Was the House vote for higher taxes yesterday a “repudiation of the leadership of House Speaker William J. Howell, R-Stafford, and Majority Leader H. Morgan Griffith, R-Salem? Del. Jeffrey M. Frederick, R-Prince William, who thinks his victory over Jack Rollison in the Republican primary and subsequent election to his first term as delegate makes him some kind of legislative guru, says of the 17 GOPers who voted for the bill, “The other body has played you as fools.”
While Sen. Roscoe Reynolds, a Democrat from Henry, says tax fairness has not been addressed.
Here’s the vote to keep most of the corporate loopholes.
Vince Callahan (R-Fairfax) in the Washington Times: “The hang-up is that [the Senate will] want to spend more money than we do,” he said. “We can’t [compromise] with a recalcitrant Senate who won’t work with us.”
Compromise? The Senate started at nearly $4 billion and is now at about $2 billion. The Senate has compromised far more than the House has.
Meanwhile, Del. Bob Marshall (R-Prince William) and one of the most arrogant lawmakers, called the bill “political infidelity” and wasted taxpayers money trying to pass a bill to change the name of the tax bill to the “Net Tax Increase Act.”
The loss of over $200 million in revenue from the original “compromise” bill was due to the loss of increased recordation fees when a house is sold. The move to cut the fees was from Del. Thelma Drake (R-Norfolk). You see, she’s a realtor, so she wants to keep home prices lower so she can sell more house and make more money. And she received “$86,395 in campaign contributions from real-estate and construction interests since 1996, roughly one-fourth of all her donations.”
She was happy to make sure she can line her pockets at the expense of school children, the sick and anybody else in need but her.
More later…