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Published Monday, July 13, 2009 | 8:38 a.m.
Updated Monday, July 13, 2009 | 8:55 a.m.
WASHINGTON — Despite the efforts by Sen. John Ensign’s parents to structure their $96,000 payment to the family of his mistress as a gift that would avoid taxes, they might want to have considered additional precautions, suggests the New York Times.
The Times outlines a series of steps the senator’s parents could have taken to ensure their gift to the family of the mistress, who was the senator’s campaign treasurer, was given tax-free.
The posting on the NYT’s Economix blog was just one of many over the weekend in Washington and Nevada as fallout continues in the Ensign affair.
Las Vegas Sun colleague J. Patrick Coolican considers whether Ensign will be reprimanded for the affair with the wife of one of his former top aides, given the slow pace of investigations at the Senate Ethics Committee and the Federal Election Commission.
Our colleagues at the Review-Journal weigh Ensign’s chances for survival here.
My story in Sunday’s paper suggests that Republicans in both Washington and Nevada have been hesitant to overtly call for Ensign’s ouster, but that the senator’s political future may be better known after tonight’s meeting of the Nevada state Republican Party’s central committee back home.
The editorial pages in Nevada and Washington are watching, waiting and asking questions.
Up north, an earlier editorial in the Lahontan Valley News reprinted in the Nevada Appeal calls the Ensign affair “another black eye on Nevada” (the governor’s marital situation being the first), but refrains from calling for Ensign’s resignation.
Similar sentiment from the Review-Journal in Las Vegas, which wrote that Ensign has “damaged Nevadans,” and said the senator “must now demonstrate to Nevadans that he can learn from his mistakes.”
The Las Vegas Sun urges the senator to tell the whole story, saying “Ensign’s fate is unclear.”
The Washington Post said this morning that the “damning details” of the Ensign affair show the need for a thorough investigation.
“Mr. Ensign should realize that no one is being served by the lingering and troubling questions surrounding his sordid affair. He should welcome any inquiry that will help put them to rest,” the Post wrote.
Ensign is a cosponsor of this stunning piece of legislation just re-introduced,
The Human-Animal Hybrid Prohibition Act of 2009.
I guess the economy, healthcare, taxes, and both wars are all fixed and the morons in congress have nothing better to do than protect us from mermaids and centaurs. I'd like Ensign to introduce the Protect the Taxpayers from Brain Damaged Congress Act of 2009 except I know he is too busy with the Automatic Zipper Act of 2008. Sen John Ensign, protecting us from gay marriage, healthcare reform and now human animal hybrids since 2000
The Incredible Mr. Limpet for Senator, I wish I was a fish. LOL
Dear John,
Do I donate to you, or should the check go to directly to your mistress? Should it be made out to Great Leader or President Ensign? Please help!!! It's so confusing these days. Maybe I'll send it directly to your parents, and they can disperse it as they see fit. Remind me of the monetary limit on a "gift" before the old IRS can take it's share.
Anyway, Thanks and God bless. You truly are a man of Jesus.
Oops, wrong site - my bad.