Tag: earmarks

An Interview with Adlai Stevenson III: Part Five, The Death of Congressional Sanity

In this final section, I’ll cover the portion of our talk in which we discussed the differences and distinctions in government between the House and Senate.  Stevenson was a first-hand witness to their devolution for eleven years while a member of the Senate.  Having won a special election in 1970 to serve out the remainder of a term vacated when a Senator died in office, Stevenson then won a full term in his own right.  By its conclusion, burned out and disillusioned, he decided that nearly two full terms was enough for him.  He instead returned to his home state of Illinois, preparing to run for Governor.  That is quite a story in and of itself, and one I will leave for those who wish to read his new book, again titled simply, The Black Book.

US Senate to defy Rules of Gravity! Spitting Into the Wind now OK! UPDATED

The US Senate has been quite complacent lo these past couple of years since the Democrats took over the Leadership(?) of the Senate.  FISA? check.  

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards a terrorist organization? check.  

No Change of Course in Iraq? check

Impeachment of Officials for lies, torture, myriad other illegal dealings?  No Check Here

Today, the US Senate may (note the word MAY) look to request a Federal Investigation into the changing of wording regarding an earmark installed into a 2005 Highway Funding bill, after the bill had been passed and before it was sent to President Bush.

From CNN:

The Senate may seek a federal investigation into a 2005 earmark on a highway funding bill that was mysteriously altered after Congress approved the measure but before President Bush signed it.

Republic’s Patron Saint McSame to offer more of the Same

Well, Saint McSame has some good news and some bad news for Americans.  I would love to do a “first the good news and then the bad news” sort of diary, but with McSame, it is all bad news for those of us that pay attention to current events once again.

From CNN:

An end to earmarks, a gas-tax holiday, government-backed mortgages — they’re all part of GOP Sen. John McCain’s “big and ambitious” plan to revive a flailing economy, a top aide said Tuesday.

OK.  Big and ambitious usually means someone is making money, and that someone isn’t you or me.  Hmmmmmmm.  Could it be Corporations again?  You make the call.

The senator from Arizona is proposing an income tax system that offers two basic rates and a “generous standard deduction,” according to his prepared remarks. McCain is proposing letting Americans choose between the new system and the present one.

“Americans do not resent paying their rightful share of taxes — what they do resent is being subjected to thousands of pages of needless and often irrational rules and demands” from the Internal Revenue Service, he will say. “We are going to create a new and simpler tax system — and give the American people a choice.”

The presidential candidate also will call for doubling the federal income tax for dependents, from $3,500 to $7,000.