The House did us proud yesterday by rejecting Tha Bush Mobb's Bailout-as-Mildly-Ameliorated-by-the-Democrats -- a bailout that, Pam Martens explains, was far more corrupt than you might have imagined. The People's Email Network continues to lead against the bailout, and provide two toll-free numbers, 1.800.828.0498 and 1.800.473.6711. And True Majority now provides a petition calling for, like, actual solutions that don't involve extorting the taxpayers. Hard to believe government regulation is popular again. Actually, it's hard to believe that Wall Street ever convinced us that whatever was good for them was good for us.
Of course, the bailout isn't the only thing going on -- Attorney General not-Alberto Gonzales has proposed new FBI guidelines for investigations. Anything you imagine only happens in police states would be OK now -- interviewing under false pretexts, stocking peaceful protest groups with informants, launching an investigation just because you're black or Muslim -- and all they need do is assert an "authorized purpose," never mind who authorized it. Possibly, just possibly, these new guidelines actually cover up FBI violations of the old guidelines, because, as any decent and moral individual knows, anytime you can't follow the rules you ought to just make up new rules. No, the need to prevent another 9.11 doesn't permit us to urinate all over the Fourth Amendment; Mr. Bush had the tools he needed to stop 9.11 and he failed. The ACLU helps you urge the Inspector General at the Justice Department to investigate possible illegal activity by the FBI. The IG has done a good job exposing Justice Department injustice in the past; hopefully the new administration won't replace him.
Finally, courtesy Princeton University's Policy Research Institute, we have more proof that taxing the rich doesn't cause them all to flee. America's Greatest State, New Jersey, actually improved its progressive income tax code with the 2004 creation of the half-millionaire bracket, set at almost 9% (the lowest income tax bracket in New Jersey sits at around 1.5%). Long story short, the Princeton study found that a) most New Jerseyans who leave the state are low-income and wind up moving to states in which they pay higher income taxes, and b) the tax revenue lost by the 350-odd half-millionaires who either flee New Jersey or choose not to move to New Jersey because of the higher taxes is way, way, way offset by the revenues the new tax bracket collects. So Grover Norquist may have to come up with something else -- or, we can only hope, concentrate more of his efforts on his hatred of the PATRIOT Act.