Happy Tax Slave Day, 2017

18 Tuesday Apr 2017

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ Comments Off on Happy Tax Slave Day, 2017

Tags

, , ,

Just a reminder that your 1040 is due today. Normally the joyous day of imperial compliance falls of the 15th of April. This year, as some, that date fell on the weekend. Thus, the magnanimous government gave you a few extra days to file. And, if you owe more than you’ve already paid, remember to pay that balance too.

Some don’t pay at all:

In tax year 2014, according to a report published by the Internal Revenue Service, the federal government hauled in a then-record $1,377,797,136,000 in individual income taxes.

Nonetheless, of the 148,606,578 individual income tax return filers that year, 52,062,499 filed what the IRS calls “nontaxable returns,” which means they paid no net individual income taxes.

Among these 52,062,499 filers who did not pay income taxes in 2014, according to Table 3.3 in the report, were 31,129,405 filers who also received $90,276,007,000 in payments from the federal government for “refundable” tax credits.

“In total, taxpayers claimed $105.6 billion in refundable tax credits,” said the IRS report. “Of this, $5.5 billion was applied against income taxes and $9.8 billion against all other taxes. The remaining $90.3 billion in refundable tax credits was refunded to taxpayers.”

“Tax credits are use to offset taxes,” the report explains. “Certain tax credits are also refundable in that if the credit exceeds the total tax owed, the excess can be refunded to the taxpayer.”

One example of a refundable tax credit is the “Earned Income Tax Credit.” “The Earned Income Tax Credit for 2014,” the IRS explains, “was a maximum of $496 for taxpayers with no qualifying children, $3,305 for one qualifying child, $5,460 for two qualifying children, and $6,143 for taxpayers with three or more qualifying children.”

For a married couple filing jointly to be eligible for the EIC in 2014, said the IRS, “earned income and adjusted gross income had to be less than $43,941 for one child, $49,186 for two children and $52,427 for three children or more.”

A married couple with two children earning $50,000 or more would not qualify for this refundable credit.

Thirty-five percent of workers pay no taxes at all. Add in those who could work, but don’t, and we have something approaching half the population paying nothing, no skin in the game. They still vote, however. Their votes cancel out those of the people who actually pay for the government.

All of this was envisioned back in 1913, when the income tax was federally instituted, and earlier when the communists plotted the downfall of the West. The plans are working seamlessly.

Oddly, the country somehow managed to exist and to grow, wildly, without any income taxes. In reality, as in history, it should be 100% paying no taxes.

01-US-CITIZENS-NOW-ONE-STEP-CLOSER-TO-BECOMING-PERMANENT-TAX-SLAVES

If you can believe it, there was a time when only one was guaranteed. Sovereign Man.

But, here we are. Pay up!

Dick Van Dyke on Hollywood and the Culture

17 Monday Apr 2017

Posted by in Other Columns

≈ Comments Off on Dick Van Dyke on Hollywood and the Culture

Tags

,

Back in the 60’s my Ex-wife’s father met actor Dick Van Dyke on a Transatlantic cruise. He reported Van Dyke was a gentleman and a pleasure to be around. Van Dyke could have reported the same.

Back then, people took cruises and just about everything else a little more seriously than today. I saw a photograph of the meeting. If memory serves, Van Dyke was weaning a plaid or checkered suit, with vest, and a hat – something suitable for both hunting Scottish Grouse or walking Glasgow in the evening. He was wearing a suit and hat on a cruise, standing, right there, on the deck of the QE2. He was smiling.

Contrast that image to any modern cruise. Contrast it to anything modern. The culture, vacations, entertainment, dress, etc., has changed. Van Dyke noticed and commented:

Dick Van Dyke, who is currently filming Mary Poppins Returns, which is scheduled for release next year, has warned of his fears over the effects of “scary” video games and films on young children.

The 91-year-old actor, who will make a cameo appearance in the upcoming film, describes these activities as a far cry from the free-spirited, kite-flying, carousel-riding world of the two children, Jane and Michael, in the original Mary Poppins.

Van Dyke believes video games incite violent behaviour and that big-screen violence is affecting impressionable young people who “idolise it as a romantic way of life”. He has no doubt Walt Disney would have been horrified by the explicit depictions of blood, gore and killing in some of the contemporary productions created to entertain children. “He would have spoken out about it,” he said.

Van Dyke rose to prominence in films including Bye Bye Birdie, Mary Poppins and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, as well as his TV sitcom The Dick Van Dyke Show. His role as Bert, the charming chimney-sweep in Mary Poppins, is perhaps the best known and, in the sequel, he will play the part of Mr Dawes Jr, chairman of Fidelity Fiduciary Bank, alongside Emily Blunt as the eccentric nanny.

Commenting on why the industry rarely makes films with such innocence as Mary Poppins, he said: “We lost Walt Disney, for one thing. Walt was a child at heart. He had such creativity and imagination. We said we were both children looking for our inner adults.”

…

He argued that children’s films from Hollywood’s so-called golden age taught morals and manners: “When I was a teenager, I modelled myself after the way Fred Astaire or Cary Grant dressed. Now kids emulate street gangs. They like to dress like hoods. That’s just a reversal. They’re picking the wrong role models.”

Dick_Van_Dyke_11

Like this, with a hat. PBS.

At 91, he has every right to complain. And, given the new reality, he is justified. The natives in Robinson Crusoe, USN, would be over-dressed on a Carnival ride these days. And they were supposed to be savages. What does that tell you?

Even on Easter …. Terror Australia, Terror Ohio

16 Sunday Apr 2017

Posted by in News and Notes

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , , , , ,

I almost didn’t see this first one. And I almost didn’t post it on this Easter Sunday. After I read the second story I decided to lump them together.

Evil does not take holidays.

A Sydney man was assaulted by a Muslim gang because he is a Christian.

Christians in Sydney, Australia, are being advised to hide their crosses after an Arabic-speaking gang shouting “F*** Jesus!” attacked a couple on a train while transport officers looked on from a “safe space” and did nothing.

They ripped off his Cross and stomped it during the attack. Of course the authorities just looked on – just like the Australian government has “looked on” in allowing the Mohammedan invasion down under.

Just as people in Ohio (John Kasich, et al) look on as Muslims attack, maim and kill. Abdul Artan wasn’t enough. They needed something more. Today they got it.

Evil does not take breaks.

In Ohio, police are desperate to find one Steve Stephens who perpetrated the Easter Day Slaughter – killing possibly 15 people, at least one on FB Live. From associated videos (what we’re allowed to see) it seems Stephens “snapped”. He says that repeatedly. He looks deranged and curses a lot. Not someone you’d expect to be a children’s counselor, which he is (was).

He is (was) also an active member of the Cleveland Islamic Center.

nimbus-image-1492390637776

Jihadi beard and all. JC Jones / Twitter.

Ohio, Stephens is still on the loose. Consider him armed and extremely dangerous. If you see him, either run or drop him, DRT.

Oz, the communists took your better guns away, not log ago, for “safety”. Now, they recommend you put your Christianity away for the same reason.

This cannot stand. Feel free to regard your treasonous politicians as the terrorist accomplices they are. Maybe it’s time to put all of them away … for safety.

Accidents and Incidents: Terror Spain

15 Saturday Apr 2017

Posted by in News and Notes

≈ Comments Off on Accidents and Incidents: Terror Spain

Tags

, , , ,

Sometimes bad things cannot be reliably predicted. A five-year-old child is dead after he became trapped between a table and a wall at Atlanta’s rotating Sundial restaurant.

westin top

Channel 2 / AJC.

The Sundial sits atop the downtown Westin hotel, occupying the 72nd and 73rd floors. If you haven’t been there, you must go. The tables downstairs and the lounge seating upstairs revolve fully once per hour. The views from 72 floors up are impressive. On a clear day one can see all of Atlanta and as far away as Alabama and the mountains of North Georgia.

I highly recommend the experience at night. I also recommend the fillet, medium-rare (no ketchup, Donny). If the outside, glass elevator ride is a bit much your you … wimps … there are internal options. Just ask the lobby desk.

Once or twice I pondered safety at the Sundial. The gaps between the outer windows and the inner walls and the moving floors are extremely thin. I suppose the boy was somehow caught between a column and the table. I didn’t know they had an automatic shutoff but it makes sense. I think the boy’s tragic end was a freak accident. I’ve never heard a similar story and imagine there won’t be any repeats.

The same cannot be said of Europe and, specifically, Mallorca, Spain. This was the site of today’s terror attack. (Thanks to Vox for breaking this one).

Another invader. Another sidewalk. More carnage. ISIS has had a suspicious presence on the island for at least a year. This particular Muslim terrorist says he actually lost control of the car. Please ignore Nice, Columbus, Berlin, London, Stockholm and other similar, deliberate attacks. Five are known injured, some critically.

Some things cannot be prevented. Some can. Or could.

So Complex It’s Simple

15 Saturday Apr 2017

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ Comments Off on So Complex It’s Simple

Tags

, ,

Only the U.S. government could rake in mind-boggling, record tax revenues and still run a deficit.

Despite collecting record amounts of individual income taxes and payroll taxes, the Treasury still ran a deficit of $526,855,000,000 in the first six months of fiscal 2017.

Also, even with record revenues from individual income taxes and payroll taxes in the first six months of fiscal 2017, overall federal tax collections were slightly down.

In the first six months of fiscal 2016, the federal government collected $1,513,124,070,000 (in constant 2017 dollars) in total taxes. In the first six months of this fiscal year, total federal tax collections have dropped to $1,473,137,000,000—a decline of about $39,987,070,000 from total tax collections in the first six months of fiscal 2016.

So much money and it’s still not enough. Thus, the debt grows apace.

The solution is simple: stop spending so much. Then again, as this cartoon, today, illustrates, the simple doesn’t always go over so well addressing the needlessly complex:

nimbus-image-1492273092428

Dustin / Steve Kelley and Jeff Parker.

Rise of the Robots: Armed and Dangerous

14 Friday Apr 2017

Posted by in Other Columns

≈ Comments Off on Rise of the Robots: Armed and Dangerous

Tags

, , ,

I can see it now. In the end it will be me versus these damned things up at the mountain retreat. Most of you will be long gone by then. We’ll have at it. They will win, ultimately. But, then, they won’t know what to do with all the cigars. Revenge….

Seriously, folks, do you really want the following mechanical monsters running loose at Epcot?

Humanoid robot F.E.D.O.R., set to fly into space in 2021, is now capable of shooting using both of his arms, according to Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin.

“The robot of the F.E.D.O.R. platform showed skills of firing using both arms. Currently the work on fine motor skills and decision algorithms is underway,” Rogozin wrote on his Twitter.

Tweeting, like Trump, … about killer robots from sci-fi. Except these are real – and improving daily. Armed, trigger-happy, ambidextrous droids, robotic tanks, Big Dog, the Terminator. Fun! “Tweet! Tweet!”

C9T0qnEXsAAQd1Y

The Russians.

Some far-distant, android Sean Spicer will say the early robots weren’t that bad (compared to the latest AI monster): “At least F.E.D.O.R. didn’t use poison gas at Disney World; he used bullets…”

Do what you can. Resist and stuff….

On That White Privilege Thing

14 Friday Apr 2017

Posted by in Other Columns

≈ Comments Off on On That White Privilege Thing

Tags

, , , , ,

Yesterday, I remembered once reading about “white privilege” at Appalachian State University. All schools, it seems, have a horde of SJWs hell-bent on pointing out privilege and whining about it. I though this particular story was interesting, because Boone. The resident multi-culti association put a display in the student center attacking straight, white, Christian men – all the rage, don’t you know.

I checked with their “diverse” school website and got a good chuckle. It’s nice that these hateful but generally harmless people are no longer confined to padded rooms in a hospital.

It was Fred Reed’s take on the matter, yesterday that made me remember the App. State episode.

Look around your university. Who do you see taking the hard subjects–math, chemistry, physics, engineering, philosophy, computer science? Whites and Asians…right? Are they the kind of people who complain constantly about White Privilege? You may notice a pattern here: Those who can, do. The rest bitch and moan.

How about your own classes? You are not blind. If you think for yourself, you can see who the smart ones are, and who are those getting a free ride. Usually, a free ride at your expense. Your professors will not want you to notice this either. The question is whether you have been so profoundly brainwashed that you cannot see the obvious.

Being very young, you will probably have little idea of the vast body of knowledge, won over millenia, behind all the things you take for granted. At your age, I didn’t either. It takes years to get a handle on things. It will be harder for you because your universities will discourage you from looking around you. But glance at the very partial list below (I paste from an ancient column of mine) to get an idea of what the white race has done over the centuries. You will never have heard of many of these things. And that is curious. While your nose is being rubbed into the virtues, often real, sometimes imagined, of other groups, your own race is seldom motioned except to revile it.

Euclidean geometry. Parabolic geometry. Hyperbolic geometry. Projective geometry. Differential geometry. Calculus: Limits, continuity, differentiation, integration. Physical chemistry. Organic chemistry. Biochemistry. Classical mechanics. The indeterminacy principle. The wave equation. The Parthenon. The Anabasis. Air conditioning. Number theory. Romanesque architecture. Gothic architecture. Information theory. Entropy. Enthalpy. Every symphony ever written. Pierre Auguste Renoir. The twelve-tone scale. The mathematics behind it, twelfth root of two and all that. S-p hybrid bonding orbitals. The Bohr-Sommerfeld atom. The purine-pyrimidine structure of the DNA ladder. Single-sideband radio. All other radio. Dentistry. The internal-combustion engine. Turbojets. Turbofans. Doppler beam-sharpening. Penicillin. Airplanes. Surgery. The mammogram. The Pill. The condom. Polio vaccine. The integrated circuit. The computer. Football. Computational fluid dynamics. Tensors. The Constitution. Euripides, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Aeschylus, Homer, Hesiod. Glass. Rubber. Nylon. Skyscrapers. The piano. The harpsichord. Elvis. Acetylcholinesterase inhibitors. (OK, that’s nerve gas, and maybe we didn’t really need it.) Silicone. The automobile. Really weird stuff, like clathrates, Buckyballs, and rotaxanes. The Bible. Bug spray. Diffie-Hellman, public-key cryptography, and RSA. Et cetera at great length.

If you talk about these things on campus, you will be called a “white supremacist.” This is silly. But calling you a racist is an effective way of making you shut up. Do you want to be supreme over anyone? I do not. Yet other races are proud of their achievements. Why should you not be? Ask where they would be without electricity, sterile water, telephones and–well, just about everything.

Fred points out that bragging is inappropriate – as is taking abuse for nothing. A little humble pride in achievement goes a long way. Maybe the others will be motivated to get off their low horse and excel. Maybe…

WhiteMen1

Nothing to see here. Just mean, old, white men at work, exploring the universe. Fred / NASA.

Of course, if the Apple State-ling Gang was really serious about doing something to terminate modern civilization white society, then they would join this yahoo in Minnesota.

Or, better yet, they could support these causes.

Or they could just shut the hell up. I suspect that is the native reaction around Boone. But, of course, I think, suspect,and type from privilege. Wonderful, wonderful, white privilege.

The Topsy Turvy World of American Political Theater

13 Thursday Apr 2017

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ Comments Off on The Topsy Turvy World of American Political Theater

Tags

, , , , ,

Where to start? Where to start????

Mike Pompeo, new head of the secret police CIA came out with guns blazing today, hot after Wikileaks and their agency revelations.

Pompeo has in the past called for Snowden to receive the death penalty.

He said people at the CIA found praise for WikiLeaks “both perplexing and deeply troubling.”

“As long as they make a splash, they care nothing about the lives they put at risk or the damage they cause to national security,” Pompeo said. “It’s time to call out WikiLeaks for what it really is: a non-state hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors, like Russia.”

During the question and answer portion of the event, Pompeo said because Assange was not a US citizen and lived in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, he “has no First Amendment freedoms.”

Odd. Odd. Odd. Odd. Very perplexing. Very odd, because, as the article explains, Pompeo was praising Wiki just last fall. Things change. No freedom of speech outside the U.S. Constitution? Shows a lack of understanding of the Constitution.

Elsewhere Pompeo (maybe on TeeVee) also claimed that U.S. citizens have nothing to fear from all the spying because the spy agencies do not spy on them. Well, they spied on Pompeo’s Boss, Donald J. Trump, and associates – the President and all … but you!, you little people have nothing to worry about….

Trump has pretty much dropped the spying allegations – even as more and more evidence comes forward to irrufutably prove them. Very odd. The media and the Democrats are a little quiet too – not so odd. Just after the Rice revelations surfaced, the Guardian presented evidence of British Intel involvement.

You read about that, here, last month, because I’m faster than the Guardian. Not as fast as Judge Napolitano, however. He blew the whistle first – and Fox fired him for it. I’ve heard no word of an apology from the Legs Network…

I supposed the “America First” White House has been preoccupied lately – what with bombing Syria, bombing Afghanistan, and preparing to bomb North Korea – all vital to Americans and their interests… All… Oops! Some of the bombs went a little off target. Not that anyone really knows what the target is. The important thing is that Raytheon, General Dynamics, and the banksters make money.

Healthcare reform has been slightly delayed. Tax cuts can wait a while. The wall can wait. Hilary’s still walking (stumbling?) free. Yeah… But Raytheon stock is up and the Goldman grip grows stronger by the day! There’s that.

The GOP is doing it’s part for the Big Club.

For their part,the Democrats are … doing something. I’ve got to give them a little blame here.

From the above, one might gather that now would be the time for the opposition party to strike back. If we had opposition, that might happen. We don’t.

160228-tulsi-gabbard-mn-1040_23f4be54d4cba554b6968a396625d6db.nbcnews-ux-2880-1000

Considerably better looking than the previous alternative … and no email issues. NBC News.

The Dems have in their party a brilliant young female politician, one Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D, HI). Female and minority – all the things they say they like. She’s a veteran. She knows what she’s talking about. She makes sense. She is 100% against foreign meddling and needless wars. And she’s pretty easy on the eyes too. Perfect, right? Sane, young, patriotic new blood, hottie in 2020?? No…

Naturally, the Donkey Party wants her kicked out of office, maybe locked away in an asylum or something.

As Carlin said, “this is the best we can do”.

Post-Apocalyptic Faith

13 Thursday Apr 2017

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Comments Off on Post-Apocalyptic Faith

A fast but fascinating look at Christianity, post-apocalypse, real and fictional. Please check out Rob’s outstanding (and much more centered than my site) Mere Inkling.

robstroud's avatarMere Inkling Press

shelter

In a post-apocalyptic world, would there be any room for Christianity? A variety of writers have addressed that in dramatically different ways, arguing for faith’s final dissipation or its ultimate triumph.

Post-apocalyptic literature being what it is, of course, most of the portrayals of Christianity either (1) reveal its idealistic collapse, (2) describe its survival as a crippled reflection of its former self, (3) depict its takeover by some persuasive power figure or mysterious cartel, or (4) ignore it altogether, as if it never existed.

In a recent essay on the subject, one of my favorite books was referenced. Canticle for Leibowitz was one of the first novels I read that awakened me to the fact reading could be enjoyable. A Canticle for Leibowitz struck a perfect chord in me, blending captivating science fiction with a consideration of the place of faith in the apocalyptic equation.

A cinematic masterpiece of…

View original post 705 more words