Taxpayers to get rude surprise

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Millions of Americans enjoying their small windfall from President Barack Obama's "Making Work Pay" tax credit are in for an unpleasant surprise next spring.

The government is going to want some of that money back.

The tax credit is supposed to provide up to $400 to individuals and $800 to married couples as part of the massive economic recovery package enacted in February. Most workers started receiving the credit through small increases in their paychecks in the past month.

But new tax withholding tables issued by the IRS could cause millions of taxpayers to get hundreds of dollars more than they are entitled to under the credit, money that will have to be repaid at tax time.

From data extracted from an Amazon Forum

We extracted about 75 percent of the responses on age (representing about 700 responses, taking equally from the earliest and most recent postings, which show very similar age distributions). Per John Makinson's quip at an LBF panel, over half of reporting Kindle owners are 50 or older, and 70 percent are 40 or older. Here is the full age bracket distribution:

0 - 19: 5%
20 - 29: 10%
30 - 39: 15%
40 - 49: 19.5%
50 - 59: 23%
60 - 69: 19.5%
70 - 79: 6%
80+: 2%

The comments themselves are as illuminating as the numbers. So many users said they like Kindle because they suffer from some form of arthritis that multiple posters indicate that they do or do not have arthritis as a matter of course. A variety of other impairments, from weakening eyes and carpal-tunnel-like syndromes to more exotic disabilities dominate the purchase rationales of these posters. Which in turn explains Amazon's pseudo-statistical case that e-book purchases are incremental/additive, rather than cannibalistic of their print sales. Countless people report being able to read much more with Kindle because it overcomes physical obstacles or limitations that had made reading difficult for them previously.

When Chelsea Clinton was a student at the Sidwell Friends School, the same school the Obama girls attend, the Clinton family’s involvement with the school’s annual benefit brought in big bucks. In 1996, a round of golf with Bill Clinton went for nearly six figures; another year Chelsea Clinton offered up her babysitting services to the highest bidder.

This past weekend was the Obamas’ first chance to participate in the Sidwell Friends School Dollars for Scholars benefit, and some families who remember the Clintons’ support are disappointed in the Obamas’ first showing.

According to a source with ties to the school, the only items up for bid from the Obamas included a signed copy of the Rolling Stone issue featuring the president and a signed copy of the January Vogue that featured the first lady.

I am embarrassed I ever wrote anything for HuffPo, which is now a cesspool of misleading misinformation. Funny though; I still get people asking me "What’s the harm in believing in things that aren’t real?"

What’s the harm?

Polio.

Smallpox.

Pertussis.

Mumps.

Measles (with possibility of encephalitis and permanent brain damage).

Hib.

Death.

Death. That’s the harm. The antivax movement, the people who promote homeopathic water, the people who want you to poke you with needles… they are peddling nonsense that doesn’t work. And worse, when they convince someone that their fantasy is correct and the entire scientific and medical establishment is wrong, that person will be denied treatment that may actually do some good.

Under proposed federal legislation known as the Dream Act, illegal immigrants who entered the U.S. as children -- defined as age 15 and younger -- and have lived here for five years could apply to the Homeland Security Department for conditional legal status after graduating from high school.

Such legal status would make the immigrants eligible for in-state college tuition rates and some forms of federal financial aid. Then, if they attend college or participate in military service for at least two years, the immigrants would qualify for permanent legal residency and ultimately citizenship.

The legislation, which has been introduced in various forms since 2001, comes as President Barack Obama is preparing to address the contentious issue of immigration reform later this year.

''Do we punish children for the actions of their parents?'' Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J, wondered.

Opponents disagree.

''Since many of these illegal aliens and their families are overwhelmingly on the lower end of the economic scale, they're going to take the lion's share of need-based financial aid,'' said Bob Dane, a spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform.

As I watch Washington politics I am not easily given to rage.

Washington politics is a game and selfishness, out-sized egos and corruption are predictable.

But over the last week I find myself in a fury.

The cause of my upset is watching the key civil rights issue of this generation — improving big city public school education — get tossed overboard by political gamesmanship. If there is one goal that deserves to be held above day-to-day partisanship and pettiness of ordinary politics it is the effort to end the scandalous poor level of academic achievement and abysmally high drop-out rates for America’s black and Hispanic students.

Top Fears By Age Group

Ages 7-10
1. Being kidnapped
2. Myself dying
3. AIDS
4. Not being able to breathe
5. Being threatened with a gun

Ages 11-14
1. AIDS
2. Not being able to breathe
3. Being kidnapped
4. Being raped
5. Being threatened with a gun

Ages 15-18
1. AIDS
2. Being raped
3. Not being able to breathe
4. Being threatened with a gun
5. Myself dying

Source

What ever happened when young to being afraid of yucky girls and later being very afraid of the dads of the not so yucky girls?

Hours before Oprah, the Post, and Mark Phillips had ever heard of Susan Boyle, I did. And so too did millions of others. Ms. Boyle was already an American sensation before the American media ever arrived.

The search involves tax officials examining websites that feature Swedish strippers, in an effort to identify them and chase them for tax returns.

The tax loss is estimated at about 40m Swedish kronor (£3.3m) annually.

Project leader Dag Hardyson said 200 Swedish strippers had been investigated so far. He said the total could be 500.
...
Mr Hardyson told BBC News that the strippers could be liable to pay about half of their earnings in tax. Striptease via webcam is quite legal in Sweden, unlike prostitution, he added.
...
Web search tools like spiders had failed to detect the Swedish strippers.

"When we investigated the sites manually it worked better," he added.

When Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele asked to speak
at the Chicago tea party, his request was politely refused by the organizers:
"With regards to stage time, we respectfully must inform Chairman Steele that
RNC officials are welcome to participate in the rally itself, but we prefer to
limit stage time to those who are not elected officials, both in Government as
well as political parties. This is an opportunity for Americans to speak, and
elected officials to listen, not the other way around."

Likewise, I spoke to an organizer for the Knoxville tea party who said
that no "professional politicians" were going to be allowed to speak, and he
made a big point of saying that the protest wasn't an anti-Obama protest, it was
an anti-establishment protest. I've heard similar things from tea-party
organizers in other cities, too. Though critics will probably try to write the
tea parties off as partisan publicity stunts, they're really a post-partisan
expression of outrage

sex preferences can change, Japan shifted from sons to daughters around 1990, while South Korea has flipped more recently. In the United States heterosexual couples prefer to adopt daughters.

Dr. Paul Offit, MD, of the University of Pennsylvania author of the excellent book Autism's False Prophets: Bad Science, Risky Medicine, and the Search for a Cure, debunking the hysteria being spread about vaccines.

MP3 Audio

Even P.J. O'Rourke can't keep up.

P. J. O'Rourke, The Weekly Standard, Febuary 9, 2009:

The next great government crusade will be against soap. The president will appoint a Blue Ribbon Commission, which will determine that soap releases polluting grime into the ecosystem, leads to aquifer depletion, and contains fatty acids that laboratory studies have shown to be acidic and not fat-free . . .

Associated Press, March 27, 2009:

SPOKANE, Wash. — The quest for squeaky-clean dishes has turned some law-abiding people in Spokane into dishwater-detergent smugglers. They are bringing Cascade or Electrasol in from out of state because the eco-friendly varieties required under Washington state law don't work as well. Spokane County became the launch pad last July for the nation's strictest ban on dishwasher detergent made with phosphates, a measure aimed at reducing water pollution. The ban will be expanded statewide in July 2010, the same time similar laws take effect in several other states.

But it's not easy to get sparkling dishes when you go green.

The soap opera "Guiding Light" is switching off after a 72-year run that predates television.

CBS says the show will have its final episode in September. Like most daytime dramas, "Guiding Light" has suffered from declining ratings and CBS is looking for a lower-cost alternative to the hour of programming.

The Guinness Book of World Records has cited it as the longest-running television drama, with more than 15,700 episodes airing.

I do believe sadly it’s going to take some diseases coming back to realize that we need to change and develop vaccines that are safe. If the vaccine companies are not listening to us, it’s their f___ing fault that the diseases are coming back. They’re making a product that’s s___. If you give us a safe vaccine, we’ll use it. It shouldn’t be polio versus autism.

At Ocean Charter School in Del Rey, near Marina del Rey, 40% of kindergartners entering school last fall and 58% entering the previous year were exempted from vaccines, the highest rates in the Los Angeles Unified School District.