A good friend sent this to me.
If you haven't read it, do so, but be warned: This is too true to be very funny.
The next time you hear a politician use the word "billion" in a casual manner, think about whether you want the "politicians" spending YOUR tax money.
A billion is a difficult number to comprehend, but one advertising agency did a good job of putting that figure into some perspective in one of its releases.
A. A billion seconds ago it was 1959.
B. A billion minutes ago Jesus was alive.
C. A billion hours ago our ancestors were Living in the Stone Age.
D. A billion days ago no-one walked on the earth on two feet.
E. A billion dollars ago was only 8 hours and 20 minutes, at the rate our government is spending it.
While this thought is still fresh in our brain, let's take a look at New Orleans It's amazing what you can learn with some simple division . .
Louisiana Senator, Mary Landrieu (D), is presently asking the Congress for $250 BILLION to rebuild New Orleans. Interesting number, what does it mean?
A. Well, if you are one of 484,674 residents of New Orleans (every man, woman, child), you Each get $516,528.
B. Or, if you have one of the 188,251 homes in New Orleans , your home gets $1,329,787.
C. Or, if you are a family of four, your family Gets $2,066,012.
Washington, D.C .. HELLO!!! ... Are all your calculators broken??
Tax his land, tax his wage,
Tax his bed in which he lays.
Tax his tractor, tax his mule,
Teach him taxes is the rule.
Tax his cow, tax his goat,
Tax his pants, tax his coat.
Tax his ties, tax his shirts,
Tax his work, tax his dirt.
Tax his tobacco, tax his drink,
Tax him if he tries to think.
Tax his booze, tax his beers,
If he cries, tax his tears.
Tax his bills, tax his gas,
Tax his notes, tax his cash.
Tax him good and let him know
That after taxes, he has no dough.
If he hollers, tax him more,
Tax him until he's good and sore.
Tax his coffin, tax his grave,
Tax the sod in which he lays.
Put these words upon his tomb,
"Taxes drove me to my doom!"
And when he's gone, we won't relax,
We'll still be after the inheritance TAX!!
Accounts Receivable Tax
Building Permit Tax
CDL License Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Dog License Tax
Federal Income Tax
Federal Unemployment Tax (FUTA)
Fishing License Tax
Food License Tax
Fuel Perm it Tax
Gasoline Tax
Hunting License Tax
Inheritance Tax
Inventory Tax
IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax),
IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax),
Liquor Tax,
Luxury Tax,
Marriage License Tax,
Medicare Tax,
Property Tax,
Real Estate Tax,
Service charge taxes,
Social Security Tax,
Road Usage Tax (Truckers),
Sales Taxes,
Recreational Vehicle Tax,
School Tax,
State Income Tax,
State Unemployment Tax (SUTA),
Telephone Federal Excise Tax,
Telephone Federal Universal Service Fe e Tax,
Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Tax,
Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax,
Telephone Recurring and Non-recurring Charges Tax,
Telephone State and Local Tax,
Telephone Usage Charge Tax,
Utility Tax,
Vehicle License Registration Tax,
Vehicle Sales Tax,
Watercraft Registration Tax,
Well Permit Tax,
Workers Compensation Tax.
STILL THINK THIS IS FUNNY?
Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago, and our nation was the most prosperous in the world.
We had absolutely no national debt, had the largest middle class in the world, and Mom stayed home to raise the kids.
What happened?
Can you spell 'politicians!'
And I still have to "press 1" for English.
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11 comments:
Landrieu (Dem) and Vitter (Rep) asked for the money and neither got it. Oh yes, and the Gulf South, my world, still lies in ruins.
Ugh. It's terrible!!! Thanks for sharing, though. Hope your Christmas is very merry!
It's funny, I was talking to an old friend of mine from college, he's a computer whiz guy and also a young man who rediscovered his Christian faith (originally from the Bay Area in California), and he now lives in Italy. (He's Italian-American so I guess that helped things out.)
The subject of the $9 trillion plus US National Debt came up, and he pointed out to me that the consequences of the Debt are going to be extremely ugly-- our Treasury Bills "horizon" in about 10-15 years which means that, by around 2020, the "bill" on the debt comes due. Which means that all of us are going to have to pay it, and if you're still in the USA at that time, it means that the average US household, by a *conservative* estimate, is going to owe close to $250,000 to pay off the debt!! Not even including personal debt such as college tuition!
That's in fact one of the reasons my friend Mike has effectively emigrated to Italy, married there and is raising his kids there. If you're stuck in the States when the National Debt Bill comes due, *you* will be paying for it! Apparently Europe, at least Continental Europe is finding its Christian heart again, much more than I thought, so Mike was perfectly comfortable there. The only hassle he said was learning Italian in his case (as well as some German which seems to be a kind of Euro common language these days), which apparently wasn't that hard after he moved. (Apparently, Britain or Australia is not an option-- their debt is even worse than USA, and the UK especially is overcrowded.)
I wonder if I could do the same, I'm mostly Scotch-Irish though I guess there's a German or Dutch great-grandfather in there somewhere, maybe could give me a pass to work in Germany if I could actually learn German. Which I've never been very good at doing.
doctorj2u: I understand your frustration. It is what we can expect when we charge the government (satet or federal) with providing our needs in times of crisis.
The nature of a government worker, whether as a beaurocrat or as an elected official, is to continue to be a government worker at all costs.
To do so, they stray outside their six Constitutional charges and try to fix everything so they can stay in office or keep their jobs.
To do that, they levy taxes at a higher and higher rate, figuring that we will not realize that they earn nothing and can only take what we have earned.
And we have come to expect that what ever happens, Uncle Sam will bail us out.
These are the people we are thinking about letting handle our health needs?
Huck's FairTax - A fringe idea, NOT
Renown economist, Dr. Laurence Kotlikoff, has stated (9/26/2006),
"Yes I think [the U.S. is bankrupt] because if you look at our long term fiscal obligations and compare them with our tax receipts that are projected to come in, you end up finding the difference in present value is equal to $63 trillion. This is according to an update of a U.S Treasury study. So it is not an academic study but rather a government study.
"To come with $63 trillion in present value, you would have to have an immediate and permanent roughly 70 percent hike in federal corporate and personal income taxes. Alternatively you could immediately double the payroll tax. So we are talking about gargantuan adjustments here, huge problems that we are facing, and a lot of this has to do with the fact that the society is aging. We are currently facing 33 million people over 65. But when the Boomers retire there will be about 77 million people over 65. And we are currently handing out per old person roughly $30,000 on average in Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid benefits. But when the Boomers retire we are going to be paying them a lot higher level of benefits because these benefit levels continue to grow much more rapidly than wages per worker. So think about 77 million Baby Boomers getting roughly $40,000 per head, and you see the magnitude of the problem. We are talking trillions of dollars. $44,000 times 77 million is a very big number. It is in the trillions, A couple trillion dollars a year in obligations. So I do not think it is an exaggeration to say the country is bankrupt."
Kotlikoff believes that Huckabee's FairTax is the vehicle to derail economic meltdown.
And Kotlikoff is in good company.
Ha! That's funny...sad, but funny. I need to start coming over to your blog more often...I forgot about your sense of humor, Joe.
debbie: Of course if you start reading more often, that means I'll have to start writing more often.
ian: While I think the so-called "Fair Tax" is much better than what we have, I don't think it is really all that fair.
Placing a point of sale tax on items would mean that the tax would have to be paid and reimbursed later.
If you are genuinely poor, this would take money from you for some period of time, decreasing your disposable income until its return.
On the other hand, a flat tax of, say 9 to 11 per cent, levied on every earned dollar in the country, both personal and corporate, above a given poverty line and without deductions, would: 1)cut paperwork; 2)reduce or eleminate the burden on the poor; 3)be absolutely equitable; 4)encourage people to become wealthy, since they could keep 89% of whatever they earn; 5)bring in more money than the government would know what to do with even after paying off the national debt (although, due to the nature of government, it probably would not take them long to figure out how to get us right back into debt).
Joe: this post makes too much sense.
I don't know what planet you are from but things are no where near as bad as you think. Just look at all the nice cars and houses we own. What does it matter that we have to pay for them, the banks have lots of money and will always be there to bail us out.
Seriously though, republicans need to change their thinking as well, we cannot afford wars like we are in now and expect to stave off financial doom indefinitely.
And since when does the Federal gov. owe New Orleans a brand new city? Why rebuild in the same disastrous place?
Huckabee and Paul 2008!!!
jim: I own a 1995 Saturn SL2. You call that a nice car?
A man asked me the other day, "Are you tan from the Sun?"
I said, "Yes"
He said, "Hi. I'm John from the Earth."
B-dum-dum.
As to the war...it's either there or here. They don't negotiate, and they've already demonstrated that they are willing to bring it to us.
They killed more people on 9/11 than the Japanese did at Pearl Harbor.
Geeze! I thought the federal government owed everybody everything.
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