The question

Posted at 5:57 AM on February 4, 2009 by Bob Collins (4 Comments)
Filed under: Politics

With several members of the Obama administration (or almost members of the Obama administration) caught up in ethics woes, we wondered aloud on The Current yesterday whether the exhaustive questionnaire that the Obama transition team used to check out potential candidates had any question on there like, "is there anything you don't want us to know about?"

It turns out, there was.

(h/t/ @vtuss via Twitter)

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Comments (4)

Is it just me, or are recent events reflecting the force of a well-informed public. In addition to the two nominess with tax problems...

The pope rehabilitates a bishop and then, under public pressure, requires that the bishop recant his denial of the holocaust.

Wells Fargo defends a Las Vegas gathering and then, under public pressure, they cancel the event.

Bailout money bonuses for bankers are nixed.

Poorly prepared auto company execs are sent packing.

This is what journalism is supposed to be. Cheers to those who keep us informed.

Posted by kennedy | February 4, 2009 4:21 PM

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I didn't read the whole .pdf, but a search on the word "tax" yielded 0 results.

Maybe I found have searched "fee" or "revenue enhancements"

Posted by GregS | February 4, 2009 5:47 PM

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While there is no question specifically asking "have you ever withheld paying taxes," (although #39 gets about as close as you can) there are many tax and financial related questions on the questionnaire (questions #21 through #41). Any applicant had ample opportunity to fully disclose. But if others outside of the administration could discover these tax problems, then the administration should have been able to as well.

GregS, the word "tax" appears numerous times in the document. I just don't think you can do a word search of a .pdf of a photocopy.

Posted by Joel | February 5, 2009 10:37 AM

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In fact, questions #55 & #56 deal directly with the Nancy Killefer tax issue.

So, maybe candidates should also be more honest when applying for a job. At some point, the Obama administration has to show trust in the people he's attempting to hire.

Posted by Joel | February 5, 2009 10:44 AM

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