Lovey, the taxman's here!

I can't resist the temptation to offer a few words on the recent dust-up over the taxes on the new yacht purchased by our junior senior senator, John Forbes "Liveshot" Kerry, with his second wife's first husband's money:

1. I like yachts.  While the formal definition of "yacht" is "any watercraft used exclusively for pleasure" one tends to apply it to vessels larger than 30-40 feet.  The next best thing to owning a yacht is having friends who own yachts. 
2. I hate taxes.  I'd be happy content to pay a federal tax whose proceeds were used to fund the military and a government just large enough to run a postal service and adjudicate matters like interstate highway numbering.  I suppose we'd also need a state tax that would fund stuff like those few departments and agencies that are actually necessary, e.g. the State Police and the Department of Corrections.  Most "services" should be local, paid for by locally-levied taxes.
3. I'm no fan of J.F. Kerry.  I don't like his politics, I don't like his sanctimonious attitude, and I don't like his phony brand of Catholicism.
4. In general I applaud "Liveshot" for doing his best to avoid the onerous Massachusetts sales tax and annual excise tax on watercraft.  Unfortunately for him, the sorry effort which came to light last week apparently was his best.
5. Like many scandals and lesser incidents, the cover-up was worse than the offense.  Witness our hero's bumbling and tone-deaf attempts to explain it all away, which basically amounted to "It's my wife's boat and it's owned by an out-of-store corporation and it's maintained in R.I. and we don't owe any taxes but we'll pay what we owe and we've alread sent them a check and how dare you accuse J. F. Kerry of even thinking about evading taxes and by the way can I get out of here now?"
6. So - is he just arrogant or just obtuse?  In the first place, why not have his yacht built by one of the yards in New England?  Hinkley comes to mind; they're in Maine rather than the People's Republic but they're "local".  And there's certainly nothing illegal about someone who's a legal resident of Massachusetts documenting his yacht with a local hailing port even though its maintenance is done out-of-state.
7. Did you notice that The Boston Daily Worker didn't have a word to say about it until today, after J.F.K. voluntarily paid the Massachusetts sales tax?  Remember when Christy Mihos had a disagreement with the tax collector over the taxes on his boat?  What double standard?

In my boating days I got chased by tax collectors for the measly excise tax due on a 35-year old wooden boat.  Seems the law says that the tax is due to the locality in which the vessel is berthed on 1 July, but the town in which I stored my boat (outdoors) for the winter also attempted to collect the same tax.  "I paid it to the other town" doesn't always cut it in Taxachusetts, and there is no "oops, our mistake, we'll fix it" from a municpal tax collector.  Perhaps, after protracted negotiations, you might receive a 30-day extension in which to file an abatement of the improperly-levied "double" tax", but many people in that situation wind-up paying twice before they're allowed to seek a rebate.  Unless, of course, your name is Kennedy or Kerry or .  And so, with it all, I have very little sympathy for ol' Liveshot.