Wednesday, September 29, 2010

ARE WE BEING RUN BY ARSEHOLES?

I managed to take time off between GD extensions to write a post (I am making progress on the GDEs).

While I was in Long Beach Island THE DAILY SHOW had a bit that asked the question “Are We Being Run By Arseholes?”. The answer they came up with was an obvious “Yes”. This is something I have known for quite some time now.

The bit concerned the attempt to repeal the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy of the military. But it could just have easily referred to extending the AMT patch.

The bottom line – Congress cannot do anything simply. If they want to pass a popular bill – say to repeal DA/DT (according to TDS supported by 82% of Democrats and 64% of Republicans) - instead of drafting and voting on a bill that simply says “The policy of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell is repealed” they have to tack it on to another bill, in this case a military spending bill, have one party’s attempt to add 20 less popular amendments blocked by the other, add an even less popular provision regarding illegal immigrants, and filibuster.

The bottom line – with all this mucking fess the bill did not pass and DA/DT is still in place.

We are being run by arseholes!

Further proof of this, and the fact that these arseholes are not confined to the halls of Congress –

Professor Annette Nellen’s post “Make Room on the Shelf - One More Tax Reform Report” at 21st CENTURY TAXATION discusses the recent report of BO’s blue-ribbon tax reform panel –

the 100+ page report won't get much attention and it really doesn't add anything new to the tax reform debate.”

True this new report really did not say anything new – but at least it highlighted (or re-highlighted) the problems with the Tax Code and could have been used as a starting point for a serious discussion of tax reform by the Administration and Congress.

But no, just like the report issued by Dubya’s blue-ribbon panel, the report of BO’s panel will now gather dust on the shelf in the archives – never to be seen or heard of again. The members of the panel’s valuable time was totally wasted – as was mine, and many others like me, who prepared and submitted serious and lengthy comments on tax reform proposals to the panel.

Why do they ask for reports like this if they are going to totally ignore them? We are being run by arseholes.

TTFN

2 comments:

Nick said...

it's true that the tax code is larger than the bible correct? that's just scary, they could put whatever they want in there and it would take years for anyone to find it!

Peter Reilly said...

I'm pretty sure if you took the Code as amended at any point in time, its considerably shorter than the bible. The political process ends up not only considering what the majority thinkgs, but also the intensity of feelings of some minority opinions. People with extreme views have more influence on who gets nominated and people with moderate have more influence on who gets elected.