What's the problem with paying?

Is it really too much to ask?

Are we asking too much, as taxpayers, to hold government officials to the same taxpaying standards the government requires us to follow?

Of course not. But it seems too much for some people aspiring for higher office.

Earlier this year it seemed as if the Obama administration all but considered installing a revolving door at the White House, as nominees for administrative posts bowed out almost as quickly as their names surfaced.

Nancy Killefer was tapped to be the federal government's first chief performance officer until her difficulties came to light about her not paying payroll taxes on her household help. Former Sen. Tom Daschle was President Obama's first pick to be secretary of health and human services before he filed three years' worth of amended tax returns to take care of more than $128,000 in unpaid taxes.

For at least one nominee, the shameful stigma of failing to pay taxes wasn't a big enough deterrent from higher office. Despite not paying Social Security, Medicare and self-employment taxes over several years, Timothy Geithner won confirmation as our newest treasury secretary -- the No. 1 Cabinet officer who oversees, among other agencies, the Internal Revenue Service.

Now it's come to light that 22 Georgia lawmakers -- making up about 10 percent of the state legislature -- are considered by the Department of Revenue to be tax evaders. Three of those lawmakers -- state Reps. Winfred Dukes of Albany, Al Williams of Midway and Roberta Abdul-Salaam of Riverdale -- have been identified, but the other 19 have not because they have not been officially served with paperwork from the revenue department.

Certainly all these lawmakers could produce explanations of why they haven't yet paid their fair share of state taxes. But that's not the point. It's the appearance of impropriety. We rightly hold our elected leaders to a higher level of accountability. And if they can't keep their own tax situations straight, what trust can citizens place in them when it comes to our tax money?

Credit Sen. Eric Johnson of Savannah for trying to bring some pressure to bear on his non-taxpaying colleagues in the General Assembly. He sponsored a bill in the Senate that would impose sanctions, and even remove from office, these negligent lawmakers.

Sadly, that effort was sunk Thursday amid partisan rancor. Democrats howled over Johnson's bill, saying it amounted to little more than a Republican witch hunt. Senate Minority Leader Robert Brown even called Johnson a "bloodsucker" -- though it's not immediately clear how he's a bloodsucker by trying to show that legislators are not above the law.

What's more likely is that Brown -- who has had to file an extension on his taxes, by the way -- is chafing at the fact that the names that surfaced early in this tax scandal belong to Democrats. But party affiliation is so irrelevant in all of this. Tax dollars aren't stamped with a "D" or an "R." If you owe, you pay. Simple.