On June 22 the U.S. House of Representatives approved a resolution to consider a bill to permanently eliminate the Estate Tax (skillfully spun by the Republican neo-cons as "death tax").

If Congress approves this bill and it is signed into law, it will mean our treasury will realize an additional deficit of  $283,000,000,000 (that's BILLION) over the next decade, a time when our soaring national deficit can least afford this additional blow.

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I'm posting on behalf of Coalition 4 America's Priorities, a non-profit group comprising dozens of progressive groups from around the country and supported by Bill Gates Sr. (who ought to know something about having a lot of money).

We probably don't need to sell you much on the issue, since few issues are no-brainers as much as this one, but we'll be around in the comments afterward if you have questions or disagreements. Suffice to say, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, this repeal would cost as much as $1 trillion dollars between 2012 and 2021. If you click through to their site, there's a wealth of info about this subject. And you can also see Harold Myerson in today's Washington Post, Mark Weisbrot in Mother Jones, and Katrina Vanden Heuvel in The Nation for more. The issue is starting to pick up steam, but we're in a time crunch.

In less than a week, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist will have Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl introduce a bill that would sweep away this tax, resulting in the predictable windfall for the friends and fundraisers of the Bush/Cheney administration.

Republicans are nervous about their position, which is why right-wing groups are warning Kyl's fellow Arizonan, John McCain, not to wander too far off the ranch, and why the Free Enterprise Fund has run TV ads targeting Lincoln Chafee and others (which FactCheck.org did a superb job debunking).

Well, we've got a TV ad now too, and during this week that senators are out of Washington and back home, we've been putting them on the air in key markets around the country. We've just posted it to YouTube, and we hope you'll take a look.

But of course that's not all we hope - we need your help contacting these lawmakers immediately. You can send them an email through our site, but after you've done that, it would matter a lot to call their state offices. This link gives you their DC numbers, but don't call that number this week. Instead click on their name and find their district number. A phone call will go a lot farther, and another call to their DC offices next week will go even farther than that. We need to keep the pressure on.

Remember - the first vote is scheduled for June 6, but just because that date passes doesn't mean it will be over then. It's a big fight, and we hope you'll help support this.

Cross-posted to Daily Kos and My Left Wing.

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When the Senate reconvenes on April 24, a key test of the GOP machine will be ensuring that HR 8, the Death Tax Repeal Permanency Act, is passed in the month or so before the following recess.

Novak said last week that Frist was

scheduling repeal or reduction of the estate tax for consideration the week of May 4.

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I can't say I've been following CA-50 as closely as a lot of folks round here.

So the claims in today's Postpiece may be old hat to the cognoscenti.

But - against the background of all those GOP candidates steering clear of any association with Bush, I found it interesting to see that Busby seems to be doing the same with the entire Dem party. (If one can believe the Post piece - which I don't, either way. Some corroboration would be nice. But...)

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