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Before his tax cheating came to light, former Senator Tom Daschle was expected to sail through the Senate and be confirmed as Obama's new Secretary of Health and Human Services and director of the White House Office of Health Reform.

But while President Obama was bashing greed on Wall Street, in terms of the big bonuses paid to executives, the details of the Daschle tax scandal were starting to emerge. The scandal not only threatens to derail Daschle but undermine Obama's national socialist health care plan.

Wall Street operator and Democratic Party moneybags Leo Hindery, who hired and paid Daschle millions of dollars and gave him a limousine and chauffeur, wrote an article for the Huffington Post in 2008 saying that he was endorsing Obama for president because the candidate believes in every American "once again paying his or her fair share" of taxes. That didn't happen in Daschle's case.

The scandal has given critics an opportunity to examine not only Daschle's tax cheating but his dangerous policy proposals, including the establishment of a Federal Reserve-like national health care board to supervise and influence the nation's health care system. "I propose a Federal Health Board, modeled loosely on the Federal Reserve System," Daschle says in his book, Critical: What We Can Do About the Health-Care Crisis. (web site)

Seen in the light of the current economic and financial crisis, brought about in part because of the easy credit and monetary policies of the Federal Reserve, Daschle's proposal is obviously not only dumb but dangerous.

Michael F. Cannon of the Cato Institute reports (web site) that the Obama federal economic "stimulus" bill, which has passed the House, includes $400 million for the Daschle "health care rationing board," as he describes it.

Media in the Tank for Daschle

Last November, in one of several laudatory articles about Obama preparing to pick Daschle, Karen Tumulty of Time said, "It's hard to imagine a more useful ally for Obama to help lead his bid for health-care reform..." Citing a road trip she went on with Daschle in South Dakota to examine poverty conditions, she explained, "The former Senate Democratic leader has an understanding of the nation's health-care problem that comes not just from Senate hearing rooms or staff briefings." (web site)

But over the last two years, as noted by Kenneth P. Vogel of Politico.com, Daschle has made nearly $5.3 million, including more than $200,000 from the health care industry. (web site)

Daschle was introduced at his confirmation hearing on January 8 by former Republican Senator Bob Dole, who works with Daschle at the Alston & Bird law and lobbying firm. Dole spoke of Daschle's "integrity." (web site)

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