Alternative to national forest sales proposed by Democratic Senators

[DeepModem Mom]

CNN/AP: Alternative to forest sales proposed
Senators: Schools program doesn't require selling public lands
Thursday, March 30, 2006

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Two Democratic senators said Thursday they have found a way to pay for a program to fund rural schools without selling 300,000 acres of national forests, as the Bush administration has proposed.

Sens. Max Baucus of Montana and Ron Wyden of Oregon said their plan would raise $2.6 billion over the next 10 years for the rural schools program by closing a tax loophole they said allows some government contractors to avoid tax obligations.

The bill is intended to circumvent a Bush administration plan to sell 300,000 acres of Forest Service lands to raise about $800 million for rural schools in 41 states.

Lawmakers from both parties have denounced the plan, saying the permanent loss of public lands isn't worth the short-term gain to schools. They also say it wouldn't raise enough money to help rural governments pay for schools and other services.

The proposal by Baucus and Wyden would provide a steady revenue stream for the rural schools program, commonly known as the county payments law, by closing the tax loophole in federal contracts, the senators said....

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/03/30/land.sale.ap/index.html

[darkmaestro019]

1. Well, I was going to say "Quit spending money to blow up brown kids

in other countries" but stopping corporate welfare is a good idea too......

[Benhurst]

2. Why don't they sell off Air Force One. It would save millions and

prevent the idiot from embarrassing us abroad.

[Zorra]

3. Good idea....but if republicans were not so fiscally irresponsible

this sale would *theoretically* not even be considered.

I suspect that the fascist Butthead administration simply wants to privatize all our public lands by selling them off to wealthy campaign donors that contributed to GOP fascists.

Republicans are destroying everything that was ever good about our country - even the legacy of our beautiful forest lands.

[liberal N proud]

4. Tax loophole they said allows some government contractors?

We can't stop those... Why those are friends of the bu$h regime and they work hard for those loopholes, sucking ass all the time just to insure the get a break on those no-bid contracts and not have to pay taxes.
We don't need those stinking trees anyway, they just make it hard to see the mountains when driving down the road.
If we cut them all down, we won't need to worry about forest fires either.

:sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

[gristy]

5. This is a terrific idea, and I mean in general

Anytime the republicks want to do something bad (like selling our national forests) to fund a pious program, the dems can instead propose to close a big, bad corporate loophole to fund the pious program. That's a win-win-win across the board. For everyone who should win, anyways...

[jwirr]

6. I wonder if they have ever thought of sell TVA? This would

allow the red states it works in to find out what privatization of energy resources is all about.