When purchasing a product or service, we all like to see the itemized list of charges – one that separates the cost of the purchase from the share going to Uncle Sam through the form of taxes and fees. Needless to say, government bureaucrats don’t like that. They desire that we remain blissfully ignorant of government’s burden on our everyday lives. This is one reason why they concocted the withholdings scheme for income tax collection. Now, they are expanding their tentacles into commercial taxes so they can obfuscate the magnitude of taxes and fees on airfare purchases. Without much fanfare, the Department of Transportation (DOT) enacted a rule which requires airlines to ensconce all government taxes and fees in a single total advertised price with the fare. For example, if you purchase a $350 plane ticket with $50 of taxes and fees, the DOT is demanding that the airline advertise the price as $400. Airline passengers pay over a dozen taxes and fees on any given airplane ticket, but the government doesn’t want us to know that. The rule was finalized last April, but only took effect last week. The timing of this rule is very fortuitous. This week, Congress will finalize negotiations for a long-term FAA funding bill. This bill authorizes the collection of all taxes – including taxes on aviation fuel, domestic and international ticket taxes, and cargo –directed to the Airport and Airway Trust Fund, which provides the bulk of FAA funding. As usual, Democrats want to spend more money on wasteful projects, and are all too hungry to increase aviation taxes. What better way to leverage tax increases than by forcing airlines to hide their cost and to shoulder the blame for the perceived higher price tag at the top! This is yet another insidious plan to raise taxes and place unconstitutional mandates on private enterprise – all by administrative fiat. It must be stopped in its tracks. Today, conservative Rep. Tom Graves (R-GA) is introducing a bill, the Travel Transparency Act, which will void the DOT rule, and demand that passengers have the right to view all the aviation taxes in separate line items for each ticket purchased. Graves asserted that “the federal government should not be inserting itself in the private sector to limit consumers’ ability to see how much they’re getting taxed. If the American people can’t see these costs clearly, I fear it will be easier these fees and taxes to be raised without their knowledge.” Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood, who used to be a Republican, defended the rule as a necessary means to ensure that passengers are treated with “dignity and respect.” The only thing this rule will accomplish is ensuring that passengers retain their “respect” for government, while blaming the airlines for perceived increases in ticket prices. At present, airline passengers are on the hook for at least 16 different taxes and fees on the average airline ticket. Additionally, they must incur the most harmful backdoor tax; the high cost of jet fuel resulting from decades of anti-energy growth policies. We must ensure that the existing taxes remain transparent so that Congress will have a harder time sneaking through new tax increases. Please ask your member of Congress to cosponsor Tom Graves’s Travel Transparency Act. Cross-posted to The Madison Project
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The Government is Playing Hide and Seek With Airfare Taxes
From the diaries by Neil Wisconsin’s Government Accountability Board has been a poster child for dysfunction for a while now and even still this supposedly non-partisan agency never ceases to amaze with its inexplicable behavior. In December, a GAB representative said that Mickey Mouse or Adolph Hitler could sign a recall petition and it would pass their initial review. A judge literally had to order the Board to actually look for fraud instead of putting a rubber stamp on recall petitions. What the GAB is doing now is beyond the realm of sanity and all Wisconsin voters should be outraged. Now the ACLU seems to be pulling the strings. The ACLU of Wisconsin recently raised privacy concerns of posting Governor Walker recall petitions on the GAB’s website. Initially, the Board committed to posting the Walker recall petitions online this past Monday . They have since changed their tune and have decided to kowtow to the ACLU despite the fact that they have an established practice of posting petitions online as they did for State Senate recall petitions last summer and again for the four Senators under recall threat right now. This change is a major snub to every Wisconsin voter, who already has reason to doubt the competence of the Board and the credibility of the entire system. It is also a slap at Tea Party and other grassroots groups across the state that are involved in protecting the system against fraud with Verify the Recall efforts. The Walker Campaign has now received all of the recall petitions, but the public is left without them. Verify the Recall had planned to begin their Walker recall review process on Monday so that they can adequately review the alleged 1 million signatures within the 30 day window for challenging fraud which is widely believed to effect tens of thousands of signatures. But Verify the Recall’s 11,000 volunteers are left waiting while the clock is ticking. In response to the GAB’s delay, both the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and the MacIver Institute filed open records requests asking for copies of the recall petitions under Wisconsin’s open records law. Even liberal Bill Lueders, president of the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council, said that the petitions should be public. The state’s largest newspaper, a conservative group, and a liberal leader all agree that these recall petitions should be public. Now, that should tell you something. Back in November, Media Trackers warned about privacy concerns. Yet it was not until the middle of January that the ACLU decided to play politics with the GAB and bring their privacy concerns forward. Here we are now at the end of January that the GAB makes a last minute decision to do what the ACLU wants. (Ironically, Politifact ruled Media Tracker’s report as “Mostly False” even though the ACLU’s concerns vindicate Media Trackers’ warning). With the amount of suspected fraud in the recall process piling up after initial reviews of the State Senate recall signatures, it is critical that there is transparency in the recall process. Wisconsinites need to be able to trust that there truly are enough recall signatures before having recall election forced on them that could cost taxpayers $20 million . The GAB has a long way to go to regain the public’s confidence in their abilities and the system they manage which directly impacts the future of this state. They need to ensure accountability. If they can’t or won’t, the people of Wisconsin should have the chance to protect the electoral process and hold the GAB accountable.
So, Google is integrating its websites more. As a result, some privacy settings will apply network-wide, and one site will be able to use data from another site. People are flipping out, naturally. People have been giving Google this data for ages. People have known that Google was watching them, and yet they chose to keep using Google and in fact use one account for many Google services . Note that the new policy changes nothing about what Google already knew about you. It just changes what certain Google sites will use about you. As Marsha Blackburn and other members of Congress begin to look into it though, Google isn’t helping its case by pleading that it’s alright because certain users are excluded , which just furthers the premise that there’s something wrong with it. But ultimately, you’re in control of what you do online . Personal responsibility: it’s not just for breakfast anymore. I feel vindicated though in having about a dozen Google accounts for the limited times I had use for their services, usual in the course of helping somebody else. Different accounts for different uses and different sites. It was never hard. You just had to do it. Oh, and not use their email. Once again, the real LightSquared issue isn’t even LightSquared. This is about the Obama administration. the actual decision is irrelevant at this point and Chuck Grassley will keep fighting for process transparency . The SOPA battle didn’t end with defeating SOPA. We still need to solve the problem of foreign free riders. That’s why Steve Forbes joins those taking a look at the OPEN Act . I’m just one guy, but it wasn’t hard for me to figure out why this Washington Post story is garbage . In the course of making the case against Net Neutrality, by pointing out that we need wireless providers to be able to innovate and expand, and get those innovations and expansions paid for, the WaPo claims that Apple’s Siri would overload wireless networks. That never made sense, though, and of course it’s not true . Siri’s sending in a few seconds of audio, and getting back some text, then maybe doing a web search. That’s not going to kill a network. It’s not even video. The problems are spectrum (we need more of it) and regulation (we need less of it). Get government out of the way, and we’ll allow incentives to build bigger, better networks. Unless the Roaming regulations which actually encouraged Sprint to reduce its network coverage, free riding on competitors’ networks, reducing total capacity and harming rural users. So again, one of the better things we can do is whip the FCC into shape by restricting its freedom to do bad things. No more picking winners and losers . California coughs up a million bucks after losing its video game censorship case . Watch people cheer, until they remember the ESA was pro-SOPA. Twitter wants to censor EuroNazis and probably Chinese users. Blaming Twitter for this is dumb. But then again, Anonymous and other radicals pitching a fit about this don’t intend to actually stand up to Red China or the EuroSocialists who censor their people online. Blaming Americans is the easier route, so naturally they take it. It’s easy to talk about turning over Facebook and others accounts after people die , but in the case of all free online accounts, how do you prove that the deceased actually “owned” that account? With most property there is a paper trail, a transaction, or something that ties the owner to the property. But free online accounts, who do they really “belong” to? And how do you prove it, without a paper trail?
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Tech at Night: Google causes a privacy stir, Twitter causes a censorship stir, Grassley continues to fight
To add to the hypocrisy, Warren is the brains behind the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), the agency Obama appointed Richard Cordray to that is meant to police . . . you guessed it, Wall Street. Via Boston Herald: I thought Elizabeth Warren was all about transparency. We are all still waiting for her to
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Report: Occupy “Creator” Mass Senate Candidate Elizabeth Warren Collects Millions From Wall St. Through Democratic Party….
In November I reported on American company Hawker Beechcraft being inexplicably disqualified from bidding on a weapons contract that appears ready to go to a Brazilian company named Embraer, which has questionable ties to America’s enemies. Embraer, a Brazilian aerospace giant which is currently under investigation for potentially making illegal payments to obtain government contracts, is essentially owned by the Brazilian government. Through their “Golden Share,” Brazil essentially has control over the company’s business operations. According to Embraer’s website, that Golden Share provision empowers the Brazilian government with veto rights over: “Creation and/or alteration of military programs, whether or not involving the Federative Republic of Brazil;” “Development of third parties´ skills in technology for military programs;” and “Interruption of the supply of maintenance and replacement parts for military aircraft,” among other things. But Brazil has their own explaining to do regarding their long and sordid history with the rogue country of Iran . According to the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, “In 1989, Brazil chose to sell Tucanos, Embraer’s relatively low cost and basic military aircraft, to Iran.” Currently, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Air Force operates around 40 Embraer T-27 Tucanos, according to the Washington Institute. In fact, the Iranians use the Tucano as their primary close air support aircraft. In recent years, Brazil has continued its troubling friendship with Iran and ruthless leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The Hudson Institute notes that, “Another area of tension between Brazil and the United States relates to Iran. In November 2009, President da Silva invited Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Brazil. In May 2010, da Silva helped broker a deal in which Iran would ship only a portion of its low-enriched uranium to Turkey for reprocessing; the rest would remain in Iranian hands, where it could be further enriched for nuclear weapon production.” After I wrote the article, most of the pushback I received was related to whether or not the Brazilian aircraft was superior and therefore deserved the contract. This painfully misses the point which thankfully, the U.S. government is conveniently highlighting for me. The point of my original article, which I apparently didn’t make obvious enough, was that Embraer didn’t “win” the contract. Hawker Beechcraft was disqualified from bidding further without explanation. The question I had and still have, is why? Thus far responses to all inquiries have been met with the transparency we’ve come to expect from this administration: complete silence, further highlighting the reason to continue asking the question. Not surprisingly, Hawker seems to feel the same way . Hawker Beechcraft, which has been excluded by the U.S. Air Force from competing for a contract to supply a new light attack aircraft, is fighting mad and fighting back. The Wichita-based manufacturer of business jets and turboprops filed suit yesterday with the Court of Federal Claims following notification that the Government Accountability Office (GAO) declined to review its protest of the Air Force decision, which was made public in November. Hawker goes on to make the case for their product which may or may not be better than the competition. And perhaps they do have a superior product which would of course raise further questions, but, as is the case with me, some are more curious as to the bidding process that government has mysteriously employed in this situation. The Taxpayers Protection Alliance is one such group : The Taxpayers Protection Alliance applauds and supports American aircraft manufacturer Hawker Beechcraft’s federal suit in response to the recent series of outrageous and perplexing actions of awarding the Light Air Support and Light Attack and Armed Reconnaissance (LAS/LAAR) aircraft to the Brazilian company Embraer. By doing this, the Administration will be shipping jobs overseas, and putting a critical defense project in the hands of a hostile, foreign government. This is all at the expense of American taxpayers. In the contract bid to support the military’s LAS/LAAR aircraft program, our organization has already voiced its support for Hawker Beechcraft over Brazil’s Embraer to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta in two separate letters here and here because of its ability to protect taxpayers and the country. The abrupt disqualification of Hawker Beechcraft will lead to the awarding of the contract – and the ensuing revenue to American taxpayers – to a foreign company currently under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission for possible violation of the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits companies from bribing foreign government officials or making other illegal payments to obtain or retain business. The Administration’s awarding of this contract to Embraer would send billions of dollars in taxpayer dollars to Brazil that would otherwise stay in the United States. Hawker Beechcraft is right to file suit with the Court of Federal Claims to help ensure this Administration keeps defense contracting and production on American soil, where they belong. As is Congressman Tim Huelskamp of Kansas : (DODGE CITY, KAN.) – Kansas Congressman Tim Huelskamp released the following statement in support of Hawker Beechcraft after it was announced that the company had filed suit following its disqualification from competition for an Air Force Light Air Support (LAS) contract. As a result of the disqualification, the only remaining bidder is believed to be Embraer, a Brazilian company. Hawker Beechcraft had protested the disqualification by requesting a review by the Government Accountability Office, but the review was denied. Hawker Beechcraft has fulfilled similar U.S. Navy and U.S. Air Force contracts for T-6A/B trainer aircraft since 1996. The contracts have been fulfilled in part at the company’s Wichita, Kansas facility. “It is simply wrong for the Obama Administration to hire a Brazilian company to handle national security when we have a qualified and competent American company that can do the job,” Congressman Huelskamp said. “With millions of Americans out of work, it makes no sense to award the work to a foreign company. Along with my colleagues in the Kansas delegation, I will continue to attempt to right this wrong in order to preserve America’s national and economic security interests.” According to data provided by Hawker Beechcraft, the AT-6 project supports 1,400 American jobs at 181 companies in 39 states. Additionally, the company has invested more than $100 million in order to meet the Air Force’s requirements for competition. But as I said, it’s the government that’s really making the case that there is something to investigate here. No answer is forthcoming when asked why they would disqualify a long time vendor of the U.S. military who happens to be an American company making a potentially superior product which would create 1,400 U.S. jobs. I’m sure they have a great reason. Cross-Posted at BenHoweShow.com
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American Weapons Manufacturer Taking U.S. Government to Court for Bid Disqualification
