"Charles Two Middle Initials Cooke (“We Can’t Trust The IRS”) -
I'll tell you what I can't trust , a guy with two middle names like "Cock Wobble " or " Chuck Wagon".
Boy, those TeaParty
Days , that was the Golden Age of Butthurt.
Old White People with too much time on their hands will be the end of democracy. We need to find useful outlets for all their energy. If I was all jacked up on B-12, Cialis and statins I'd probably be starting shit all the time too. Maybe an Early Bird version of Midnight Basketball.
Speaking of Jeff Bezos, the definitive rebuttal to the conservative claim that Biden is turning America into a socialist collective is the mere fact of Bezos breezily planning to go into outer space. If America were a socialist collective Bezos would know we’d never let him back in again.
An excellent, albeit depressing, post. What's even more depressing is that the real scandal, to borrow a phrase, is that this extreme tax avoidance of our capitalist overlords is all perfectly legal -- "Perfectly Legal" also being the name of a terrific aneurysm-producing book by David Cay Johnston that elucidates how the rich manage to get away with this. If by "Bipartisan majorities have long supported this part of the tax code" the WSJ means majorities in Congress, they are correct. The legislative authors of the very tax code that requires everyone reading this to pay a higher tax rate than Bezos, Gates, et al (and the lesser known Paulsons, Teppers, and Steve "It's Like When Hitler Invaded Poland" Schwarzmans, etc.) make their money the old-fashioned way, under the table. And lucky us, Bezos and Musk don't have to waste any of their Space Cadet Club money on welfare queens.
Pseudoconservatism is a one trick pony: tax cuts. That and vote suppression. And gun promotion. And womb regulation. And xenophobia. And racism. And militarism. And religiousity. OK, it’s an eight trick pony but it’s still horseshit.
". . . except for the drama of whether we’re gonna do anything about it."
Spoiler alert: No. And it's not because we the people don't care. It's because we the people are completely shut out of that conversation. If you're an average citizen, just try to get a 1-minute face-to-face meeting with your congressional representative. Not gonna happen. A meeting with either of your senators is about as likely as you being crowned Queen of Norway.
But if you're Bezos or Buffett, Gates or Koch, you have Senator Piemaker's personal cell number. When you call, Piemaker answers. And Piemaker really REALLY wants to please you. So Piemaker never even hears the constituent voices saying "TAX THE RICH!!!" What he does hear is the voices of the rich saying "You know, user fees would really be the best way to raise revenue, and I'd be happy to pay the toll on I-95 for the one time each year I use that road." Meanwhile, every working schlub who uses I-95 to commute 4 exits from home to work is subsidizing Daddy Megabux's yearly jaunt.
"Remember the Tea Party shtick, where the Car Dealers and Nail Salon Owners dressed up like a community theater production of 1776 and acted as if Nathan Hale died for a capital gains tax rate cut?" LOL, I adore you.
The problem is, the rubes would rather have Elon Musk (a man so rich he can afford to blow up rockets during test launches like the technology had not advanced beyond 1940s prototypes) and pay little in taxes than have any kind of almost sorta healthy society which might mean the immigrant driving to work for a 12 hour shift isn't hitting a pothole every 7 seconds or some darkies and skirts get a free education at a community college.
I'm sure when the GOP state legislatures refuse to certify the election results of any Democrat in 2024 and the federal government is again run by lunatics who think vaccines make your blood magnetic, the Republicans can retool the tax code (and eliminate the filibuster to stop Democratic interference, obviously) and demand all people pay a "fair" flat tax of $50,000 per year. Of course, if you can't pay your taxes, the IRS will investigate and prosecute you. It would be wrong to skip out on your tax obligation.
Wait, Roy—you didn’t think to sprinkle any Himalayan pink salt on Megan McArdle’s WaPo column (“…given a choice between letting billionaires spend fortunes reaching for the stars, or destroying those fortunes so that the rest of us don’t have to look at them, then personally, I’ll take the rockets”) from yesterday? Too low-hanging?
It is a Newtonian-class law of physics, that the more wised-up and in-the-know these people think they are (and present themselves as being), the more oblivious they are of what I call "reality." E.g., they'll sneer that someone like Fauci is only in it for the self-aggrandizement and they money, but show them someone who really IS in it for the self-aggrandizement and the money, like Bezos or Trump, and they praise them for being selfless heroes.
The absolute evil freaking genius of the right wing “scandal” machine is its uncanny ability to create a “scandal” from little or nothing, have it be debunked over and over again, and then, for the rest of time refer back knowingly to said “scandal” as if it were established fact (which, for a certain subset of American — those who, for example, think BLM protests were orgies of violence and 1/6 was a literal picnic in the park — it is).
Back in the day, they would have nodded toward the argument that THAT money is different because it Creates Jobs. You like Jobs, don't you? (I see below ol' Broken Calculator McArdle came though, thanks Megan!). It show just how important outrage is to Republican philosophy is these days, they're cancelling William F. Buckley.
I saw somewhere a defense that the untaxed money was not liquid simoleans, and taxing unrealized gains would be unfair, somehow. Not an insane argumemt, so useless to Republicans. But I don't care anyway, there's more than 1 way to skin a plutocrat.
Once I remembered how often Abbie Hoffman used to dress as a Floundering Fodder and thought that being outrageous were an argument, I understood the Tea Party to have a lot of Yippie Envy—to repeat an earlier comment, just like Norbert the Narc they still would like to 'get a chance at them big-tittied hippie girls'.
On the main topic: is it better or worse that they don't frame it entirely as a moral issue and instead are just lubing themselves for an orgy of 'Look over _there_!'?
How about that wealth tax idea? Or is that extortion like making people pay all kinds of insurance and stuff just to live above board, and thereby funding whole sectors of our economy inefficiently but with plenty of room for graft and grift, not to mention grip and grin photo ops at the local chamber events?
*This* time the car dealers and nail salon owners went to the Capitol on 1/6 and tried to lynch their way to power. The IRS was a "least concern".
"Charles Two Middle Initials Cooke (“We Can’t Trust The IRS”) -
I'll tell you what I can't trust , a guy with two middle names like "Cock Wobble " or " Chuck Wagon".
Boy, those TeaParty
Days , that was the Golden Age of Butthurt.
Old White People with too much time on their hands will be the end of democracy. We need to find useful outlets for all their energy. If I was all jacked up on B-12, Cialis and statins I'd probably be starting shit all the time too. Maybe an Early Bird version of Midnight Basketball.
Speaking of Jeff Bezos, the definitive rebuttal to the conservative claim that Biden is turning America into a socialist collective is the mere fact of Bezos breezily planning to go into outer space. If America were a socialist collective Bezos would know we’d never let him back in again.
An excellent, albeit depressing, post. What's even more depressing is that the real scandal, to borrow a phrase, is that this extreme tax avoidance of our capitalist overlords is all perfectly legal -- "Perfectly Legal" also being the name of a terrific aneurysm-producing book by David Cay Johnston that elucidates how the rich manage to get away with this. If by "Bipartisan majorities have long supported this part of the tax code" the WSJ means majorities in Congress, they are correct. The legislative authors of the very tax code that requires everyone reading this to pay a higher tax rate than Bezos, Gates, et al (and the lesser known Paulsons, Teppers, and Steve "It's Like When Hitler Invaded Poland" Schwarzmans, etc.) make their money the old-fashioned way, under the table. And lucky us, Bezos and Musk don't have to waste any of their Space Cadet Club money on welfare queens.
Pseudoconservatism is a one trick pony: tax cuts. That and vote suppression. And gun promotion. And womb regulation. And xenophobia. And racism. And militarism. And religiousity. OK, it’s an eight trick pony but it’s still horseshit.
". . . except for the drama of whether we’re gonna do anything about it."
Spoiler alert: No. And it's not because we the people don't care. It's because we the people are completely shut out of that conversation. If you're an average citizen, just try to get a 1-minute face-to-face meeting with your congressional representative. Not gonna happen. A meeting with either of your senators is about as likely as you being crowned Queen of Norway.
But if you're Bezos or Buffett, Gates or Koch, you have Senator Piemaker's personal cell number. When you call, Piemaker answers. And Piemaker really REALLY wants to please you. So Piemaker never even hears the constituent voices saying "TAX THE RICH!!!" What he does hear is the voices of the rich saying "You know, user fees would really be the best way to raise revenue, and I'd be happy to pay the toll on I-95 for the one time each year I use that road." Meanwhile, every working schlub who uses I-95 to commute 4 exits from home to work is subsidizing Daddy Megabux's yearly jaunt.
"Remember the Tea Party shtick, where the Car Dealers and Nail Salon Owners dressed up like a community theater production of 1776 and acted as if Nathan Hale died for a capital gains tax rate cut?" LOL, I adore you.
The problem is, the rubes would rather have Elon Musk (a man so rich he can afford to blow up rockets during test launches like the technology had not advanced beyond 1940s prototypes) and pay little in taxes than have any kind of almost sorta healthy society which might mean the immigrant driving to work for a 12 hour shift isn't hitting a pothole every 7 seconds or some darkies and skirts get a free education at a community college.
I'm sure when the GOP state legislatures refuse to certify the election results of any Democrat in 2024 and the federal government is again run by lunatics who think vaccines make your blood magnetic, the Republicans can retool the tax code (and eliminate the filibuster to stop Democratic interference, obviously) and demand all people pay a "fair" flat tax of $50,000 per year. Of course, if you can't pay your taxes, the IRS will investigate and prosecute you. It would be wrong to skip out on your tax obligation.
Wait, Roy—you didn’t think to sprinkle any Himalayan pink salt on Megan McArdle’s WaPo column (“…given a choice between letting billionaires spend fortunes reaching for the stars, or destroying those fortunes so that the rest of us don’t have to look at them, then personally, I’ll take the rockets”) from yesterday? Too low-hanging?
As long as Manchin and Sinema are senators (never mind the entire GOP) we will do nothing about Stop the (Tax) Steal.
It is a Newtonian-class law of physics, that the more wised-up and in-the-know these people think they are (and present themselves as being), the more oblivious they are of what I call "reality." E.g., they'll sneer that someone like Fauci is only in it for the self-aggrandizement and they money, but show them someone who really IS in it for the self-aggrandizement and the money, like Bezos or Trump, and they praise them for being selfless heroes.
Lois Lerner!!!!
The absolute evil freaking genius of the right wing “scandal” machine is its uncanny ability to create a “scandal” from little or nothing, have it be debunked over and over again, and then, for the rest of time refer back knowingly to said “scandal” as if it were established fact (which, for a certain subset of American — those who, for example, think BLM protests were orgies of violence and 1/6 was a literal picnic in the park — it is).
Back in the day, they would have nodded toward the argument that THAT money is different because it Creates Jobs. You like Jobs, don't you? (I see below ol' Broken Calculator McArdle came though, thanks Megan!). It show just how important outrage is to Republican philosophy is these days, they're cancelling William F. Buckley.
I saw somewhere a defense that the untaxed money was not liquid simoleans, and taxing unrealized gains would be unfair, somehow. Not an insane argumemt, so useless to Republicans. But I don't care anyway, there's more than 1 way to skin a plutocrat.
Once I remembered how often Abbie Hoffman used to dress as a Floundering Fodder and thought that being outrageous were an argument, I understood the Tea Party to have a lot of Yippie Envy—to repeat an earlier comment, just like Norbert the Narc they still would like to 'get a chance at them big-tittied hippie girls'.
On the main topic: is it better or worse that they don't frame it entirely as a moral issue and instead are just lubing themselves for an orgy of 'Look over _there_!'?
whether we’re gonna do anything about it. Not if Joe Manchin has a say in things!
How about that wealth tax idea? Or is that extortion like making people pay all kinds of insurance and stuff just to live above board, and thereby funding whole sectors of our economy inefficiently but with plenty of room for graft and grift, not to mention grip and grin photo ops at the local chamber events?