Geithner to crack down on tax cheats? Bwahahaha

It’s just too good to pass up. The best part is they say it with a straight face. The president said he intends to close loopholes that actually were put in place during the Clinton administration to allow companies to compete more effectively overseas.

But the irony of making the announcement with Treasury Secretary and Tax Cheat in Chief Tim Geithner at his side was too good for even Gretta Van Susteren to pass up.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emQEldcAqoQ

Bwahahahah. Oh … and here’s the best part. The corporate executives who run these companies (which included GE, one of Obama’s biggest supporters) were surprised and hurt at the language Obama used. Bwahahaha.

The U.S. has “a broken tax system” that is “full of corporate loopholes that makes it perfectly legal for companies to avoid paying their fair share,” Obama said as he outlined his plan with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner at the White House. Obama called most of the breaks “unjustifiable” and likened some company practices to a “tax scam.”

That rhetoric stung some executives: Carl Guardino, chief executive of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group, told Treasury officials on a conference call after the speech that Obama’s “word choices were a bit troubling” because chief executives in his organization are “proud Americans.”

Sound like maybe these guys supported the young President? What? And now he turns on them … throwing them under the bus along with the Wall Street folk? Oh my, when will they learn? No one is immune in this administration. Hope n Change.

Read that whole article and you will also find that the Democrats in Congress are not exactly on board with Obama’s plan.

Senate Finance Committee ChairmanMax Baucus, a Montana Democrat, called for “further study” of Obama’s proposals within minutes of the president’s announcement yesterday. RepresentativeJoseph Crowley, a Democrat on the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, said he’s wary because the tax changes would hurt Citigroup Inc., his New York district’s largest private-sector employer.

Now, I like everyone else, am in favor of companies paying taxes on the money they make. But I am not in favor of companies paying taxes twice, here and overseas. In this case, corporations would immediately pay US taxes on foreign profits at the US rate of 35% and that is the second highest corporate rate in the world putting companies at an immediate disadvantage overseas.

The unintended consequences are pretty simple. The tax bite is big enough that companies will shift operations overseas completely, and encourage others to start their operations their as well.

As I have said repeatedly, lower the US corporate tax rate and you will prevent much of this from happening, but that’s not part of this administration’s outlook on the economy.