TAXPAYER BREAKING NEWS, May 2006,
continued from MTA Home Page

May 30, 2006. Maryland: Lost in Translation, reports Jim Boulet of English First in the Baltimore Sun. "Canada has two official languages. The United Nations has six. Because of the 2002 law, Maryland now has several official languages. The available evidence suggests that no one in Annapolis is quite certain as to exactly how many."

May 30, 2006. Raiding Congress: The Justice Department went overboard in raiding Rep. Jefferson's office, say the editors of the Wall Street Journal. "Justice also hasn't helped its case with its bullying behavior after Speaker Denny Hastert denounced the raid. Someone leaked to ABC News that Mr. Hastert was himself a target of a Justice probe, and while it was quickly and officially denied, this kind of media ambush is typical of prosecutorial payback. Someone also leaked that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and Deputy AG Paul McNulty had threatened to resign if President Bush returned material confiscated in the raid. So here we have someone at Justice trying to intimidate not just the House Speaker but also President Bush. If we were Mr. Bush, we'd have accepted both resignations on those grounds alone." See also analysis by Byron York of the National Review.

May 25, 2006. Gov. Robert Ehrlich vetos SB 333-Prescription Drug Monitoring Program. "Senate Bill 333 could have a chilling effect on providers prescribing pain management. Prescribers are already fearful of inappropriate or unfounded scrutiny of their prescribing practices. The provisions of this bill may exacerbate untreated or inadequately treated pain management."
TBN notes: MTA had urged veto action in an email to Gov. Ehrlich's chief of staff Chip DiPaula on May 15. "Simply put, the measure does not pass our "smell test" appearing, as it does, to authorize more Maryland health-care regulatory burdens while potentially intruding into the practice of medicine itself."

May 25, 2006. Taxpayers Win!!! declares Americans for Tax Reform."Treasury Secretary John Snow announced this morning that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) would no longer collect the federal long distance telephone excise tax, part of a 108-year-old 'temporary' tax enacted to fund the Spanish- American War in 1898."

May 25, 2006. IRS Abandons Telephone Excise Tax on Long-Distance Calls, reports Andrew Chamberlain of the Tax Foundation. "Treasury Secretary John Snow states, 'Today is a good day for American taxpayers; it marks the beginning of the end of an outdated, antiquated tax that has survived a century beyond its original purpose, and by now should have been ancient history. The Federal Appeals courts have spoken across the board. It's time to `disconnect' this tax and put it on the permanent `do not call' list.'"

May 18, 2006. Nation's Largest Taxpayer Group Praises House Committee for Asking Hard Questions on Navy's Ship Spending, NTU reports. "The citizen group today applauded the House Projection Forces Subcommittee and Chairman Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD) for taking the initiative to explore whether tax dollars are being used as efficiently and effectively as possible to secure our nation."

May 17, 2006. Celebrities using BWI get armed police escort, reports Michael Dresser in the Baltimore Sun. "David Marks, who has operated a Beverly Hills, Calif.-based celebrity protection business for 30 years, said police agencies have no business competing with private companies that offer such services. In particular, he said, they are not qualified to decide who is deserving."

May 16, 2006. Taxpayers to NFL: Do the right thing, writes Steve Walters in the Examiner."Taxpayers have been very, very good to the National Football League. In 1998, for example, Marylanders wrote a $200 million check so the Ravens could build a state-of-the-art stadium with abundant luxury boxes and other amenities that help make the team fabulously profitable. As a result, the value of the franchise soared from $329 million to $864 million in just eight years, according to Forbes magazine."

May 8, 2006. Maryland loves eminent domain, write Steve Walters and Jude Blanchette in the Examiner. "More worrisome is the fact that politicians and bureaucrats are painfully inept at playing this game. Whenever we see entertaining news footage of an imploded public housing project or drive past another freeway ramp to nowhere, we’re reminded how often one administration’s gilt-edged investment turns into another’s white elephant. Spending other people’s money, while fun, makes even high-minded folks a tad careless. There’s no guarantee, of course, that a person willing to pay the most and risk his own wealth will put a property to its best use — but that’s generally the way to bet."

May 6, 2006. Special session on BGE unlikely, reports S.A. Miller in the Washington Times. "The soaring energy rates have resulted, in part, from a 1999 deregulation deal approved by the legislature and Gov. Parris N. Glendening, a Democrat. The deal capped BGE rates below market-level prices for six years while the wholesale cost of electricity rose."

May 5, 2006. National Taxpayers Union urges Governor Ehrlich to cut the gas tax. "According to the Federation of Tax Administrators, the state holds the dubious honor of having the 18th-highest state gas tax in the country. When a customer pulls up to a gas station in Maryland, he or she pays 23.5 cents per gallon alone in state gas taxes. Combined with an 18.4 cent per gallon federal gas tax, this means Maryland residents are paying nearly 42 cents per gallon just for taxes, or the equivalent of $6.29 on a 15-gallon fill-up."

May 5, 2006. The Supply-Side Cure to the Energy Crisis: Liberals and regulations caused it . . . conservatives and the free market can fix it, writes Peter Ferrara in the National Review. "...we now hear liberals screaming loudly about oil-company profits. But according to the Tax Foundation, the government takes about three-times as much in taxes from what you pay at the pump than the oil companies take in profits. Federal, state, and local gas taxes alone total about 46 cents per gallon, on average. Corporate income taxes, property taxes, sales taxes, and other taxes tack on much more."

FIRST MTA LEADERSHIP DINNER: Taxpayer advocates drew nearly 140 souls from the Maryland center-right for An April 17 coalition event featuring distinguished economist and columnist Walter Williams. The gathering at Ellicott City's Turf Valley Resort included Ambassador (now Assistant Secretary of State) Ellen Sauerbrey, ATR head Grover Norquist and NTU chief John Berthoud. Participants honored the work of Maryland center-right grass-roots activists. MTA's Leadership Events will bring together, on a larger scale, the men and women of Maryland’s grass-roots, from across the Free State, with some of the best national thinkers and practitioners. MTA plans a post-election Leadership Event this fall.

May 2, 2006. MTA joins policy groups urging Senate to act on eminent domain abuse--as the House of Representatives did last November when it overwhelmingly passed HR 4128. "This legislation seeks to curb eminent domain abuse by withholding federal economic development funds from states and localities that engage in these practices for a period of two years."

May 3, 2006. George W. Milhous Bush? Is Dubya the new Nixon, asks Jonah Goldberg in the National Review. "But explanations of Bush have often gone too far in the other direction. Critics think all you need to do to prove he's a Reaganite is point to his tax cuts. Yammerers like Kevin Phillips point to Bush's sincere Christianity and the rise of Christian conservatives to demonstrate he's a 'theocon.' It's worth remembering that Bush was always loyal to his father, who came out of the Nixon wing of the party and whose only term looks more than a little similar to his son's second term."