A request to all DUers

[wildflower]

In preparation for tomorrow's debate on domestic policies, I've been trying to post some news on domestic issues (mostly in LBN).

-If you see news on domestic issues** today and tomorrow, can you post it (as a new thread) to DU?

-And if you see domestic news on DU, can you kick it? (Even better, add your own story.)

I'm hoping it will help for the debate if the K-E campaign is lurking.

-wildflower

**E.g. poverty, the environment, disability and chronic illness, homelessness, jobs, health care, civil rights and liberties, long-term care, the Supreme court, women's issues, minorities' issues, and GBLT issues....I'm sure I have left some out.

P.S. Can you help me keep this request kicked too?

P.P.S. Mods, thanks for moving this

[juliagoolia]

1. credit card rapes

We are being raped by credit companies.

People who have lost jobs or have a issue come up are being raped by the credit card companies, sometimes causing those out of work or between jobs to file record numbers of bankruptcy.
These large banks are raping the unemployed and underemployed and outsourcing their jobs to India to do the collections while at the same time sending our banking and private information to foreign nations.

[Ranec]

6. When they start raising interest rates

consumer credit is going to be a huge drain on the economy.

Bush re-wrote the bankruptcy laws to favor the credit card companies. This needs to be addressed to keep American's on their feet, and make credit cards companies more responsible for their deceptive marketing techniques.

[papau]

2. Attack Bush credibility-threaten veto before signed 87 B, lies in Ad below

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-campaign12oct12.story
THE RACE FOR THE WHITE HOUSE
Bush Attack Ad Is Questioned
Democrats say Kerry's comment was taken out of context. Some analysts warn that the president's credibility could be damaged.
By Peter Wallsten and Maura Reynolds
Times Staff Writers

October 12, 2004

WASHINGTON — With a new advertisement that accuses Sen. John F. Kerry of viewing terrorism as a "nuisance," President Bush is continuing his push to depict his Democratic opponent in a harshly negative light.

But some analysts warned Monday that his campaign was playing loose with the facts — and that the attack could backfire.

The new ad, which began appearing late Sunday on national cable stations, has drawn protests from the Kerry campaign and other critics, who say the Bush camp took a line out of context from a recent newspaper interview with the Massachusetts senator.

Some critics said the ad followed a pattern of the president distorting his rival's record on taxes, healthcare and other matters in an attempt to portray him as too liberal and unfit to lead the fight against terrorism.

They said the pattern began after polls showed the race tightening and after Bush stumbled during his first debate with Kerry.

Kerry has also been accused of distortions in his attacks on Bush. But Republican pollster Tony Fabrizio, who is not working for the Bush campaign, said Bush's attacks could wind up hurting the president by undermining his credibility.

"The Bush campaign did an effective job creating questions about Sen. Kerry's credibility that led them to a double-digit lead" in several national polls in early September, Fabrizio said. "But it would be a shame if that knife were turned on them because they pushed the envelope too far with ads like they released" Sunday.<snip>

[Moderator]

7. papau

Per DU copyright rules
please post only four
paragraphs from the
copyrighted news source.



Thank you.

DU Moderator

[papau]

3. New Corporate tax bill spends 136B to solve 50 B problem!

The extra taxes imposed by the EU amount to 300 million (on wood, jewelry, paper and clothing, etc) and they wanted to restore the 50B tax break that US corps had lost.

But the then ad a load of special interest items - indeed everything Bush asked for - and nothing that Dems objected to got removed (the Food and Drug Administration is given authority to regulate, but not ban, tobacco products - meaning they have no authority!)

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-tax12oct12.story
Senate Passes Big Tax Breaks
A bill designed to resolve a trade dispute with Europe also cuts $136 billion in levies on businesses. Bush is expected to sign it.
By Warren Vieth
Times Staff Writer

October 12, 2004

WASHINGTON — A bill that was conceived as a way to resolve a trade dispute with Europe but became a sanctuary for special-interest tax provisions won final congressional approval from the Senate on Monday.

The $136-billion bill will repeal an export tax subsidy that the World Trade Organization had ruled illegal. But Congress, heavily lobbied by business, added a host of complexities and preferences for politically connected industries, from a $10-billion buyout of tobacco growers to a $4-million tax write-off for Alaskan whaling boat captains.<snip>


Sure enough, the legislation will replace the export subsidy with an across-the-board $77-billion corporate tax cut for manufacturers and a $43-billion reduction for companies operating overseas. The bill will lower the corporate tax rate for manufacturers from 35% to 32%.

Among the biggest winners was General Electric Co., which stands to save as much as $8 billion over 10 years on its foreign operations, according to Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee. Before they were finished, lawmakers went far beyond the original game plan, adding scores of special tax breaks for makers of bows and arrows, operators of NASCAR race tracks and importers of ceiling fans, among others."All these little parochial provisions — 276 of them — have been festering around Washington for years, in some cases decades," said Keith Ashdown, policy director for Taxpayers for Common Sense, which lobbies against pork-barrel politics. "They finally found a home."

One of the biggest was a $10-billion buyout of the holders of coveted tobacco quotas — in essence, permission from the government to grow certain amounts of tobacco. The quotas, established during the Depression, have become assets that entitle the holders to benefit from the federal price support program for tobacco.<snip>

[papau]

4. Bush's special interest provisions in new corporate tax bill

Of course the EU will now lift about $200 million in levies on U.S. farm products. WOW!

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-caltax12oct12.story
Tax-Cut Bill Could Help State's Firms
Legislation OKd by Congress extends a break to businesses including film studios and oil producers.
By Jerry Hirsch
Times Staff Writer October 12, 2004

<snip> cut taxes for manufacturing companies and other key businesses in the state, including movie studios.<snip>

lower the tax rate for manufacturers to 32% from 35% and broaden the types of businesses eligible for the lower rate to include such nontraditional manufacturing operations as construction companies, engineering and architectural firms, film and music ventures and oil and gas producers. <snip>

5.25% for one year tax rate for The bill offers a big break for multinationals that want to bring into the U.S. profits (undistributed earnings) they make overseas. As it is, they pay the U.S. 35% on that money.<snip>

(pro sports owners get a single sentence in the 633-page bill, that allows owners to write off the full value of their franchises over 15 years - a $2 billion windfall that adds about 5 percent to the value of professional franchises; under current tax law, they can write off only the value of players' contracts over three to five years. So at least they get to write off the lobbying cost to get that franchise and that taxpayer-sponsored stadiums to play in!


A three-year extension of a provision allowing small businesses to deduct up to $100,000 a year in capital expenditures — THE HUMMER SUV DEDUCTION -which had been set to revert to $25,000 at the end of 2005.<snip>(The new provision would limit most first-year write-offs to $25,000, so it is "raising $372 million over the next three years" - I love GOP speak)

special breaks for the fishing-gear and the electric-fan industries and a $10-billion buyout for tobacco farmers. <snip>

if at least 75% of a movie's production costs are spent domestically, then a producer can immediately depreciate certain expenses rather than amortize them over 10 years, as the law currently requires.<snip>

1,000 wineries get a three-year suspension of a Civil War-era tax of $1,000 a year on alcoholic beverage makers. <snip>

[wildflower]

5. kicking.....n/t

[MalibuWaker]

8. Unemployment is huge