Friday, October 3, 2008

Congress to America: Eat More Pork!!!!!

A partial list of the continued porking of America by the leadership in the House and Senate. Shame to everyone on both sides of the aisle who voted for this Oinker. Some of what the “Bailout” is used for:

Manufacturers of kids' wooden arrows - $6 million
Puerto Rican and Virgin Is- lands rum producers - $192 million.
Wool research.
Auto-racing tracks - $128 million.
Corporations operating in American Samoa - $33 million.
Small- to medium-budget film and television productions - $10 million
$223 million package of tax benefits for fishermen and others whose livelihoods suffered as a result of the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill

$3.8 billion health-care provision that forces insurance companies to provide coverage for mental-health treatment equivalent to the coverage they provide for physical illness.

Allows employers to provide a benefit to employees for costs associated with bicycle commuting, including purchase and repair of a bicycle, bicycle improvements, and bicycle storage. This provision is estimated to cost $10 million.

Provision allowing for deductions related to the charitable donation of “apparently wholesome food”—defined as food intended for human consumption that meets all quality and labeling standards imposed by law and regulations even though the food may not be readily marketable. The cost is $149 million, according to Joint Committee on Taxation.

Allows residents of states that don’t pay income tax to deduct, from their federal taxes, sales tax paid over the course of the year. States that benefit include Texas, Nevada, Florida, Washington and Wyoming. The bailout bill extends this provision for 2 years at a cost of $3.3 billion.

Secure Rural Schools provision sponsored by Reps. DeFazio (D-OR), Bill Sali (R-ID); Sens. Wyden (D-OR), Larry Craig (R-ID) The original version of this provision was estimated to cost $2.2 billion. To give the package more heft, Payment In Lieu of Taxes (PILT) was added to the package, bringing the total cost to $3.3 billion.

2 comments:

kkdither said...

So when the political commercials condemn a candidate for voting in what appears to be an immoral way... on what appears to be a totally common sense issue, bear in mind that there probably was a huge "oinker" attached. It could be that morals and good sense made them vote that way. Well... maybe.

hale-bopp said...

Yes, kk. Don't watch legislation being made, just like hot dogs.

When you hear that a candidate voted for something x times, well, that could include a lot of votes on the same bill as different amendments are offered. People sometimes vote against provisions in a bill (or amendments to a bill) but still end up voting for the final product if they feel it contains more good items than bad. Is that an unprincipled flip flop or a reasonable compromise? Depends on who you are attacking or defending. If you don't know what I am talking about, well, you haven't been fact checking the debates!

Even the most famous one, John Kerry's "I voted before it before I voted against it" wasn't the same bill...it had been amended (bonus points for anyone who knows what the amendment was that made him switch his vote). Therefore, he changed his vote. Makes sense to me. Unfortunately, he gave a stupid statement about it which was easy to latch onto rather than a good explanation of the vote.

That is why it is easier for a governor or young Rep or Senator to run...they have a smaller (or non-existent for Governors) voting record for people to dig through to find these things.