The Scallywags*!

 They are at it again!

House GOP Wants to Pair Israel Military Aid With IRS Cuts That Help Rich Tax Cheats
"House Republicans are using aid for Israel as a political pawn in order to slash taxes for their wealthy donors," said Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden.
Common Dreams
By Jake Johnson
October 31, 2023

House Republicans released legislative text on Monday that pairs around $14 billion in military aid for Israel with steep cuts from Internal Revenue Service funding that has given the agency more capacity to pursue wealthy tax cheats.

The GOP bill would strip $14.3 billion in funds from the IRS, a move that would undercut the agency's renewed enforcement push and nix efforts to build out a free digital tax filing system to compete with private tax-prep firms, which have lobbied aggressively against the IRS alternative.

While the House GOP's proposed IRS cuts were widely presented as "offsets" for the new aid for Israel's military, such cuts would in fact add to the federal deficit by depriving the agency of resources to collect taxes from rich tax dodgers who are costing the U.S. tens of billions in revenue.

"Every $1 you cut IRS funding will lose about $2 of revenue," noted Marc Goldwein of the conservative Center for a Responsible Federal Budget. "So that means this bill would add about $30 billion to the deficit.

The question is why do they want to cut the funding. Could it possible be because like Trump these billionaires don’t want their books looked at?

---

Then in the Senate the Republicans are worry about the Democrats find the dirt under the rug and they don’t want them looking too close in to the finances of the Supreme Court justices.

McConnell tells Senate Democrats to back off on Supreme Court
The Hill
By Alexander Bolton
October 31, 2023

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) warned Senate Democrats on Tuesday about issuing subpoenas to two prominent billionaires and a conservative activist because of their friendly ties to conservative members of the Supreme Court, calling such a move “totally inappropriate.”

McConnell essentially told Democratic colleagues to back off after Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) announced this week that his committee will subpoena two businessmen who extended personal hospitality to conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.

“What he’s targeting here is private citizens with no legislative purpose. I think it’s completely and totally inappropriate,” McConnell said at a press conference Tuesday.

Influence peddling? Tax evasions? Who know what they might find.

A painting at the private lakeside resort shows Crow, Leo and Thomas smoking cigars together in a relaxed outdoor setting.

Durbin said on the Senate floor Tuesday that the subpoenas are “the next step in the committee’s ongoing investigation of the ethics of the Supreme Court.”
Lets see.

How many years have the Republicans investigated President Biden son? Abe News reports that,
Five years into a federal probe of his personal and professional life, President Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden, is facing additional legal exposure in the coming months after a summer punctuated by setbacks.

U.S. Attorney David Weiss, a Trump-era appointee who has since been elevated to special counsel, has indicted the younger Biden on felony gun charges after a plea deal between the two parties fell apart in a Delaware courtroom in July.

And that was all they found his son. Their investigation into the President found no evidence on anything improper, the Republicans have said,

During a press conference explaining the investigation, Comer was asked if he had evidence directly linking Biden to corruption. The Kentucky Republican hemmed and hawed but ultimately admitted he didn’t.

As reported by the New Republic.

---

And then up in Wisconsin…

Wisconsin's Democratic governor sues Republican Legislature over blocking basic functions
AP News via NPR News
By Scott Bauer
October 31, 2023

Wisconsin Democratic Gov. on Tuesday sued the Republican-controlled Legislature, arguing that it is obstructing basic government functions, including signing off on pay raises for university employees that were previously approved.

Evers is asking the liberal-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court to take the case directly, bypassing lower courts.

Evers said it was “a bridge too far” and “just bull s---” that Republican state lawmakers were telling 35,000 University of Wisconsin employees who were expecting pay raises to “stick it.”

“You can’t do that,” Evers told reporters at a news conference. “That’s why we’re suing and that’s why we’re going to win.”

Evers argues in the lawsuit that committees controlled by a few Republican lawmakers are being used by the Legislature to “reach far beyond its proper zone of constitutional lawmaking authority.”

Now get a load of what the Republicans are trying to sell to the people,

And Republican Sen. Steve Nass, who was also named as a defendant, accused Evers of attempting a “radical power grab” to "empower unelected state bureaucrats and minimize the constitutional oversight powers of elected state legislators.”

Do you believe the audacity of the Republicans?

What Lord Acton wrote in 1887, “power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely”  is still true today and the Republicans prove it every day.

* Scallywags: a white Southerner who collaborated with northern Republicans during Reconstruction.