but also from the dual job he was to fill as White House Health Care Czar, a post that needed no Senate confirmation.)
My guess is that Dr. Jeanne Lambrew, who was appointed to be Daschle's number-two in the Health Care Czar slot may now be nominated for HHS: She's obviously studied and versed on the game plan to steer through national health care. And in the end it's not the fame of the name that matters, but the effectiveness of the effort. If the game plan is a good one, it shouldn't matter whether the captain of the team is well-known or not.