Sen. Kyl strikes me as a decent (which means better than average these days) senator. Seems like its unusually responsive that he (or his office) took the time to respond. I'm a little skeptical on some of it even though there's probably some inside baseball stuff that has to be done to make the Senate run. Things like tax breaks or subsidies for wooden arrows in the bail out bill seem very pork-ish to me.

I happen to have know some people who interned for various congressman/senators in the 90's. Its apparently common to have staff that is versed in the politicians positions who then prepare these letters, which is then read & signed by the pol. Perhaps Kyl wrote this himself, but who knows.

I think we need more transparency and accountability in congress. That would prolly go a long way in cleaning up pork. maybe.

I love the fact that he cites that these 'additions' had to be included in this bill as Congress was "poised to adjourn for the November elections." So let me get this straight, you slapped something together at the end of the day so you wouldn't have to stay late? I don't know about you, but I'd be canned if I told my boss that I would have implemented a proper solution, but couldn't as I didn't want to miss a job interview.

I worked for Senator Kyle in 2005. He is a really decent guy. I'd say his office is way above average in terms of responding to and serving constituents. The fact that you got a response at all (snail mail's better than nothing) is pretty nice.

Pretty cool that he responded with that much detail instead of a "thanks for contacting us" type of letter. Gives me hope for at least one politician.

Kyl seems like a decent fellow. It's nice to see an informed explanation about what the bill actually contained directly from someone who was involved, rather than hearing the watered-down analysis that almost all news outlets represent these days.

For all the acrimony that the wooden arrows generated, there was very little mention of the removal of the $2000 cap on residential solar tax credits. As someone who has been pricing that out over the past year, that's hugely positive news.

Should the tax bill have been bundled with the stabilization bill? Not in ideal world, no. But that's the way things operate - there just isn't enough time to separate every initiative into its own bill and gather everyone to vote on them separately. Can you imagine how little would get done if our representatives voted on each measure individually?

Wait, on second thought... that might be a good thing...

Tim,

Thanks for sharing all of this; it's really interesting. But ultimately, the bills were bundled to sway the vote of one issue or another. Either the tax stuff was there to sway the bailout bill or it was in the bailout bill to sway the votes on the tax issues.

I think congress should have to vote on each and every issue on its own. When I check code in to a large system, I do it one bug fix or feature at a time. This ensures measurement and accountability. Oh wait, yeah, congress would never want that.

Jeff Handley

I wish they would just permanently repeal broken tax codes and set a formula to properly calculate AMT instead of revisiting these things every few years. Aren't they just creating more work for themselves? Somebody needs to learn about refactoring as a way to keep down infrastructure debt. Also, any bill that passes with more than 66% vote should automatically go into law without the chance for veto, sliding in some earmarks, and re-vote. That would cut down on earmarks and remove some doubt about a move like the rescue bill.