The article reports that the McCains had been delinquent in paying taxes until Newsweek inquired about the matter. The McCains then paid off $6,744.42 in back taxes, but still owe more. Newsweek writes:When you’re poor, it can be hard to pay the bills. When you’re rich, it’s hard to keep track of all the bills that need paying. It’s a lesson Cindy McCain learned the hard way when NEWSWEEK raised questions about an overdue property-tax bill on a La Jolla, Calif., property owned by a trust that she oversees. […]
County officials say the trust still owes an additional $1,742 for this year, an amount that is overdue and will go into default July 1. Told of the outstanding $1,742, the aide said: “The trust has paid all bills shown owing as of today and will pay all other bills due.”
That settles that.
modern day "GOP fiscal conservative."
Trust fund babies that can't balance their own checkbooks, nevermind the budget of a country.
But this raises an even more important issue. In the military little things like unpaid bills and not paying your taxes can lose you your security clearance. It makes you a security risk in as far as the possibility of being blackmailed. I can't imagine the rules are much different for public servants and politicians.
John McCain is a security risk according to military standards.
John McCain and his wife's finances need to be fully investigated to ensure that this is an isolated incident. From the Army Adjudicative Guidelines for Determining Eligibility for Access to Classified Information:
Guideline F
Financial ConsiderationsThe Concern. An individual who is financially overextended is at risk of having to engage in illegal acts to generate funds. Unexplained affluence is often linked to proceeds from financially profitable criminal acts.
Conditions that could raise a security concern and may be disqualifying include:
a. A history of not meeting financial obligations;
b. Deceptive or illegal financial practices such as embezzlement, employee theft, check fraud, income tax evasion, expense account fraud, filing deceptive loan statements, and other intentional financial breaches of trust;
c. Inability or unwillingness to satisfy debts;
d. Unexplained affluence;
e. Financial problems that are linked to gambling, drug abuse, alcoholism, or other issues of security concern.
Conditions that could mitigate security concerns include:
a. The behavior was not recent;
b. It was an isolated incident;
c. The conditions that resulted in the behavior were largely beyond the person's control (e.g., loss of employment, a business downturn, unexpected medical emergency, or a death, divorce or separation);
d. The person has received or is receiving counseling for the problem and there are clear indications that the problem is being resolved or is under control;
e. The affluence resulted from a legal source; and
f. The individual initiated a good-faith effort to repay overdue creditors or otherwise resolve debts.
(emph. mine)His security clearance, as a politician, must demand a full investigation of his family's finances given this news of his and his wife's tax delinquency. For what it is worth, and as far as his security clearance is involved, McCain also filed deceptive loan statements that have resulted in his breaking campaign finance law.
I mentioned earlier today that it was quite a thing to see John McCain denouncing Barack Obama for breaking his word on public financing when McCain himself is at this moment breaking the law in continuing to spend over the spending limits he promised to abide by through the primary season in exchange for public financing. (By the FEC's rules, we're still in the primary phase of the election and will be until the conventions.)Those are two huge red flags as far as John McCain's security clearance is concerned.
I want to return to this subject though because this is not hyperbole or some throw away line. He's really doing it. McCain opting into public financing, accepted the spending limits and then profited from that opt-in by securing a campaign saving loan. And then he used some clever, but not clever enough lawyering, to opt back out. And the person charged with saying what flies and what doesn't -- the Republican head of the FEC -- said he's not allowed to do that. He can't opt out unilaterally unless the FEC says he can.
[update] oceanstar17 was kind enough to drop these links in comment at dkos:
the key standard for granting security clearances falls under the DCID 6/4. You can read about it here This website also has information about the adjucation process.
Furthermore, if you want to read cases of appeals that have gone up to the DOD, you can read about them here. You can see that applicants are allowed to have negative information about them. The key is how they handled their situations.
I guess I have some more reading to do.
[update deux] More as a matter of curiousity... How does this effect any income taxes John and Cindy McCain may have claimed? From comment at HuffPo:What exactly do these Trusts and S Corporations involve? Do they earn taxable income? One would think that things like Mortgage interest charges and property tax would be very important when the tax returns are done since they are tax deductable and reduce the amount of taxes owed. Does the failure to pay property tax indicate that they also failed to file tax returns for the trust involved in this little condo? Or they just paid more tax than they owed?Was she claiming tax deductions on these property taxes while not paying the actual taxes? Sounds like the republican way!
Its clear that mortgage interest and property taxes must be on Cindy's returns because they dont show up on the Schedule A for any of the tax returns that John has released.
Cindy McCain needs to open her books for public scrutiny.
