http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1802&ncid=703&e=5&u=/washpost/20040419/ts_washpost/a22581_2004apr18Special-Interest Add-Ons Weigh Down Tax-Cut Bill
Mon Apr 19, 1:00 AM ET By Jonathan Weisman, Washington Post Staff Writer
Congress's task seemed simple enough: Repeal an illegal $5 billion-a-year export subsidy and replace it with some modest tax breaks to ease the pain on U.S. exporters.
But out of that imperative has emerged one of the most complex, special-interest-riddled corporate tax bills in years, lawmakers, Senate aides and tax lobbyists say. The 930-page epic is packed with $170 billion in tax cuts aimed at cruise-ship operators, foreign dog-race gamblers, NASCAR track owners, bow-and-arrow makers and Oldsmobile dealers, to name a few. There is even a $94 million break for a single hotel in Sioux City, Iowa.
Even one of the tax lobbyists involved in drafting it conceded the bill "has risen to a new level of sleaze."<snip>
Between the special-interest provisions are also some of the most ambitious curbs on corporate tax abuses to emerge since Enron Corp. imploded 21/2 years ago. The bill would ramp up penalties on corporate tax scofflaws, untie the Internal Revenue Service's hands to pursue more tax shelters, come down hard on affluent individuals who renounce their citizenship for tax purposes, and virtually eliminate the tax benefit for companies that transfer their "headquarters" to a post-office box in a Caribbean tax haven.<snip>
COMMENT - I can wait till next year to get the "ramped up penalties on corporate tax scofflaws, the untied Internal Revenue Service's hands to pursue more tax shelters, to come down hard on affluent individuals who renounce their citizenship for tax purposes, and to virtually eliminate the tax benefit for companies that transfer their "headquarters" to a post-office box in a Caribbean tax haven.p>
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