Oh I thought you were there to represent ME

I need to start off by saying that while I am not really the grassroots anti government everything in Washington is evil kind of person.  Sometimes I do believe something about spending time inside the beltway makes you loose touch with reality a bit, but for the most part I think the US government is about as good as any other form of government available to us in this world.

It was always my understanding that each community elected congressmen and senators to represent that communities' interests, and I accept that there is some compromises to be made.  Us folks in Texas like it when federal dollars go to build airplanes in Ft. Worth, but we tend to think it is a waste of money to build aircraft carriers in Long Beach, but personally, I can accept that is part of the give and take.

So I am questioning why my senators from Texas would vote against extending the tax laws that allow you to choose to deduct sales tax when you do your federal tax return.  Let me give you a little background here.  Prior to 1986, when you were figuring out your itemized deductions in the taxes section you got to put state income tax, property tax and sales tax as deductible state taxes.  Someone came up with the bright idea to exclude sales tax from the list and so for several years the list of deductible taxes was limited to just property taxes and state income taxes.  The problem is folks that live in states that have no state income tax (like Texas) still had to pay sales tax and back then in most cases we paid a lot higher sales tax than the states that did have a state income tax.  I will grant you that a lot of those other states have caught up and in some cases passed up Texas in how much sales tax they collect now, but remember this is all about me, so I don't really care about those other states.  I was pissed that I lost out on a tax deduction.  (To be fair folks in Alaska, Nevada, Florida, Tennessee, South Dakota, Washington and Wyoming got screwed too, but this is about ME)

I am not the only one who felt that way and finally in 2003 Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson introduced a bill that gave you the choice of deducting state income tax OR sales tax.  Way to go I got back my tax deduction.

The problem is that deduction came up for renewal last week and the same Kay Bailey Hutchinson along with John Cornyn also of Texas voted AGAINST the extension, because it would add to the already out of control federal deficit.

I certainly agree that Congress needs to do something to reign in the deficit, but I kind of have a simple priority list of ways to do that.

#1 Raise taxes and cut spending on things that don't affect me and my community. (I really don't care if they continue to research the breeding habits of salmon in Oregon or not)

#2 Raise taxes and cut spending where the impact is shared among all communities. (I'm even ok when we all share the pain equally, that seems fair)

#3 and lastly raise taxes and cut spending on things that affect just me and my community. (You need to go here last because it just does not seem fair when I can no longer deduct my sales taxes, but those folks in California still get to deduct their state income tax payments, at least my state government can balance their budget)

I could understand if Charles Shumer D-NY voted against the extension, but surely the good senators from Texas can see how logical my plan is and would have my best interest at heart.  It must be a mental disorder where you spend so much time in a place that you forget about the people who put you there to begin with.  Since I discovered the disease, I am calling it dc-itis.  Remember it's all about me.