Quote:
Originally Posted by Villages Kahuna
News reports this morning are that some members of Congress are attempting to attach earmarks to the bailout legislation being negotiated. But even more disturbing is the reported attempt by the Republican caucus in the House to add a capital gains tax decrease to the bailout language being drafted.
Maybe it's just "politics" to take advantage of a situation where legislative action is desperately needed to tack on other, extraneous items that are personal "favorites" of legislators or groups of legislators, knowing that the proposals won't pass on their own.
Our system is broken and needs to be fixed.
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Members from both parties are attempting to add riders to this bail-out bill, and this is a common practice. Singling out this one instance may be accurate in facts, but limiting as to all of the facts. What other pork may find itself attached at the end, if the bill does get passed, may be shocking to all of us.
The alternative to such action is the line item veto. Presidents want it, Congress doesn't want to authorize it, and even if passed by Congress, the Supreme Court may weigh in and throw it out. So, the line item veto would need probably need a Constitutional Amendment (very unlikely to happen) to occur.
That's the system - and that's how to fix it.