Vain Repetitions

Every time I try to think about Sandy Berger shoving state secrets into his drawers, the media distract me. How? By talking about Sandy Berger and then--talking about something else later. Yes, the media are CHANGING THE SUBJECT. Just like they always do. The media have long used the tactic of reporting stuff and then not reporting on the stuff they've been reporting on--all in an effort to fill our heads with news, then dilute it with different news.

According to the Media Research Center's 1,768th Cyber Alert (http://www.mrc.org), some reporters who once talked about how Sandy Berger made a pair of Depends Diapers out of National Security Documents--ARE NO LONGER TALKING ABOUT SANDY BERGER. In particular, MRC says that the following reporters are especially guilty of reporting the Berger story--only not to report it the day after they reported it. And apparently, they continued not to report it the day after that:

Time magazine's Joe Klein was talking about Sandy Berger on CNN's Paula Zahn Now. The CBS Evening News was talking about Sandy Berger. ABC's Peter Jennings was talking about Sandy Berger. On NBC Nightly News, Andrea Mitchell was talking about Sandy Berger. Tom Brokaw was talking about Sandy Berger. Today co-host Matt Lauer was talking about Sandy Berger. So was Couric. She even talked to Sandy Berger's attorney. David Gergen was talking about Sandy Berger. George Stephanopoulos was talking about Sandy Berger. ABC?s Linda Douglass was talking about Sandy Berger. Charles Gibson wastalking about Sandy Berger.

But guess what? None if these people kept talking about Sandy Berger. It's as if they want us to believe that the news, once reported, CHANGES,replaced by other so-called "current" events.

And it's working, too. According to Google's Zeitgeist, the Top 10 Gaining Google Queries for the Week Ending July 19, 2004, are:

Where is the Sandy Berger Zeitgeist? It is kaput. Does anyone need further proof of the media's attempt to bury this story?

Help me turn the tide. Defy the corporate liberal media. Let's make this Talk About Sandy Berger Week and discuss nothing but SandyBerger.

Did you hear about Sandy Berger? Well, the Republicans did, about 10 months ago. I'm glad they finally thought to tell us about it. A week before the 9/11 report. Phew! Had they waited a few days longer, we may have REALLY been distracted from the Sandy Berger story. Kudos to the Republicans forkeeping us focused on The Big Important Stuff.

House Passes 3 Tax Cuts, Plans a 4th

Cost Would Outstrip Recent Action on Deficit

By Jonathan Weisman

Washington Post Staff Writer

Thursday, December 8, 2005; A01

The House passed three separate tax cuts yesterday and plans to approve a fourth today, rimming the federal revenue by $94.5 billion over five years -- nearly double the budget savings that Republicans muscled through the House last month.

GOP leaders portray the tax bills -- for the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast, affluent investors, U.S. troops serving in Iraq and taxpayers who otherwise would be hit by the alternative minimum tax -- as vital to keeping the economy rolling.

Really. Who among us doesn't make more than $1 million a year? Oh sure, there may be some housewives slumming it around the $100,000 a year level. They all deserve a tax break. Is that crazy? I think not.

I'll give you more insanity. Revenue to pay for these tax cuts will have to come from someplace. States are someplace. Can you guess which of your taxes will be going up even as the federal taxes of the very wealthy are going down? If you guessed property taxes, sales tax, and state income tax, then you're right!

The House wants to pass a bill (H.R. 1956) that would make it more difficult for states to tax the income of interstate corporations. It's tough enough for a state to tax the income of a corporation. H.R. 1956 would make it tougher by requiring companies to be physically present in a state before the state can tax them.

Corporate cash cows, such as trademarks--Geoffrey the Giraffe from Toys R Us, for example--can be sold by Toys R Us to a Delaware holding company and then "rented" back to Toys R Us in West Virginia. Under HR 1956, W.Va. couldn't tax the $50 million a year earned by Toys R Us from the Geoffrey the Giraffe trademarks.

And by "physically in Delaware," I mean the Delaware company has a room in the American National Building at 1105 N. Market Street in Wilmington.

Want to hear something really crazy? There are--I kid you not--more than 700 companies in the United States with an address at 1105 N. Market St. Five hundred of those companies are on the 13th floor. For a building that purports to have only 20 stories and only 150,000 square feet of commercial space, that's about 15 square feet for each of the 500 businesses on the 13th floor.

Who would have thought that Shell, Seagram, Sumitomo, Colgate?Palmolive, Columbia Hospitals, Comcast, British Airways, Ikea, Pepsico, Nabisco, General Electric, and the Hard Rock Cafe would squeeze their massive corporate selves into a 15-square foot closet alongside 488 other corporate closets?

Toys R Us pays its Delaware holding company $50 million a year to rent Geoffrey the Giraffe. I mean, using W.Va. dollars, Toys R Us pays the rent it owes itself in Delaware to rent something it already owns in W.Va. just to avoid paying W.Va. income tax on the $50 million.

The moral of the story is: The holding company then "loans" the money back to Toys R Us at Very Favorable Rates, like five years interest free with a renegotiable balloon payment at the end.

And so Toys R Us, with its W.Va. left hand, removes $50 million from its W.Va pocket, puts it into its Delaware right hand, which promptly gives the money back to the left hand in W.Va--except now W.Va. can't tax the $50 million and Toys R Us gets to use it interest and tax free.

And I love state's rights. I thought Republicans loved state's rights, so why is the House majority hell bent on using HR 1956 to make the states the middleman in their Republican tax-cut daisy chain?