mjh's blog

Estate Tax Malarkey

Estate Tax Malarkey – FactCheck.org

Misleading ads exaggerate what the tax costs farmers, small businesses and “your family.”

Summary

In TV and radio ads two conservative groups greatly overstate the burden that the federal estate tax puts on heirs to a family farm or business.

One ad claims the federal estate tax “can bury your family in crippling tax bills,” which is untrue for nearly all of those who will see the ad, including the large majority of farm and business owners. Both ads claim the estate tax is a “double tax,” which is only partly true, and mostly false when it comes to very wealthy families.

We take no position on whether the estate tax should or should not be repealed permanently. The claims made in these one-sided ads, however, present a misleading picture of who is actually affected by the tax.

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Deep Throat’s Other Legacy

Deep Throat’s Other Legacy
By Colbert I. King

Felt’s devotion to J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI caused him, I believe, to place the bureau ahead of the Constitution and his own faithfulness to the Bill of Rights.

Felt’s Watergate heroics notwithstanding, he was also on board when the FBI’s series of covert action programs against Americans was well underway. He was a high FBI official when the bureau, arrogating unto itself the role of judge, jury and vigilante, trampled with impunity on the rights of citizens. Felt was there when the FBI sought to get teachers fired, when it tried to stop people from speaking on campus, when it prevented the distribution of books and newspapers and when it disrupted peaceful demonstrations and antiwar marches. Those shameful activities are cited in stark detail in Book III of the April 1976 Final Report of the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations With Respect to Intelligence Activities of the United States Senate.

In the name of protecting national security and preventing violence, the FBI tried to promote factionalism and violence between groups it regarded as domestic threats. It planted informants to spread false rumors, labeled innocent people as “snitches” and passed along derogatory information to the families and friends of investigative targets, sometimes through anonymous letters or telephone calls. These despicable actions were carried out under COINTELPRO, an FBI acronym for “counterintelligence program.”

Mark Felt knew all about it. …

[W]ithout talking to the prosecution, consulting the judge or conducting the customary Justice Department review, President Ronald Reagan, asserting that Felt and Miller were motivated by “high principle to bring an end to the terrorism that was threatening our nation,” pardoned the two high-ranking FBI officials.

To be sure, Mark Felt’s role as “Deep Throat” earned him a place in history. So, however, did his complicity in COINTELPRO, the FBI’s dirty little secret war against Americans.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/03/AR2005060301451.html?referrer=email

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Don’t Cry for the Beach

ABQjournal: All Dried Up: Beach Waterpark shuttered and for saleBy Charlotte Balcomb Lane, Journal Staff Writer

Every June since 1987, the lines snaking up the big blue slide at The Beach Waterpark have been a symbol of summer in Albuquerque.

Not this June.

The 17-acre water park located at Montaño and Interstate 25 is closed, and the property is for sale. Weeds are growing through cracks in the sidewalk, and the pools are empty and bleached in the sun.

Actually, the Beach has from the beginning been a symbol of our inability to accept we live in a desert with limited water.

When the Beach was announced 18 years ago, I sent a letter to the editor about the insanity. A client of mines scoffed, “we have an aquifer under the city that will last 1,000 years.” Now, he’s gone and so are the aquifer and the Beach.

By the way, I hope someone is doing a study of skin cancer rates among Beach patrons. mjh

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Republican Pirates

(washingtonpost.com)

Which president submitted the first Supreme Court justice nomination to be filibustered by the Senate?

In June 1968, Chief Justice Earl Warren announced his plans to retire before the end of Lyndon Johnson’s administration, to ensure that Richard Nixon would not be able to appoint Warren’s successor if Nixon won the November election. Johnson nominated Associate Justice Abe Fortas to the position in the hopes that the liberal judge could garner enough votes for a confirmation. However, a filibuster resulted and when the Senate failed to invoke cloture in October, Johnson withdrew the nomination.

The first filibuster of a Supreme Court nominee was by REPUBLICANS stalling to let a conservative Republican President appoint the next Justice. Remind them of this when they sputter and fume in the next couple of years. mjh

[filibuster: From Spanish filibustero, freebooter, from French flibustier, from Dutch vrijbuiter, pirate. from vrijbuit, plunder : vrij, free; see pr- in Indo-European Roots + buit, booty (from Middle Dutch bte, of Middle Low German origin).]

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Oppose Secret Meetings to Expand the Unamerican Patriot Act

This week. Tuesday, June 7, 2005, the Senate Intelligence Committee will be voting behind closed doors on a bill to expand the Patriot Act?s secret search powers. No matter the outcome in that Committee, your outreach in the coming weeks will be absolutely essential. Together, we can stop expansion, add new sunsets, and reform the Patriot Act.

There are significant flaws in the Patriot Act, flaws that threaten your fundamental freedoms by giving the government the power to access to your medical records, tax records, information about the books you buy or borrow without probable cause, and the power to break into your home and conduct secret searches without telling you for weeks, months, or indefinitely.

Some of these flawed provisions are set to expire at the end of the year. But President Bush wants to make them permanent, and the House and Senate have been holding hearings in preparation for votes that are expected this June and July.

The Patriot Act doesn?t have to be a fact of life. We have an opportunity to stop Congress from expanding government surveillance and removing proper checks and balances.

Take action today at: http://action.aclu.org/patriotactsunsets

Go to our website blog at www.aclu-nm-blog.org for New Mexico specific Patriot Act fact sheets.

Together we can make a difference and help keep America safe and free.

Residents of New Mexico are represented in Congress by 2 Senators and 3 Representatives.

Member Name
DC Phone
DC FAX
Email

Senator Pete V. Domenici (R- NM)
202-224-6621
202-228-0900
http://domenici.senate.gov/resources/contactform.cfm

Senator Jeff Bingaman (D- NM)
202-224-5521
202-224-2852
senator_bingaman@bingaman.senate.gov

Representative Heather A. Wilson (R – 01)
202-225-6316
202-225-4975
http://wilson.house.gov/Contact.asp

Representative Steve Pearce (R – 02)
202-225-2365
202-225-9599
http://www.house.gov/pearce/contact.shtml

Representative Thomas Udall (D – 03)
202-225-6190
202-226-1331
http://www.tomudall.house.gov/feedback.cfm?campaign=Udall&type=Helping%20You

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the Senate’s political math

Centrist Democrat a Test of GOP Hold By Charles Babington, Washington Post Staff Writer

As in recent elections, Democrats anxiously ponder the Senate’s political math, which does not favor them. The more Senate races tend to reflect presidential outcomes, the stronger it makes the GOP in the Senate. For example, Bush won 31 states last year. If Republicans hold all the Senate seats from those states, they will command the chamber 62 to 38, even if they lose their eight members from states that Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry won last November.

Last fall, Republicans won all five southern seats from which Democrats retired, and Democrats are desperate to reelect their incumbents in tough states next year. Topping the GOP’s target list are Nelson and Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota, where Bush took 63 percent of the vote last fall, only slightly lower than his 66 percent majority in Nebraska. …

Republicans say they have outside chances of ousting Democratic Sens. Robert C. Byrd (W.Va.) and Debbie Stabenow (Mich.) if they recruit the right challengers. Likewise, Democrats say they see vulnerability in Republican Sens. Mike DeWine (Ohio), Conrad Burns (Mont.) and James M. Talent (Mo.).

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