Monday, November 10, 2008

Theft

link
While Congress was distracted by the bailout, Treasury Secretary Paulson changed a rule giving a lot of tax money to his industry.
"Did the Treasury Department have the authority to do this? I think almost every tax expert would agree that the answer is no," said George K. Yin, the former chief of staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation, the nonpartisan congressional authority on taxes.
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Section 382 of the tax code was created by Congress in 1986 to end what it considered an abuse of the tax system: companies sheltering their profits from taxation by acquiring shell companies whose only real value was the losses on their books. The firms would then use the acquired company's losses to offset their gains and avoid paying taxes.
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The Jones Day law firm... released a widely circulated commentary that concluded that the change could cost taxpayers about $140 billion. Robert L. Willens, a prominent corporate tax expert in New York City, said the price is more likely to be $105 billion to $110 billion.
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Lee A. Sheppard, a tax attorney who is a contributing editor at the trade publication Tax Analysts[, said] "We're left now with congressional Democrats that have spines like overcooked spaghetti. So who is going to stop the Treasury secretary from doing whatever he wants?"

I really feel that the time for removing George W. Bush from the Presidency has passed. It'd be hard to get it done in the two months remaining in his term. But, if he retains the power of the pardon in January, how will these people end up in prison?

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