To be fair to Joe Walsh, he is actually in debt quite a bit due to his legal problems, and so should be excused his child support as he has no way to pay it. He is not just trying to stash away some more cash, he actually has no money.

He is not one of those congressmen who are already millionaires and do not need the paycheck they earn from being in congress.

Joe Walsh needs a nickname that will follow him for life. Something like "Deadbeat Joe" or "Deadbeat Joe Walsh." Nothing vulgar; we want it to be able to go on air.

@1

If that's the case, he should have kept his dick in his pants. The mother of the kid doesn't get to decide she can't afford to support him if she's broke, so Deadbeat Joe shouldn't, either.

@3: Men like this do not get excused child support for the rest of their lives, they get the original schedule voided and a new one put into place which usually includes garnished wages.

My point is, the article and post make it out like Walsh has the money but just wants to keep it because he is an asshole, but he simply does not have the ability to keep paying that support schedule. Two very different things. He does not even have an income anymore, so obviously the courts are going to need to adjust the payments somehow. Common sense.

Walsh’s court filing states: “Joe’s employment has been terminated through no voluntary act of his own ..."

So being an asshat loser was involuntary?

And the French National Assembly votes to legalize marriage equality by a vote of 329 to 229.

Live blog in English:

http://www.thelocal.fr/page/view/live-fr…

So Walsh's kids need the government to support them?

@4: He claims he has no income, and he wants the payment reduced to 20% of his income, which of course is zero.

Frankly, I'm not energetic enough to investigate his financial circumstances, but why would anyone with "common sense" believe a thing Deadbeat Joe claims about his impoverishment?

And the article itself makes it pretty clear that he's full of shit, with all those supposedly innocent errors, like titling the motion as terminating rather than modifying child support, in addition to stopping payment on his own rather than waiting for a court's approval. What, did he already blow through all of his Congressional salary? On what, cocaine?

If I'd just witnessed a drunk driver kill my two sons, I'd shoot him too.

This is one reason I don't have a gun.

@9 Exactly.

@1 I was a full-time professional blogger for six years, and I still managed to take care of my daughter.

@6 avec Le Fin.

@3 raises an interesting point. If the custodial parent has no money, hopefully (s)he could access government aid. Why, when the non-custodial parent has no money, is (s)he not eligible for gov't help paying child support? Or is that in fact what happens, but in an indirect way when the custodial parent, deprived of child support, seeks state support? Seems Walsh, in addition to being a deadbeat dad, is also a rotten Republican.

@8: Haha, just energetic enough to speak about something you admittedly know nothing about though, huh?

Being a public servant who releases tax forms to the public, it is easy to see that the man has financial obligations that put him about $20,000 in the red. I guess you could argue that he has been lying to the IRS, or maybe he and the IRS are in cahoots, but that just seems silly.

I do not even see what you are so mad about, the guy went to court to do something that happens all the time. He has no money, and likely does not have the ability to magically create it. So he needs to go to the court and work out a new schedule to come into effect when he finds an income stream. It is not like he fled the country. Also, the article directly contradicts several things you said.

Seems to me you have just decided to hate him for whatever reason: politics, gender, his last name, his choice of suits, I dunno. Sure he made a mistake by having a kid he could not support after losing his job, but if you are going to hate everyone who has problems like that, you are going to have a large enemies list.

@11: Congratulations...? Do you have a point, or did you just want me to know that?

@16

Uh, because he's an asshole?

You do come across as one of those men's rights nuts, though, so suspect that's why you're so sympathetic.

Losing an election doesn't mean you can't work. Surely there's something this gentleman can do that someone would pay for. That's generally what people do when they lose one job: immediately look for another and in the meantime, work at McDonald's. But no, he's a Republican, and that kind of work is for other people.

As a snap judgement, I'm totally cool with the guy who shot the man who killed his two sons. If some drunk driveer killed someone in my family, I'd want to barbecue his ass. But that isn't how civilized society operates. It can't do revenge justice. It takes into account the whole story. First of all, when you are drunk, your judgement is impaired. No one inebriated realizes how drunk he/she are. What if the guy had just found out his beloved wife was dying of cancer? What if he'd just lost his job? These aren't excuses for vehicular homicide, but it does paint a different picture than some mean son-of-a-bitch out to murder someone's two boys. We can't always count on our judicial system finding justice either. But it's a very slippery slope when we start imposing justice ourselves.

A truly sad story. My condolences to all.

@16,

Are you not aware that Walsh is a massive scumbag? I mean MASSIVE, and I'm not even referring to his personal life here. The fact that he's an unemployable loser who has rarely netted more than $40k a year AND has piled up hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt does not make me sympathetic. Someone that loserly ought to show a little humility now and then.

@19: The father could make a plausible plea of not guilty by reason of temporary insanity. Losing a child, let alone two, in such a traumatic manner, can tear people apart.

Getta load of Deadbeat Joe's accountant. Maybe he could afford his child support if you paid him for letting you suck his dick in this thread.