The Paris Hilton Benefit Act moves closer to passage

June 22, 2005

The other day I had a post about what Republicans in DC might try to straighten their ship and get some semblance of an agenda back on track. In the comments section, many of you suggested they’d go with more tax cuts, because, when in doubt, the GOP goes with what it knows.

A report in today’s Wall Street Journal suggests you were all right.

Senators are nearing a compromise that would permanently wipe out estate taxes for all but the very wealthiest Americans.

Republican and Democratic senators say they are increasingly confident that they can iron out details to reach a compromise changing the estate tax by the end of the summer — and win enough Democratic votes to avoid a filibuster on the Senate floor. A Senate Republican staffer close to the talks said key players have agreed on rough parameters.

House Republicans voted for a permanent repeal of all estate taxes last year, but it failed in the Senate and Dems have said they’d use a filibuster to defeat it again. But GOP negotiators think they have a bill that will peel off enough Dem votes to pass, and at this point, the House is prepared to take what they can get.

So, what’s the new plan? Put it this way: there are a lot of multi-millionaires who are going to be very pleased.

According to aides close to the Senate talks, Republican and Democratic negotiators so far have agreed to dramatically and permanently lower the estate-tax rate beyond 2010 and boost the amount per person that is exempt from taxes to more than $3 million. By contrast, the personal exemption was $1 million in 2001, and this year is $1.5 million.

Of course, the devil’s in the details — including the White House response.

Arizona Republican Sen. Jon Kyl, who is leading the negotiations, is pressing for a $10 million per-person exemption and a 15% tax rate, which would match the rate for capital gains. Montana Sen. Max Baucus, the top Democrat on the Finance Committee, wants to couple a higher rate with a personal exemption between $3 million and $5 million.

The debate itself is rather obscene. We’re talking about a proposal to either cut taxes exclusively for millionaires and add tens of billions of dollars to the deficit, or cut taxes for millionaires even more and add tens of billions more to the deficit. Considering the fiscal picture the nation is facing, the fact that this is even on the table right now is the height of irresponsibility.

But the really funny part? This “compromise” plan to dramatically scale back existing estate taxes is facing resistence from the White House — not becuse it’s too reckless, but because it isn’t reckless enough.

Yesterday, a White House spokesman, Trent Duffy, said it’s “way too early” to discuss whether the White House would veto a compromise measure that had passed both house of Congress.

But he said President Bush continues to insist on full repeal and doesn’t support a compromise. “He wants the spike to stay in the heart,” Mr. Duffy said.

Cutting tens of billionaires of dollars in taxes for millionaires during a war and with the highest budget deficit in American history isn’t good enough for the president.

The mind reels.

Frankly, I am not opposed to raising the exemption from 1 mil to 3 mil…as long as the top income tax bracket is raised to cover the difference (“[thump]and then some”). But that has as much a chance of succeeding as a fart in a hurricane.

  • It might be interesting, if the Democratic Party had a spine, to use this debate to really focus on the Republicans as the party of multi-millionaires. See, now that there are some numbers on the table, maybe some regular working Americans can see who’s really getting the benefit.

  • These people ( rethugs and dem’s ) have so little thought or connection with every day people. We are in unthinkable yearly deficit’s, the national debt has sky rocketed under BUSH, we have a medicare drug plan written by the drug companies stealing billions more.
    The whole lot of them should be fired and replaced with people who care about the whole USA instead of just the RICH.

  • Pigs. Lying Stinking Pigs (for you, Eadie, I cleaned it up, but this is so filthy that I think calling them “pigs” is an affront to the porcine variety).

  • Re: the headline

    Paris Hilton has definitely become the poster child of disdain for the ne’er do wells of the leisure class. After sitting through about 15 minutes of her TV show I couldn’t think of a more deserving person. I actually think that in her case there should be a special clause in the estate tax where she gets taxed at 100%. If ever there was a case where someone should be forced into a lifetime of low wage jobs so that they could get a dose of reality she would be the prime example.

  • The repeal of the Estate Tax will be the birth certificate of an American parasitical “nobility”, the seeds are all over the place, but the untaxed transfer of wealth will secure that a few families can claim ownership of the whole country.
    May be we are witnessing the birth of a dynasty. “Bush XVI” for President in 2105?

  • Today the President was discussing the Social Security system, and lamented that after money is spent on government programs, all that’s left is “a file cabinet full of IOUs.” Another big gift to his wealthy donors will mean a lot more IOUs. Does he not see any connection there?

    From the transcript…

    http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/06/20050622.html

    In other words, you’re paying payroll taxes in a system that’s going broke. By the way, they call it pay-as-you-go. A lot of people in Washington — in the country probably think the payroll — the Social Security system is, I’m paying my payroll taxes and the government’s holding my money for me and giving it back to me when I retire. I hate to tell you, that’s not the way it works, and it hasn’t worked that way for a long time. We take your money and we pay out to the retirees, and if we have money left over, like we have now, we’re spending it on government programs. And all that’s left is a file cabinet full of IOUs in West Virginia and I went and saw the file. You’ll be happy to hear the paper’s there — (laughter) — but not your money. In other words, all you’re left with is an IOU.

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