If any additional evidence was needed that Congress has lost the reigns of its passions, it was adequately provided by the furor over the AIG bonuses.  The Congress of the United States, each member of which was sworn under oath to uphold the Constitution, voted overwhelmingly to impose a 90% tax on certain income received by certain people at one particular company.  The reason given:  AIG took federal TARP money, and we the mighty Congresspeople are wise stewards of the taxpayers money, and these bonuses are obscene, and therefore we must confiscate them.

Laying aside the fact that the bonuses were contractual obligations made before TARP, and forgetting that Barney Frank and Chris Dodd whining about fiscal prudence is like Michael Jackson saying he really prefers grown women, and pretending for a moment that Congress, Obama, Geithner, and the rest weren’t fully aware months ago that the bonuses were scheduled,  the issue that trumps all is the Constitutional one.

Recall the Constitution.  It’s that dusty 18th-century relic that is, at least nominally, in the eyes of most people, The Law of The Land, to which at least a passing attempt at conformity is to be made.  Section 9 – Limits on Congress:  “No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.”  A bill of attainder is one that singles out a particular person or group of persons for punishment or special negative treatment.  It is trial, conviction, and sentencing by legislative act.  In the founding era this was a common practice:  if you got on the wrong side of Parliament, it might simply vote away your shirt.  This is exactly what the house did, Democrats and Republicans:  like a mob of angry sixth graders it cried, “We loathe you because you are being paid a lot of money; we don’t care whether or not you are contractually entitled to it; so we’re going to tax it almost all away.”  That this dictatorial act spits on Section 9 must be clear to every single member of that body.  The despicable truth is, the members voting yea simply do not give a damn.

Congress has shown again that our sacred Constitution, and the rights it protects, are to be appealed to, expanded, manipulated, ignored, or perverted, only as required to protect and defend the limiteless right of the federal government to enact the will of those in power.