Tax reform is apparently so treacherous for senators these days that they require the utmost protection from the public — half a century’s worth.
The leaders of the Senate Finance Committee last month asked senators to submit written proposals detailing tax breaks they’d like to see preserved once the tax code is reformed and explain why. The point was to help inform committee leaders in their efforts to craft a tax reform bill.
The request apparently wasn’t embraced, and the committee has now promised skittish senators that their proposals will be kept secret for 50 years.
A memo sent out on July 19 promised to mark all submissions “COMMITTEE CONFIDENTIAL. NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION. DO NOT COPY. These materials may not be released to the public from the National Archives or by the Finance Committee prior to December 31, 2064.”
What’s more, the memo said that in addition to the committee’s chairman and top Republican, only 10 staffers would be authorized to see the proposals. Only two digital copies of them would be made. Each would be saved on a secure, password-protected server. Paper copies would be kept in locked safes.
The only way a proposal could be made public before Dec. 31, 2064, is if it “has been modified in such a manner that it could not potentially identify the source of a submission.”
Leadership
When Corporations ally closely with government, using their clout (money) to ensure politicians do their bidding or are defeated, its a form of government this nation once abhored, Or claimed to detest.
I figure since so many huge corporations are part and parcel of how the NSA-type spying operations work, on both Americans and foreigners, that these corporate powers enjoy quite a bit of access to the collected information. We know from leaked reports that NSA collected information on German corporations and passed it on to US corporations to allow the US businesses a bidding and even design (as in theft of designs and discoveries) advantage. German companies were not the only ones so affected.
I don’t find it hard to imagine that the really powerful corporations are also given access to or provided information which they can use to control the votes of politicians. (And the NSA is properly grateful for their giving additional information to the Surveillance State databases — the state and corporate databases will proably merge soon in the future….) And pesky pols who think the represent all the people may well be getting hints about and even direct athreats, even outright blackmail.
It would be almost impossible for those trying to protect and increase their power and wealth would to do the right thing andpass on getting such information.
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Re: this Senate embargo for 50 years on what senators want in a tax reform bill — Any senator who goes along with this should never be allowed to hold office, to be a lobbyist, or to play a pundit on our MCM (Mainstream Corporate Media). He or she should be laughed out of DC and maybe their home states. Tarring and feathering is too violent and dangerous.
Every senator who gives a damn should be making their tax proposals public and as well publicized as the PTB/government mouth pieces ‘free press” will give them air time and print space. This is a good use of their franking privilege.
We need to have a full bore telephone, email, fax, snail mail, local office informational picketing –however we can reacht them- and reach the public– and keep track of who says what and who lies to us or tries to con us.-
I think it might be time to wear black armbands, to indicate we are in mourning for our democracy.
Do they have info they use against Obama? Or is he such an insider he knows enought to take damn good care of the powerful? Did Clinton actually believe in some of the more egregious things he did, or did he too get pretty heavy pressure?
Let’s all vote for whomever is running against any public official holding elected office on election day November 2014. Just for kicks. Vote out every member of the House—–all 435 of them——-and all 33 Senators running for re-election. 58% of us already want to do that. If we do that two or three times in a row all of this crazy shit will stop. Bet on it.
And the corruption of what was was our democracy is now complete.
Wish I was a brilliant hacker.