January 2009 - Posts
Many things in this life puzzle me. One of those puzzles recently bouncing around in my head is how legislators decide what people and industries should be paying what level taxes and even what should and should not be taxed. It is fascinating to watch the powers that be at local, state and federal levels levy taxes with a few lines of text on a bill, a stroke of a pen and little or no logical consideration of what they are doing beyond political pandering.
Otto von Bismarck, the Duke of Lauenburg and Prince of Bismarck, once said, "Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made." I disagree. He has the process right, but I think we should all have a good look. Not many would sit still for what is happening in our government if they would only pay attention.
But recent events revealed some of the reason for much of the pseudo-random tax codes across the country. It seems that many of our esteemed law-givers and government money mangers can not get their own taxes right.
The top money man in the United States, Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner had to
clear up a couple tax headaches before he was confirmed. He blamed Turbo Tax for the oversight. I can understand that, Turbo Tax encourages everyone to write off their children's day camp fees as a business expense. Anyone
can miss paying their fair share in social security taxes.
Does anyone else have a problem with this man taking the role of top dog over the Internal Revenue Service?
Tom Daschle, the former Democratic Senate Majority Leader from South Dakota, found himself scampering down to the tax office shortly after his nomination for Secretary of Health and Human Services. He needed to cover a couple things he overlooked.
Former Sen. Tom Daschle, picked by President Obama to lead his health reform efforts, recently filed amended tax returns to report $128,203 in unpaid taxes and $11,964 in interest, according to a Senate document obtained by The Associated Press.
USA Today: Tax issues emerge in Daschle nomination
It is interesting there are no penalties listed in those figures. You and I would have been up to our earlobes in penalties. I guess being the former Senate Majority Leader does have some perks.
It is impossible not to notice that Daschle paid additional taxes equal to several times the annual gross incomes of most Americans. And to think that while he was the Senate Majority Leader, Daschle had a hand in guiding the tax code we all end up paying on.
But it get's even better. Congressman Charles Rangel (D-NY), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, is in hot water over
failing to declare income from off shore rental property. Rep. Rangel is the chairman over the committee in charge of writing and rewriting our tax code and even he doesn't get it right.
In fact the tax code is getting to be such a pain that Rangel's taxable mis-steps have prompted legislation nicknamed in his honor.
Rep. Carter introduced a bill Wednesday to eliminate all IRS penalties and interest for paying taxes past due.
The legislation calls for the creation of what he calls the, "Rangel Rule," -- drawing attention to the recent legal issues of House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., enabling citizens who fail to pay taxes on time to do so later with no additional fees.
Rangel, who writes the country's tax policies, acknowledged last fall that he failed to pay thousands in real estate taxes for rental income he earned from a property in the Dominican Republic.
Fox News: GOP Congressman Intros 'Rangel Rule,' Eliminating IRS Late Fees
Now it is clear to me why the tax and spend crowd in Washington can raise taxes without so much as a second thought beyond the favors they are earning or paying off. Most of the people that are writing our tax laws never had to worry about getting it right. Most of the people deciding the tax laws have never been so short on money that ten more dollars taken out of the paychecks would make a difference in how many meat based dinners are prepared that pay period.
The most disgusting part of this whole mess is that these elite law-givers get to smooth over their "mistakes" with a slap on the wrist at worse. It is hard not to wonder what our chances of getting the same deal would be in a similar tax situation. Then our esteemed elite get to go along with with their lives like nothing happened and in some cases remain in charge of making tax law.
So the grief and stress caused by taxes and tax laws is completely foreign to these legislators. No wonder they don't understand our anger when the paycheck bite goes up.
Now there are a few of you reading this who are probably saying, "Wait a minute! The President said he is going to lower my taxes" or "I get all my taxes back every year." That may be true. But what you don't see is what you are paying in higher prices and the drain on the economy to cover the taxes paid on everything you buy from Apples to Zoo Tickets.
Keep always in your heart the end consumer pays all the taxes charged anywhere along the line before it gets to the store shelves. Those end consumers are you and me.
We don't pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.
- Leona Helmsley
The left is very stressed right now. The stimulus package that came out of the house might not get an easy ride through the US Senate. In order to apply pressure to Senators that might not be on board with
all this pork barrel spending the $800+ Billion economic stimulus package, a large coalition of liberal advocacy groups including Americans United composed and released a new ad for consideration by the masses.
The ad claims that anyone opposed to the stimulus package is a Rush Limbaugh lackey. That includes members of Congress. Part of that ad reads:
"Every Republican voted with Limbaugh and against creating four million new American jobs," a narrator says in the ad.
"We can understand why a extreme partisan like Rush Limbaugh wants President Obama's jobs program to fail, but the members of Congress elected to represent the citizens in their districts? That's another matter."
CNN: Ads pressure GOP senators to back Obama's stimulus plan
Is that the best they can do?
But coming from the far left it is not possible for the creators of the ad to see any other possibility. It has to be Rush Limbaugh leading the troops. The idea something is actually wrong with with the stimulus bill is simply an idea the people of Americans United cannot conceive of.
These purveyors of ignorance simply cannot understand that some representatives could not bring themselves to blow another $800+ Billion on very short term hand outs and do nothing pork projects. For that wisdom, I thank them.
It is beyond ridiculous to assume a vote against the largest barrel of pork ever legislated by the United States Congress is a vote against jobs.
As for trying to demonize congressional representatives (and the rest of his audience by default) for listening to Rush Limbaugh, I think they screwed up. Rush Limbaugh and I will never agree on everything. However I find his opinions and observations to be several orders of magnitude more consistent with reality and common sense then those held by Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Barney Frank.
Last I heard, every day somewhere between 13 and 14 million people listen to Rush Limbaugh. The owners of this ad may have awakened a sleeping giant. You know Rush isn't going to let this one slide by without comment.
Next up from Harry, Nancy and Co: Watch for a huge push on the laughingly named "Fairness Doctrine."
Liberal Democrats are inexorably opposed to tax cuts, because tax cuts give people more power, and take away from the role of government.
- Rush Limbaugh
I'm going through some old photos and found this one from February 2007. It made me laugh.
Except for the occasional heart attack, I never felt better.
- Cheney
Under the heading of proof the United States is becoming more and more internally divided we have today's
Rasmussen Poll that states 44% percent of all Democratic Voters believe that President Bush and senior members of his administration are guilty of war crimes. Only four percent of Republicans are deluded in the same manner.
And of course Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and a few of her co-conspirators are clearly in line with the 44%. Ever since the congressional majority landed in their laps they delight in making noises about prosecuting President Bush and his people. Here is the latest installment:
"I think you look at each item and see what is a violation of the law and do we even have a right to ignore it," the California Democrat [Pelosi] said. "And other things that are maybe time that is spent better looking to the future rather than to the past."
Rep. John Conyers, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, announced Friday he wants to set up a commission to look into whether the Bush administration broke the law by taking the nation to war against Iraq and instituting aggressive anti-terror initiatives. The Michigan Democrat called for an "independent criminal probe into whether any laws were broken in connection with these activities."
Fox News: Pelosi Open to Prosecution of Bush Administration Officials
Speaker Pelosi goes on to say that the law may "compel" her to pursue this matter. "Compel" my butt. Speaker Pelosi reached a new high in political theatrics when she suggested that she is even remotely reluctant to harass President Bush and his former staff.
Let us keep it real here. Speaker Pelosi is positively orgasmic over the prospect of pursuing President Bush and his staff on a stack of trumped up charges. She and her co-conspirators in Congress are going to push this in spite of the facts or the law. If they can't bend the law or facts far enough to bring charges, I give even odds they try to fabricate charges out of thin air.
At worse, Speaker Pelosi and her band of merry idiots are going to split this country down the middle. At best they are going to have the current and future Commanders in Chief second guessing their advisers and courses of action.
How many of us want our Commander in Chief checking with his lawyer when an attack is imminent? Anyone here want the President on the phone to his personal council while another hurricane Katrina is in progress? Does anyone think it is a good idea to have the White House council involved in all black operations?
We are so screwed.
I love studying Ancient History and seeing how empires rise and fall, sowing the seeds of their own destruction.
- Martin Scorsese
The Senate approved President Obama's selection for Treasury by roughly two to one. That means two out of every three United States Senators felt that Timothy Geithner is good enough to do the job in spite of his numerous tax oversights.
I think Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) sums it best in an interview she gave ABC News:
"Throughout the state of Maine and indeed throughout the nation, millions of hard-working Americans pay their taxes on time and in full," Collins says. "Our taxation system is essentially an honor system that depends on self-assessment and honesty. When taxpayers make mistakes, they are expected to correct them promptly and completely. How can we tell the taxpayers that they are expected to comply fully with our tax laws, when these laws have been treated so cavalierly by the person who would lead the Treasury Department and, ultimately, the Internal Revenue Service, when he was applying them to himself?"
ABC News: Liberal Republican Senator to Oppose Geithner
I could not have said it better.
Whichever party is in office, the Treasury is in power.
- Harold Wilson
Trussville, AL - Here is some simple advice to Vegans, Radical Vegetarians and other seriously unbalanced people that are easily offended by other's lack of conformity to their viewpoints in public.
- When the group of people you go to breakfast with picks Cracker Barrel, don't go.
- If you do choose to go, don't help those in your group order their food.
- When the bald headed old fart seated alone at the table across the isle from you gets his medium-rare steak and soft scrambled eggs, don't loudly demand that he change tables and then summon management when he refuses to comply. (This is especially true on a Sunday morning in a Cracker Barrel with a waiting line wrapped around their front porch.)
- If you are going to behave in such an out outrageous fashion, please don't get your feelings hurt when the bald headed old fart and restaurant management responds in a less then sympathetic manner.
- While you are behaving in this manner, you might want to look around and see how those in your group are reacting to your outburst.
- As you are storming out the restaurant the first time be sure and get the keys to the car so you can stay warm while you are waiting for the rest of your group to finish their breakfast.
The rest of the group was actually very nice. Once the embarrassed apologies and statements of "not to worry" were over with, we had a grand time talking about television, building houses and community centers in poor areas and swapping road stories.
I guess I should thank her for the introduction.
"Vegetarian is an old Indian word for bad hunter."
- Unknown
Washington, DC - Millions of people stood shoulder to shoulder filling the entire Washington Mall between the capitol and the Washington Monument. Our new President is sworn in and another chapter begins.
I wish President Barack Obama the best. May he find the wisdom to lead well
Americans... still believe in an America where anything's possible - they just don't think their leaders do.
- Barack Obama
Dear President Bush,
Over the last eight years we have listened as ignorant people clinging to rumors and lies claimed you somehow stole the election in 2000, suggested that you were not intelligent enough to do the job, proclaimed you to be a puppet controlled by vice President Cheney and even say you were bought and paid for by the oil industry. We watched as a large part of the US news media pandered to their own polictial beliefs and prime demographics with half truths and outright lies about you. We stood witness as the New York Times committed acts of treason revealing intelligence operations and then wrote editorials suggesting you violated the law.
The net is riddled with people under delusions of real world knowledge with no other life then to write things about you that go beyond fantasy. People called you a Fascist, Nazi and compared you with Hitler. The stunningly arrogant that think they know everything you know about the current world situation falsely condemned you as a murder and a liar. They said you went to war for oil and greed. As untrue those claims are, they got a great deal of play while common sense was put aside. You were vilified in the comments on this very blog for things that go beyond the limits of rationality.
No other President in our history received the unfounded public ridicule that was handed you on a daily basis. You are not well spoken and every trip-up in any public statement was immediately pounced on as evidence you are somehow mentally deficient. David Letterman made sure to point these spoken mis-steps out several times a week in carefully edited spots. The personal attacks against you and your family are a new low in the United States.
Frankly, I don't see how you did it.
From your start in Texas, I saw that if you said you were or were not going to do something, that was the way it was going to be. You stated in clear specific terms what you were going to do and then you did it. There are not many left in US politics that can make that claim.
Your administration dealt with issues no other President has had to handle. Attacks on the United States by an enemy that is not nailed down to a nation state where the enemy territory is easily defined. An enemy who's warped dogma dictates they kill us, convert us or die trying. You did well these last eight years.
I do not agree with everything you did and stand for. But I can say that I admire you and respect you for standing by your principals and doing what you think is right.
Thank you for your service to our country. It is greatly appreciated.
"America will never seek a permission slip to defend the security of our country."
- President George W. Bush
This note is to acknowledge
some most excellent flying. There are people alive now and their future some generations that owe their continued existence to U. S. Airways pilot Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger III and co-pilot Jeff Skiles. The pilot was the last one off the plane only after walking the aisle twice making sure that no one else remained on the aircraft.
Well done and a tip of the hat to you both.
"I've got a minor inconvenience here..."
- Richard Dreyfuss playing Pilot Pete Sandich in the 1989 movie "Always."
Kingsland, GA - President Elect Obama's nominee for the United States Attorney General, Eric Holder, had several interesting things to say during his confirmation hearing today. The most note worthy was this little tidbit:
In a related issue, Holder said he believes that detainees at Guantanamo should be tried in U.S. courts and not under the type of military commission set up by the Bush administration, unless they are "substantially revamped."
USA Today: AG nominee Holder says 'waterboarding is torture'
Just one question, which US court has jurisdiction over crimes committed in foreign lands? Is there any civilian court that has jurisdiction in a combat situation?
If I were President Bush right now, I would order all the detainees in Guantanamo transfered to Iraqi custody and the order to be carried out before midnight Eastern Time Jan. 19. That would be one thing the new attorney general can't screw up. Those poor abused Guantanamo detainees would likely find the Iraqi hospitality far less desirable then their present quarters.
His comments suggesting he will be reviewing the decisions made while interrogating terrorists with an eye toward criminal prosecution shows what a zero this clown is going to be. Talk about a way to shut down your intelligence operations overnight. I wonder where he got the idea that the eternal game of spy vs. spy was ever played by the Marquess of Queensbury rules.
Prediction: Once the new administration's kinder, gentler intelligence gathering methods are in place I figure it will take between six months and a year for the bad guys to rebuild their operations to effective levels. Once the terrorists reestablish command and control, financing and intelligence, another six to eighteen months before they mount and execute operations in the United States. So we are talking an attack somewhere between one and three years from now.
And when that happens, President Obama's Administration will be desperately seeking someone to talk to about it.
"The decisions that were made by a prior administration were difficult ones. It is an easy thing for somebody to look back in hindsight and be critical of the decisions that were made. Having said that, the president-elect and I are both disturbed by what we have seen and what we have heard."
- Eric Holder, US Attorney General Nominee
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