VOLUME No: 68 Issue No:2

Washington, D.C. - Dec 10, 2004

Cabinet Reshuffle Complete

Veterans Affairs Secretary Anthony Principi's departure this week from the Cabinet marks the ninth and final member of the President's advisors to leave his post in the aftermath of the election following Senate confirmation of their successors. The Bush administration has asked Secretaries Rumsfeld, Jackson, Norton, Chao, Mineta, and Snow to stay on for a second Bush term.

Last week, the President announced his nomination of New York police commissioner Bernard Kerik as the next head of Homeland Security. Kerik was head of the New York Police Department on 9/11 and has made a career out of law enforcement as both a soldier and a policeman. Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson also resigned last week. A nomination to the position has yet to be named.

Here's a full list of the Cabinet Changes ( italics indicate nomination)

Intelligence Bill Passes House and Senate

The National Intelligence Reform Act passed the House on Tuesday and the Senate yesterday despite grumblings from an unusually independent Congress. The bill is the first to unite U.S. intelligence agencies under a single leadership and passed the House, 336-75, on Tuesday and the Senate, 89-2, on Thursday.

To calm dissent among members of the White House's most enthusiastic supporters, the Bush administration encouraged members the House to vote for the bill through phone calls from Vice President Dick Cheney and others. Through the calls a deal was struck between Cheney and House Armed Services Chairman Duncan Hunter's (R-Ca.) to insert a four-word phrase guaranteeing the maintenance of the military chain of command as changes are implemented. The concession rallied enough support in the House for a majority of Republican Congressmen to vote for the bill. House Judiciary Chairman James F. Sensenbrenner's (R-Wis.) criticism of the bill went unaddressed, however, as the 108 th Congress decided to leave immigration reform for a separate bill in the 109 th Congress.

Both Democrats and Republicans voted in favor of the bipartisan bill sighting the disadvantages the existence of 15 separate agencies, budgets, and agendas has on the intelligence community. When signed into law by the President in the next few weeks, the bill will end the work of the 9/11 Commission.

Internet Taxes Nixed: New Law extends until 2007

Internet taxation on both access and e-commerce was retroactively abolished in a law signed into law on December 3, 2004 by President George Bush. The Internet Tax Nondiscrimination Act, S. 150, continues the nationwide ban on taxes related to accessing the internet through local providers or doing business through on-line firms established six years ago under the Internet Tax Freedom Act. The bill specifically prohibits state and local taxes on access and commerce over the internet, but allows taxing on voice services and assets associated with Internet use, including property, capital gains and net gains taxes.

Some local taxes were grandfathered into the bill, including local landline access taxes in Wisconsin and Texas and the federal universal service fee, but the bill ended further taxation of the Internet for at least the next two years. It also repealed taxes imposed by eighteen states since the expiration of the Internet Tax Freedom Act last November.

The bill passed with bipartisan support and was advanced by Sen. George Allen (R-Va.), Rep. Chris Cox (R-Ca.) and Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), the standard-bearer of the original bill. Sen. Allen commented on the bill saying, “This definitional change was essential to stop the eighteen states that began imposing burdensome taxes on broadband service derived from DSL and wireless providers."