On Tuesday of this week, The Helena IR put out this editorial highlighting the perceived conflict between the Montana Department of Revenue and business organizations.  The IR is notorious for blindly following where the gov leads them, but usually they stick to the general facts.  Not this time, unfortunately.

The IR writes, "Just last week a war of words erupted between the Montana Taxpayers Association and Revenue Director Dan Bucks over a multi-state pact giving people who owe out-of-state taxes a break on penalties and interest if they voluntarily agree to pay up." It is true that MonTax and Bucks had a very public disagreement last week, but it wasn't about the merits of the Voluntary Compliance Issue.  The "war of words" was about the sneaky, misleading method that Bucks used to initiate the program.  In fact, MonTax supports the VCI program.  The way that the IR presents this issue, they'd have you believe that MonTax is the bad guy when in reality, Dan Bucks is the only one to have done anything wrong.

The IR continues, "All this angst is mysterious to most Democrats, who wonder what's wrong with getting people to pay taxes they rightfully owe."  It's obvious from that statement that the IR editorial board has a very poor understanding of what the so-called "tax cheaters" legislation actually does.  DOR already has the tools they need to track down people who owe taxes; they've demonstrated time and again that they know exactly who falls into the non-compliance categories.  The truth is that this legislation would have made it more difficult and expensive for ALL Montana taxpayers to file their taxes.  That's exactly what opponents to the legislation have said from day one.  It's a mystery why the IR continues to ignore this fact.

The IR also presents this issue as pitting Republicans against Democrats.  In fact, the opposition to this bill was bi-partisan.  Senator Kim Gillan (D-Billings) led the effort in the Senate to amend-out some of the more objectionable aspects that it contained.

And finally, the IR had this gem, "Sometimes, the answer to whether strengthening the state's ability to collect taxes is a common-sense goal or a sinister power grab may lie in the size of the beholder's net worth."  Again, this legislation would have affected EVERY taxpayer in the state.  There was nothing in the bill that specified certain income levels, nor did the bill exclude Montanans - a lie that Dan Bucks continues to spread.  This statement from the IR is just a blatant, ugly attempt to induce class warfare, and it has no place on a editorial page.