'Evil-mongers' Vs 'Crap-mongers'

U.S. Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada has a new word for those who attend town hall meetings to protest pending legislation:

Evil-Mongers!

Such "evil-mongers" are using "lies, innuendo and rumor," to drown out rational debate, Reid said.

Give me an example of "rational debate" and I might concede his point, but I've listened to a long list of congress-persons at their town hall events and I have seen very little actual debate. They want us to listen to them tell us that they know what they are doing, don't worry about the details, it's all in our best interest, the president and Congress are working very closely for the public good, blah, blah, blah.

Yet when asked the simplest question about a particular provision, they go into full defensive mode and claim that they are being hit with "lies, innuendo and rumor."

Enough of this horse manure! Under the Constitution of the United States, the people have a right to speak their minds and, horror of horrors, even ask tough questions of their elected representatives! If the elected reps don't want to answer, well, that's fine. Don't expect our support in the next election, Dingy Harry.

The same goes for Congressmen who won't even hold town halls, substituting instead "telephonic town halls" where they can control both who is in the "audience" and the questions. They can also disconnect you if you don't ask the right question. This technological cowardice is being employed by several elected officials, including 2nd Dist. Rep. Dan Boren of Oklahoma, who couldn't hold a real town hall meeting because he just had to join an "around the world" junket with a bunch of other congressmen.

Most people are a lot smarter than Washington gives them credit. We may not have all the facts at our disposal, and we may not have the gilded tongue of the politician to employ, but we know bull crap when we are confronted with it.

And we know a Crap-Monger when we hear him in action.

Gulfstreams for the Elite on Capitol Hill

No more commercial flights home for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The reports of her badgering the Air Force for free rides on executive class jets are legendary since she became Speaker of the House. On the few occasions where she has been told that no Gulfstream jets were available, she reportedly flew into tirades.

The fix, however, may be in.

Last year, lawmakers excoriated the CEOs of the Big Three automakers for traveling to Washington, D.C., by private jet to attend a hearing about a possible bailout of their companies.

But apparently Congress is not philosophically averse to private air travel: At the end of July, the House approved nearly $200 million for the Air Force to buy three elite Gulfstream jets for ferrying top government officials and Members of Congress.

The Air Force had asked for one Gulfstream 550 jet (price tag: about $65 million) as part of an ongoing upgrade of its passenger air service.

But the House Appropriations Committee, at its own initiative, added to the 2010 Defense appropriations bill another $132 million for two more airplanes and specified that they be assigned to the D.C.-area units that carry Members of Congress, military brass and top government officials.

Because the Appropriations Committee viewed the additional aircraft as an expansion of an existing Defense Department program, it did not treat the money for two more planes as an earmark, and the legislation does not disclose which Member had requested the additional money.

But we know, don't we!

The political class in Washington just doesn't get it. At a time when millions of Americans have lost their jobs, and many others take "under" employment just to get by, this Congress and the executive branch continue to spend like there's no tomorrow.

And if they keep going like this, there won't be.

Sure, another $200 million for three fancy jets is but a drop in the bucket of the national budget, but it makes a statement. We're important; you, not so much.

Remember the image of this elite jet. Remember how the auto chiefs were lambasted by lawmakers when they flew private jets to Washington, at Congress' demand, to testify.

Oh, the theatre! Oh, the drama!

Oh, the hypocrisy!

Another Reason You Can't Trust the Blue Dogs

Another reason you can't trust any "compromise" coming out of this Congress.

Abortion measure passes, then fails, in House

WASHINGTON — An anti-abortion amendment to a sweeping health overhaul bill was voted down in a House committee late Thursday — a dramatic reversal just hours after the measure initially was approved.

The amendment said health care legislation moving through Congress may not impose requirements for coverage of abortion, except in limited cases. It was approved in the Energy and Commerce Committee after conservative Democrats joined Republicans to support it.

But committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., invoked House rules that allowed him to bring up the amendment for a second vote, despite Republican objections.

This time, one conservative Democrat — Rep. Bart Gordon of Tennessee — changed his vote from "yes" to "no." And a second conservative Democrat who hadn't voted the first time — Rep. Zack Space of Ohio — voted "no."

It was enough to take down the amendment on a 30-29 vote.

How can you call Gordon and Space "conservative" when they voted to keep the abortion provisions in the health care legislation?

Yes, I know they identify themselves as Blue Dog Democrats, alleged conservatives, but if you support taxpayer funded abortions you really cannot call yourself a conservative. Not even a fiscal conservative.

Do not be fooled by these "Blue Dogs." They are not nearly as conservative as they pretend to be. They are stealth votes for the Progressive agenda. Their very presence in Congress keeps Nancy Pelosi, Henry Waxman, Barney Frank, and their ilk in power.

If the Blue Dogs won't work with conservative Republicans to stop taxpayer funded abortions, how hard will they work at anything else?

Egg-Sucking Blue Dogs & the ObamaCare Compromise

Back when I was growing up on the farm, I learned that there was a difference between dogs that could hunt, and dogs that would make a lot of noise but were generally lazy.

We didn't own these dogs. We had a fine watchdog that was a cross between Alaskan Husky and Border Collie. He kept the yapping rabble from the woods out of the yard around our house. But the hunting dogs visited us anyway. Often. Their owners would turn them loose of a night, and they would go baying across the countryside in search raccoons and possum.

The hunting dogs produced results for men who were genuinely hunting.

The others, the noisy, lazy ones, were generally the dogs of shiftless, beer-swilling men who claimed to be coon-hunters but in truth were just guys who liked to get away from home to swap ribald stories of loose women, lie about their exploits, and talk sports. Like most people, we didn't really care as long as they didn't leave their empties alongside our property.

But you could tell a difference in the dogs. The good hunting dogs were well fed, usually returned to their masters, and if they did wander by they were well behaved until someone came looking for them.

The dogs of the bull-tossers were often poorly fed, mistreated, and poorly behaved. They would often as not wind up in the henhouse where we would find them stealing eggs. Naturally they were penitent when they were caught, tails tucked between their legs, and they would flee as soon as you told them to "git." However, if you turned your back on them to soon, they would return to the property, and to the hen house.

Some people would shoot these dogs. My folks and I could never bring ourselves to that point, although they made us angry enough. Sometimes we'd load 'em into the pickup where we would drive them over to the property of one of the men we knew were involved with this kind of faux hunting. My dad said that they would get back to the original owners soon enough, because no one wanted to feed extra dogs, especially "the lazy SOBs who don't actually hunt."

I couldn't help but think of the two types of hunting dogs when I heard that the Blue Dog Democrats had reached a "compromise" on the health care reform bill with their fellow Democrats on Henry Waxman's committee.

The baying Blue Dogs have promised us that they are fiscally conservative men hunting for savings on our behalf. Well, according to the word from Waxman's committee, here's what they've accomplished:

First, they "won" a promise that ObamaCare won't be voted on for a few more weeks. They already had that one in the bag. This is a non issue.

Second, they claim that ObamaCare will not have a mandatory government plan but will be optional. That was already in the wording of the bill.

Third, on a bill that easily will cost $1.5 Trillion in its first 10 years, they've got Democrats to agree that a meager Point One Trillion in savings will be made in the cost, leaving us with "only" $1.4 Trillion to worry about. With that small egg from our hen house, these Blue Dogs congratulate themselves on a fine hunting expedition and toss in the white towel.

And they expect us to pet them behind the ears and feed them some more. Oh, yes; they expect our grateful vote in 2010.

Well, pardon the hell out of me, but what did I warn you about? I told you the Blue Dogs would sell us out, that they were merely looking for sufficient political cover so that they could tell us that they worked hard to "protect us" from those evil liberals on Capitol Hill, all the while seeing how many eggs they could suck from our hen house!

Those noisy hounds from my youth were worthless, and not worth shooting. So, too, with these "blue" hounds of the today's political world. You can't count on them to have principles, other than their own self-preservation. If we do not rid ourselves of them in November 2010, they will sneak back into our lives, and destroy our nest eggs, one by one.

A pro-ObamaCare columnist at the online version of the Kansas City Star noted that the Blue Dogs essentially gave President Obama a victory. You can read his valedictory here.

If the Pro-ObamaCare people know the truth, what is your excuse?

Getting Taxed Out the Butt

To paraphrase Harrison Ford in "The Mosquito Coast":

"Toilet paper is civilization."

Of course, he said "ice" and he made a good case for it, but I think affordable and plentiful toilet paper could just as easily qualify.

Others disagree, and if they prevail, you could well be taxed out the butt. Literally.

Someone inside EPA has brought to my attention how Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer has proposed legislation calling on a federal agency to define toilet paper.

Really. It says it right in the bill, the "Water Resources Protection Act" (I know, I know — you were expecting it to be called the Protecting Infrastructure and Sewer Systems Act):

‘‘SEC. 4172. DEFINITIONS AND SPECIAL RULE.

‘(b) WATER DISPOSAL PRODUCT. — For purposes of this subchapter —

(4) TOILET TISSUE. — The term ‘toilet tissue’ means toilet tissue, as determined under regulations prescribed by the Secretary."

No, it's not as silly as it sounds. It's sillier.

The rulemaking to define what rises to the level of a bottom-wipe is in the name of a good cause: to tax the stuff. The current band of feds don't think you've paid enough tax — this has been established ad nauseum — and now want a dedicated revenue, er, stream, to pay to replace corroded pipes and overburdened sewer sytems nationwide.

Believe it or not, Rep. Blumenauer is proposing a 3 percent excise tax on toilet paper, toothpaste, cosmetics and cooking oil because all of this stuff eventually goes down the drainpipe.

You may be wondering where in the U.S. Constitution it provides that the federal government worry about such things, but then you would be less focused on the ass-end of American life than certain congressmen.

Cap & Trade -- The Bill That Didn't Actually Exist

There were two almost equal sized camps inside the well of the House of Representatives Friday night following the vote on the Cap & Trade bill.

The winners slapped one another on the back and made wonderful pronouncements on what a marvelous piece of legislation it is, and how it will save humanity. The authors, Henry Waxman and Ed Markey, were given considerable credit for the bill-writing expertise.

The losers were much quieter, although there were those who pointed out that no one had had time to actually read the bill, which was reputed to be over 1,300 pages.

This morning, it was learned that not only was there no time to read the bill, there was no actual bill to read. The 310 pages of amendments that floated in at 4 a.m. Friday were never integrated into the original bill. As one critic suggested, "They didn't pass a bill, they passed a concept." Legally speaking, the "bill" doesn't exist.

John Hindraker at Powerline says this isn't the first time this has happened since Nancy Pelosi's team took over in 2007. "Disgraceful," he says.

David Freddoso at The Washington Examiner wonders who will be watching while the "amendments" are integrated into the original bill.

... they cannot be simply combined, because the amendment contains 300 pages of items like this: "Page 15, beginning line 8, strike paragraph (11)..." How many members of Congress do you suppose have gone through it all to see how it changes the bill?

Global Warming is apparently so urgent that we can't even wait until members of Congress know what they're voting on.

He quoted Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, who tried to get the chair to acknowledge there was no actual bill before the voting took place:

"If a bill for which there is no copy were to actually pass this body," Barton asked, "could the bill without a copy be sent to the Senate for its consideration?"

And could a bill without a copy be signed by the president?

Life in the New Progressive era of America is getting stranger and stranger.

This Guy is a Real Weiner

Earlier this week we noticed this congressman buddying up to Barney Frank.

Now he's claiming that the Iranians and Saudis don't want us to have Cap'n Tax. And that the Republicans are somehow in collusion with them.

Republicans are playing into the hands of the Iranian regime and the Saudi Arabian kingdom, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.) argued Friday.

Weiner said that Republicans' opposition to the climate change bill scheduled for a vote this afternoon benefits the oil-rich companies, which have been accused of funneling some of that money to terrorist groups.

"Ahmadinejad, the Saudi Kingdom — they want exactly what my Republican friends are advocating," Weiner said on the floor during the debate ahead of this afternoon's vote.

This is the kind of stuff for which Congress is famous: people making extremely asinine statements and making real "weiners" of themselves.

I wouldn't waste my time phoning him, but there are 435 other clowns to pick from.

And there's still time. Barely.

Cap'n Tax Survives First Key Vote in House

Cap'n Tax, the swashbuckling legislation designed to put Uncle Sam's hand on your tiller, survived a key test vote this morning in the House, 217 to 205, which means that it will come to a vote later today.

Have you called your congresspersons yet?

Thirty Democrats defected on this largely party line bill.

But not enough.

As usual, the White House is spouting lies.

"The bill contains provisions to protect consumers, keep costs low, help sensitive industries transition to a clean energy economy and promote domestic emission reduction efforts," the White House in a statement of support for the legislation.

Do they take us all for fools?

Not mentioned in the Associated Press report (surprise, surprise) is a 300-page "amendment" inserted into the bill in the wee hours of the night by Congressman Henry Waxman, co-author of the bill, which apparently no one has read.

The rule of law has been abandoned.

According to an outfit called SolveClimate.com, there are two amendments that will be considered today. One is Waxman's, which incorporates a compromise with farm state representatives that will give oversight of the carbon offsets to the Secretary of Agriculture instead of the Environmental Protection Agency.

This is supposed to guarantee that people like Congressman Dan Boren will support the bill.

People, bad is bad. The agriculture department is already talking plans to regulate everything that farmers do. The Secretary of Ag is appointed by the president and serves at his pleasure. Does anyone seriously think this is going to be enough protection for farmers? Wake up!

Big government is bad, pure and simple. Moving in that direction, under any plan, is a defeat for individual liberty and personal choice!

The second amendment, which doesn't have a chance of a snowball in hell, is from the Republicans, calling for scrapping Cap and Trade and replacing it with a "Manhattan Project" for Energy Independence. Sounds good, but the devil is in the details.

Maybe Satan can examine that snowball while it melts.

Congressional Hot-Dogging

Barney Frank is meddling with Fannie and Freddie. Again.

And this time Frank has a sidekick, Rep. Tony Weiner.

Seriously. Frank & Weiner. You can't make this stuff up.

(Reuters) - Two U.S. Democratic lawmakers want Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to relax recently tightened standards for mortgages on new condominiums, saying they could threaten the viability of some developments and slow the housing-market recovery, the Wall Street Journal said.

In March, Fannie Mae ... said it would no longer guarantee mortgages on condos in buildings where fewer than 70 percent of the units have been sold, up from 51 percent, the paper said. Freddie Mac ... is due to implement similar policies next month, the paper said.

In a letter to the CEO's of both companies, Representatives Barney Frank, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, and Anthony Weiner warned that a 70 percent sales threshold "may be too onerous" and could lead condo buyers to shun new developments, according to the paper.

I'm not sure of the merits of their argument, but I am 100 percent sure that government meddling into mortgages got us into a huge mess over the last decade, and that Barney Frank was smack dab in the middle of it.

HR 1966: It Could Get a Bit Bumpy, Folks!

Blogosphere colleagues, in the words of St. Mick, "Here comes your 19th Nervous Breakdown." (Via Eugene Volokh):

Federal Felony To Use Blogs, the Web, Etc. To Cause Substantial Emotional Distress Through "Severe, Repeated, and Hostile" Speech?

Otherwise known as House Resolution 1966 by Reps. Linda Sanchez and 14 others.

Whoever transmits in interstate or foreign commerce any communication, with the intent to coerce, intimidate, harass, or cause substantial emotional distress to a person, using electronic means to support severe, repeated, and hostile behavior, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both....

["Communication"] means the electronic transmission, between or among points specified by the user, of information of the user's choosing, without change in the form or content of the information as sent and received; ...

["Electronic means"] means any equipment dependent on electrical power to access an information service, including email, instant messaging, blogs, websites, telephones, and text messages.

Eugene gives us six broad scenarios of how this law would work in practice, none of them pretty.

The good news is that he believes the courts would strike the law as overly broad.

What are Rep. Linda Sanchez and the others thinking here? Are they just taking the view that "criminalize it all, let the prosecutors sort it out"? Even if that's so, won't their work amount to nothing, if the law is struck down as facially overbroad -- as I'm pretty certain it would be? Or are they just trying to score political points here with their constituents, with little regard to whether the law will actually do any good? I try to focus my posts mostly on what people do, not on their motives, but here the drafting is so shoddy that I just wonder why this happened.

The bad news is that someone would of necessity have to be the guinea pig, the test case.

It may be time to do a testosterone check soon.

Wheeling & Dealing for Cap'n Trade Votes

After reading this, I feel like the entire country, me included, could use a good shower:

To get votes, Waxman offers cap-and-trade breaks

In exchange for votes to pass a controversial global warming package, Democratic leaders are offering some lawmakers generous emission “allowances” to protect their districts from the economic pain of pollution restrictions.

Rep. Gene Green, D-Texas, represents a district with several oil refineries, a huge source of greenhouse gas emissions. He also serves on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which must approve the global warming plan backed by President Barack Obama.

Green says Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., who heads the panel, is trying to entice him into voting for the bill by giving some refineries favorable treatment in the administration’s “cap and trade” system, which is expected to generate hundreds of billions of dollars over the coming years. Under the plan, companies would pay for the right to emit carbon dioxide, but Green and other lawmakers are angling to get a free pass for refineries in their districts.

“We’ve been talking,” Green said, referring to a meeting he had with Waxman on Tuesday night. “To put together a bill that passes, they have to get our votes, and I’m not going to vote for a bill without refinery allowances.”

Naturally, Waxman denies this is happening.

“That is what the Republicans are saying, but that is not accurate,” he said. The bill left out specifics on allowances “in order to be able to have discussions on how best to ease the transition for various geographical regions and ratepayers.”

Notice, however, that Rep. Green is a Democrat.

Even some environmentalists are taking a critical second look at cap-and-trade, wondering whether we will end up with a dirtier environment after the program is enacted because the dollars involved are so massive that there will be closet deals, fraud and waste.

If the command-and-control environmental policies of other socialist countries are an indication, you bet.

Health Care Reform to be Rammed Through in Budget Deal

The New York Times reports that Congress will ram health care reform through by using the "budget reconciliation" process in order to minimize debate, eliminate potential amendments and avoid filibuster.

That means the American people have virtually no chance of knowing in advance anything substantive on how this is going to change our lives, nor will we have a chance to stop it.

Budget reconciliation means that the entire health care reform apparatus will be inserted at the House-Senate conference, and then the two houses vote on the entire budget. There is little chance that lawmakers, especially since most of them are enthusiastic progressives or, like the Blue Dogs, controlled by them, will vote against the overall budget because of health care.

Both parties have used this budget reconciliation tactic to blunt the opposition since the process was "invented" in 1974. As David Freddoso at National Review explains:

Reconciliation, originally designed in the 1974 Budget Act as a means for helping the government save money and keep federal budgets closer to balance, allows for certain legislation to pass both houses of Congress on an expedited basis — and perhaps most importantly, to pass the Senate with a bare majority.

It was also meant to make Congress more efficient, something our Founding Fathers were loathe to consider. They feared efficient government, and for the same reason we should fear it now.

I initially thought we might survive the first two years of a liberal Obama/Congress tandem with our Republic intact, enough anyway to elect enough conservatives in 2010 so that 2011 might open on a more hopeful note. Now I am not sure there will be enough individual liberty left to be worth saving.

A Reading Disability

EPA director Lisa Jackson testified Wednesday that she hadn't actually read the text of a bill she was promoting in a congressional committee appearance. I like the way Chris Horner described her testimony:

"I haven't read it -- but it's a great bill!"

Don't you think it's time members of Congress actually read and study the bills they are being asked to vote for? Especially when we are being threatened with a complete restructing of life as we know it? And shouldn't that also include the people who testify on behalf, or against, a piece of legislation?

Right now, the Obama Administration is trying to force a congressional stampede in favor of the Carbon Cap-and-Trade Tax legislation by threatening to use the EPA to mandate something even worse, if that were possible. Remarks Horner:

We've seen two major overreaches by the Democrats — the budget's cap-and-trade revenue stunt, and now this bill. The administration has painted itself into a corner with the "endangerment" threat: "We'll do something really disastrous to the economy unless you agree to do it first!" Now, either acting means they both lose — mutually assured political destruction, which is why they are desperately seeking to have their bacon saved.

A bit later today I want to talk about the actual cost of "cap and trade" to the average American family.

Blue Dogs Acting Like Lap Dogs on Spending

How are the Blue Dogs doing in Congress in terms of trimming spending and making sure that huge liberal/progressive majorities do not run roughshod over personal liberty?

There are 51 congressmen who identify themselves as Blue Dogs, including Oklahoma Second District Rep. Dan Boren. (How do I know this? They have a website. ) They claim they've “been particularly active on fiscal issues, relentlessly pursuing a balanced budget and then protecting that achievement from politically popular ‘raids’ on the budget.” This "relentless pursuit" sounds more like Don Quixote than Lexus, don't you think, considering we've had the Porkulus, Son of Porkulus and Obama's $3.7 trillion budget since the new term began in January.

Since many of these Blue Dogs asked for our votes in 2006 and 2008 based on the claim that they could more effectively represent our values by working within the Democratic Party majority than the Republican incumbents they replaced, it only makes sense that we should hold them accountable for their votes.

Michael G. Franc, vice-president of government relations at the Heritage Foundation, examined the nine major votes in the House that dealt with the release of the second half of the TARP funds, the expansion of SCHIP, the economic-stimulus package, the omnibus spending bill, the expansion of government funding for volunteer activities, and the FY2010 budget. He used Rep. Barney Frank as the big spending measuring stick; each one of Frank's votes was for greater spending. (Frank missed one vote, so Rep. Barbara Lee of California was the substitute vote for big spending.)

Using this Big Government Scale of Spending, how did the Blue Dogs stack up?

-- 11 Blue Dogs voted 100 percent with Barney.

-- 10 voted with Barney 8 out of 9 times.

-- 11 voted with Barney 7 out of 9 times.

-- 6 voted with Barney 6 out of 9 times.

If you're keeping score, a whopping 38 of 51 of these "fiscally conservative" Blue Dogs voted with the big spenders on 67 percent or more of these bills. That's 75 percent of the Blue Dogs.

That's not Blue Dog fiscal conservatism. That's pathetic yellow lap-dog behavior.

It gets worse. Only six Blue Dogs voted against the spending on more than half of the 9 bills, and four of those were freshmen congressmen, which means they will probably cave in to pressure from the liberal establishment in another year or so. Who are the true Blue Dogs? They are Bobby Bright (Ala.), Parker Griffith (Ala.), Frank Kratovil (Md.), Walt Minnick (Idaho), Colin Peterson (Minn.), and Gene Taylor (Miss.).

Okay, you've been waiting for it: How did fearless Dan Boren fare?

Our intrepid budget battler voted with Barney Frank on six of the nine spending bills. Yes, indeedy! He claims to be one of us, but he's sure looking like one of them!

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that you should always trust a Republican over a Democrat, or that Blue Dogs can't do good work. Big spending is as big spending does. A politician who won't put principle over party is valuable to the party but not to the American republic.

It's time We the People (WTP) quit voting by party and starting really quizzing candidates about what they really believe. Any candidate who merely claims that "I'm with you fellers" isn't worth a spit, and flag-waving allegiance to the Second Amendment alone isn't going to be much help when the government takes control of major portions of our economy because we spent the dollar into oblivion.

There are big votes coming up this year, earth-shattering pieces of legislation that effect energy, health care, farming, transportation, and without exception they are all designed to decrease our freedom and increase our cost of living. Even if the Blue Dogs rally in opposition it is not likely they can stop the Progressive Express from radically changing our nation.

At this point, given their performance so far, I'm not sure they should even save their jobs.

The Bonus Tax Passes the House as Cowardice Prevails

There's an old adage: "There's never enough time to do something right, but there's always time to go back and fix it."

I don't think this applies to most actions of Congress.

Unfortunately, here "they" go again, passing H.R. 1586 -- to tax bonuses given by companies like AIG that received federal bailout money at 90 percent -- by a margin of 328-93.

Democrats supported the bill 243 to 6. Republicans initially opposed the measure but, cowardly fingers to the political winds, by the time the roll call was closed 85 Republicans supported the bill and 87 opposed it. (Individual vote breakdowns are not available just yet, but I am anxious to see how the Oklahoma delegation voted.)

Why 90 percent tax? Why not 100 percent?

Rep. Charles Rangel, a New York Democrat, chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, said he expected local and state governments to take the remaining 10 percent of the bonuses, nullifying the payouts.

Rangel said the bill would apply to mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, among others, while excluding community banks and other smaller companies that have received less bailout money.

Rangel is openly inviting state and local governments to belly up to the trough. Notice that some bonus recipients are more equal than others under this rushed, unconstitutional abortion of a law. Many observers believe that the legislation creates an unconstitutional Bill of Attainder. The bill doesn't even cover all bonuses, only those going to companies receiving more than $5 billion and only on those people who make more than $250,000 in adjusted gross income. It is very narrowly targeted!

I find the Associated Press report reprehensible in that it doesn't even mention the potential unconstitutionality of the bill. Instead, they quote a "corporate tax lawyer" in New York saying that of course it's okay to narrowly craft this sort of bill. It's an odd quote since the lawyer is defending a charge that the AP refuses to acknowledge in print.

But the Washington Times has more integrity, and spine:

But the tightly targeted tax bill, which places a special federal tax on bonus money given out since Jan. 1, could face constitutional questions over the use of the taxing power to override legal contracts and to target retroactively a specific group of taxpayers. [SNIP]

Rep. Joe Wilson, South Carolina Republican, called the tax bill "an unconstitutional joke of a bill."

Legal scholars are divided on the constitutionality of the tax measure, but critics called it a bill of attainder — a punitive, targeted tax specifically forbidden by the constitution.

"It basically targeted on a small group of people," Sen. Judd Gregg, New Hampshire Republican, told the Bloomberg News service.

The Republican website, GOP.gov, had this to say:

By legislatively imposing a tax penalty on employees that were given bonus payments by TARP recipients, some Members may be concerned that the underlying bill may violate the Constitutional prohibition on bills of attainder. Article 1, Section 9, Clause 3, states that "No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed." A bill of attainder is an act passed by a state or federal legislature that punishes a specific person or group without a trial. In determining whether a piece of legislation violates the constitutional prohibition against bills of attainder, the Supreme Court generally tests whether the act specifies a group of people, contains a punishment specifically for that group of people, and does not require a trial. Given that criteria, this legislation could be ruled unconstitutional for imposing a tax penalty on a specific group of individuals.

It's a shame that 85 Republican, who could have blocked this bill by staying true to their principles, chose instead to run with the mob. The good news is that the U.S. Senate must still vote on this, an event that won't take place until April when cooler heads may prevail.

Now you may ask yourself, "Why does Dave give a rat's behind whether these bonuses get taxed away?"

And you may ask yourself, "Does his beautiful wife work for AIG?"

But you should ask yourself, "My God, next time it could be me they're attacking with a 90 percent tax."

We never should have given bailout money to begin with, last fall when Mr. Bush and Treasury Secretary Paulson were telling us the sky was falling. Mr. Obama and Mr. Geithner have not only embraced bailouts, they've gotten creative and added new layers of spending only dreamed of by the Bush team.

It is wrong and it will be the death of our economy, if not our political system.

But wrong also is shredding the Constitution in order to punish people for accepting bonuses they were promised by contract and that were protected in previous federal legislation.

Your Bonus or Your Life ...

The head of AIG testified Wednesday that death threats against executives (and their family members) have been received over the controversial bonuses. He refused to give their names to Rep. Barney Frank, saying that public disclosure might well put these people in harms way. Frank, the ever-sensitive guy, said he would consider issuing subpoenas for them.

Well, Congressman Gary Ackerman, 5th District New York, has the answer for solving the dilemma. On Neil Cavuto's TV show yesterday, he said, (courtesy of Jonah Goldberg at NRO's Corner):

But, certainly, the point of finding out who has taken this money - - listen, we own 80 percent of that company right now. From my — as far as I am concerned, they are almost public employees. Public employees, we have — we can have certain requirements on them.

If they return the money, then I don't think anybody has to know who they are or what their names are.

So that's the choice. Face 90 percent taxation from patently unconstitutional legislation, or face congressional extortion. Just great.

Who are these clowns in charge?