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<p>The chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, tears welling in his eyes, apologized yesterday to Democrats for being "just plain stupid" for calling the Capitol Police to evict Democrats from a meeting room Friday.</p> <p>"Every member has just as much right to be here and be heard as any other," said Rep. Bill Thomas, California Republican, accepting blame for a "breakdown of order and decorum" at the committee meeting and admitting that his pride and passion got in the way.</p>

Trade tax bill gains support in U.S. House WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A bill that aims to avert a damaging trade war with the European Union over U.S. tax breaks for exporters but still give some tax advantages to American manufacturers is gaining support in the House , sponsors said Wednesday. The bill would repeal a system of tax breaks for U.S. exporters that the World Trade Organization has said violates international trade rules. The WTO has given the EU the green light to slap $4 billion in punitive import tariffs on U.S. goods if Congress fails to repeal the export...

One is a brainy, sharp-tongued, former professor with a personality like sandpaper. The other is a folksy, thrifty hog farmer from Iowa. Together Bill Thomas, the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, and his counterpart, Senate Finance Committee chairman Charles Grassley - with a giant assist from Vice President Dick Cheney - squeezed and pulled for most of three working days to thrash out the economic stimulus and tax cut bill Congress narrowly passed last week.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republicans in the House of Representatives said on Wednesday they decided to shelve tax break legislation for investors, citing Senate inaction and disagreement among themselves over items to bring to a vote ahead of the congressional elections. Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert of Illinois said Republicans at a meeting on Wednesday decided it was better to wait until after the Nov. 5, congressional election to deal with the tax bill some Republicans were pushing to help investors and individual retirement account holders weather the current market slump. "There is just not total agreement on it," Hastert...

Confronted with economic uncertainty, the congressional response is to promulgate new laws and regulations rather than cut taxes or exercise spending restraint. This is as true for the Republican-controlled House of Representatives as the Democrat Senate. When it was reported that the Bush administration was considering a tax package that would alleviate double-taxation of corporations and lower taxes on investors, some congressional Republicans were unenthusiastic. House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas (R-CA) doesn´t want to bring these proposals up for a vote. Robert Novak wrote that Thomas was opposed to the administration´s initiative, while columnist Bruce Bartlett reported...