Look out, it's icky political stuff
Politics and government crud, except John McCain
Now relegated to Blogblivion...Sunday, September 10, 2006
The Dustbin of Rational Response
Here is why I don’t expect us to be flying anywhere any time soon. I mean, besides the cost. Which isn’t too much different than that of driving even the farthest we’d want to go, except in terms of time.
Our weakness is that the tendency to slide into this sort of nonsense was already there. “The terrorists have already won” reaction really is saying “the terrorists exploited a tendency that was there, ready to come out under the right provocation, or perhaps eventually under no provocation at all.”
I greet tomorrow’s anniversary with my horror at the carnage, destruction, and savage evil of it all having morphed into horror at the lost opportunity of it all. Unless you’re talking opportunity presented to those who would enfeeble us because power feels good and a cowed populace makes things so much easier.
If you see a whirling dust eddy in the right location, it might just be the troubled spinning of graveless heroes and victims.
Monday, August 28, 2006
Crazy Dream
This makes my having a dream last night in which I met and talked with Ted Kennedy all the more fascinating.
Saturday, August 19, 2006
Happy Birthday
To former President Bill Clinton.
How appropriate that just last night we were talking about term limits, and how things might have gone down had he been in for a third term.
Sunday, August 13, 2006
Unhappy Birthday
To Fidel Castro. Die already, you tyrannical bastard.
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
Locomotive Bad Breath
Anyone know who we would contact to ask about the now almost daily idling trains filling our apartment with exhaust fumes for hours on end and making us sick?
We were hoping this would be the last apartment, and we just love the place, but we’re talking about moving because of the exhaust. It was one thing when once every few weeks a train with bad exhaust idled at length. Now it’s as if they’re using primarily trains with bad exhaust.
By comparison, you’ve all driven behind a diesel truck. Maybe you’d rather not be there, but hey, it’s sometimes, and it’s not that bad. But then you’ve also driven behind one of those diesel trucks; the ones you can’t understand still being on the road; the ones that make you have to drive 90 and pass before you stop breathing, or else slow way down and back off half a mile or more so it dissipates before it reaches you.
Those are rare. Now imagine if every other truck you encountered was suddenly one of the bad ones. You would be wondering what the hell was going on.
So it is with the trainyard and the idling stinkers. If we can get to winter, we can deal until spring, but there’s no way we can take another summer of this.
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Pardon me while I go find my temper.
This kind of stuff just makes me want to beat my head against a wall:
These readers weren’t complaining about a sexually explicit cover, but rather one of a baby nursing, on a wholesome parenting magazine yet another sign that Americans are squeamish over the sight of a nursing breast, even as breast-feeding itself gains greater support from the government and medical community.
Because we all know you’re a crap mom if you don’t nurse, but it’s also essential that nobody sees you, you know, actually nursing.
Gaaaaaaaaah!
People suck.
(Yes, I nurse in public, yes, I’m reasonably discreet, and yes, I don’t give a good goddamn if it bothers anyone. I really do think that if we saw it more often, it wouldn’t seem so weird.)
(And you all know that I don’t think you’re a crap mom if you don’t nurse. But people do, and then they want you to hide it. Gawd, the competing pressures on women! I feel like the rope in a game of societal tug-of-war a sometimes.)
(I love parentheses. Very much.)
Dr. Taylor does it again.
Sums something up beautifully, that is. This sort of thing is what makes me love his blog so much:
The bottom line is twofold: 1) the motivation behind a policy isn’t the test of whether that policy is a good idea, and 2) the people who run the government, like the rest of us, are far from perfect.
Talk about getting to the heart of the matter!
(These are excellent arguments for less government in general, as well.)
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
Un-be-freaking-lieveable.
Bush finally vetoes something and it’s this?
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
Steven Taylor for President
No pipeweed required to imagine it.
Steven Taylor: A Rare Rational Choice For America
This message brought to you by the Committee to Draft Steven Taylor for President.
Friday, June 30, 2006
The Theory of Money And Credit Goes HTML
I was excited to see Billy Beck reporting that The Theory of Money And Credit by Ludwig von Mises is now online.
Beck notes it’s on his list of recommended books, itself a fascinating post to read. I’m not so sure about some of the “know your enemy” selections, on which it’s heavy, but I found myself lusting after many of the titles listed… and contemplating rereads.
At any rate, it’s not as if I read the whole Mises book, but in referencing it in the college library for this old paper, it was hard to keep myself from getting sucked in, dry as it may be. It resonated.
Monday, June 12, 2006
Dear Californians for Schwarzenegger ‘06
You are spammers.
Yes, spammers.
Do you really think a person in Massachusetts needs four e-mails in a day with statements from you regarding the race for governor in California?
We did not ask to be on the list. Yes, each of us in the same house get the same e-mails. You’d thinking it might have something to do with our increasingly distant connection to the Bear Flag League, except a blog group such as that would know better than to share out member e-mail addresses unbidden.
The e-mails don’t offer a means of removal from the list.
They aren’t even from the same address each time, but instead from varying addresses such as advisory@joinarnold.com, cfs06pressoffice@joinarnold.com, TypicalPhil@joinarnold.com, and FactsOnPhil@joinarnold.com, plus not doubt other that were on previous e-mails I deleted out of hand rather than razzing.
Why not name the group accurately: Spammers for Schwarzenegger.
Friday, June 09, 2006
Top Cities Through History
The largest cities through history is a fascinating look, via Chris O’Donnell here.
Note how long it took before Europe started showing up, and how weird it seems for a city in Sri Lanka to have been on one of the historical top ten lists. Heck, how odd is seems to see Philadelphia on the list for 1900. That wasn’t so long ago.
Thursday, June 08, 2006
Earworm
I don’t think I’ve ever been happier to have an earwormy song pop spontaneously into my head and play over and over.
Hail Special Forces! Al-Zarqawi is dead! Ding dong the wicked witch is dead.
As seen pretty much everywhere, but Dean’s post is a fine place to start, and of course Glenn and Wizbang are all over it. I actually heard it first from Deb, who heard it first from the President.
It feels like one of those big turning points, you know?
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Trying to Understand Microsoft Licensing…
Can make your head explode.
How many client access licenses are needed? User or device CALs? Are there fries with that?
Argh.
It reminds me of a conversation we had last night about how absurd it is to tax income, and how complicated and excessive the tax code and variety of taxes are. I pointed out that all I have to do to know something is wrong with 15% just for Social Security is to remember that the amount I perceive as appropriate for a flat tax rate for everything is maybe 15%. But I digress.
What’s really annoying about this whole buying and licensing server software thing is they’re going to make me have to speak to an actual sales person. I hate it when that happens.
Sunday, June 04, 2006
We Don’t Need No Constitution, We All Prefer Thought Control
Via John Cole via Radley Balko, here is the latest case coming in a couple years to a Supreme Court near you. That should be completely unnecessary. It’s a cut and dried, cast in stone, no brainer case in which idiot California justices ruled 6-1 to castrate the Fourth Amendment.
Yup. Now if cops suspect you’ve been drinking and then driving, or can even pretend to suspect that, they can break and enter without a warrant, drag you from your bed, extract and test your blood.
Tell me the cops will never do this just because they can. Tell me they will only use it in hot-pursuit style, arriving at your house not long after you, having followed your sleepy drunken ass home from working late the bar.
Yeah, right.
So in a couple years we can look forward to the Supremes wisely correcting this clear Constitutional pillage, just as they did with Kelo.
Oh wait…
And hey, since I mentioned Kelo, let’s recap:
Kelo-related posts:
Will The Supremes And Bad Lawyering Perpetrate A Constitutional Travesty?
United States Constitution, 1788 - 2005: Promise Unkept
Bad Precedent
Additional Kelo Fallout Thoughts
Will the Money Be Followed?
Kelo and Raich: The Root of the Supreme Court Problem?
Olek V. New London Case
Kelo and "Fair" Value
Boycotting Can Be Hard
Becker and Posner on Kelo and Eminent Domain
Kelo, IOLTA and Drugs - Oh My
Sama on Kelo, Disney, and Boston's West End Tragedy
Was Kelo The Lost Battle That Won The War?
You Thought The Kelo Outcome Couldn't Be Worse?
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
Now That’s A Cool Memorial
Dale Amon reports that bits of aluminum from the World Trade Center have been roving Mars for two years.
Saturday, May 20, 2006
Dear Quiz Writer
I believe the word you’re seeking for this is “libertarian,” with pro-war leanings in the real world:
|
Your Political Profile: |
| Overall: 70% Conservative, 30% Liberal
|
| Social Issues: 50% Conservative, 50% Liberal
|
| Personal Responsibility: 50% Conservative, 50% Liberal
|
| Fiscal Issues: 100% Conservative, 0% Liberal
|
| Ethics: 50% Conservative, 50% Liberal
|
| Defense and Crime: 100% Conservative, 0% Liberal
|
Via Pammy
Friday, May 19, 2006
Three Wishes?
This is something I am borrowing and paraphrasing from the soc.history.what-if newsgroup, where I saw it last night. I haven’t actually dreamed up answers of my own for it yet, but perhaps some of you would like to tackle it via the comments, or the old blog-and-link method.
The proverbial lampbound genie comes out and is willing to grant you three politically or economically themed wishes, as opposed to ones for self-aggrandizement. This means new social, economic or political policies you’d want instituted in the world, disliked politicians or laws you’d want replaced or revoked, or that sort of thing. What are your three wishes? Feel free to elaborate on reasoning and expected consequences.
Monday, May 15, 2006
Am I A Liberal?
I’ve seen this “are you a liberal” test everywhere and thought it might be amusing to answer the questions. But do I answer based on absolute ideals and assume my answer encompasses the idea that things were rolled back to a position that makes the answer valid? Or do I answer in either a way that is realistic and practical but points us more in the right direction, or a way that accepts that if you’re going to go a certain way, then take it all the way and do it right? Hmmm…
1) Repeal the estate tax repeal: Estate taxes are evil. No.
2) Increase the minimum wage and index it to the CPI: No. This is government economic intervention at its worst, and then to put it on autopilot…
3) Universal health care: How about a market in health care? The government and the AMA got us where we are today. The lack of same is needed to make it right. But in the real world we are headed for universal health care and it’s not wrong to talk about how best to get there, even if it’s not where we should be heading and will be less superior to the hybrid mess we have now than a market would be.
4) Increase CAFE standards: No. How about letting the market function, rather than letting the government dictate what we should drive and what it should run on. How about letting ethanol, as well as petroleum, have a market. How about letting refineries and nuclear plants exist, and encouraging technology if only by getting out of the way.
5) Pro-reproductive rights, getting rid of abstinence-only education, improving education about and access to contraception including the morning after pill, and supporting choice: As always, a state issue if a government issue at all, which it’s not. In the world as it is, sure, for the most part. In the world as it should be, the government and education wouldn’t intersect any more than would government and reproduction. As things are, abstinence-only education is outrageously stupid, like something an anti-human death cult might dream up.
6) Simplify and increase the progressivity of the tax code: Aren’t these mutually exclusive, and besides, who says so-called progressivity is good and right? There should be the minimum taxes possible. They should be on consumption before income, fees for specific services before consumption, and be less invasive of the general citizen’s privacy than the KGB’s NSA’s crazy compilation of phone records. I’ve sometimes called gasoline taxes my favorite tax, funny as that may sound these days, because it makes a relatively direct connection between provision of roads and payment for use of same. Not that the government necessarily is the only way to do roads, hard as that may be to imagine. A few days ago we were talking about how great the interstates are and an alt-history “what if” based on the feds never having built them.
7) Kill faith-based funding: You mean kill government funding of things the government wasn’t conceived to do? Okay. In the world as it is, not so fast. Does it descularize the government? Does it establish a government church, or favor one religion over another? No? What’s the problem then? Does it get help where needed at least as efficiently as alternatives? Yeah? What’s the problem then? If we’re going to steal people’s money and throw it around, there’s nothing inherently wrong with this.
8) Reduce corporate giveaways: What are corporate giveaways? Making roads cheap and plentiful so commerce can happen? Government recording of patents? A court system and stable system of laws for ease in doing business and resolving disputes? The fact that corporations are a government-sponsored legal structure granted a form of personhood and some legal benefits? Government sponsored or encouraged monopolies? Shall I go on? Some might say almost none of this should be governments job, and even that corporations as such shouldn’t be able to exist. Some might say we should interfere in business as much as needed to shape society into our own mental image. But they would be wrong.
9) Have Medicare run the Medicare drug plan: Don’t you mean “eliminate Medicare and the Medicare drug plan”? After all, that would be part of number three, and an overwhelming contributor to the current non-market in health care. Real world answer would be “you mean it’s not? Why?”
10) Force companies to stop underfunding their pensions: The knee jerk answer is “duh, yeah.” Apparently there is more to this, legally, and the government that would go after them for underfunding has also made it impossible to do otherwise. In the real world… heck, in the real world it’s still nothing to do with the government, because it’s a contractual obligation between business and employee, or union and member, in which nothing should interfere.
11) Leave the states alone on issues like medical marijuana: Hell yeah, and the states should leave the people alone on same.
12) Paper ballots: Duh. Even if we’re voting electronically, it’s stupid not to have a clear and extensive paper trail.
13) Improve access to daycare and other pro-family policies: And a gobbledy goo gah to you too. In the sense that daycare should be easier to get into as a business, so there is less regulation, zoning, etc. to contend with, absolutely. Funny how less keeps meaning more. Pro-family? No. Get away from our families, thank you very much.
14) Raise the cap on wages covered by FICA taxes: No. Eliminate FICA taxes. Which in the real world must either be gradual or replaced by an adequate, all-encompassing consumption-based tax. This administration and congress missed such an opportunity to be transgenerational heroes.
15) Marriage rights for all, which includes “gay marriage” and quicker transition to citizenship for the foreign spouses of citizens: I said stay out of our families. Marriage is not a government institution, nor is it something for the government to meddle in. In the real world, then yes, but I’d rather see government out entirely. Certainly the feds have no place in defining or legislating marriage. Immigration, that’s a whole other topic that this only just nudges, but under the status quo, then quicker transition is to the good.
16) Undo the bankruptcy bill enacted by this administration: Absolutely. It was essentially written by the creditors for the creditors. At least, given the government sets law for bankruptcy in the first place, it should go. And if government’s role includes creating the legal structure within which people do business, having such a thing as law to handle bankruptcies isn’t out of place.
Others answering these rather arbitrary questions include Glenn Reynolds, Dean Esmay, Daniel Drezner, Megan McArdle, Stephen Bainbridge, and Pixy Misa.
Tuesday, May 02, 2006
Online Integrity
Via Glenn Reynolds, this Online Integrity Statement of Principles makes sense to me, and as far as I can recall is something I have always inherently followed.
I see no reason not to be counted in. Especially as one of those who sought pseudonymity initially, and still is largely identified that way.
Sunday, April 30, 2006
Pundit Roundtable
I had the pleasure of participating in the latest Pundit Roundtable over at WILLisms. This is a regular feature in which a few other bloggers and the host give their answers to a couple of questions, or related sets of questions, on different topics. It’s sort of like the McLaughlin Group in blog form, only different. Certainly more verbose.
The first topic was: How did we get into this mess of high gas prices? What is the solution? Give us your plan for getting gasoline to under $2 a gallon.
The second topic was: You have the power of life or death over any two figures from history. You may condemn one to an early death, and save one from their fated demise. Who do you choose and why?
I will cross-post my responses below, but you should go check out the complete Pundit Roundtable for the whole thing, including Jay Tea, David Anderson, and the host himself, Ken McCracken.
Now, my responses. Topic one, oil and gas prices:
People like simple, knee jerk, catch phrase explanations for things, so that is what we hear a lot of on the dramatic recent gas price increases. Pick the right one and you might even win some votes, but that doesn’t make you less wrong, or at least unrealistically pat.
The current price behavior is an unfortunate, yet perhaps overdue, confluence of many factors. There’s geopolitical forces. It’s oil; there’s always geopolitical forces. There’s the economic growth and therefore increased demand in places like China, but do we really want to go backward and lose the other benefits? There are the forces of environmentalism, NIMBY and regulation. Thus the lack of refining capacity, lack of new nuclear power in the overall mix - none of this exists in a vacuum, lack of new drilling in this country - for what that’s worth, given the fungibile nature of oil, seasonal and other blend requirements that make production more expensive and disrupt already tight refining capacity, and fundamental, seasonally variable supply and demand.
The best thing anyone could do for gas prices is to get out of the way. Let economics work. High prices give incentive to develop new sources of oil, as well as alternatives that might reduce the extent to which we depend on same. People will act to conserve, or if they don’t then the price isn’t so excessive after all. Companies will act to chase revenue and profits available at these prices that might not be at lower prices, and in so doing are likely to make the cost of alternatives or more efficient extraction methods fall.
There seems to be a high income punditry class trumpeting how low gas prices are in historical terms, and they are right. However, your average person has trouble appreciating that long term trend when the price rockets up so quickly. It’s as if milk went up another 75 cents in the course of a few months; of course we’d all complain. This is “milk” we buy five, ten, twenty, thirty gallons a week, as opposed to a gallon or two. It really does hurt.
The mistake is rushing to do something political about that pain. We’ll adjust. We’ll pursue ways to save - or not - and the signals from that will ripple through the economy to reflect in prices and availability. To the extent that we can have an influence given the politicization and regulation of oil, and energy generally.
Where the spike toward $3 was rapid, any fallback to $2 and under will be slow. How long to get that many people driving higher mileage cars? How long to slay the NIMBY Monster and build more refineries? How long to persuade congresscritters to encourage new nuclear, encourage new drilling, etc.- or at least back off of preventing or slowing same.
My plan? Get out of the way and let the economy work. Ultimately this works even if we do nothing to change the nutjob governments in key oil producing countries. Fungibility: Know it, love it.
Topic two, creating an alternate history through an extended life and an early death for two historical figures:
This is tougher than it sounds, and one of my answers sums that up in one person. My knee jerk thought on who to condemn, partly on the idea so many people would find it a controversial choice, was Lincoln.
I rapidly changed my mind and decided Lincoln was the most logical choice off the top of my head for saving, on the idea he’d done all the harm he was going to do, but was killed before he could do all the followup good we needed. His life may have been about the Civil War, expansion of federal power, and a near dictatorial Presidency, but the founders made that conflict almost inevitable, under someone, by what they had to do and gloss over to make the Constitution happen at all. Even if the muddy status of slavery couldn’t be handled, was it really a show stopper to leave the right of states to leave the union implicit rather than explicit? Some tell me it absolutely was.
After the war, things went awry due to the loss of Lincoln, so taking the war we had instead of the war we might imagine could have happened (or not), keep Lincoln alive for the cleanup. That probably makes for a smoother reconstruction and integration of former slaves, and blacks in general, into ordinary society. Imagine no segregation in the 20th century, no need for the civil rights movement, and arguably no need for programs like affirmative action to keep the races disparate. LBJ is on my short list of kill targets, but if we spare Lincoln, perhaps we lose some of the damage of LBJ’s war on poverty. So perhaps LBJ can live, if Lincoln does. The ripples go far.
The toughest question of all is who to kill, because there are just too many. Do I go with someone obvious, like Hitler, Stalin, Mao, or Jimmy Carter? Maybe whoever is responsible for giving up Cuba? (Who is that, anyway? Help me, history buffs, you’re my only hope.) LBJ? Not if Lincoln lives. John Maynard Keynes? Imagine, no famed “we’re all Keynesians now” quote from Ronald Reagan (who is decidedly not on my short list). As I write this, I lean strongly in JMK’s direction, but if we’re gunning for “economists,” why not Marx? Heck, that’s like taking a scythe to multiple follow-ons at once. I could suggest an early demise for Jesus Christ and make the Christians feel persecuted. Oh wait, they already do! Plus if we’re being mean enough to suggest that, why not that Paul dude who got it past the mere cult stage. Or I could invite a denial of service attack by suggesting a certain crazy Arab before he can impose his hallucinations on the world. FDR? But like Lincoln, he is a mixed bag of deepest evil and decisive good, and unlike Lincoln he got to live to do the best of the good.
Augh! Can’t. Make. Up. My. Mind.
Aw, what the heck. It’s obvious, but let’s go with Karl Marx. Let the folks with dictatorial impulses find another ostensible muse to justify themselves rather than merely being what they are. Imagine a twentieth century without Marx looming over it like the father of nightmares.
Had I been thinking, I would have ended that with a “he’s dead Jim” joke. Oh well.
Saturday, April 29, 2006
I Preferred When DOS Only Meant “Disk Operating System”
Why yes, we’re here. Yesterday morning? Not so much.
There was a Saudi-based denial of service (DoS) attack against Hosting Matters, where we are hosted, yesterday, lasting a few hours. I’ve seen mention that it came back for a while after 9:00 last night, but I didn’t observe that and have no idea if it’s true. There was rumor that the attack was aimed at a specific blog, then point blank denial from HM that the particular bellicose blog was the target. Be that as it may, if you go around goading a bully to punch you in the stomach as hard as he can, and the bully punches you so hard you lose your lunch all over your neighbors, don’t be surprised if your neighbors aren’t unhappy with the bully exclusively.
Anyway, this made things interesting, as I was working from home and couldn’t get work e-mails. This is going to lead to changes in how I have things configured. Any internal e-mail to me forwards to an elhide.com account I can get anywhere. That’s on HM too. Along with the business site and thecotc.com, which is supplied hosting directly by the business site, a couple of client web sites, and one client’s e-mail. My new business sites I’ve been too busy to pursue are hosted in elhide.com’s space, which meant they’d have been down too had that mattered. For me the e-mail was the main thing. The big client’s MX record points inside the building, so even as their web site was down, e-mail worked fine.
Apart from any notions I may have of diversifying my hosting, and apart from having made sure people have Gmail and Verizon e-mail addresses as backup, I think I will switch it so internal client e-mail (to clarify, my office is on their network and I am directly on their internal e-mail, which is great when I am at the office) forwards to Gmail instead. In turn, the Gmail forwards to my primary account, so it would look the same. But if elhide.com were down, I could go to Gmail and have complete continuity.
I almost went and blogged at my original backup site yesterday: InstaJay. That was meant as an “if Hosting Matters is down” backup to my old blog, but after I set it up, HM got more reliable. I may setup something else as an AV backup, but you might bookmark the one I just mentioned so if I do post “we’re down, here’s what’s happening” someone will actually see it, even if I don’t create and publicize another backup site.
Michelle Malkin took it upon herself to be the reporter of record regarding the outage. She offered to list and link all the blogs that were affected, so I sent her ours as an experiment. I guess we don’t count.
My old cell phone also chose yesterday to act up, spontaneously rebooting itself, and being found to be off completely as it sat on the charger. That made me say “well, time for the cell upgrade project like NOW,” until I discovered the back cover was loose and letting the battery disconnect randomly. Doh. I had been thinking I’d try to get a mixed-use portable web and e-mail and phone device as part of updating the cell situation, but maybe it will make more sense just to get a family plan with two or three basic phones (me and Deb, and possibly one to leave at the office), then later do something about “e-mail anywhere” (and web if possible). We’ll see. Just because it’ll officially be a business expense doesn’t mean I don’t want to do the whole thing as reasonably in cost as possible.
Okay, enough digression. This was supposed to be just an obligatory “we were down and we’re back” post. Oh, and I meant to note that from my perspective we’re loading even slower than ever, as if things atill aren’t completely right in host land. Hope that goes away.
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Meanwhile, they’re talking about slapping some extra restrictions on teens.
I knew the elderly have a hell of a lobby and all, but only in Massachusetts would that somehow translate to a discount on auto insurance.
Good God.
Monday, April 24, 2006
I think he’d probably be quite good at politics.
I think Kelsey Grammer is correct that being forthright would more than balance what he’d be being forthright about if he ran for public office. Hell, I’ve been saying for years that if President Clinton had just ‘fessed up, the whole affair would have fizzled right out with no lasting damage...and that was a contemporary sin.
If only we could move it closer and *really* ruin Teddy’s view…
I only agree with the New York Times once every 2.3 years, so I have to note it when it happens. Today, they’re bashing the sneaky little amendment that would kill the Cape Wind project. Good for them.
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
Time for Updating
I just finished the Massachusetts Form 1 and schedules C, E, Y, and DI, which left me with a blogworthy thing that irritates me each year. I mean, besides the whole legalized theft thing in general.
It’s the Massachusetts rental deduction.
We paid $13,125 in rent last year, which is more than my total income for most years prior to 1993. The deduction is half your rent, up to a maximum of $3000.
This particular tax deduction was part of the famous Proposition 2 1/2, which was inspired by California’s Prop 13 (which from what I understand was poorly written in a way that has led to increasing weirdness, but I digress). The law limited property taxes, benefitting homeowners and, of course, owners of rental property.
On the theory that renters wouldn’t get a break the way homeowners would, the benefit being absorbed entirely by landlords, a deduction of 50% of rent paid was included. Well, that and it helped the referendum pass because it gave many more people a stake in the outcome.
Circa the time of Prtop 2 1/2 my first apartment was $225 a month, $2700 for the year, which would have been a deduction of $1350. Great! But they slapped the maximum on it, and the maximum has had no relation to the reality of rents for most of that time.
And so it is that the lovely 50% rent deduction is less than a quarter rent deduction, with our rent low by many people’s standards. Nobody pays $500 unless they’re splitting a place or have some particularly fortuitous situation renting from a relative.
I think it’s time to go by the original law, or raise the limit to a more realistic amount. $6000 would be acceptable. If you’re gonna give breaks, you should do it right, and keep up with the times. Sheesh.
Monday, April 17, 2006
I Owe My Soul To The Elders And Poor
Oh wait, I am poor, relatively. Enough for my taxes to be a mere $981. Well, except for the other almost 89% of the bill that goes toward the folks on social security.
I love tax time.
I love getting everything ready to mail and then realizing I don’t have enough cash to mail the taxes and refill Val’s diaper supply today.
Sigh…
Friday, April 14, 2006
Work’s Been Taxing
So I haven’t even collated, stapled, signed and sent the partnership return yet, let alone done more than rough out what the damage will be for us on our personal return. Oddly, it looks like we’ll owe about $2500 less in taxes on about $6000 - 7000 less income. I thought you had to be rich for those kinds of marginal rates, rather than someone paying almost half their income in rent plus medical insurance, co-pays and deductibles.
But anyway, I am more relieved than usual to note the 15th falling on a weekend. Better still, Monday is Patriot’s Day in Massachusetts, so the personal tax return doesn’t have to be mailed until Tuesday. Woohoo! This doesn’t apply to the partnership return, as that’s going to Cincinnati rather than Andover, but still… very nice.
Wednesday, April 12, 2006
For enjoy your new tax! values of provide…
If one more local news dork refers to the health care fiasco that Romney and company are foisting on us as a law that will provide health insurance for the people of Massachusetts...I’ll, I’ll...oh, hell, I don’t know. I guess “being forced by the state to spend your own money on” is the new “provide.” Are they keeping Orwell’s brain alive in a jar at the statehouse, where linguistic violence and irony reign?
My favorite moment so far has to be Romney implying that if it doesn’t work right, it’s just because he’s such a damned studly visionary, and you know, the little people *dismissive hand gesture* implementation blah blah. I’d go find the quote, but A, I’m lazy, and B, I suspect that without the tone of voice it sounds more reasonable. But that’s what he meant.
Just when I was starting to like this forsaken mess of a state, too. Have I mentioned that it’s supposed to be 70 degrees today? Yippee!
Sunday, April 09, 2006
What I love about blogging, #4372:
I was flipping channels this morning and John Kerry was on MTP, and I said to Jay, “I’ll let Steven Taylor watch this one for me,” and he did. Thanks, Dr. Taylor!
