When politicians panic

By Libby

Avedon reminds me I meant to get to this earlier. TChris at Talk Left noticed a disturbing addition to the "improved" Wall St. rescue. This is what happens when the Congress rushes through legislation and trades off amendments for votes.

The bailout bill also gives the Internal Revenue Service new authority to conduct undercover operations. It would immunize the IRS from a passel of federal laws, including permitting IRS agents to run businesses for an extended sting operation, to open their own personal bank accounts with U.S. tax dollars, and so on. (Think IRS agents posing as accountants or tax preparers and saying, "I'm not sure if that deduction is entirely legal, but it'll save you $1,000. Want to take it?") That section had expired as of January 1, 2008, and would now be renewed.

What a waste of resources. As TChris goes on to point out:

We don't need IRS sting operations. There is no shortage of tax evasion schemes for agents to pursue without trying to sting taxpayers into committing new crimes. Increasing the audits of the wealthy taxpayers who are most likely to abuse the system would be a more reasonable approach to tax crime enforcement.

Exactly and that has certainly been a low priority under the Bush administration. They're much more interested in chasing down some bottom of the ladder taxpayers who wrongfully accept the Earned Income credit.

But this can't all be blamed solely on Bush or even Republicans. This rush to pass bad bills under political panic is same dynamic that gave us the Patriotic Act and a multitude of other bad legislation. Democrats are just as guilty for failing to exercise their leadership after 06 and their responsibilites as the oppositional minority before that. Small wonder 59% of the electorate would like to throw all the bums out and just start over.