SINCE LAST TIME . . .
We have celebrated easter and April fools day, watched Tiger Woods not win the Masters, I have read an Associated Press article about a two-nosed bunny (“2-Nosed Bunny Surprises Pet Shop Owner”, April 1, 2009), and the deadline to file our income tax returns has passed (appropriate sub-topic below); we have witnessed the crowning of a truly dominant NCAA college basketball team (Go Heels!), the rescue of an American captain from Somali pirates, the opening of the Hannah Montana movie that premiered at #1 for the weekend, and the bowing of a U.S. president to some Saudi king named Abdullah who probably has drawn a parallel between our fear that we are seeing the end of peak oil and a dish called no-peak chicken. Aren’t all Saudi kings named Abdullah? Sorry king- if our own president acts that penitent during easter week, there are far too many of us anxious to be irreverent willing to pick up the slack.
Name is not the same: A romp of otters, a school of fish, a herd of cattle, a stable of horses, a shoal of herring or tuna, a tower of giraffes, a pod of orcas or dolphins, a group of geese is called a flock, in flight they are called a skein, flying in formation they are called a wedge. There are many different names for a collection of one set of animals in nature. How this came to be so would involve me wasting weeks of research and the results may prove more entertaining and less obvious than the final sub-topic I have yet to cover- taxation. On a related topic, to the naming of animal groups above, is that, unfortunately, there have been many more varieties of taxation- from the necessary to the ridiculous, to the even more ridiculous.
TAXATION - A VERY BRIEF HISTORY
Egyptians: During one time period, tax collectors, known as scribes, imposed a tax on cooking oil. “To insure that citizens were not avoiding the cooking oil tax scribes would audit households to insure that appropriate amounts of cooking oil were consumed and that citizens were not using leavings generated by other cooking processes as a substitute for the taxed oil.” Since then, no scribe has made sure that a household's average Pam consumption is at or above acceptable levels or has decided that the cans which dispense this oil in a bottle are something that would promote the ozone's obesogenic nature (or is it nurture?).
America, present day: A 15% obesity tax on sweetened sodas was proposed by New York governor David Paterson to aid in a $15 billion budged deficit. (according to the New York Times- December 15, 2008 via a Lexicon short in Time December 29, 2008-January 5, 2009. How I could go for a New York governor prostitution scandal about now; where is Eliot Spitzer when you need him? Why this tax iis a bad idea- we have the right to drown ourselves in any variety of excess we see fit, so long as it does not impact others. People not aware of the difference (you conservatives who are ok with smoking in public should read more John Stuart Mill) To those who claim that the collective American obesity problem impacts other’s health insurance premiums I say, when we can enact improved, and meaningful, fossil fuel emissions standards and the conservatives can acknowledge the threat of climate change, we’ll start talking about increased health insurance premiums for the fatties. (Note- Hopefully that is plural for fatty.)
Greece: “In times of war the Athenians imposed a tax referred to as eisphora . . . When additional resources were gained by the war effort the resources were used to refund the tax.” What a novel idea. In Minnesota, rumors run rampant that we are still paying for the Metrodome and a convention center that have long since been built and have surely benefited someone, to the extent that living in Minnesota can really benefit anyone.
America, present day: “Council rejects idea of plastic bag tax” Dave Orrick, St. Paul Pioneer Press, December 4, 2008. Why this tax idea is a good one- our over-reliance on compartmentalizing everything by using a plastic bag at Walgreen’s to cart home one package of night-lites is wasteful, socially and environmentally irresponsible. In fact, it is socially irresponsible because it is environmentally irresponsible. Let’s not consider the future- that would be wrong. The only time the future generations of the inhabitants of this nation are considered should not be when we assume, they’ll assume our debt from all the borrowing our elected officials have been approving. We could stop being a liability to the world we live in any day now. Instead, there are probably some inventors trying to find the best way to mass market urinals for home use or those who are writing their one-millionth word in a blog saga that would blind a small epic poet while he was reading it.
Great Britain: In the 11th century- “According to legend, Lady Godiva's husband Leofric, Earl of Mercia, promised to reduce the high taxes he levied on the residents of Coventry when she agreed to ride naked through the streets of the town.” A progressive Poll tax on the Duke of Lancaster in 1377 “was 520 times the tax on the common peasant.” No word on whether that Duke was the first conservative. By the way, if Godiva was as smooth-bottomed as the top of the line chocolate which bears her name . . . yum.
America, present day: I just had an original thought . . . I paid a 7.5 cents on the dollar tax for it . . . it was about mice having sex with cheese- the government gave me a bailout because I am running out of good ideas. The sarcasm industry is in dire need of federal funds. I’ve been at this for about two years, so long that the number of news stories, political books, conversations with co-workers, exchanged emails with talk-show hosts or discussions with slippery conservatives that remind me of the liquid metal assassin from the second Terminator movie or liberal DINKs that feel empowered that a democrat is back in the white house, fills me with a feeling so near apathy I hardly know how to keep going. There is just too much material to dismiss and my supply of sarcasm is running low. I cannot possibly come up with something witty to write to downplay the rationale of all those I disagree with . . . silence! to those of you who think that I stopped being witty in part 1. (Note- DINKs- Dual Income No Kids.)
The talent of taxes: Because of taxes people have been beheaded or convicted of treason, tea has been poured into harbors, wars have been started, conducted and funded by a tax (the Civil War twice, among others), armies have been expanded, stadiums have been built, some aggressions known as the Whiskey Rebellion and the Fries* Rebellion have taken place, people have volunteered their wives to ride naked through the streets of Coventry, and the Constitution has been amended (16th amendment). About that last one- I know! I am as shocked as you are that the Constitution could be amended. And you see how well that amendment has gone for the good of government spending. How else is the government going to improve on that 19% we expect them to spend in the name of a healthy GDP- see part 45. Rhetorical questions are less expensive; question marks are spendy, thus taxed more and they are the granite countertops of the punctuation world.
My corporate America: “During the 1930's federal individual income taxes were never more than 1.4 percent of GNP. Corporate taxes were never more than 1.6 percent of GNP. In 1990 those same taxes as a percent of GNP were 8.77 and 1.99 respectively.” So, as a percentage of the Gross National Product, individuals have contributed six times more than they did 80 years ago and corporations have barely had their taxes raised at all in nearly 80 years. Shocking! Somewhat less so than if someone told me that hamster bacon were on sale this week at Cub foods.
The above historical taxation pieces are courtesy of- http://www.taxworld.org/History/TaxHistory.htm. Course, I made up that stuff about hamster bacon . . . probably; I don't frequent the ethnic foods section.
TAXES TAXES EVERYWHERE
Types of taxes: tariffs (a tax imposed on goods moved across a political boundary)**, excise- (tea, tobacco, motor fuel, telephone usage, alcohol- goods produced within the country); direct taxes- such as capitation, head,*** property, or poll, i.e. indirect taxes), payroll taxes, income taxes, sales tax, too many framed photos tax, capital gains, death, excessive use of the stapler tax, inheritance, gas; pet snake tax, estate and gift taxes, license tabs, payroll tax, FICA tax (for the funding of social security)- this tax was increased during the Lyndon Johnson administration with the addition of Medicare; there have been things called fees, which semantically-brave**** governors, congressmen, presidents, city council people, airline industry and cable company executives and board members have wholeheartedly or feign-reluctantly endorsed.
Cable bill: There is a sales tax, franchise fee, PEG fee ($1.89), FCC fee (7 cents in March, 6 cents in December- apparently that went up); for the digital voice addition a couple of years ago there is a state sales tax ($2.69), a county sales tax (10 cents) and 911 “fee(s)” (65 cents). Apparently, this means there may be more than one fee- how would we even know and how would they remember?
Cell phone bill: Wireless surcharges and other charges and credits ($2.86), taxes, governmental surcharges & fees ($5.18), voice equipment ($3.50)- should someone be charged for this every month? A universal connectivity chg. – recurring (74 cents), regulatory recovery fees – recurring (13 cents)- can I agree to pay a regulatory fee for regulation of the legislature, elected politicians, the financial industry? Just go ahead and take that right out of my paycheck which may not be something that recurs a year from now. Regulatory recovery fees . . . that kind of sounds like reparations that should be made to the middle class for the lack of regulations on the free market.
Car insurance: installment fee ($3.50).
Mortgage: the property tax associated with a mortgage.
Electric: resource and tax adjustment ($10.34), state sales tax ($3.20), Dakota county transit tax 12 cents and something called a fixed charge $7. Good thing that isn’t a variable charge. Oh, the property tax is a variable charge.
Ticketmaster: I would not identify the right to purchase event tickets through Ticketmaster a necessary cost, one that every middle class citizen should be able to afford, (so this is a little indulgent) but can’t because of the cost of gas, cars, education, food, homes (mortgages or rent), health care, taxes, etc. Consider this and tell me if you think the free market should continue to go unregulated- “ . . .say you purchase a $35 ticket through Ticketmaster for an upcoming event, there could be a convenience charge of $8.35 (per ticket) in addition to a $3.15 order processing fee and $1.75 fee for an e-ticket. That adds up to a whopping 38 percent premium over the face value of the ticket price. Like any business, we have every right to seek a fair return on our investment and efforts," the company said in a statement.” Like every private citizen, I have the right to shove squid, afflicted with salmonella derived from their love of the leisurely consumption of pistachios down their throat? No?
More other taxes: There has been a Sugar Act, a Sugar and Molasses Act, a Stamp Act, a Townshend Revenue Act, the Revenue Act of 1913, the Earned Income Tax Credit (which subsidizes some of the worst decision-makers in the country, and rewards them for having more children than not only they, but the remainder of the country can afford). Lower rates for 18-month and five-year assets were adopted in 1997 with the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997. Bush signed the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 which cut taxes by $1.35 trillion. Unfortunately, select members of the middle class are unaware how unbelievably fortunate this tax cut was for the rich, who clearly needed an economic break to rival the fortune of the whale-shark that swims around at the bottom of the sea consuming mass quantities of plankton simply because its mouth is always open. I wonder what the insurance premiums are for the underinsured contingent of the whale-shark shoal***** that report to their physician the repetitive stress injury of lock-jaw and how many conservatives would be against single-payer health care if it meant providing for one of its own.
Tax short: From a letter to the editor from the Minneapolis Star Tribune from some time in 2008- “ . . . for five of the last six years that Enron was in business, it did not pay any federal income tax. According to . . . [the] Nobel Prize winner for economics in 2001, corporations profited by 68 percent during the Bush administration era, while median household incomes were at negative 1 percent.” To the extent this is true, I hope there is a hell, and that there is an observation deck in heaven allowing people other than me the opportunity to watch evil people be 70 % more unlucky in the afterlife. I’ve decided that being more graphic than that would be unsuitable so early in this sub-topic. (Note: the Nobel Prize winner in economics- that sounds like an expert to me.)
I WOULD LIKE TO SAY THAT IS ENOUGH FOR THE HISTORY AND LITANY OF TAXES IMPOSED UPON A SOMEWHAT SUSPECTING POPULACE, BUT . . .
Yeah, you knew I was not done quoting from the Constitution annex, The Federalist Papers: Hamilton, in The Federalist No. 70, wrote- “Men often oppose a thing merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike. But if they have been consulted and have happened to disapprove, opposition then becomes in their estimation an indispensable duty of self love. They seem to think themselves bound in honor, and by all the motives of personal infallibility to defeat the success of what has been resolved upon, contrary to their sentiments. Men of upright, benevolent tempers have too many opportunities of remarking with horror, to what desperate lengths this disposition is sometimes carried, and how often the great interests of society are sacrificed to the vanity, to the conceit and to the obstinacy of individuals, who have credit enough to make their passions and their caprices interesting to mankind. Perhaps the question now before the public may in its consequences afford melancholy proofs of the effects of this despicable frailty, or rather detestable vice in the human character.” (pg. 357, Hamilton #70)
My rebuttal directed toward the ass: What kind of "despicable frailty" is it when an elected representative consistently continues to ignore the requests of their electors to be more fiscally responsible than formerly? Many men, no matter how many hours they work are the most frail when they chase more and more money that has never seemed to flee from them. Being against a pig odor study or any of the 9,000 earmarks in the omnibus bill, as a responsible citizen, is not a “detestable vice.” Demanding accountability of our elected officials is not vanity; urging regulations of the free market and transparency of our government is itself a sign of a "benevolent temper" and requesting that government waste be chronicled for the sake of improving how much our nation’s citizens are taxed is not a mark revealing the “obstinacy of individuals.” A couple weeks back, American Idol host Ryan Seacrest explained that, in the interest of time, only two judges, rather than all four, would be sounding off on the performances of each singer, so that the program which followed AI could start at its normal time. It is too bad that the best example of American democracy comes from a reality show, where the most loyal viewers of a television program can complain about Fringe or House starting a minute or two later than scheduled. These are the types of people who put up yard signs on behalf of candidate X who is no better and no worse than his rival. He is just different in the same way. Shallow, hollow, stupid voters. I would call them sheep, but I do not mean to offend the lemmings who had seemed to be satisfied with being considered the most gullible member of the animal kingdom all to themselves. Man is so disappointingly predictable that sheep probably compare us with lemmings.
“Benevolent tempers”: The most obviously deficient among Hamilton’s retinue of characteristics, is benevolence. If this man were alive today, he might purposefully transport zebra mussels with Slapped Cheek Syndrome (i.e. Fifths Disease) to previously unaffected lakes, be determined to use metal spatulas on other people’s non-stick cookware and demand an accident forgiveness car insurance policy before proceeding to deliberately crash his car into others and pay witnesses to corroborate his side of the story. In the Star Wars world, a world my son entered 6 weeks ago, and is obsessed with, this man (Hamilton) is Darth Sidious. For those who are unlike my son, who put two Star Wars shirts on the other day when I asked him to get dressed, and may not know who that is, he is the guy who connived his way to the emperorship and literally made Darth Vader, the third best villain in the history of the cinema, according to AFI.
Remarkably consistent Hamilton: Our friend Mr. Hamilton, justifying why a cabal, a plurality of magistrates ought not share the highest office in the land (one occupied these 220 years by 44 different men- the president) writes that- “The circumstances which may have led to any national miscarriage or misfortune are sometimes so complicated, that where there are a number of actors who may have had different degrees and kinds of agency, though we may clearly see upon the whole that there has been mismanagement, yet it may be impracticable to pronounce to whose account the evil which may have been incurred is truly chargeable." (pg. 359, Hamilton #70) We are especially unlikely to “pronounce to whose account the evil . . . [may be] chargeable” if we cannot identify the lawmakers responsible, in that they do such a masterful job of protecting each other. Hamilton’s idea is to just treat this obligatory innuendo hot potato of governmental malfeasance as something for which no proof can be provided, and thus, there is no punishment to dole out. I realize he is writing to justify that just one executive shall hold office, but he happens to describe exactly what takes place within the halls and chambers of congress. If Hamilton were alive today, judging by his consistent inability to reason appropriately, he would probably defend the incredulous nature of physics as exhibited in the average Tom and Jerry cartoon.
This one is especially prescient: Again, Hamilton is writing speculatively about some misguided soul****** who might investigate a matter of some importance, so diligently so as to come to the undeniable conclusion that gross governmental irregularities have occurred (and will keep occurring), with the full participation of certain avaricious elected officials, and further, that members of at least two parties are in collusion with each other to act as czars overseeing the serfs they are elected to represent. Meanwhile the serfs/citizens fidget their way to some middle class oblivion where they are required (via some Freudian social acceptance theory) to build upon the illusory, yet palpable, Tower of Babel,******* where our collective complaints are measured, but go unheeded because everyone is talking, and no one is listening- not really anyway. Oh yes, Hamilton’s quote- “Should there be found a citizen zealous enough to undertake the unpromising task, if there happen to be a collusion between the parties concerned, how easy is it to cloath the circumstances with so much ambiguity, as to render it uncertain what was the precise conduct of any of those parties?” (pg. 359, Hamilton #70) Indeed, and so much so that it would require more than 47 installments in order to flush out that ambiguity, using facts rather than conjecture, and reveal how moronic it is to vote for the status quo, no matter how brainwashed you are.
Federal government offices: Hamilton, in justifying the Constitution, had to, for immediacy’s sake, alleviate the fear detractors had over how much a new government would cost, in the short term certainly, but also in the long run. In this, Hamilton was anything but prescient. He refers to the present population and the likelihood that the population will continue to increase due to the number of representatives required to serve the people, according to the Constitution and asks rhetorically of those who fear the price tag of the proposed government- “Whence is the dreaded augmentation of expence to spring? One source pointed out, is the multiplication of offices under the new government. . . As to persons to be employed in the collection of the revenues, it is unquestionably true that these will form a very considerable addition to the number of federal officers; but it will not follow, that this will occasion an increase of public expence. It will be in most cases nothing more than an exchange of state officers for national officers.” (pg. 441 Hamilton #84) Not quite right as it turned out. Course, I thought bailing out the financial corporations and tying retirement money to the stock market for the purposes of eliminating social security was a good thing and we see how both of those have and will turn out, no accountability in the former example and no money for retirees in the latter- they both have a shared cause, the willful, and unaccountably ignorant trust of an unregulated free-market- that goes out to all of you little Darth Sidiouses out there. “Whence is the dreaded augmentation of expence to spring?” Are you kidding me? Mr. Hamilton, you are dead, I do not really expect for you to be able to answer that question. In fact, when I die, I plan on having a duel with you in hell with as many as several IRS agents in attendance.
TAX SEASON
Accountable I: There are baseball seasons, football seasons, the spring season, The Four Seasons (a high-end restaurant chain) and Four Seasons, (some rather famous classic music written by Vivaldi) and tax season. While team IRS is probably not undefeated, surely they have a Globetrotter-like record against their patsy, the middle class-like Washington Generals. If it is one thing the IRS is charged with, it is holding citizens accountable for paying their taxes in full and on time. However, their own accountability is less than assured to the citizen in return. Never mind the problem of immigrant and corporate taxes the IRS, as an entity, may fail to collect, there are certainly other government agencies to blame for that. My wife and I complete our taxes each year by using a software program called Turbo Tax. This year there happened to be a glitch in the program, or our AGI was otherwise transcribed by an IRS agent incorrectly and my wife spent three hours on the phone, getting redirected to other agents three times, none of whom completely allayed any of her anxiety about potential penalties for the filed taxes being late (as it was April 15th when we found out about their error). The AGI is another number the IRS uses to verify, that everyone is filing their taxes; the IRS can match up the most recent tax year with your filed taxes from the previous year and accountably ensure that everyone is filing. Never mind that your address, date of birth, size of your big toe, name, bank account number, the expected number of predominantly yellow teeth within your mouth by the age of fify, and the ITIN number- (Individual Taxpayer Identification Number) and social security numbers are always also included on the form as a way to specifically identify particular delinquents or angels. If all of those numbers match from the previous year, why would you make someone spend two hours on the phone being transferred to multiple agents, none of whom are willing to admit that the error is the fault of the agency that employs them. Further, there seems to be a requirement that the IRS agent assigned to help when calls are transferred their way provide an identification number that my wife described as having been delivered so quickly in a couple cases she didn’t have time to write it down. In one case, my wife was transferred to a woman who gave her two different id numbers, one at the beginning of the call and one at the end. The average elephant seal does less damage to its environment when it hunts squid for sport than the average IRS agent does to our environment just by being less helpful and by not offering to pay us for assisting them in rectifying a situation that was caused by them.
Accountable II: To tie this back to Hamilton’s shortsightedness, where the number of federal employees that would be needed to conduct a federal government’s business is concerned, I bring you this very logical quote- “As to persons to be employed in the collection of the revenues, it is unquestionably true that these will form a very considerable addition to the number of federal officers; but it will not follow, that this will occasion an increase of public expence. It will be in most cases nothing more than an exchange of state officers for national officers. In the collection of all duties, for instance, the persons employed will be wholly of the latter description. The states individually will stand in no need of any for this purpose.” Really? Ladies and gentlemen, you read it here first, we may not be required to file a state income tax return in the future, for there will be no one interested in collecting our state income tax shortfalls. This was so written in The Federalist Papers, the majority of which was penned by Hamilton to defend the honor of the, at the time, yet to be ratified Constitution. I should think that Hamilton held his flourish (The Federalist Papers) meant to accompany, introduce, and protect the honor of the Constitution, in such high esteem, as if it were some knight errant meant to escort a celestial virgin (the Constitution) on its way to the castle in the sky ball.
Accountable III: I am not even going to deliberately hunt for any material about IRS agent fraud, conspiracy, mistakes, inaccuracies, etc. that might have cost/is costing/will cost the taxpayers money. Is that not assumed? The cost of that type, and other types, of belligerence, and I don’t want to under-exaggerate things here, is slightly more probable than a Swedish man being able to run the 100 yard dash in negative time or of Siamese Twins being born twelve days apart. I did a search on “how many federal government employees” and did not find an accurate total from some of the results. I hit upon a link to the NFFE- “ The National Federation of Federal Employees (NFFE) is a national union representing 100,000 blue and white collar government workers across the United States.” So, there are at least that many federal employees. Hamilton writes- “Where then are we to seek for those additional articles of expence which are to swell the account to the enormous size that has been represented to us? . . . it can upon no reasonable plan amount to a sum which will be an object of material consequence.” (pg. 442, Hamilton #85) Hamilton is the type of snake-oil salesman (yes, there are types of snake-oil salesmen) that, after having collected a healthy supply of snake-oil from its own slithery form, would give away life insurance policies as christmas presents. His policies would reward those who owned two male beta fish, one that was named Ariel by his daughter, which will apparently have to go through gender reassignment surgery and the other which his son named Millenium Falcon.
Maybe the most important rhetorical question I have asked in my life: Defenders of the Constitution, and of Hamilton, might claim, in response to my insinuation above that it is preposterous to attempt to hold Hamilton accountable for how many, and how often, things have changed in the intervening 220 years since the Constitution took hold of this country. Those ardent constitutionalists would dismiss my point and the irreverent manner I use to advance it, and state that there is no way I can criticize a man for being unable to successfully predict how profoundly things have changed, how much more expensive the federal government was going to be than previously predicted by Hamilton, how much more our government would cost the taxpayer. My question would simply be- if the contents of the Federalist Papers, the secondary source document with 85 numbers, which was written for the singular purpose of defending the existence of the Constitution is outdated, couldn't the same be said of the document itself? Or, people just may not care.
The last of the Hamilton quotes, at least for now: “The result from these observations is, that the sources of additional expence from the establishment of the proposed constitution are much fewer than may have been imagined, that they are counterbalanced by considerable objects of saving, and that while it is questionable on which side the scale will preponderate, it is certain that a government less expensive would be incompetent to the purpose of the union.” (pg. 443, Hamilton #84) Yes, imagine how incompetent a government less expensive might be if one this expensive is this incompetent.
OBAMA’S TAX-CHALLENGED CORTEGE
Very taxing: president Obama has had some difficulty finding qualified candidates to head his various departments- “A third of the Senate voted against the nomination of Treasury Secretary Thomas F. Geithner because of his failure to pay self-employment taxes while working for the International Monetary Fund. Both Health and Human Services Secretary-designate Thomas A. Daschle and Nancy Killefer, Mr. Obama's choice to be the first "performance chief officer," withdrew their names” before the senate hearings for their potential confirmations “after admitting to past tax irregularities.” (See- David R. Sans, Washington Times- http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/feb/05/more-obama-appointee-tax-problems/) Also within that article- “A Senate committee abruptly canceled a confirmation vote for Labor Secretary-designate Hilda L. Solis Thursday amid fresh reports of tax problems involving the husband of the California congresswoman.” And then, at the end of March another headline presented itself- “Obama’s Health Nominee [Kathleen] Sebelius Reveals Tax Errors.” (See- http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSTRE53004X20090401.) Because of this year’s AGI******** tax slip-up (see above), the senate hearings for my confirmation to be the next head Tolerance of Rich Assholes Engineer might be cancelled. The former head of the Rich Assholes Tolerance team was the two-nosed bunny whose major accomplishment, after its stroke was to overlook the stench in Ames, Iowa, the site of the pig-odor study (see part 45). What, you don’t think a two-nosed rabbit would have to be tolerant to get passed the stench of pig feces?
Obama fan: A friend of mine, who voted for Obama, asked me if I was going to thank him for the middle class tax break that had been instituted, and would be left to each of our paychecks. Unfortunately, the savings are to sneak back into our paychecks over the course of the year, so as to be barely noticeable. And actually, the “tax break” is really just a trick with income tax withholding. The news is-
“Federal income-tax credits for middle- and lower-income households -- part of the $787 billion federal stimulus plan -- go into effect Wednesday. The so-called "Making Work Pay" tax credits -- in the form of reduced paycheck withholding -- offer $400 to individuals making less than $75,000 and $800 to married couples making less than $150,000 per year. The credits, which will show up in workers paychecks, will be phased out for those above the thresholds. Couples making $200,000 and individuals making $100,000 will not receive any breaks. The aim of the stimulus tax credits is to encourage stunted consumers spending.” (Denver Business Journal, April 1, 2009- “Middle-Class Income-Tax Credit Starts Wednesday”.) With a net income, after the tax "break" is in effect, of $3-$5 a paycheck, after social security, welfare, charity, and 401k $$ is withdrawn, I might be able to buy that pack of gum I've been saving for.
Another co-worker mentioned that this really is not a tax credit or tax break, but rather a way for the government to adjust taxpayer withholdings so that they get back their own money gradually throughout the year, rather than all at once. I don’t really see that as a tax credit and await the day when a guy who received a 1.5% raise who associates with those who can sniff out those types of governmental semantics will actually get a tax break.
Agents of the government: I am reminded of a quotation (shocking I know)- “So long as we love we serve; so long as we are loved by others, I would almost say that we are indispensable; and no man is useless while he has a friend.” – Robert Louis Stevenson Men may be admired, famous, friendLY, affable, proficiently human, even servilicious, but the average government agent comes as close to not meeting the requirements of indispensability as any other man that I could imagine. There are far worse complements.
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* This was not a skirmish fought over the rights of some French fries, whether they were crinkle cut or waffle.
** Which is not a tax that law abiding citizens, who want campaign finance reform, are allowed to collect from the two major parties that hide behind freedoms the founders never intended to grant. Talk about a political boundary- there is no way in hell Madison ever intended to protect the freedoms of billionaires interested in buying someone an election. I have a feeling that circumventing the collected will of the people was not something Madison had in mind. And I wish, when I become governor of New York, after I have my requisite sex scandal and try to institute my fat people tax on ho-hos that I will push for a vote on the Dumbass Tolerance Tax. If you annoy me and try to pretend that as a politician you are doing well when the overwhelming (or just the whelming) evidence suggests otherwise, you will have to pay me a tax. Hey, I have to recoup my smartass taxes somehow. That whale-shark stuff went over too well.
*** In which, people are not taxed for having a head. This is a strange name for two taxes listed consecutively- capitation and head, which, one could joke, might be a tax on someone’s head being re-affixed to their neck.
**** Fees are the red-headed step children of their pristine-blooded tax forbears. Some mid-western governors (think Minnesota’s Tim Pawlenty) have used the word “fee” as a sly alternative to “tax” and must think no one has access to a poor man’s thesaurus we carry around in our heads. Perhaps Pawlenty thinks we are children who won’t eat something until it is called by another name. My son did not eat clementines one morning until I call them oranges, and it seems as if the reverse was true a couple weeks ago. It isn’t a power struggle, at least not in this case (with my son), despite how unreasonable it is. We should not desire for our elected officials to call something by another name in order to get us to swallow it, or for that matter, to have multiple names for the same thing when one will do. The two most inevitable things in life- are death and taxes, not death and fees.
***** I have done zero research on what a group of whale-sharks are called. I can speculate that a group of politicians seeking to increase the progressive tax or those that complain about restricted CEO bonuses, salaries and golden parachute packages are a group of assholes and/or bitches- depending on their sex and whether they fly down K Street in wedge formation.
****** That would be me.
******* I’ve already mentioned this incoherence and powerlessness due to our even further becoming a melting pot of a country, from heritage/culture, language, social status, and ethnic background standpoints in parts 12, 24, and 37. I thought I better do it again for old-time sake.
******** Not to be confused with AIG- I thought I would clarify. Those with dyslexia- just move on, unraveling this level of transposed letters could cost you an entire weekend. But, you’re probably still working on it.
