A Handout is a Handout

Right now in Congress, they're debating a pair of bills that have something in common, and it may not be apparent at first, so I'll just point it out right up front: Both bills involve giving federal assistance to industries that don't need them.

The first one is pretty obvious: the oil industry. We're set up to give the oil industry $17 billion in tax breaks over the next 10 years... the same industry racking up record profits amid $4 a gallon gas prices. Now, hear me out: I am NOT opposed to oil companies racking up record profits. If you're ExxonMobil, and you can make $40 billion a year, more power to ya... especially since the federal government takes in $30 billion in taxes from them each year. And to those who say that this is a piddling amount compared to the $400B in revenue ExxonMobil takes in, let me just remind you of something: yes, a corporation spends money on supplies and bills and expenses just like any average person does, but on top of that, the corporation then PAYS SALARIES TO ITS WORKERS. Average Taxpayer doesn't have a payroll to support. Therefore, I would say $30 billion in taxes is a fair amount for this corporation to pay.

However, when you ARE making $40 billion a year, and when adding in Hess, Shell, Chevron, Occidental, Marathon, and ConocoPhillips, you all combine to make $128 billion a year, YOU DON'T NEED $17 BILLION IN CORPORATE WELFARE!!! Especially when the federal government is running a half-trillion deficit. If we need to find a place to cut "wasteful government spending", this is a great place to start! So the Congress is currently working on a new energy bill, and one of the parts that is gaining traction is dumping this $17 billion. This is one time when I will back the Democrats and say go for it, just PLEASE don't do the stupid "windfall profits tax" on top of that, because THAT is unnecessary. You already have your own "windfall profits" known as the taxes you're already collecting on the oil companies. I'm always for cutting spending first, raising taxes never.

And speaking of which... bill number two that is currently being debated is one that unfortunately will pass but shouldn't. They're debating farm welfare again. I call it "farm welfare" because it's the federal government giving money to an industry... no different from what we call "corporate welfare." The federal government is the body that made the pioneering move to pay farmers NOT to grow certain crops. Talk about wasteful spending. So now in the midst of an international food crisis, the Dems are set to lavish another $40 billion in farm welfare, plus $30 billion to "idle their land"... otherwise known as "to NOT grow anything." All told, that is $70 billion, or 4 TIMES what is given to the oil industry. President Bush is right to want to veto this, and the international community says this bill will do little to help efforts around the world to ease the food crisis. But the Congress is confident that it can override Bush's veto; after all, it's an election year. We've been conditioned to feel that if we don't support a bill like this, we're hurting the small family farm... but a farm is a business. If we're going to help small business, that's one thing, and if there's a way to only help the small farms (without paying them NOT to grow something), let's do it. But giving rich farmers a handout makes no more sense than giving one to ExxonMobil. Let's be consistent here.

And now some random thoughts that didn't make it in the batch that made up my last entry:

Hey Flagstaff... how'd you like that "global warming" on Tuesday? Several inches of snow... in mid-May... State College, PA got 4 inches of snow on Monday. Yeah, global warming is really happening...

The best Alternative station out there (well, I should say best terrestrial Alternative station, because Sirius Alt Nation is the best station ever) is the Edge in Toronto. Beyond the fact that they feature an eclectic and wide-ranging playlist, they go even further than American Alternative stations because they have to play 30% Canadian artists. So you hear stuff like Sam Roberts and illScarlett that will never get played in the States even though they should be. Just one more reason to love our neighbors to the North...

Only in Central New York would people be fighting a community center being proposed for their community. Residents in Radisson (a planned community near Baldwinsville) don't want the new YMCA to be built in their neighborhood because it's zoned as residential, and they think it will affect their quality of life and lower their property values. Okay, first of all: given that people are complaining now more than ever about their property taxes and that people go ballistic every time a new round of increased assessments comes out, one would think that lower property values would be a GOOD thing. And secondly, yes, YMCAs do affect quality of life... in a GOOD WAY! These things are supposed to be built in residential areas so that people have easy access to them! But then again, these are the same people who flip out when one of their neighbors overdoes it on the Christmas lights, so there may just be no getting through to these people...