Slimeball Christmas: Obama/GOP Tax Bill Loaded With Earmarks & Sweetheart Tax Gifts For Such Things as Hollywood, Railroad Tracks, Race Horses & Rum.

For many Americans, it seemed like a simple enough and easy-to-support tax compromise between Obama, the democrat party and republicans: The current income tax rates would be extended for all Americans for two additional years rather than having those rates go up during the ongoing recession. Apart from the far left loons, who could possibly be against that, right?

Problem is, the "tax bill" (signed this week by Obama) was also chock full of earmarks and specialized tax breaks of all sorts -- all completely unrelated to the issue of the income tax rate. And democrats and republicans alike jumped onboard faster than you can say Porky Pig. Business as usual in DC. (There was just an election a few months back, no?)

And that's the reason why I was opposed to the bill before it was passed. But even I didn't realize the full magnitude of some of the utter crap that these two parties jammed into the bill. A lot of that is just starting to come to light now. As the linked story details, the "tax bill" contains all kinds of horse$hit having nothing whatsoever to do with income tax rates. Here's some examples:

-Tax breaks for producing movies and TV shows in Hollywood.
-Rum subsidies for Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.
-Grants to put up windmills.
-Grants for producing solar energy.
-Tax breaks for people to buy race horses.
-Tax breaks related to railroad track maintenance.
-Other breaks for motorsport racetrack upgrades.

And if you're like me and most Americans -- i.e. not really involved in a great deal of movie production, race horse ownership or windmill construction -- then Obama and these two parties have a special gift in this new bill that may just apply to you: For homeowners, an end to the tax break for paying local property taxes unless you pay a tax preparer to itemize your deductions on your tax return. The linked story says that two-thirds of tax filers don't itemize.

Put another way: The new bill sticks it to millions of average Americans who don't itemize by taking away one of their most basic tax breaks while at the same time including within the bill all sorts of sweetheart tax breaks for huge companies, Hollywood movie studios and players within the race horse industry.

Gee, thanks Obama, democrats and republicans (and Captain Morgan thanks you as well)! Just in time for Christmas too! With such wonderful politicians as all of you looking out for us this Christmas season, who needs the Grinch?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_tax_cuts_goodies