The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

If I Had A Dollar For Every Time Someone Like A Fat Film Maker With A Baseball Cap Blathered About Insufficient Taxation, I Could Buy A Death-Porn Doorstop

by Smitty (title allusion) Stephen Edwin King: Sierra Tango Foxtrot Uniform. “As a rich person, I pay 28 percent tax… what I want to ask you is, why am I not paying 50?” Balls. Why don’t we, as a thought experiment, separate the gentleman from all of his property. All numbers are morally equivalent after […]

Tax Time

Please excuse the relative shortage of blogging this afternoon, because I’ll be at the accountant’s office, going through my annual ordeal. If there’s one thing a self-employed freelance journalist/blogger dreads, it’s tax time. Back in the old days, when I had a regular job with a salary, my taxes were simple enough that I could do […]

From the Dept. of Obvious Headlines

Low-tax states attract budget-conscious Americans Gee, ya think so? You mean to tell me that, given the choice, people would rather live where taxes are low than where they are high? Put that story at the top of A-1 and phone the Pulitzer committee! Update (Smitty): “Those bitter, Klingon, unpatriotic swine!” Vice President Biden was […]

The Governor California Deserves

Wrecking the state in the name of civil rights: Gov. Jerry Brown on Thursday called education funding a civil rights issue, defending his plan to eliminate redevelopment agencies as necessary to reduce California’s yawning budget deficit and to push more tax revenue to schools and public safety. “We take from redevelopment and we put $1 […]

112th Congress: Ready to Rumble!

The Wall Street Journal‘s Patrick O’Connor and Janet Hook preview the upcoming fights: The Republican majority that takes over the House this week plans an ambitious drive to slash government spending by tens of billions of dollars in the next few months, a strategy that ensures that the capital soon will be consumed by intense […]

Class Warfare vs. Economic Facts

“A 2008 study of 24 leading economies by the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) concludes that, ‘Taxation is most progressively distributed in the United States, probably reflecting the greater role played there by refundable tax credits, such as the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit. . . . Taxes tend […]

Death of Omnibus Boosts GOP

Defeating Harry Reid’s pet pork package gets Republicans off on the right foot going into the 112th Congress: Senate Republicans sought to build momentum on Friday after successfully forcing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to beg off a $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill. Sen. John Cornyn (Texas), the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial […]

Oh, Boy! House Democrats Trying to Screw Up Lame-Duck Tax ‘Compromise’

Understand that (a) I hate this godawful bipartisan monstrosity as an unwarranted sellout by Senate Republicans and (b) there’s very little chance that the House Democrats can screw things up so completely as to wreck the deal. But yet there is a glimmer of hope: A final House vote on President Obama’s tax proposal could […]

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