Month: February 2013

On the issue of basic fairness, and also because we need to raise more revenue than our basically flat income tax rate allows, it is time for Delaware for add a few more tiers to its progressive tax structure. As it stands now, Delaware has two tax rates it taxes you at. If you make under $60,000, you are taxed at one percentage. If you make over $60,000, you are taxed at another percentage. The unfairness and ridiculousness of this system cannot be overstated. Someone making poverty level wages (i.e. under $18k) is taxed the same rate as someone making $55k. And someone making $14 million a year is taxed the same as someone making $90k. Delaware has a $63 million budget shortfall, and we cannot make that shortfall up and deal with the cost of Medicaid simply with spending cuts. It is time that Delaware adds more tax rate tiers above and below the 60k dividing line. Meanwhile, the JFC will be holding public hearings this Wednesday on the health and social services spending.

Sadly, it is not terribly shocking that Pam Scott had a lot of influence in New Castle County. It also isn't terribly shocking that Tom Gordon comes off as a little too giddy in this front pager.

What they lack in human decency, they make up for with tunnel vision.

“We have a pro-life Legislature, pro-life governor in Scott Walker and a pro-life attorney general (J.B. Van Hollen). We can all wrap our arms around this agenda.” And it sounds like the first bill to get a warm reception from Republicans will be what's being dubbed the “Woman’s Right to Know her Unborn Child Act,” also being termed the "ultrasound bill" by pro-choice forces. The bill would require a woman seeking an abortion to receive an ultrasound and be informed of what is visible on the monitoring screen — although the woman would not be forced to look at the image. “This bill is a priority,” Fitzgerald said. “It is long overdue.”

Priorities....

Angelo Cataldi has a feature every Friday morning on his talk show on 94WIP, in which he names his choice for the winner of the week and the weasel (or loser) of the week in the local and national world of sports. For example, this week the winner was an Swedish LPGA golfer who was bitten by a black widow spider while golfing. Instead of quitting the tour, and the game, she took a golf tee, but punctured the bite wound on her ankle to release the poison, and then she completed all 18 holes. The weasel of the week was new Philadelphia Eagles coach Chip Kelly, who hired lackluster assistant coaches and re-signed failed QB Michael Vick. Then, for the rest of the Friday show, callers call in to offer better choices than Angelo's for the winner and weasels of the week and Angelo's cohosts vote on which is better. I am wholly stealing this idea for a new Saturday morning column outlining my choices on who is the winner and loser of the week. I can't call the loser a weasel, because I am told the conservative blowhard Rick Jensen already awards a weasel of the week. Rick must have stole from Angelo too. Candidates for each can be from local Delaware or national politics. I will select my winner and loser based on something they did or said during the previous week (Saturday, February 9 to Friday, February 15), and then our wonderful commenters will debate my choices, and offer what they think are better options for each. And my fellow contributors can judge whose choices are better. My choices, and yours, are relegated to the world of politics and government. I can't chose that Blade Runner guy from South Africa for allegedly murdering his model wife, because he is not in politics or government. For my Loser of the week....