Highlights: House Republicans are proposing funding $14 billion in aid to Israel by cutting additional money for divisions of the IRS tasked with making sure wealthy people and tax cheats pay their fair share, according to a new bill filed Monday.

The bill would also eliminate a task force intended to design a free direct e-file tax return system that could wind up competing with TurboTax—a change that the company, and politicians, particularly Republicans, have fought. Advocates have said such a system could save taxpayers billions of dollars, and millions of hours of prep time, per year.

The GOP’s latest bill matches $14 billion Biden’s funding request for Israel in number—but not in its proposed approach.

The thought of—as my colleague David Corn put it in Mother Jones‘ internal Slack channel—”letting billionaires cheat to pay for bombs to drop on civilians” is jarring, particularly given the more than 3,500 children that Gaza health authorities say have been killed by the Israeli airstrikes; heartbreaking photos and videos have shown kids covered in blood and dust and collapsing while coping with living through the trauma of war and losing loved ones.

  • DoomBot5@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I have a better idea. Fund the aid to Israel by funding the IRS more, so they can investigate all these Republicans. Should be enough money there to give Ukraine a nice additional package as well.

    • jeffw@lemmy.worldOP
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      What’s crazy is the IRS funding increase that Dems put through is basically supposed to pay for itself (unlike the fake promise that comes with tax cuts paying for themselves, which fails every time)

      • Ranvier@sopuli.xyz
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        1 year ago

        Much more than pay for itself! It will help decrease the budget defecit.

        So just like many things Republicans do that they falsely claim will reduce the defecit, this “cost cutting measure” will actually increase the budget defecit.

    • gregorum@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      No kidding. The IRS actually generates revenue. These jerks want it shut down because they hate paying their fair share.

    • Amaltheamannen@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      How many more billions does Israel need? If I was American I would be ashamed to fund a colonial ethnostate.

      • DoomBot5@lemmy.world
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        Idk, you’re fine with mass casualties of civilians if they’re Israeli? Hamas has fired thousands of rockets at civilian population centers in Israel. Thanks to the Iron Dome, most of those rockets were intercepted.

        Imagine Israel’s response in Gaza if that wasn’t the case.

        • SmoothIsFast@citizensgaming.com
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          Imagine Israel’s response in Gaza if that wasn’t the case.

          Still enacting a genocide? You want peace go in aid the Palestinians, incorporate them into your economy, allow them jobs, education, and a better life then under hammas direction, the Palestinians population is mainly young and stuck in an authoritarian regime help them help you ffs, you don’t bomb them to create more hammas fighters and complain. Nor do I give justification for genocide in any bearing, especially not because this one is less worse than what they would do unabated ffs…

        • Reptorian@lemmy.zip
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          Yes, Hamas is bad. Ok, I accept that. We all accept it in fact.

          Israel is not free from criticism, and by allying with democratic nations, they signed a contract to be judged by their behaviors and to have their history judged.

          Arguably, the most moral position is to leave Middle East to fend for itself until they get their religious extremism problem fixed.

        • CaptFeather@lemm.ee
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          You’re pretty ignorant to be spouting this shit at this point. Israel has been trying to fuck over Palestine for almost a goddamn century now. Hamas is a response to decades of oppression from the Israeli govt. Does that excuse Hamas? Fuck no it doesn’t, but Israel is still much more in the wrong than Palestine ever was or could be at this point.

  • coach@lemmynsfw.com
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    Remind me again why we need to fund the world’s strongest and most elite military?

    You all do realize each and every citizen of Israel is drafted. This allows them to select from the best in the country. Again, why are we funding this?

    • doctorcrimson@lemmy.today
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      1 year ago

      They know. The GOP is anti-government. They’ve done nothing but gut regulatory bodies and cut taxes for the rich, with some occasional bipartisanship, for over 30 years.

      • TechyDad@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        The only exceptions are things like abortion bans and laws restricting the rights of groups they don’t like. Then, suddenly, the GOP are big fans of a large government.

        • doctorcrimson@lemmy.today
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          The large government was the one stopping abortion bans until the right wing SCOTUS overturned ROE v. WADE, tho.

          • Chetzemoka@startrek.website
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            What? No lol. I don’t think you understand how government regulation works. Stopping abortion bans was just a handful of Justice Department lawyers prosecuting lawsuits on Constitutional grounds. Enforcing abortion bans will require any number of absurd bureaucracies - auditors to review medical records, police to investigate reports of illegal behavior, prosecutors to litigate cases, some kind of agency to enforce any fines levied, more prisons.

            Enforcing a ban requires massively more government intervention than filing a few lawsuits did.

            • doctorcrimson@lemmy.today
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              Smaller Governments across the USA have banned abortions after the SCOTUS ruling, so them banning abortions is not an example of them being pro-government. It was just another example of them dismantling the federal government. A better example to make the above point would be drawing attention to the times when state lawmakers took away school district’s rights to teach certain subjects, as the school districts are small decentralized governments being bossed around by the larger state government.

              • Chetzemoka@startrek.website
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                Lmfao that is not at all what Republicans mean by smaller government. They literally mean “no government regulations of any kind”

                https://theconversation.com/the-shutdown-drowning-government-in-the-bathtub-111333

                "Many believe that government is at best superfluous and at worst a drag on a free market. It has long been their aim to cut taxes to “starve the beast.”

                Grover Norquist, who founded Americans for Tax Reform in 1985 at the urging of President Reagan, declared in 2001: “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.”"

                They want government taxation and regulation at ALL levels GONE (except when it’s convenient for their political agenda, we see)

                What you’re talking about is their disingenuous pretending that they care about local government and “states’ rights” to hide their real agenda.

                (Funny enough “states’ rights” was also used as an excuse to maintain and expand slavery before the Civil War. So never forget that bigots have always been liars because they know they’re wrong and evil.

                https://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/feature/causes-of-the-civil-war/#:~:text=A key issue was states,Another factor was territorial expansion.)

                I don’t know where you got your information from, but they’re wrong. I lived through the 80s; I’ve been listening to Republicans talk about “small government” for 40 years. They only care about being able to handicap taxation and regulations that cost corporations money.

    • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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      Oh, they do. But the party gets the money primarily from the big donors, so it is important to keep them happy. The load of the taxes is on the shoulders of the middle income people, anyway, who cannot afford to bribe the politicians their way.

  • Doorbook@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Your tax money is going to a military state that you have no control over… nice…

  • Etterra@lemmy.world
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    GOP: we made a graphic to explain our new plan.

    ❤️🇮🇱➕💰🔫➕🖕🇺🇲👥👥👥➡️👍✝️➕🤑🧐🎩

  • Sanctus@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    The GOP is standing at the concession, plotting Palestine’s oppression

  • Rakonat@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    What wacky world did I wake up in. Last I checked GOP voters were always in the majority of the pro-Israel camp. When the heck did that change, or is it because GOP has to sign the check this time around they don’t want to openly support them?

  • Konala Koala@lemmy.world
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    And then it has a high possibility of turning into ‘The House GOP’s proposal: Gets vetoed by President Joe Biden’