BooHoo for the Rich -- Two Senators Trying to Ban Estate Tax for Billionaires

Please take a look at this editorial from yesterday's New York Times -- The Forgotten Rich. It details the ridiculous and unpardonable efforts by two senators -- including a Democrat, shame on her -- to eliminate the Estate Tax for the wealthiest of Americans. It's a disgrace.

Bush's revision of the tax code to benefit the highest income Americans didn't end with basic tax rates, he wanted to eliminate any taxes on the transfer of huge inheritances from one dynasty to the next generation. Read this article from earlier this year to understand the history of this pernicious movement, a favorite of Bush Republicans. Championed by an estate planning advisor under marching orders from the forward-looking and gruesomely greedy Gallo wine family, the Mars Candy Company heirs, and the next generation of Campbell Soup kids, the "Death Tax" -- as Bush renamed it, per his pollsters advice that this would make it seem distateful to everyone -- was one way that Americans with tremendous fortunes could be fairly taxed after a lifetime of avoiding levies through all sorts of financial advantages available only to the very very rich.

Gallo? Campbell's? Mars Candy? I think it's time to give up that canned soup, your glass of cheap wine, and that handful of M&Ms, don't you? I'd say these folks don't deserve your support -- they certainly have shown their true colors.

While it appears that Obama merely wants to freeze the tax at current levels, it should rightfully be pushed back to previous levels, such as during the Clinton years and before. Unless you're a shockingly greedy multi-multi-millionaire without a shred of ethics, decency, fairplay, or sense of realistic payback, and with a pack of trust fund kiddies clawing for their unearned inheritances, you should be in favor of the Estate Tax without question.

It's simply obscene that these two Senators would choose billionaires to be their holy cause.

In fact, here's the link to Democratic Senator Blanche Lincoln's website and here's Republican Senator John Kyl's site, where you should drop them a line to tell her how her concern is woefully misplaced. You should also write to your own Senators to tell them that you completely support Barack Obama's Estate Tax reinstatement.

This is a huge issue and don't let the bullshit rhetoric coming from the (mostly) Republicans backers for the elimination of the Estate Tax change your mind. This is all about giving another break to the already-wealthy...just like almost everything else these days. Fight it!