Reading this morning’s excellent Tax Analysts publication Tax Notes Today, this headline caught my eye: “Graves Says Death Should Not Be Taxable.” Tax headlines can be funny even if they don’t mean to be.

Seems there’s this Congressman whose name is Sam Graves. He’s a Republican from Missouri – the show me state. He’s also the ranking member of the House Small Business Committee, which yesterday held a hearing on the federal estate tax. We’re going to hear a lot more about the federal estate tax because it is set to expire (pun intended – why not join in) for one year starting next year. That bit of absurd tax policy comes from tricksters like Congressman Graves who went on a marketing campaign several years ago to kill the federal estate tax by calling it the “death tax.” That campaign really ticked me off – in part because it was like trying to sell a Pinto as a sports car and in part because it worked, sort of.

According to Congressman Graves, “Death should not be a taxable event. The notion that the federal government is owed anything upon the death of a family member is outrageous.”

You know what’s really outrageous? That guys like this get away with continuing to call the federal estate tax the death tax.

So, one more time, Congressman: IT’S NOT A DEATH TAX! Get it? It’s a tax on the transfer of an estate. BIG DIFFERENCE! And most estates will never be affected by it. You and your friends get a lot of mileage out of your false advertising, but it’s still false advertising.