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Amen! Congress has been starving the IRS of funding. The ROI to the federal government in terms of successful audits of the biggest tax cheats is huge, but with a tiny budget for audits, the IRS can't take on as many of the "big fish" who can mount strong defenses; it only has the resources to go after the minnows, even though there isn't much meat on them.

A 2010 report from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse found that the audit rate of large (> $250M in assets) corporations dropped from 42.6% to 25% since 2005, and that for huge (> $5B) corporations dropped from 78% to 64% since only 2007. Do you think this is because of increased compliance? Ha. Ha.

Also see this 2008 OMB Watch report.

Just take a look at the list of 'riders' on the bill and it will become clear who they represent:

http://www.ombwatch.org/files/budget/OMB_Watch-HR1_Policy_Riders.pdf

It's pretty clear they're not interested in balancing the budget. The republicans are only interested in gutting those agencies responsible for enforcing pesky regulations like wetland preservation, emissions/dumping of hazardous material, the clean water act, etc., defunding institutions like NOAA and anyone else doing any sort of climate studies and generally gutting a wide range of social services provided to low income and middle class Americans, while simultaneously providing criminally large tax breaks for corporations:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/25/business/economy/25tax.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1,
http://sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=67562604-8280-4d56-8af4-a27f59d70de5

That isn't to say the democrats are much (if at all) better, but it should be absolutely clear exactly who the republicans represent.

"Even Pentagon officials admit that the "charity" spent the majority of its money feeding hungry people, teaching poor people, and helping sick people. Only a small portion of it was skimmed by a few terrorist sympathizers who infiltrated the charity."

I agree the threat has been blown out of all proportion, 65yrs in jail for charity work is nothing short of barbaric.

Luckily we have the FDA looking out for our health and best interests (joke!).

You do realize that the FDA employees and their families use this medicine, right? They've got a bit of a vested interest in actually looking out for us.

Yes, I always trust my government to look out for me too. Anyway, never mind the rank and file employees. They don't make the important decisions. How about the decision-makers of the FDA? Are they trustworthy? They're often pharmaceutical industry insiders (and when they're done working at the FDA, they often go right [back] into the industry). Fox, hen house, anyone? I won't waste anyone's time posting lots of links to stuff you can easily research yourself, but here's one good example of a no-good FDA commissioner who actually got canned.

In the words of another writer: However, the profits up for grabs have become so enormous that critics say the goal of industry-controlled research is no longer focused on finding a cure for cancer to save lives. Instead, the focus is on thwarting the development and approval of new therapies in order to protect the profits of the treatments already on the market. (source; emphasis mine)

I mean, come on, READ the article you just linked: "The results in The Lancet Infectious Diseases conflict with other studies that show no beneficial effect."

I have. The conclusions of the cited study were based on the results of 14 previous studies! As stated, some previous studies haven't shown any preventative or ameliorative effect of Echinacea. Those might have been commissioned by people with a vested interest in "proving" Echinacea ineffective. Or maybe they were done by incompetent researchers. Maybe they were using some adulterated form of the herb that wasn't effective, or based on the wrong variety (before you call 'bullshit', consider the difference in "effectiveness" of smoking industrial hemp vs. smoking recreational marijuana; all varieties of the same plant).

I'm sure I could design with a study that would pass the average peer review AND fail to show any positive effect of Echinacea (especially if those "peers" were biased towards, or at least expecting, the stated results). Perhaps I could design one to show positive results. The question is, what is my vested interest in proving something one way or another? Even if there's no personal benefit involved, do I have a preconceived notion of what the results will be? Let's say I carefully design a double-blind study, and the results, to my chagrin, prove something that is extremely financially detrimental to me and/or my employer. Will I lose my funding grants? Will my employer even allow it to be published? Will my conscience demand that I publish it, or will I leave it to the dust heap of history because I must feed my family? It's incredibly naive to assume that all "scientific" studies are accurate. Especially when you see similar ones appearing to contradict one another.

In my first post, perhaps I shouldn't have been so bold as to say Echinacea *does* have value. I don't know that. Some studies have shown it to be so. Some have shown otherwise. My personal experience is generally positive, but obviously that could be the placebo effect at work. Good thing it's cheap; if I'm wasting my money, at least I'm not wasting much.

Speaking of money--although alternative medicine is a multi-billion dollar industry in the US, it is still dwarfed by the pharmaceutical industry. The more money you've got to prove your point (which will help you get more money), the more skeptical I'm going to be about your

Seems to me the bill passed... am I reading this wrong?

http://www.ombwatch.org/article/blogs/entry/4101/36

Does this mean that Chris Dodd is an impotent fool?

Sure thing, here you go:

"First, almost all of the new jobs created in July were in the service industries (generally lower paying jobs with worse benefits) as the employment picture is still very bleak in the manufacturing and good producing sectors (generally higher paying jobs with better benefits)."

Source: OMBwatch

"Lazy people on social programs", geez, I hope you are being sarcastic and do not honestly believe that "lazy people on social programs" are bogeymen for why we have to pay taxes...at most, Welfare, food stamps, housing assistance take up 8% of the budget, about 80 billion... see here table S-4, under Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education (about half goes to education) and see this which breaks down the 2004 budget in a nice little pie chart...

I tire of hearing this "blame the poor" for taxes, when it is not the poor who are busting the budget... plus, the assumption that all poor people are lazy is absurd and groundless. Social programs help this country... it helps people that need it... granted, there those that probably are lazy, but those are few and far between...

If you want to bitch about taxes and be angry, why not take umbrage at the deductions for mortgages on 2nd homes and boats and cap the mortgage deduction, which cost the taxpayers some 70 billion a year, hell, I am all for eliminating the mortgage deduction all together. If home ownership is really THAT important and compelling as Bush pontificates in his "ownership society" babbling, then there does not need to be a mortgage deduction incentive... also, get rid of deductions for state and local taxes which cost taxpayers 50 Billion a year, which in addition to saving the taxpayers money, I figure this will make the Rep and Senators in high tax states more accountable to their constituents in cutting government spending since those constituents in high tax states will not be able to deduct their state taxes... hell, I would even get rid of the child tax credit...if you want kids, then pay for them yourself and not make the rest of us without kids subsidize those with, or those of us that waited until we were financially secure so that we could afford to take care of our kids before we had them... and for heavans sakes, lets not Jettison the estate tax, since it would cost about 90 billion a year if it was eliminated. As the estate tax stands today, it only affects some 2% of the population

Anyway, the whole point is to look else where when bitching about taxes... don't always blame the poor... there are plenty of more substantive ways to cut taxes than simply projecting one's anger on the poor.

"Lazy people on social programs", geez, I hope you are being sarcastic and do not honestly believe that "lazy people on social programs" are bogeymen for why we have to pay taxes...at most, Welfare, food stamps, housing assistance take up 8% of the budget, about 80 billion... see here table S-4, under Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education (about half goes to education) and see this which breaks down the 2004 budget in a nice little pie chart...

I tire of hearing this "blame the poor" for taxes, when it is not the poor who are busting the budget... plus, the assumption that all poor people are lazy is absurd and groundless. Social programs help this country... it helps people that need it... granted, there those that probably are lazy, but those are few and far between...

If you want to bitch about taxes and be angry, why not take umbrage at the deductions for mortgages on 2nd homes and boats and cap the mortgage deduction, which cost the taxpayers some 70 billion a year, hell, I am all for eliminating the mortgage deduction all together. If home ownership is really THAT important and compelling as Bush pontificates in his "ownership society" babbling, then there does not need to be a mortgage deduction incentive... also, get rid of deductions for state and local taxes which cost taxpayers 50 Billion a year, which in addition to saving the taxpayers money, I figure this will make the Rep and Senators in high tax states more accountable to their constituents in cutting government spending since those constituents in high tax states will not be able to deduct their state taxes... hell, I would even get rid of the child tax credit...if you want kids, then pay for them yourself and not make the rest of us without kids subsidize those with, or those of us that waited until we were financially secure so that we could afford to take care of our kids before we had them... and for heavans sakes, lets not Jettison the estate tax, since it would cost about 90 billion a year if it was eliminated. As the estate tax stands today, it only affects some 2% of the population

Anyway, the whole point is to look else where when bitching about taxes... don't always blame the poor... there are plenty of more substantive ways to cut taxes than simply projecting one's anger on the poor.

You can't really be that naive, can you? Take the OMB for example. There's a big debate going on about whether OMB should use static scoring or dynamic scoring. It doesn't really matter which one you prefer, but I can tell you that in the current political climate it makes a *huge* difference. Democrats prefer static modeling because then they can argue against tax cuts. Republicans favor dynamic modeling to support a "trickle down" effect. But the idea that somehow OMB is neutral is ignoring reality. Even if they don't intend to favor one party or another, the fact is that there is no action that they can take that won't benefit one group or another.

Interesting that you should mention NASA. Their very existence depends on the support of the aerospace community and the regions of the country that benefit from NASA centers. They are very good at using their influence to get what they want. Even if you could claim that they don't favor one political party over another, they are still very skilled at using political influence to their advantage.

the price is not and should not be $0.00

[breathes in] Funny, I don't recall paying for that hydrogen.

You are absolutely wrong and dada is absolutely right. In classic economic theory, as supply of a commodity approaches infinity the cost must drop to zero. If one decides to make ones intellectual 'property' available in an easily reproducible format, one must expect exactly this price (0) to happen; unless one distorts the free market with government intervention.

What you are (by implication) advocating is a have-cake-and-eat-it-too world - where the costs of production approach zero, but some price is artifically 'fixed' by government intervention. What's next - will you suggest the government force the intellectual property on an unwilling public to secure the cartel's revenue stream? Your choice of words 'should not be $0.00' makes me wonder.

Have some free clues:

The recession stared in March 01

The GDP most certainly did drop and recovery hasn't been as strong

Bush has lied about this in the past

earlier this year, Bush tried to manipulate the reporting of this for political purposes

While it can certainly be substantiated that the the Bush administration's policies didn't cause or contribute to the cause of the recession, he most certainly is on the hook for dealing with it. Argueing about when it began is both counterproductive and rather clueless on his part, as it does do anything to change the situation.

I'd like you to name a bidding scandal then.

Dick Cheney's Haliburton was awarded contracts for Iraqi oil-field work without even bidding.

Dick Cheney's 2001 financial disclosure statement, states that the Halliburton is paying him a "deferred compensation" of up to $1million a year following his resignation as chief executive in 2000. -- from CorpWatch

Nope, no scandal here...

They may be. But you can bet they wouldn't be so expensive if Bush weren't president. Damn, he's fucked the economy.

While the APA [Administrative Procedure Act] does not require all agencies to follow one single model for rulemaking, it does impose minimum procedural conditions that all agencies are expected to follow. This is to ensure that the public has the opportunity to participate in the formulation and revision of government regulations, and that there be minimum standards for judicial review. The requirements are quite minimal, yet as basic rules they provide the foundation for the development of further procedures. For example, although the APA does not require a public file or record of the rulemaking process, agencies usually compile one to prove their process is fair and reasonable.

The way things are going, I wouldn't think the government would need this executive order. After all, they've already been busy pulling back information already in the public domain.

Here's what's been removed.