According to a new report by The Star Tribune, Al Franken will end up paying over $70,000 to 17 states due to a failure to pay taxes for 4 years. I guess everyone else in the world should pay more taxes, while Franken doesn’t even pay the current rate.

DFL U.S. Senate candidate Al Franken, frontrunner in the race to unseat Republican U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman, owes $70,000 in back taxes in 17 states, where he earned income going back to 2003.

Franken on Tuesday told the Associated Press that he never intended to avoid paying taxes and that on the advice of his accountant, had paid taxes to the city and state where he lived.

Franken has been under fire since early March, when a Republican operative revealed that Franken had failed to pay workers’ compensation and disability premiums for employees of his New York-based corporation, Alan Franken, Inc., between 2002 and 2005.

New York state officials had tried to collect the back premiums for four years, resorting to a collection agency and even filing a summary judgment against Franken in state Supreme Court last May for $25,000.

Ed Morrissey goes after the media’s constant reference to Michael Brodkorb as a “Republican operative”.

They have continued to use the “Republican operative” appellation even though Michael no longer works for the Republican Party, and insinuate a political attack when it turns out that Michael reported nothing but the truth.

In fact, Michael underestimated Franken’s incompetence. He assumed that the problems were limited to only New York and California. As it turns out, Franken never filed any tax returns for income in states other than his residence, even though his corporation generated revenue in one-third of the states in the US.