Congress and the President have finally left town. But they left quite a legacy. Here are our nominees for the five biggest fiscal losers of 2007. The AMT Patch: Sure, Congress finally agreed to keep 20 million middle-class families off the AMT for one more year. But it never paid for the $50 billion temporary fix and ignored proposals to permanently resolve the mess. Just wait until next year, when they do it all again.    more »

When the Senate passed a long-awaited energy bill yesterday, I flashed back to a fascinating off-the-record chat I had back in 2004 with a top executive of a major oil company. He was in Washington to help make sure that the energy bidness got its piece of an especially hideous tax break called the Sec. 199 production deduction.   more »