Editorial in today's Wall Street Journal: Picking on the Swiss: The Obama Administration Blows Up a Tax Treaty:
President Obama has been traveling the world to "reset" diplomatic relations with the likes of Russia and Iran. But his Administration continues to do what it can to blow up America's long and amicable relationship with Switzerland.
In a federal court in Florida, the IRS and Justice Department are seeking to compel the Swiss bank UBS to hand over the names of 52,000 U.S. taxpayers with private-banking accounts in Switzerland. … This sort of fishing expedition expressly violates the U.S.-Swiss treaty on sharing tax information. … [W]hat the IRS is attempting here is a mass search of U.S. taxpayers merely for banking in Switzerland.
This is not to say that everyone caught up in the IRS's dragnet is pure. But the American system of justice contains probable cause and reasonable search requirements precisely to prevent law enforcement from rounding up everyone who might conceivably be guilty of some crime. … [T]he government's request for so broad a swath of information could well run afoul of the Fourth Amendment's protections against unreasonable search. The Obama Administration should use the court reprieve to rethink the whole case.
Also in today's Wall Street Journal:
