Meanwhile - there's this Alice-In-Wonderland quality to the debate in Washington over these payroll tax cuts.
And you're not nuts if you wonder what in the world is going on when they want to continue cutting taxes that contribute to a Social Security system that really needs the money.
Why not just cut taxes somewhere else?
That would be too simple.
So the payroll tax cut debate continues - or, more accurately, doesn't. The stalemate that now grips Washington is frustrating for everyone, and is one reason why Congress' approval rating is so low.
The other hard truth to this tax cut is that for people who really could use another $30 or $40 a week, the stalemate will eliminate that - and in a real sense hurt the economy when that happens.
So why tie all this to some pipeline in the hinterlands?
I'm just sayin'.
We'll have the latest on the debate/stalemate, tonight at 11.
Also at 11, we're following developments in the NTSB investigation into the single engine plane crash that killed five people yesterday in New Jersey.
And talk about throwing gasoline on a fire - the attorney for Levi Aron, the man charged with luring, kidnapping and brutally killing 8-year-old Leiby Kletzky from a street in Borough Park, Brooklyn last July, is stirring a hornet's nest of controversy. He says that his client may be schizophrenic because of "inbreeding in that community."
Attorney Howard Greenberg, trying for an insanity defense, offered that, "look, everybody knows when blood relations have offspring, there can be genetic defects" and "it's something that needs to be investigated down to the ground."
Yeow.
The response has been predictable. Assemblyman Dov Hikind, who represents Borough Park, snapped that the comments are "absolutely vile, disgusting, and wholly untrue…. His comments are nothing more than an attempt to distract and confuse the public into thinking there is some merit to his ridiculous assertion." We'll also have any breaking news of the night, plus Meteorologist Lee Goldberg's AccuWeather forecast, and Rob Powers with the night's sports. I hope you can join Sade Baderinwa and me, tonight at 11.
And a P.S. We're looking once again to read your emails on air this Christmas morning. While we love your "have a happy holiday" messages, we're especially looking for your thoughts on this Christmas, 2011 - maybe someone you miss, your thoughts for the new year (there's a big election, maybe you've heard about it), or what you remember from the year past.
Please send them HERE or to my email, Bill.S.Ritter@ABC.Com. I look forward to hearing from you.
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