The already grinding gears of immigration reform slowed again last week when Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) angered conservatives by suggesting that his committee extend to roughly 40,000 binational same-sex couples the same rights enjoyed by other couples to sponsor their spouse for a visa to enter... [Read More]

Winston Churchill said that Americans can be counted on to do the right thing, after we have exhausted all other possibilities. He might have added that we usually start with the least direct and most complex approach. So it is with the energy tax policy expressed in President Obama's FY 2014 budg... [Read More]

This is the time of year when tax planning is reduced to “fund your retirement plan by the due date of the return.” What intrigues me is how many people, including many tax advisors, think that Roth-style retirement plans are tax-exempt -- while traditional retirement savings plans are merely t... [Read More]

Washington has been fighting over the president's “balanced” approach to deficit reduction and the Republicans' “spending only” approach. Now that the issue of top tax rates seems to be settled, this old debate feels a little like a false choice since the tax measures on the table are “spendi... [Read More]