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Thursday, November 15, 2007
Compassion, death and taxes
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thinking Right’s weekend free-for-all. Pick a topic:
• Headline: “Who killed Mark Allen MacPhail?” The jury’s already told us who killed police officer MacPhail. That’d be Troy Davis. We know, too, who killed children in Atlanta and DeKalb. That’d be Wayne Williams. A genuine question is “Who snatched Mary Shotwell Little?”
• Favorite headline of the week: “Hospitals no place for sick people.” That’s my belief, too. Too many really sick people there.
• Demo presidential sweepstakes: Hillary promises a $1 billion federal program to give employees at least eight weeks of paid leave to care for newborns or sick family members. Nope, says Obama, $1.5 billion. But wait! says John Edwards. He’ll spend $2 billion. In Democratic political terms, this means Edwards is twice as compassionate at Hillary.
• Former Atlantan Lois Quick Novick, who died this week, was described by her family as “a voracious reader of newspapers [who] had the gift of being able to take editors to task and articulate her position with intelligence and wit.” And, furthermore, “she never met a dog she didn’t love.” I often read obits thinking: “I wish I’d known” the departed. A dog-lover who could dress down snarling editors with intelligence and wit is high on that “wish I’d known” list.
• Let’s see. On the one hand, as a Cobb resident, I have a sheriff, Neal Warren, who is checking the immigration status of those booked into his jail. On the other, the man who did little or nothing with law enforcement or job creation to deter his citizens from entering this country illegally, former Mexican President Vicente Fox, visits Cobb for a $500-a-plate fund-raiser, considers Warren’s actions to be “really going too far.”
Warren or Fox? In my county, it’s Warren by a landslide.
• Sixty-nine million dollars — the sum the Rev. Creflo Dollar’s World Changers Church International in College Park took in last year — is a mind-boggling sum. But unless somebody’s done something crooked, the $69 million and how it’s used is entirely between him and his congregation. Same for Bishop Eddie Long, another of the evangelists whose records are being sought by Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa). Ministers can’t dip into the church’s accounts for personal use, compensation must be “reasonable,” and expenses must further the church’s purpose.
• Striking transit workers in France, angry that President Nicolas Sarkozy proposes to end their retire-at-50 perk, force Parisians to walk, bike or skate to work. Roads don’t strike.
• President Bush is chosen by the online magazine Film Threat as the “least-powerful, least-inspiring and least-intriguing people in Hollywood.” Or, more correctly, “to Hollywood.” We know. We see their movies. And Academy Awards clips.
• Billionaire Warren Buffett tells Congress to keep the death tax — now set to expire in 2010. Unless Congress makes existing law permanent, though, it roars back in 2011 on estates of more than $1 million. “I think we need to … take a little more out of the hides of guys like me,” he told the Senate Finance Committee. Buffett is giving 85 percent of his fortune, estimated last year to be $44 billion, to five foundations not subject to death taxes. Tax policies targeting “the rich” have unintended consequences. The alternative minimum tax that Congress passed in 1969 to chase down 155 individuals who avoided income tax now hits up to 25 million middle-income taxpayers, costing them as much as $2,000 in additional taxes.
• The silly U.S. House of Representatives. The silly, silly House. For about the 40th time, Democrats bring up an Iraqi withdrawal bill — this one attached to $50 billion to fund troops for about four months. It has no chance of making it into law. The silly, silly House of Pelosi. All Georgia Republicans voted no, as did Democrats John Barrow of Savannah and Jim Marshall of Macon. Both are in competitive districts. Atlanta’s John Lewis voted present.
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Driver’s licenses for illegals
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
After appearing to flip-flop all around the question of driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants in the last Democratic presidential debate, candidate Hillary Clinton took a stand Wednesday: The polls are in: She’s opposed.
In that late-October debate she told moderator Tim Russert: “You know, Tim, this is where everybody plays gotcha, but it makes a lot of sense.” She was referring to the proposal by New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer to issue driver’s licenses to illegals. It didn’t make a lot of sense to those polled, with two-thirds or more expressing opposition. Spitzer threw in the towel this week.
“Leadership is not solely about doing what one thinks is right,” said Spitzer. “Leadership is also about listening to the public.” His proposal would have established three different licenses. One, considered more secure, would be for those routinely crossing the Canadian border. Another was the secure REAL ID, which is to be required nationally by Dec. 31, 2009. The third, for illegals, allegedly could be used only for driving. There were questions, though, about whether such a document could be misused for voting and for accessing public benefits.
Hillary’s chief rival, Barack Obama, said in phone interview with the AJC’s editorial board after the October debate that he does support driver’s licenses for illegals. My reaction was that taking that position would be a body-blow to his chances in the General Election. My colleague disagreed, insisting that the immigration issue — and especially the driver’s license question — is over-rated as a concern among voters.
Who’s right here? Spitzer? Hillary? Obama? My colleague? Me?
