Charles Rangel should be in jail right now for tax evasion.

If he was a Republican or just anyone else other than a Dem politician, he would be in jail and paying fines till the end of time because of hiding assets.

Representative Charles B. Rangel failed to report hundreds of thousands of dollars in income and assets on his financial disclosure forms for 2002 through 2006, including tens of thousands of dollars in rental income from a Harlem brownstone he sold in 2004, according to records filed this month with the clerk of the House of Representatives. Mr. Rangel, who is facing investigations by two House subcommittees into his personal finances and fund-raising, filed amended financial disclosure forms on Aug. 12 acknowledging that he had omitted an array of assets, business transactions and sources of income. They include a Merrill Lynch Global account valued between $250,000 and $500,000; tens of thousands of dollars in municipal bonds; and $30,000 to $100,000 in rent from a multifamily brownstone building he owned on West 132nd Street.

Update: Democrats say Rangel is safe. No surprise the Congressional Black Caucus will vow to protect him because the color of your skin is a helluva lot more important than your actions to them.

But unless the Ethics Committee probes hit Rangel with something more than a slap on the wrist -- or a bigger scandal arises -- Democrats are unlikely to push him off the Ways and Means Committee, a Washington insider said. "He doesn't strike me as someone who would go quietly, and he's not afraid to play the race card on his own party," the DC source said. Friends like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, members of the Congressional Black Caucus and the New York delegation are committed to keeping Rangel in place, sources said. "Unless he's done something absolutely insane that hasn't come out yet, he's protected," said a Democratic official.