The July 4th Knucklehead of the Day Marathon Part Sixteen

Our sixteenth winner is Republican Senator Charles Grassley. Guess what he is proposing?

Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, received approval Wednesday on his idea to create an office within the IRS to focus on prosecuting individuals who profit from prostitution and make tax evasion related to criminal activity a felony. The office would be funded with some of the money it seized from sex traffickers who don't pay taxes on their ill-gotten gains.

Despite the giggles the headline "Grassley chases pimps" may cause , this is actually an appropriate strategy for fighting a loathsome crime.

The IRS has put many otherwise elusive criminals behind bars. Income tax must be paid on all forms of income, legal or not. This includes drug sales or profits from prostitution. Because someone committing one crime is unlikely to balk at committing another, and because a tax return deducting drug paraphernalia as a business expense is likely to attract police attention, most people making money from crimes also evade their taxes. The proposal would allow the IRS to audit suspected sex traffickers by assessing their possessions and lifestyle, thus determining how much they should pay in taxes.

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One drawback to this program is that while it will remove certain individuals from the industry, it won't do anything to attack the underlying causes of prostitution. However, by making pimping unprofitable, the IRS can remove the incentive to exploit prostitutes and cause the industry's cash flow to dry up.

Another drawback is the cost. There exists enough layers of bureaucracy in the IRS to chase tax cheats. How about an office to investigate legislators who don't report bribes as income? Oops that might hit a little too close to home for Congress.

For proposing the creation of just more redundant bureaucracy, Senator Charles Grassley is our sixteenth Knucklehead of the day.