Tax Day 2014

This is how I always imagine the IRS and the bloated government as they cast a lustful eye on the populace's paychecks!

Or perhaps this?

 

I'm Shocked ... SHOCKED: Californians Appalled By Rising Health Insurance Costs

Oh, yeeeeeeah, like we couldn't see this coming.  But apparently some Californians didn't.  Time to pay up, suckers.  Gullibility and stupidity are expensive, yo.  

Plus there's this precious little comment:

Although recent criticism of the healthcare law has focused on website glitches and early enrollment snags, experts say sharp price increases for individual policies have the greatest potential to erode public support for President Obama's signature legislation.

You don't say!

Hang Onto Your Wallets ...

When the government thinks it can decide how much money you can save for a "reasonable" retirement.

Yep, We're Screwed on Social Security

Basically, I've kissed goodbye to all that money that gets sucked out of my paycheck in the name of Social Security.  I'm never going to see those sweet little greenbacks again.  Bye, darlings!  Look, we all know that Social Security has become an unsustainable Ponzi scheme.  I'm fully expecting the whole rickety structure to have collapsed by the time I get to retirement age.  You'd have to be an economically illiterate idiot if you're my age and still thinking that you won't get totally screwed by this.  

On a personal note, I got into an argument with some elderly relatives not too long ago when Social Security came up in the conversation.  I did not - did not! - want to talk about it, but they kept on and on until finally I couldn't help myself anymore.  There's not going to be anything by the time I retire, I said.  I am flat-out assuming that I won't get any Social Security at all.  But the government promised!  they insisted.  You paid into it, so you have to get something out of it!  I gave up at that point.  How can you be so naive?  How can you be so baffled by the ideas that (a) my generation's going to get the shaft, and (b) the only smart thing to do is to plan ahead as if there won't be any Social Security?  

I knew better than to say that what I'm paying into the thing now is going toward the checks going out now, as in their checks.  Mama didn't raise no fool.

Now my peers and I gloomily wait to see if our pessimistic predictions will come true of the government raiding IRAs and 401(k)s and every other kind of savings so it can pay for its profligate, irresponsibly managed joyride.  Heck, it's like in those old cartoons when a hungry character looks at another character, and that second figure morphs into the image of a delicious roast chicken or something.

A Song for Tax Day

LOL: The "Mercy" Demotivator

Sometimes it takes a joke to drive home a very serious point, doesn't it?

Rachel Lucas on the Fiscal Cliff Shenanigans

What do you think? Rachel's also running an impromptu poll, where currently the "let it burn" option is winning by a huge margin. 

An additional thought: everyone's howling about taxes, but the bigger problem is the government spending, and that does include entitlement reform.

Meanwhile, I'm sure we're all delighted that Obama's apparently scheduled a 20-day Hawaiian vacation over Christmas, so if we do go sailing over the fiscal cliff in fine Thelma and Louise fashion, he'll be off sunning himself in Oahu or whatever on $4 million of taxpayer money.  "Let them eat Hawaiian vacations"? 

Yeah, that really demonstrates how much he cares for the little guy, the unemployed guy, the people actually suffering from the toxic effects of this craptastic economy.  Hey!  I thought a bunch of people voted for him because you thought he was more "empathetic" or some touchy-feely nonsense like that.  O RLY?  I bet he'll really be feeling your pain when he's out there surfing for 3 whole weeks.  The optics are horrible, but nobody seems to mind. (No, I don't care if it's a habitual place to go for him. I'm talking about right now.)  Meanwhile, the closest your humble hostess is going to get to Hawaii any time soon is this.

RELATED POST: LOL, though it's not funny, not funny at all.  There's no way you can seriously propose $50 billion for another ill-advised round of stimulus spending, much less - well - any of the rest of it.

Sushinomics

That yummy sushi is going to cost more, and it's going to cost more in NY than LA.  

Rant: I Forego Pizza for Nobody. NOBODY.

So it wasn't bad enough that the Obama campaign fundraisers suggest people give up wedding and birthday presents in order to give money, but now they're suggesting that you give up your family's pizza dinner.  Professor Althouse has the sordid details.  These people get an F- for public relations.  

Anyway, if I were a kid whose mother knowingly and deliberately refused to give me dinner so she could give that money to some stupid politician - any politician - I'd scream child abuse and look into emancipation.  BAD MOMMY!  Seriously, what kind of parent would do this?  More, what kind of parent would do that and then be so proud of it that she proceeds to tell people about it?  Even worse, what kind of dipstick campaign would then publicize this story as a good thing?  Are you advocating child hunger in the cause of your re-election?  Oh, why the hell not, if your policies will already saddle the younger generation with crushing debt?  Screw you guys!

One more thing: the simple scenario that you have to pick between dinner and a campaign contribution (besides being indicative of some serious personal idiocy) in itself makes the case that:

1. The economy freaking sucks.
2. Your candidate as president hasn't done enough about it.
3. It's time for a change in leadership so we can get an economy in which YOU DON'T HAVE TO CHOOSE BETWEEN FOOD AND CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS.

I am once more tempted to give money to the Romney campaign out of pure spite.

Congrats on Winning a Medal. Now Pay Tax On It.

Oh, come on!  UPDATE: Someone's doing something about it.  Well, good.

Nerd Analysis: The Screwed Generation

Well, that's just freakin' great.  Let's eat the young.  I'm weirdly reminded of The Grapes of Wrath and Rose of Sharon breastfeeding not a baby, but a starving old man.

Thoughts on Tax Freedom Day 2012

Indeed.

Tax Rant 2012

I rant about taxes every year.  This time I have too much work to do to rant to expectation.  Please read tax rants from previous years.  The only good thing about tax season is the fact that there is e-filing.

What Fresh Hell Is This? Higher Prices For E-Books

What?

Quote of the Day on Government Spending, Debt, and the Innumeracy of Politicians

We rant a lot about the evils of illiteracy.  Yes, illiteracy is bad.  SO IS INNUMERACY.  Here is a suitable quote about the perils of innumeracy mingled with political silliness and general idiocy: 

Government can’t balance a checkbook. They’re idiots. I know finance math. I do it for a living. And when I look at the numbers involved here, (and the interest!) it makes my head swim . . . It doesn’t work. No matter how hard you wish, no matter how hard you hope, no matter how much compassion you can fit in your stupid compassionate heart, no matter how much you happen to like some program that helps somebody do something wonderful… math never lies and interest never sleeps. Caring don’t pay the bills.

The source of that quote is, by the way, also the best tax rant of Tax Day 2011. Read the whole thing.  (Slight language warning!)

The Homer Simpson Approach to Social Security

D'oh!

Taiwan: Crackdown on Food Hoarding

Well, this just isn't a good sign, either in itself or as the inevitable response to recent hikes in food prices.  Stocking up is an actual crime?  We'll all screwed.

Cultural Commentary: Liberty Versus Benevolence

Read this.  Need I give you this remark by Thoreau? "If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life."  Well said, sir.

Just One Snarky Comment. Or Two.

I'll make one -- just one, I promise -- snarky comment about the SOTU speech last night.  SPUTNIK?  SPUTNIK?!   This morning even my students were poking fun at it, and they're Obamacolytes.  "It sounded like he was talking about potatoes the whole time.  Spuds, spuds, spuds."  Or even: "I didn't bother watching the speech.  Does that make me a bad American, hahaha."  When you've lost the pie-eyed undergrad dreamers, you're in trouble.

Kitchen Notes: Grocery Costs Are Increasing

I guess we'll all have to go back to our college-era dining habits of eating nothing but ramen.  OH WAIT -- I'M ALREADY DOING THAT.