I was -- and I don't use this word lightly -- flabbergasted to find out yesterday that big corporations that provided a prescription drug benefit in their retirement plans were deducting from their taxes incentive payments from the government to provide the coverage. You read that right: the government pays corporations to provide a benefit and the corporation deducts that payment from their income taxes.

According to a Bureau of National Affairs article (subscription required) from earlier today, Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, co-chairs of the 18-member panel created by President Obama to devise strategies for reducing the nation's debt and deficits, have sent a letter to members informing them that the panel's first meeting will commence April 27. Formally known as the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform (NCFRR?), the panel has a disastrously devised procedural process that is likely to produce either gridlock or, at best, water downed recommendations.

Here's a little news tidbit from the Recovery Board: in his latest "Chairman's Corner" post, Recovery Board Chairman Earl Devaney disclosed that the website Recovery.gov has thus far cost $6.8 million. This is out of a $9.5 million contract with Smartronix, a Maryland IT company, meaning that the Board has about another $2.7 million left in its contract. After that, the Board has the option of extending the contract through 2014, for about another $9 million. Now, $6.8 million isn't exactly cheap, but for creating a website to show a brand new type of reporting in an extremely compressed time frame, it's not too bad.

Responding to a smart ProPublica article from a couple weeks ago, the Recovery Board will be removing 79 of 389 awards from the "two-time loser" list, which documents Recovery Act recipients who twice failed to report on their use of Recovery Act funds. Turns out these 79 reports were in fact filed for one or both of the two reporting quarters.