on the spending package

[sisyphusshrugged]

the Washington Times on the Republicans' attempt to sneak fishing expeditions through IRS records for committee chairmen into a spending bill

The spending bill, a conglomeration of nine overdue appropriations bills, passed the House 344-51 with 27 Republicans and 24 Democrats voting against it, then passed the Senate 65-30, with six Republicans, 23 Democrats and one independent voting against it.

But the measure stalled for hours in the Senate after staffers discovered that the bill, which runs thousands of pages, includes a provision that would allow the appropriations committees to grant access to anyone's IRS tax forms to anybody the committee chairmen chose.

While promising to pass another resolution to remove the provision, Senate committee Chairman Ted Stevens, Alaska Republican, apologized.

"It's more than a mistake, it's a terrible disaster," he said, adding that it was a provision stuck in by some staffers and never seen, much less agreed to, by the senators or House members. The Senate then unanimously passed a brief bill to strip the offending language, but it must await House passage next week.

In the meantime, the spending bill will be kept in the Capitol to ensure it is not signed into law by the president. Congress passed a temporary bill to keep the government open until then.

Well, sort of, in the sense of not really. Sen. Stevens of Alaska, the alpha pig at the federal tit, wasn't embarrassed a bit. He fought to have the law signed as written.

"This is a serious situation,'' said Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska. "Neither of this were aware that this had been inserted in this bill,'' he said, referring to himself and House Appropriations Committee Chairman Bill Young, R-Fla.

Questioned sharply by fellow Republicans as well as Democrats, Stevens pleaded with the Senate to approve the overall spending bill despite the tax returns language.

But Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., said that wasn't good enough. "It becomes the law of the land on the signature of the president of the United States. That's wrong.''

Conrad said the measure's presence in the spending bill was symptomatic of a broader problem - Congress writing legislation hundreds of pages long and then giving lawmakers only a few hours to review it before having to vote on it.

Stevens, who repeatedly apologized for what he characterized as an error, took offense at Conrad's statement. "It's contrary to anything that I have seen happen in more than 30 years on this committee,'' he said.

Pounding on his desk, Stevens said he had given his word and so had Young that neither would use the authority to require the IRS to turn over individual or corporate tax returns to them. "I would hope that the Senate would take my word. I don't think I have ever broken my word to any member of the Senate.''

"... Do I have to get down on my knees and beg,'' he said.

Both Young and Stevens will cede their chairmanships when the new Congress elected earlier this month takes office in January.

Some Democrats didn't accept the assertion that the provision was a mistake and demanded an investigation.

"We weren't born yesterday, we didn't come down with the first snow,'' said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. "This isn't poorly thought out, this was very deliberately thought out and it was done in the dead of night.''

Members of the tax-writing Senate Finance Committee and House Ways and Means Committee now have limited access to tax returns, but there are severe criminal and civil penalties if the information is disclosed or misused.

the we didn't know, it was a staffer thing isn't exactly true either

House leadership aides said the controversy was a knee-jerk reaction to a misunderstanding of the provision, which was inserted by Rep. Ernest Istook, R-Okla., whose House Appropriations subcommittee oversees the IRS.

"It was not any surprise," said John Scofield, spokesman for the House Appropriations Committee.

"The Senate was in the room when it was negotiated."

The provision, written by the IRS, was intended to give top appropriators the same oversight authority now afforded to leaders of the House Ways and Means Committee, Scofield said.

He added that in two instances, the House Appropriations Committee was denied access to IRS facilities even though the panel oversees spending.

Maybe the Chair of the Agriculture Committee should be allowed unfettered access to fishing expeditions in IRS files with no privacy protections and no penalties for disclosure too.

After all, I'm guessing all the folks at the IRS eat.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

You know, if this weren't so serious, I'd laugh at their gall. I have to admire that level of shamelessness.

[snuh.livejournal.com]

Here in San Diego, there's a cross on top of scenic Mt. Soledad, it was built in the 1920's.

For over decade, atheist organizations and civil libertarians have argued it was illegal display and the courts agreed.

After November 2nd, amidst talk of a new era of *moral* values was word Washington was coming to the rescue of the Christian community - who would've guessed these Friends of Rummy had the time, after throwing a monkey-wrench into the spending bill that effectively gutted the 9-11 Commission's recommendations for change?:

Congress acts to save cross

Congress last night joined the fight to keep the Mount Soledad cross in place by naming it a national veterans memorial.

The designation, inserted by two local congressmen in a voluminous spending bill that requires President Bush's approval, raises more questions about the fate of the symbol that has been at the center of an emotional 15-year legal battle.

Christian activists hailed the development yesterday. Civil libertarians, however, said it would not stop a plan to move the cross from city land in La Jolla to comply with a federal court injunction that has been on hold since 1991.

The fate of the cross has been uncertain since two atheists and a group called the Society of Separationists sued the city in 1989. They successfully argued the cross's presence violated the state constitution's "no-preference clause" that prohibits religious symbols on public land.

Reps. Duncan Hunter, R-El Cajon, and Randy "Duke" Cunningham, R-Escondido, inserted the designation.

Assuming Bush signs the spending bill, the cross, estimated to be between 29 and 43 feet high, and a surrounding set of granite walls and plaques honoring veterans would become part of the national park system. That is, if the city agrees to donate the land.

Philip Paulson, an atheist who has continued the legal challenge, declined to say what effect Congress' move might have on his lawsuit. But he did comment on the political developments in his first public remarks in years.

"Jihad Jesus Republicans need to understand that the separation of church and state has kept this country from getting into religious wars," Paulson said. "... If God was powerful, there would not be a need for the government to go in and force a religious agenda on nonbelieving citizens."

Federal judges declared unconstitutional the city's sale of the landmark and the ground around it in 1994 and again in 1998 because the transfers favored a group that wanted to preserve the cross.

On Nov. 2, voters shot down Proposition K, a plan to authorize a new sale of the cross to cure the constitutional violation. In placing the measure on the ballot, the City Council agreed to move the cross if voters rejected it.

Recently, lawyers for the Thomas More Law Center, a national group that fights for Christian ideals in court, have urged Congress to declare the cross a public park to prevent it from being taken down.

Hunter, Cunningham and Darrell Issa, R-Vista, were all lobbied by the Thomas More Law Center to preserve the cross.

"I hope this will resolve the issue for good," Murphy said in his statement.

Jordan Budd, the legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of San Diego & Imperial Counties, had an alternate view of the politics at play.

"This is just more unfortunate political gamesmanship and grandstanding when what this city really needs is a solution that acknowledges the constitutional violation and deals with it," Budd said.

Cunningham said he and Hunter pushed to add the veterans memorial designation for the cross into a $388 billion spending bill. Few had digested that huge piece of legislation before its approval yesterday.

They inserted the provision into the bill Friday, Cunningham said, without asking for a written legal opinion from an attorney on whether it would allow the church to remain at its current location.

"I'm just an old fighter pilot," Cunningham said. "I'm not a lawyer. I imagine the ACLU, those rascals, will try to do something, but I'll figure out a way to beat them."