Soccer Dad

Maryland - the sanctuary state

Maryland's becoming a sanctuary state. I'm not talking about for undocumented immigrants, but for congressman who want tax breaks.

Last year we learned that Rep. Robert Wexler was more a Marylander than a Floridian.

Wexler pays taxes on the home he owns in Montgomery County, Maryland. His most recent tax bill there includes a $948 state property tax and a $7,747 county property tax. Wexler doesn't pay any state income taxes. There's no Florida income tax, and members of Congress are exempt from paying taxes on their residences in the Washington, D.C. area.

Now we learn that Rep. Pete "Fortney" Stark takes advantage of his Maryland residence too.

Representative Pete Stark, the second-ranking Democrat on the Ways and Means panel, in 2007 and 2008 saved a total of $3,853 in state and Anne Arundel County taxes on a Maryland waterfront home that he claims as his primary residence, according to Maryland tax disclosures.

Maryland officials, contacted by a Bloomberg reporter about the tax break Stark received, said they plan to look into his eligibility for it.

The Wall Street Journal writes:

Oh my. If New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo and Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank are going to try to make public the names of bonus recipients to help mobs demonstrate in front of individuals' homes, perhaps Maryland's tax authorities could do the same for out-of-state politicians who've turned the state into their personal Liechtenstein. No doubt millions of average Joes living in such tax hells as New York and California would love to work on the taxpayers' dime in Washington and live in a low-tax jurisdiction nearby.

Maryland is not a "low-tax" jurisdiction - though it may be lower tax than New York or California. However these legislators are taking advantage of loopholes that ordinary citizen can't exploit.

It gives the appearance, as Instapundit puts it:

And regardless, this certainly explains, once again, why these guys are so comfortable with high taxes -- they don't pay 'em anyway. A government of the tax cheats, for the tax cheats and, especially, by the tax cheats.

We were supposed to be governed by citizen legislators. But the legislative class has seen to it that they get to be more equal than others. They demand that we live by laws that they pass and claim exemption for, because they're too important to be limited by such trivialities.