FMA, flag burning amendments provide smokescreen to repeal estate tax.

[flpoljunkie]

Of these three, only repeal of the "death tax" has any chance of passing in the Republican controlled Senate--it's "money they love" as Randy Newman would say.

Word has it that McCain will case a vote for cloture for the repeal of the estate tax, and vote against the same bill on the floor.

As E. J. Dionne wrote today in the Washington Post:

This month's offensive by President Bush and his allies in Congress against gay marriage and flag burning proves one thing: The Republican Party thinks its base of social conservatives is a nest of dummies who have no memories and respond like bulls whenever red flags are waved in their faces.

The people who should be angry this week are not liberals or gays or lesbians, but the president's most loyal supporters. After using the gay-marriage issue shamelessly in the 2004 campaign, Bush and Republican leaders left opponents of gay marriage out in the cold as they concentrated on the party's real priorities: privatizing Social Security and cutting taxes on rich people.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/05/AR2006060501472.html