Pelosi says she's not done yet

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) wants everyone to know she's not done yet. 

After a recent wave of retiring veteran Democrats, the former House speaker assertively said Thursday that's no indication she would soon follow in their footsteps. 

"When it is [time], you'll know," Pelosi told reporters in the Capitol.

"They go at their pace, [and] I go at mine. We'll miss them — they're fabulous — but, again, it stirs the pot, and lots of people are very excited about the prospect of what comes next for them," said the Democratic leader. "It's a constantly reinvigorated body; that's what our founders intended."

Since January, a number of seasoned House Democrats, have announced that this year will be their last in Congress. The list includes many close Pelosi allies like Reps. George Miller (Calif.) and Henry Waxman (Calif.) and other longtime members such as Jim Moran (Va.), Rush Holt (N.J.) and John Dingell (Mich.), the longest serving member in the history of Congress.

While the number of retirements is not unusual and is so far less than in recent cycles, the veteran stature of the names and their relationships with Pelosi has only amplified the whispers that she, too, might be eyeing the door, particularly if the Democrats fail to take back the House in November.

Pelosi, for her part, has consistently dismissed such speculation, which has swirled ceaselessly since the Democrats lost control of the House in 2010's landslide elections.

She says her focus on passing Democratic bills and winning back the House — a tall order with the 17 seats her party needs to flip — doesn't allow the time to contemplate her longer-term plans. 

"I'm too busy," she said. "As long as there's 1-in-5 children in America who lives in poverty, what I do is get up every morning revved to the task."

Pelosi used the question about her future as an opportunity to attack a comprehensive tax reform bill introduced Wednesday by Rep. Dave Camp (R-Mich.), the head of the Ways and Means Committee. 

Pelosi said the proposal would pile $2,000 in additional taxes on single moms making the minimum wage. 

"I have enough to invigorate me, and everybody's timetable around here isn't everybody else's timetable around here."

Via: The Hill

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President Obama's campaign group polling supporters on Obamacare

There's no doubt congressional investigators have their hands full probing allegations the Internal Revenue Service targeted conservative non-profit groups. But now a different IRS scandal -- involving the chronic, ongoing, mind-bogglingly wasteful mismanagement of a popular tax credit program -- demands Congress's attention because it has taken on new importance with the arrival of Obamacare.

The program is the Earned Income Tax Credit, through which the federal government gives out between $60 billion and $70 billion to low-income working Americans each year. It's known as a "refundable" tax credit, but it is basically a transfer payment, in which the IRS sends a check — perhaps even $5,000 every year — to workers who have little or no tax liability.

The problem is, the IRS does little to determine whether recipients actually qualify for the money. A recent report by the IRS inspector general says the agency has given out somewhere between $110 billion and $132 billion in improper Earned Income Tax Credit payments in the last decade. In that time period, between 21 and 30 percent of tax credit payments went to people who didn't qualify for them.

That is bad enough. But what infuriates lawmakers is that the IRS refuses to do anything about it. Agency officials told the inspector general they couldn't fix the problem because the tax credit program is very complicated, and also because they are afraid vigorous enforcement would discourage legitimately qualified recipients from applying for credits. And the IRS is not only not working to reduce improper payments, it is refusing to report those payments to Congress as required. The bottom line, in the words of inspector general Russell George: "The IRS is unlikely to achieve any significant reduction in Earned Income Tax Credit improper payments."

Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, has heard that before. "The IRS has repeatedly ignored the fraud and abuse in the Earned Income Tax Credit program, which has already cost Americans over $100 billion," Camp said in a statement Monday. "Americans should be confident that their tax dollars are being used properly, but that confidence has been shattered by the blatant disregard this agency has shown for monitoring refundable tax credits and better protecting taxpayers."

Via: Washington Examiner

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House Ways and Means chairman demands Delphi pension termination documents from Obama administration

Republican House Ways and Means Committee chairman Dave Camp demanded Wednesday that the U.S. Treasury Department and the Obama administration release records connected to an emerging scandal surrounding autoworker pensions terminated during the auto bailout. The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) and the Treasury Department axed pensions in 2009 for 20,000 non-union salaried retirees who worked for Delphi.

Those workers’ pension plans lost between 30 and 70 percent of their value, while similar plans covering members of the United Auto Workers and other labor unions were preserved and made whole.

Camp fired off letters to PBGC director Josh Gotbaum, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and White House Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler, asking for dosuments by September 7. His committee seeks internal documents and communications relating to the decision-making process that resulted in those pension losses for non-union Delphi retirees.

From the PBGC, Camp demanded Gotbaum provide “all records, including but not limited to electronic mail to or from PBGC, the Departments of Treasury, Labor and Commerce and the Executive Office of the President of the United States” that relate to Delphi and General Motors’ interest in Delphi “for the period of January 1 through December 31, 2009.”

He demanded similar documents from Geithner and Ruemmler.

Via: The Daily Caller

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