Lawmakers Argue Over Tax-Return Snooping

WASHINGTON -- A skeleton crew of lawmakers voted Wednesday to keep the government from shutting down as House Democrats lambasted Republicans over a provision passed last week that both parties agreed was a turkey.

The dispute was over language buried in a $388 billion spending bill letting leaders of Congress' Appropriations committees examine income tax returns. Both parties favor killing the tax return idea before it becomes law and the Senate has voted to do so, but Democrats blocked a House vote until Dec. 6.

That delay gave Democrats more time to criticize majority Republicans for inserting the measure and for using their muscle to ram bills through Congress with little chance for lawmakers to learn what is in them. The overall bill and accompanying documents stood 3,646 pages tall on lawmakers' desks when they approved it Saturday.

The measure was completed in round-the-clock negotiations so exhausting that Rep. David Obey, D-Wis., said Wednesday that two aides fainted from sleeplessness. He said such procedures are hurting Congress' credibility with the public.

http://www.newsday.com/news/politics/wire/sns-ap-tax-return-disclosure,0,5049129.story?coll=sns-ap-politics-headlines

Far as I can see, the first time they ran a slow clock on a bill the GOP surrendered any claim to legitimacy, let alone this Delay bullshit.

I think the US public has a very good, very clear understanding of what Congress is all about in the Era of the GOP.

Isn't it ironic that the only part of Gingroach's Contract with AMerica that didn't get into law was the term limits thing? Go figure.

they conveniently forgot all about that one too.

or so the are claiming. An aide put it in. an IRS employee put it in. The fucking janitor threw it into the bill. Somebody, anybody,(well any white male, I'd bet, would think they could) can get something, anything, passed in this congress. Ridiculous.

you know.

http://www.istook.com/

Frist now claims he misspoke in calling it that, a Freudian slip, perhaps.

But in doing so they are now claiming "Ah-yuck, garsh, we doesnt know who put that language in there" which, if true, is the scary part to me.

A stupid excuse for a stupid bill.

expected that it would become bad PR in the media so when it got unexpected attention, they simply lied knowing that big media wasn't going to persue it very long (since GE, Murdoch, etc are in their pockets). And really, if big media doesn't cover something it never happened with most folks.

:bounce:

Ronnie Earle who indicted DeLay's co-conspiritors. I htought Delay was threatening Earle with personal finance snooping and a vendetta.

a House Democrat for this. After all, no one knows how it got in there, might have been a Dem, right? If a GOP member went on Faux News today and accused a Dem, the echo chamber would have him tried and convicted before the Sunday talk shows...

Not that the GOP needs any ideas from me...