Steve's Musings

Trial by TV-watching Jury

2010-01-17T21:30:00.002-06:00

Today's issue of Parade magazine contained a short column, "The High Price of Jury Trials." Even before reading the article, I said to myself, "It's sure not because they are paying the jurors too much." The actual point of the article was that the expense builds up when courts have difficulty filling jury boxes because of so many summons recipients claiming hardship or simply not showing up for duty.

I certainly agree with Matt Fullenbaum in the final paragraph when he calls the jury system a cornerstone of our democracy and claims that it's important for everyone to answer the call. However, I think that one reason so many people try to get out of it is that jury duty is such drugery and jurors are generally treated rather badly. (For the record, I have never sat at a defendant's, plaintiff's, or prosecutor's table, but I have served three tours of duty in the jury box.)

Yes, jurors are generally poorly paid, the Arizona example of $300 per day on longer trials being a notable exception. The highest I have ever been paid was $30 per day. Transportation, parking, and lunch were not covered, and all of those can be significant costs in downtown Los Angeles. As I sat in my last trial, I was quite cognizant of the fact that the defendant was the only person required to be there that was being paid less for it than I or my fellow jurors were. In fact, I was pretty sure that the judge and the attorneys were each being paid more than all twelve jurors and two alternates combined. So, where are our perks?

Yes, perks. It's not only the pay, but jurors are often treated rather poorly for anyone of any pay scale. They have to sit quietly and attentively while evidence and testimony are presented, and while arguments are being made; that's not really a problem for most jurors. But then there's an objection, and the judge tells the jurors to disregard the last few statements spoken. (Yeah, right, and why don't you order us to never think about pink elephants while you're at it? That will purge them from our minds!) When there is a sidebar conference, jurors have to just sit there and do exactly nothing: they can't talk, they aren't supposed to be reasoning toward any conclusion yet before all evidence is presented, and they darn sure better not be listening in on that conference that's happening only twenty feet away. On the other hand, if the court is waiting for some slowpoke to show up, the jurors have to wait out in the hallway, where there is generally no comfortable seating, and they are still allowed to neither talk nor listen.

One thing that has improved in the past few years is the one-day-one-trial policy now implemented in many jurisdictions. When I last served, Los Angeles County had a ten-day-one-trial policy. You had to sit in the waiting room all day, reading or watching the soaps on TV, until you got called to a courtroom. Once called -- usually with about 50 other people -- you got grilled as to your suitability for that trial. If you got rejected, or if all jurors and alternates were selected before they got to you, it's back to the waiting room. And this goes on and on until you either get seated in a trial or spend ten days in the waiting room. In my case, I got dismissed twice and then finally seated for a five-day trial on my ninth day of service. (So yes, I had to miss fourteen days of work for a wonderful $30 per day.)

During that service, I devised a means of streamlining the trial system and being much more kind to the jurors. It was a videotape trial. Granted, the technology has greatly improved since then, digital video, DVDs, and all that, but the idea remains the same.

It's simply this: prospects report to the courtroom for jury selection, some are selected, and then all go back to their daily business until the end of the trial. The attorneys' opening statements are recorded on video, as is all testimony. At the end of each day, a copy of the raw video is given to each party, with the original retained as the court record. At the end of the trial, the video is edited: all sidebars, gone; all objections, obliterated along with the offending statements that prompted them (assuming that the objection was sustained). All that's left is the pure statement that the jurors are supposed to hear. Naturally, the person doing the editing must be an officer of the court, but each party to the case is allowed to have one witness to the editing process. If there is any objection to an editing decision, they can be quickly raised with the judge; after all, each party has their own copy of the raw video.

Finally, all selected jurors are summoned back to the court. Both parties are introduced, and then the jurors sit and watch the entire edited video, with a five-minute break each hour. The defendant is allowed to be present for the viewing, but is not required to be; he is however required to remain silent through the viewing if present.

Before the defense rests their case, they must declare one of the following choices: (A) the defendant's testimony and cross-examination will be on video like all previous statements and testimony, and will be likewise edited, (B) the defendant will give live testimony in the presence of the jury and will likewise submit to live cross, or (C) the defendant will decline to take the stand at all. If choice B is selected, all existing video must be edited and presented to the jury before the defendant takes the stand, in order to maintain chronological continuity of the trial.

Closing statements of each counsel can be on video, or can be live -- live would probably be convenient if defendant's testimony was live, while video statements would be more convenient otherwise. But then, after instructions from the bench, the jury retires for deliberation, and gets to take the full trial's edited video with them to play back as they please.

So, what would this accomplish? For one, you would waste far less of the juror's time. Enough less time that the court can probably afford to pay them minimum wage or even more. Second, the jurors don't have to go through the doublethink process of pretending they didn't just hear statements that the judge told them to disregard. Third, because the attorneys know that the jurors will never hear those statements, they will probably make far fewer of them, so the additional time for the jury to view edited video after the live testimony has already occurred will probably all come out in the wash. Fourth, in some cases the jurors will never be called to the courtroom because, after all testimony has been presented, the prosecution may drop the case or the defendant may plea bargain. In all of this, what it accomplishes overall is that the jurors are treated like valuable members of the court rather than its indentured servants.

If we really believe in trial by jury, then the juror is arguably the most important person in the courtroom, possibly even more important than the judge on the bench. So why shouldn't we treat them that way? If we did, then maybe not quite so many people would try so hard to finagle their way out of jury duty.

Health Care Non-Reform

2009-12-22T16:23:00.005-06:00

There is a world of difference between "You scratch my back; I'll scratch yours," and "we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor." If you don't see the difference, or see it as only minor, then you are part of the problem with politics in this country, and you are by no means worthy of the right to vote.

I am absolutely disgusted that Ben Nelson agreed to the Cornhusker Kickback. As a resident of Nebraska, am I supposed to be grateful that he negotiated this concession? Sure, it means things are not as bad for Nebraskans as for people in many other states; in actuality, it takes what would otherwise have been a monumental catastrophe and improves it to being merely a major disaster. But hey, my wife and I both have family in other states where it is still a monumental catastrophe. And am I not supposed to care about other hardworking Americans in still other states? Gee, and all this time we've been told that it's the conservatives that try to divide this country.

As a pro-life conservative, am I supposed to be pleased that Nelson managed to get a compromise on the abortion language in the Senate health care bill? To be pleased with that would be like celebrating the fact that my team outscored the other team 10-7 in the third quarter, even though the other team was ahead 40-3 at halftime and is now close to another touchdown early in the fourth quarter. There is no guarantee what will happen in the fourth quarter, nor is there any guarantee that Nelson's abortion language will survive reconciliation with the House bill.

Celebrating that compromise would also be like believing that Planned Parenthood doesn't use federal funds for abortion. Sure, officially they don't. But federal grants subsidize their other activities. Which means that funding from non-governmental sources that might otherwise be required by those other activities can instead be diverted to promoting and providing abortion. So they are in effect being subsidized for abortion; to state otherwise is merely an accounting trick.

Little concessions here and there do not make this so-called health care reform bill any less of a major train wreck. The bill might make health care a little more accessible to a very small minority of Americans, but at the cost of making it worse for the vast majority; simply yet another handout in a long chain of wealth transfers from those who produce wealth to those who contribute nothing at all to society.

And despite spin to the contrary, this bill will do nothing to control costs. Rather, it restricts the amount that some people will have to pay for certain goods and services. That doesn't mean that those goods and services will actually cost any less, just that others will have to bear the brunt of the cost. Three guesses who those others are.

Even if the bill explicitly says that the cost of certain things cannot rise, those words will not be worth the paper they will be printed on. If words in signed legislation always caused reality to reflect those words, then why don't we just outlaw poverty and be done with it? From now on, nobody is allowed to be poor; everyone will always have plenty of everything, whether they bother to work for it or not. While we're at it, why not have the law also mandate that everyone be able to fly? Won't that be cool?

No, every time government tries to control costs by restricting prices, the only thing it accomplishes is reduction of supply, because those suppliers simply cannot remain in business while being forced to lose money on nearly every transaction.

Am I advocating doing nothing? No, but continuing with this so-called health care reform would be far worse than doing nothing at all. It's not that we want to go slower, and it's not that we don't want to go anywhere; it's that we want to go in a completely different direction. A direction in which people and not government bureaucrats control their own destiny, and in which people that work hard to provide for themselves and their families don't have to carry water for those who are too lazy to carry it themselves.

The Problem with Entitlements

2009-08-09T16:00:00.007-05:00

Probably the biggest problem with entitlements today is the very fact that they are called "entitlements." As George Orwell demonstrated in 1984, when you institutionally bastardize the language, you gradually control the direction of thought in the people that use that language. Since welfare handouts are referred to as "entitlements," people have come to believe that they really are entitled to them.

My family was on vacation at Disney World a couple of weeks ago, and we participated in one of their Dining Plans. I have to admit that I was somewhat disturbed the first time that we got a meal and the cashier informed us of how many entitlements we had left in our plan. My first thought was "We're not on welfare!" But then it occurred to me: those really were entitlements. We were in fact entitled to them because we had already paid for them.

How many government benefits actually get handed to people that really paid for them? Those are typically referred to as "services," and the money paid is "service fees" or "user fees." Ironically enough, benefits are only referred to as "entitlements" when the recipients have no moral ground from which to claim that they deserve the benefit. Why are you entitled to receive something that I paid for and you didn't?

We've got to stop worrying about the "dignity" of those who continually absorb every resource sent their way. Those resources are not entitlements; they are handouts. And we can no longer afford to hand so much out. So we need to stop the doublespeak and call them what they really are, not what some wish them to be.

Do you hope he fails?

2009-03-13T22:02:00.003-05:00

The day before Barack Obama was inaugurated as President, Rush Limbaugh was asked about his hopes for the new administration. His four-word reply: "I hope he fails." It's been nearly two months since then, and Limbaugh has explained his meaning several times, but I still hear it presented as though he wants our economy and/or the country to fail.

Hoping Obama and company fails is not at all the same thing as hoping the country fails. Granted, if you are of the mindset that Obama is The Messiah, the Pure and Perfect One, then sure, they are pretty much the same thing to you. But if you really think that Obama's failure necessarily means that the country fails, perhaps you need to better examine your beliefs and motives.

If you honestly believe that Obama's plans will be harmful not only to you, but to most everyone around you, and to the country as a whole, and you can credibly support those beliefs with historical and empirical evidence, not just one or two isolated anecdotes, then what in the world is wrong with hoping that those plans cannot be successfully carried out?

Now, I know that the analogy I'm about to pose, some will find offensive, even incendiary. (You have been warned.) But hey, was anyone censured for implying that the Bush administration was complicit in 9/11? I can't think of anyone. In fact, I can't think of anyone censured for publicly saying it outright.

I bring up 9/11, because I'm thinking of a situation that day. Did the passengers on United Airlines Flight 93 hope their hijackers would succeed? Did any of those passengers say, "Well, I don't agree with them, but they're in charge now, and I hope they succeed because we need to get along"? Hardly. They surmised that the hijackers were attempting something that would be devastating to this country, and from the evidence we've been able to gather, they not only hoped the hijackers failed but considered it their solemn ultimate duty to ensure that failure. And thank God that they did.

So is it wrong to hope Obama fails with his plans for the country? Well, was it wrong to hope that George W. Bush failed? Apparently, a lot of people did hope just that. In fact, a number of people not only in Congress but within the entrenched executive bureaucracy actively worked toward making him fail.

Obama has made no secret that he wishes to remake this country, to take wealth away from those who hold it and "return" it to others. (You can only actually return money if it was wrongfully taken in the first place, or if the product that the money paid for has also been returned to the seller.) Obama also wants to severely restrict tax deductions for charitable gifts, but make up for it by offering government support to certain non-profit endeavors. (Rather than you giving your money to the charity of your choice, he gives your money to the charity of his choice. Hello ACORN, goodbye anything remotely conservative, libertarian, or religious right.)

Let me tell you a little story. When they were first married, my parents were struggling to get up into the middle class. Their first Christmas tree was cut out of a small scrap of cardboard and covered with aluminum foil. (Hey, they recycled way back then!) Now, 53 years later, I find myself lumped in with those evil rich people that have what everyone else deserves. But along the way, we took no handouts, cheated nor stole from no one, didn't operate on the shady fringes of legality (like Ted Kennedy's family did during Prohibition), didn't try to buy votes or favors with other people's money (as do many in every level of government), got education and other training when and where we could, delayed gratification when necessary, and generally just did the best we could with what we had. And I didn't get where am by being greedy, stingy, or conniving, or by winning any lotteries; I was generous along the way, even naively over-generous in a few cases.

I hope that didn't sound too much like bragging. If I actually thought that my story was unique, perhaps I would brag. But I'm convinced there are at least a million Americans who could tell you a similar story. So why should we be punished?

I have seen numerous situations where certain people quickly burn through significant amounts of cash, even tens of thousands of dollars, and yet have nothing at all to show for it when the money's gone. Or are even worse off after than before. Sometimes it was even my money they were burning through (see "naively over-generous" above). I'm not talking about people who worked hard and trustingly invested their savings with Enron or Bernie Madoff. I'm talking about people that think they don't need to really work as long as they can get someone else to support them in some way or another. And I'm talking about people who spend more than they can afford on things that wouldn't improve their life in the long run even if they could afford them. Particularly irritating are the folks who manage to be in both of those groups.

If anyone thinks that it's okay to forcibly take my hard-earned, carefully-saved money and redistribute it to others who put out far less effort than me, or were far more foolish than me, then yes, I certainly hope that that person and his plans fail miserably.

No More Year Glasses

2008-12-31T14:04:00.006-06:00

Tonight, as on the last nine New Year's Eves, a lot of people will be celebrating while wearing glasses shaped like the number of the incoming new year, with the two middle zero digits surrounding their eyes. It occurs to me that tonight is the last time this will happen, because the next year number with two zeroes in the middle is 990 years in the future. And I'm guessing that by then, objects to be placed on the face for purposes of modifying vision will be reduced to the status of historical or even archaeological curiosities, so it would occur to no one to emulate them with a year number.

But we wouldn't have to wait 990 years were we to change our calendar system from its present Anno Domini (aka Common Era) numbering. However, we would need to select an origin year that is sometime within the second AD millennium so that 1000 New Calendar could occur significantly sooner than AD 3000 (aka Y3K).

But do we even need to base our large time unit on the duration of Terra's Solar orbit? After all, our current solar days and years don't quite fit together as it is, so we have to add a Leap Year Day every fourth year except for those divisible by 100 but not 400 (making a year equal to about 365.2425 days, or 349.2 more minutes than are claimed by Rent's "Seasons of Love"). And even with that, we have to occasionally throw in a Leap Second, as is supposed to happen tonight, in order to keep things synchronized. So why not adopt time units derived from something more astronomically universal. Stardates, anyone?

So if we play with stardates, why not call our new system the New Cosmic Calendar? And instead of searching for some great event to mark the origin of our new time axis, why not just arbitrarily designate the time at which the system was adopted as "NCC 1701"? Okay, maybe that's a bit too geeky, but at least we would only have to wait another 299 stardate units to wear glasses with two zeroes in the middle.

Well, Happy New Year anyway, and enjoy those year number glasses for the last time in your life. (Unless 51 years from now you use a large "6" as the left eye hole.)

Community Organizer

2008-09-18T10:34:00.003-05:00

Honestly, I believe that if a liberal mouthpiece or pundit were to say that the sky is green or that the state of Delaware was in the middle of a desert, a lot of people would be repeating it as gospel the next day, particularly if it could be somehow interpreted to the detriment of one or more conservatives.

I say this because I saw a letter in the paper this morning that ended with "Jesus was a community organizer. Pontius Pilate was a governor. 'Nuff said." Well, my response to that is "The Mississippi River runs backward." It's equally true, and equally relevant to the current presidential campaign, which is to say, not at all. (The river did in fact run backward for a few days following the New Madrid quake in 1812, so it might even be more true than the first statement.)

The community organizer/governor statement was already making the rounds, attempting to equate Barack Obama to Jesus and Sarah Palin to the Roman procurator who ordered His crucifixion, before Rep. Steve Cohen repeated the statement on the House floor September 10. But it is simply hogwash, and can be true only in the Joseph Goebbels sense of telling it big enough and often enough.

First of all, Roman procurators like Pilate were not democratically elected governors as we know them, but were appointed by the emperor. And whereas Sarah Palin enjoys overwhelming approval in her state, Pilate was popular only with the corrupt local leadership to whom he capitulated. Hmmm, that last part doesn't sound much like Palin, either.

But the more odious comparison is Obama to Jesus. Jesus was, is, and will be many things. In His earthly incarnation alone, he went from miraculous Child of a virgin, to carpenter, to Teacher and Prophet, to Suffering Servant, to Sacrificial Lamb, to Risen Savior, and finally to Ascended King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He was never a community organizer of any kind, let alone the kind that rabble-roused the populace to demand that the government support them at the expense of others.

Jesus called for people to be servants to others and generous givers of their resources, but Obama calls for people to demand to be served and given to. Jesus told a parable in which one talent was confiscated from the lazy servant who refused to do anything with it and was given to the productive servant who turned five talents into ten; Obama calls for confiscating the earned wealth of productive people and redistributing it to people who seem productive only in the sense of fecundity.

In short, the implied comparisons of the oft-repeated statement are illogical, nonsensical, demeaning, and borderline sacrilegious.

And by the way, I'm sure that it is Bush's fault that Delaware is a desert. You know, global warming and all that.

The AMT Strikes Yet Again!

2008-02-03T14:31:00.000-06:00

Well, our wonderful Congress did a few last-minute tweaks to the Alternative Maximum Tax a couple of months ago, rather than dispensing with it altogether as should have been done at least a decade ago. So, until it's gone, it looks like this will be an annual rant of mine.

In last year's version of this rant, I mentioned that it turns out that the AMT is even worse than I realized the previous year. But can it get any worse? Are you kidding? Of course it can!

Let's revisit the dinner party for 20 that I hypothesized in last year's rant: You had to pre-pay for 30 steak dinners when you only needed 20; the restaurant refunded you for 5 dinners immediately and for 3 more a few months later. If you do the math, he still owes you for two dinners that you never got but had to pay for a long time ago. So you and your spouse decide to go out for a nice dinner, and you wind up at the same restaurant. When you're finished, the restaurant owner presents you with a bill for the full amount of the meal. You say, "Why not credit the dinner refunds you owe me against this bill?" The owner responds, "Oh, no, those were for steak dinners! You had fish tonight, so it doesn't apply."

Why did I add such an odd turn to the dinner party story? Because that is precisely what is happening to my taxes yet again!

To review, the AMT forced me in spring of 2005 to pay tax on income imputed to me in 2004 but which I had not yet received. In spring of 2006, computing 2005 taxes made it obvious that the previous imputed income was overstated so I got to recapture the tax overpayment. But not all of the overpayment; some rolled over to 2006 taxes. What I was ranting about last year was that 2006 taxes still didn't let me recapture all of it, but rolled some still further.

It's now February 2008, and I'm doing my 2007 taxes. The labyrinthian tax instructions say that I owe $1572 of AMT for 2007. But they still owe me $715 for AMT overpayment three years ago. So I should have to pay $857, right? No, only in a world that actually makes sense. But in the world of our marvelous tax code, there are certain activities that trigger the AMT, and there are certain activities that trigger AMT recapture credits. Apparently, in 2007 I did a few from the first group but none from the second. So the entire $715 credit has to roll over to 2008 taxes next year, and the entire $1572 AMT is in the tax bill that I have to pay by April 15 of this year.

So next year the feds will still owe me $715 for taxes that I paid four years earlier, taxes on income that never existed at all! Will I ever get any interest on that four-year (or possibly even longer) loan? Again, that would only be in a world that actually makes sense. But will the insanity ever cease?

Instead of Term Limits

2008-01-23T11:14:00.001-06:00

Calls for term limits for members of Congress and/or state legislature come up frequently due to annoyance at some very senior member, pushing something ridiculous or blocking something worthwhile. We pretty much all know the arguments for and against such term limits. The Founding Fathers never intended Congress to be a career, but any given constituency should have the right to vote for whomever they want to represent them.

What does it say about the people of Massachusetts if they cannot find anyone to be a better Senator than Ted Kennedy? What does it say about the people of north Omaha if they cannot find anyone to send to the Nebraska Unicameral Legislature better than Ernie Chambers? He's been there since 1970, twice as long as anyone else in the history of the state.

[Update: Nebraska passed term limits for its state senators in 2006, and Chambers was finally forced out January 6, 2009, after 38 years in office. But Kennedy is still on Capitol Hill.]

Any state could pass a law limiting the term of their own members of the U.S. House and Senate, and any throw-the-rascals-out group can boycott their state representative, but why would anyone want to limit their own representation if other constituencies were going to continue to send the same people year after year?

The problem is in the power of seniority. Experience in the legislative body naturally carries some de facto influence in that body; there is no reason it needs to carry de jure control as well. Yet nearly every legislative body in this country grants preference for committee chairmanships and other such positions of influence to the people that have been there the longest. But what does having been there forever prove? That the campaign deck is stacked in favor of the incumbent, who can communicate with the electorate at their expense, and can bring home a little bacon just before he has to face reelection? Or does it perhaps prove that sitting pretty on the public payroll is a lot easier than trying to advance a career or build a business in the real world?

Since term limits are so difficult to bring about, and since some validity can be ascribed to the argument that you don't want to be forced to retire a true talented statesman, I think we ought to abolish the legislative seniority system. Or, at the very least, restrict it severely. Let's say that we only have two grades on the seniority scale: anyone joining the body at or since the last general election is a freshman, and anyone else is a veteran. Veterans would include those who didn't have to face reelection in the last general election, such as a U.S. Senator in the third through sixth years of his first term. All freshmen are considered equals, and all veterans are considered equal, regardless of their relative terms of "service".

Positions of influence should then be granted to someone who has demonstrated knowledge and competency in the appropriate subject rather than someone who has just been hanging on in the certainty that he would eventually "deserve" the position.

Call me crazy, but somehow I think that Ted Kennedy's reelection chances would go down if the people of Massachusetts knew that the following January he would have exactly as much power as someone from Wyoming or Idaho with only two years experience.

Hangups About Cordless Phones

2007-11-12T10:18:00.000-06:00

The wonderful thing about a cordless telephone is that you don't have to be right next to the phone cradle to talk. The evil, wicked, mean, bad and nasty thing about the cordless phone is that you also don't have to be next to the cradle to hang up. So, more likely than not, the handset gets laid down next to wherever the talker happened to be when the conversation ended. Which typically is not even in the same room as the cradle.

So then you hear the phone ringing, or perhaps you hear only the base station ringing, or maybe you just see a Caller ID alert come up on the TV screen. But any of those will prompt a frantic scramble and "Where's the *#&@%* phone?!"

Sure, you can locate the handset anytime by going back to the base unit and hitting the "page" button, then try to find the source of the beeps. But sometimes the echos make it almost as hard as finding the source of a cricket chirp, especially given that the beeping tends to stop just as you are getting warm on the source.

Well, not quite anytime: paging the handset only works if you happen to do it before the handset runs out of battery power. Since it usually spends more time off the charging cradle than on it, the battery life is rather limited.

We have one of those Motorola MD481 systems with a main base station and multiple remote charging cradles that simply extend the one base station to several cordless handsets rather than having multiple systems. It's a fine product, as cordless phones go, and we theoretically have four phones operating from a single base. I say "theoretically" because one of the handsets went missing more than six months ago.

Where is it? Fallen between couch cushions somewhere? Who knows? Since most of the charging cradles sit vacant much of the time, it never occurred to anyone that we were short a handset until the battery power was far diminished beyond any capability to respond to a page. Maybe it will turn up someday.

I've many times threatened to throw away all our cordless phones and replace them with good ol' tied-down models. Even though phone cord tangles can be irritating, at least you always know where the phone is.

Okay, here's what I really want: Give me a cordless phone that doesn't act like a cordless phone. I want to see a handset that has nothing visible on it but a microphone and an earphone. No buttons, no display, nothing else. Just like a simple corded handset, but without the irritating tangly part.

Most cordless phones automatically pick up if you remove them from the base while they are ringing, and automatically hang up when you return them to the base. On the phone I want, this is the only way to answer or hang up, because the handset has no buttons to perform the task. When you finish a conversation, you simply have to return the handset to the base, because until you do, the base will remain online unless you actually unplug it from the phone jack.

Suddenly, like magic, you don't have handsets that go missing because they fell behind the couch cushions in the next room. And you don't have handsets that die in mid-conversation because they've been away from the charger for the past three days.

Sure, the MD481 has a number of nice features. But I could use those features at the base station; I don't need them on the handset. Is this a move backwards? Certainly no more than running all over the house for a locatable working phone.

Waiting and Walking

2007-08-27T08:49:00.000-05:00

One of my wife's heroes never knew that he was her hero, and she doesn't even know his name. Some years ago, she was working in a grocery store, and a man came in looking for a job. He had just been laid off from an oil company executive position, and was searching for another, but meanwhile he needed to be earning something even if it meant sacking groceries. She recounts that he showed up every day in a starched white shirt with a tie, and he did his job well. But after a few weeks he was gone, presumably to another job more like the one from which he'd been laid off.

Why is he one of her heroes? Because he stepped up and did what needed to be done, when it needed to be done, to support his family. He didn't complain about not finding what he wanted right off, nor did he whine about sacking groceries being beneath his dignity or his education. He just took the job and put his best effort into it for as long as was necessary.

Why is that so hard for some people to understand? Why do some people seem more like Cousin Eddie Johnson in Christmas Vacation, explaining his seven-year stint of unemployment with "I'm holding out for management"?

Yet those who wait for the Lord
Will gain new strength;
They will mount up with wings like eagles,
They will run and not get tired,
They will walk and not become weary.
—Isaiah 40:31 (NASB)

I count this among a number of scripture passages in which I think one phrase is perhaps overused while other phrases are overlooked. It seems like some can wait on the Lord forever, hoping that He will eventually just wave away whatever mess they've found themselves in. Don't forget the rest of the verse: once the Lord provides some kind of wings, you're supposed to leave the nest, even if they are not the specific wings you were expecting. You are not completing the verse until you get out and do some walking and running.

I know people (I bet we all know a few) that never seem to expend any real effort to improve their situation, and instead just seem to be holding out for somebody to rescue them in just the fashion that they wish to be rescued. If you offer them any suggestion that is not in line with their ideas, there will always be a "reason" why it does not apply to them or can't possibly work. I really think some of them see their position as virtuous, depending on God alone, as in Habakkuk 2:4 "the righteous will live by his faith" (NASB) But they remind me of the joke about the guy who prayed for years to win the lottery. If only he won, he could get out of his hole and be such a generous person. Then one day as he was complaining in prayer about never having won, he heard a voice: "It might help if you bought a ticket."

My wife and I have an expression, "sometimes you need to just buy a ticket." (Note to the metaphor-impaired: this is not an endorsement of state lotteries!) To truly live by faith, the righteous need to first pray and then put their feet to their prayers.

At the other end are people who boldly go out to do whatever they wish and expect God and others to honor their "stepping out in faith." Sometimes what one might call faith, another would probably call presumption, expecting God to go along with your program.

We need to be open, watching and listening for opportunity, but we also need to wisely consider whether our plans are honoring to God and His purposes, that they are needs and not just wants. There is always a balance point somewhere. Jesus alluded to that in John 14:13, "Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son," and 15:7, "If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you." Just anything you want does not fit in that description, but pretty much anything you really need does.

The saying "God helps those who help themselves" is not in the Bible: not all that God has helped began by doing the work themselves, and not all that set out to help themselves saw God step in to finish it. Nevertheless, it is a good saying, and I believe that God honors our honest attempts to do that which honors Him, including caring for the needs of our family. And I believe that because we have seen numerous examples in our own lives and in lives of those around us. And unfortunately we've seen negative examples as well.

A Jim Croce song recounts a failing search for "an executive position". But unlike Cousin Eddie Johnson, at least he went ahead and took the job at the car wash. And maybe when he does get himself straight he can have that air conditioned office.

I hope the unnamed hero wound up with an even better job than the one he lost. He deserves it after mounting up new wings in the grocery store.

The Greatest of These is Charity

2007-08-04T22:04:00.000-05:00

Am I really that selfish, insensitive, greedy, or uncaring if I want to keep more of my earnings and pay less in taxes? Contribute your fair share, they say. We all need to do our part, they say. It's the Christian thing to be charitable, they....

Hold on right there. You need to be careful about bringing "Christian" into it. I dedicated most of an earlier blog to criticism of invoking God's name to further your own ends. Mind you, charity is certainly supposed to be a Christian virtue; surely it is highly regarded by all major religions. But what is it?

In the old King James Bible, the 13th chapter of I Corinthians ends with:

And now abide faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.

More modern translations use the word "love" instead of "charity" in that verse, so I don't think that's quite the meaning we're looking for, but it may be close.

Going back to the old Merriam-Webster, we find "benevolent goodwill toward or love of humanity", "generosity and helpfulness especially toward the needy or suffering", "public provision for the relief of the needy"; "mercy" is offered as a synonym. Maybe that's helpful, but I want to look at some examples of what I believe charity really is, and is not.

When person A notices that he has something that person B needs, and freely gives some or all of it to B, that is charity. However, if B is then expected to give A something of somewhat comparable worth, that's not charity; that is trade or commerce. There is nothing at all wrong with trade, as long as both A and B knowingly and willingly entered into it. But when A gave directly to B (charity), every bit of what A gave entered B's possession, B knows whence it came, and if B has any feelings of gratitude they would naturally be directed towards A. But this has nothing at all to do with our tax or welfare system.

Now consider when a third party, C, takes from A and gives to B. Is that charity? I don't think so. Now if A was unfairly withholding what rightfully belonged to B, and C recaptured it and returned all of it to B, then what you have is justice, or perhaps you have merry olde Robin Hood.

But what if B could use that which A has but has no particular rightful claim to it, and what if C forcibly takes from A, gives some of it to B, and keeps the remainder for himself. That is much more like what occurs in the modern welfare state. Instead of A being the hero, C will be the recipient of B's gratitude (if any), even though C contributed nothing except the threat of force, and in fact profited from the exchange. And A just feels like he's been well taken, because he indeed has, and he may also feel frustrated that not all of what was taken from him even went to help B. That's not the charity that has anything to do with love; that's just wealth transfer, and self-aggrandizement on C's part.

It does bear some resemblance to the last dictionary entry, "public provision for the relief of the needy," but since none of the other definitions had anything to do with the public, I think that last one is just an example of the warping of the language through constant misuse.

But actually the welfare state is even worse than that. As C takes more and more, and grows steadily more powerful, it seems like most of the B's never see any real improvement, but become increasingly dependent on the handouts.

So don't you dare tell me I need to be more charitable when you're demanding more taxes out of me. I'm tired of being the A in the above transaction, as the governmental juggernaut C just keeps getting bigger and bigger. There is nothing loving and charitable about making someone else more and more dependent on you for the necessities of life.

Remember, as Reagan said, a government that is big enough to give you everything you need is big enough to take everything you have. But, given that government tends to be run by people that like having power, which do you think is more likely to happen?

Musing on KFAB

2007-08-02T08:28:00.000-05:00

This week, Scott Voorhees' page at KFAB.com features a blog that is a combination of the two I wrote last year about the E?IC: the rant against it, and a suggested alternative.

In Vain

2007-06-30T12:20:00.000-05:00

"You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain." (Exodus 20:7 NASB)

While Jewish, Protestant, and Catholic traditions differ on the exact enumeration of the Ten Commandments, the above verse is generally accepted as the Third Commandment. Where people differ is in just what it means. What is that "vain" thing? Does this mean we are not to say "God" or various names for Him when provoked into speaking in colorful metaphors? Is that what vain means? As Inigo Montoya said, "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means." What's inconceivable to me is that profane language would be all it means.

According to Merriam-Webster, "vain" means having no real value, marked by futility or ineffectualness, foolish, silly. (It also means conceited, but that's not important right now.) What does any of that have to do with cursing? Well, I guess it would actually be foolish, ineffectual, and maybe even conceited to suppose that God would eternally condemn someone else just because we happened to be irritated with them at the moment. That seems rather minor to me. And Dr. Laura Schlessinger agrees; she maintains that cursing must be only the most trivial form of using God's name in vain, that God would seem rather petty if that was His primary concern. (Whatever you think of Dr. Laura, she has written a good lay commentary on the Ten Commandments.) There has to be more to it than that.

Those who claim to be "people of faith" — regardless of the actual faith — wear the name of God wherever they go. Some quite literally wear it, on a T-shirt, or as an ichthys fish symbol on the back of their car. Have you ever seen one of those fish symbols on a car in which the driver was giving the finger to another driver who annoyed him in traffic? (Or rather, how long ago did you lose count of such occurrences?) The driver was not doing such a wonderful job of wearing God's name, because the character portrayed was contrary to what ought to be associated with God. That indeed seems to be to be foolish and silly, and showing no real value for the name of Jesus that the fish represents. It must be taking His name in vain, even if no words were actually spoken. Now we may be getting somewhere.

Actually, that's still just scratching the surface. If you claim to be Christian or otherwise godly in order to lend legitimacy to whatever you happen to be saying, then what you are saying had better already be legitimate, and it ought to be within the character of God, both in its content and in its manner of delivery. If not, then essentially you are falsely claiming to be speaking for God. In ancient times, that could come down on you like a ton of bricks, er, rocks.

I wrote in an earlier blog about being offended by the way that Fred Phelps and his "church" picket soldier funerals and announce gays in hell. (And I wrote that blog before Phelps' daughter picketed a local funeral and allowed her 10-year-old son to trample an American flag.) I went on to express disappointment at Jerry Falwell referring to 9/11 as God's judgment. In both cases, they are making an appearance of preaching in the name of God when the apparent intention is merely to bring attention to themselves. (The late Dr. Falwell subsequently apologized for his remarks, but the Phelps crew continues merrily along in their self-glorifying ways...) Pat Robertson also occasionally announces that God told him this or that; I can't say whether or not God has spoken to him, but usually it just seems like something Robertson himself wanted to say.

But you don't have to be on a platform proclaiming "Thus saith the Lord!" in order to be vain in this fashion. If anything you say is more self-serving than God-serving, wrapping it in religious language is still doing the same thing. Are you saying it to honor God, or to make yourself look good?

One morning a few weeks ago, Jack Van Impe mentioned on his TV show that he had recently gone to a movie; he walked out when he heard the Lord's name being taken in vain (yes, referring to swearing) and asked for his money back [cue his trademark little smirk here]. It's okay to be offended by hearing God's name that way. (And yes, I am too.) But get real: if the movie was made anytime in the last 35 or 40 years and did not come with a G rating from the MPAA, you have to expect at least a little rough language, and have to be able to let it roll off of you so you can move on unchanged. And walking out of the movie is one thing, but making a show of asking for your money back is rather self-serving, showing how pious you are. If you were really expecting to be so offended, and actually planned the walkout in advance, then it was even more self-serving with the premeditation.

Something else that really bugs me is when fellow Christians confide something on the order of "God has been telling me that you need to...." Not "I think you need to do it" or "I feel like God wants it done", but God is telling me that you need to do it — whatever "it" is. When you hear such a pronouncement, is the fact that "it" really seems to mostly benefit the speaker such a huge coincidence? And amazingly, the speaker is not obliged to any more effort other than sharing that wonderful revelation with you. (But please don't confuse this with the Christian who humbly confides, "I feel that God is telling me I need to...." This asks nothing of the listener except understanding and support, leaving all responsibility for action on the speaker, and indicates that some honest and humble seeking is taking place.)

There are just too many other examples to list here. Heck, there are too many categories of examples to list. But there are many ways to bring shame upon the name of God, and it is our responsibility to avoid doing any of them. The first step in that responsibility is to open our silly eyes and realize how many things we already do shame or profane God's name, and not just in swearing.

Alternative Maximum Tax Again!

2007-02-25T11:18:00.000-06:00

Around this time last year, I wrote a post about what I call the Alternative Maximum Tax. (Yeah, I know the post is dated in September, but that's the date that I transferred it to this blog server, not when I really wrote it!)

It turns out that the AMT is even worse than I realized then. You see, one thing that triggers the AMT is future income that is likely but has not yet been realized. And when that income actually occurs sometime in the future, if the original estimate was too low, then you immediately owe tax on the excess. But if the original estimate was too high, then Uncle Sam will credit your tax overpayment back you, not all at once, but bit by bit over several years. Nice, huh?

Let's say that you make reservations for 20 at some fancy restaurant. But in order to accept such a reservation, the restaurant required you to put up a deposit for the price of, not 20, but 30 steak dinners a couple of months in advance. The date rolls around, and what do you know, your party consumed 20 steak dinners just like you expected, so you have paid for 10 dinners you never got, and what's more the restaurant has been holding that money for two months. So they say, "Here's your refund." You look at the check, and it is the price of only 5 dinners. When you ask about the amount, they claim that they're holding the deposit just in case you consume more in the future. They will refund you for 3 more dinners in a few months if you haven't used them yet, and refund you for the last 2 dinners a few months after that.

Is that illustration silly? Of course it is, but that is essentially what happened to my taxes. You see, part of my employer's compensation program consists of blocks of options on the company's stock. (At least it used to be a part; not so much any more.) Each option represents the right at some time in the future to buy a share of stock at today's market price, regardless of what the price will be by then. The catch is, it's in the future, at least a year away, and sometimes as much as five years away. It's supposed to be an incentive to help the company succeed so that when your options are vested (matured), the stock price is significantly higher than the price you have to pay. (Sometimes the price is lower, which makes the option worthless.) Well, the easiest way to use stock options is to do a "same-day sale", where your broker essentially lends you the money to buy the stock from the company at the option price so that you can turn around and immediately sell it on the open market at the current price. The broker actually just sends the company enough of the sale proceeds to cover your option price and then sends you the remainder.

The problem with a same-day sale is that the remainder check that the broker sends you becomes regular W-2 income, and is therefore taxed at same rate as your "wages, tips, and other compensation". However, if you instead dig into your own checking account to come up with the money to buy stock at the option price, and then hang onto that stock for at least a year before selling it on the open market, any profit you make on the sale will be taxed at the much-lower long-term capital gains rate.

Here is where the evil of the AMT kicks in. (Remember, I'm really writing about AMT, not stock options.) In 2004, I decided to try this capital gains savings, and went ahead and forked over the cash to get some stock at the option price. Then, when working on the 2004 Form 1040 in spring of 2005, the AMT rules said that that stock was now income. Even though I have not yet received a penny of such income, for AMT calculations I had to assume a long-term gain by selling the stock at the market price of the day I bought it. So I had to fork over quite a few $ on April 15, 2005.

Later in 2005, I needed the cash that the stock represented, so shortly after the one-year mark, I sold it. But the market price when I sold it was lower than when I bought it, so although I did make a profit on the sale, I didn't make as big a profit as I had already paid taxes on back in April. So Uncle Sam should owe me a credit for that tax overpayment.

Come February of 2006, I'm working on 2005 taxes and it turns out that the AMT rules won't let me recapture all of the overpayment; I get some of it back immediately and have to roll the rest over to 2006 taxes. So the government has already been holding tax payments for nearly a year on income that has never existed and never will, but I can't get all of it back yet.

Oh, and we moved during 2005, and due to some strange gyrations of our county's property tax system, we wound up paying a full year's real estate tax on both our old and new home. Somehow I overlooked that detail when itemizing deductions for 2005, so when it came to my notice, I had to file an amended return, Form 1040X. But as it turns out, that extra property tax did not increase our 2005 refund by even a penny; it merely increased the AMT recapture rollover into 2006.

So now here it is February 2007, and I've done all 2006 taxes. Guess what? I still don't get all of my AMT back. There's still a few hundred dollars that have to roll over into 2007 taxes next year. (Sigh.)

I don't have many stock options left, but I will not do another exercise-and-hold on them. (That's what the broker calls what I did back in 2004.) The AMT just makes it totally not worth it.

Moral Basis?

2006-09-18T08:30:00.000-05:00

This morning on Meet the Press, there was a debate between Senator George Allen (R, Virginia) and Jim Webb, his Democratic challenger this November. I wasn't able to hear much of it, but early on, I did catch Russert asking Allen if he agreed with a quote from Colin Powell to the effect that "the world is beginning to doubt the moral basis for our war on terror." Sen. Allen is a politician, so of course he did a complex song-and-dance around it. But I'm not running for office and doubt I ever will, so here is my straight answer to that question.

I think a significant portion of the world doubted our moral basis for any struggle against terrorism as early as September 12, 2001. Although they never show up in newscasts anymore, I distinctly recall celebrations in numerous places as the news spread about the September 11th attacks. There was laughing and dancing, gunfire into the air, shouts of "Death to America". They think we deserved what we got simply because of who we are. Why should we care if they doubt our moral basis? They have less credibility on moral judgments than would Helen Keller on aesthetic comparisons of various shades of blue.

Do certain Europeans doubt our moral basis? Are we talking about French, German, and Russian idiots -- nay, criminals -- that tried to stonewall any effort to do anything about terrorism because it might interfere with the sweetheart oil deals they had that were in complete violation of the Oil for Food arrangements? Or are we talking about the people in Kofi Annan's own office who did the same thing? Again, we are worried about the moral judgments of folks who on their best days have far less brains, hearts, or courage than Dorothy's three friends on their worst days.

Sometimes you just have to ignore what other people might think, go do the right thing, and leave the judgments to historians of centuries hence. History has not judged Neville Chamberlain kindly, but at least Chamberlain came around when Hitler proved that Churchill was right.

Too Many and Too Few Diplomats

2006-09-18T08:27:00.000-05:00

The U.S. foreign policy establishment suffers from a couple of problems. One is that it is spread more widely than anyone gives it credit for. Obviously it primarily consists of the State Department bureaucracy; there are probably hundreds of people at Foggy Bottom that no one has heard of, and yet have influence over various details of our international relations. However, the Constitution specifies that the Senate must ratify treaties, and has "advice and consent" oversight on presidential appointments to upper-level positions and ambassadorships; therefore, virtually every veteran Senator, as well as a number of Senatorial candidates, fancies him- or herself as a foreign policy expert. And you have to include much of the media in the foreign policy establishment because many journalists seem to see themselves as the real experts concerning any subject they've ever reported on.

But the real problem is that the foreign policy establishment has both too many and too few diplomats. That is, it suffers from an overabundance of good diplomats and a fierce paucity of great ones. So, you ask, what is the difference? Well, I don't remember who first said this in the dim recesses of history, so I can't credit it properly, but a good diplomat will let you have your way some of the time, whereas a truly great diplomat will let you have his way all of the time and lead you to believe that it was your idea all along. There are simply not enough people in the establishment that are convinced that what is good for U.S. security is also good for the civilized world in general. And there are far too many who want to give concessions in order to soothe tensions with those who hate us.

I don't often agree with columnist Froma Harrop, but on September 7 she nailed it with her "Islamic Terror's Endless 'Root Causes'" column. A most telling quote from that column:

Islamic terrorists are attacking people on nearly every continent -- many who have little or nothing to do with U.S. foreign policy. Multicultural, huggy-bear, we're-not-in-Iraq Canada has uncovered a plot by 17 Muslims to invade its Parliament and chop off the prime minister's head.

No matter how you paint it, no matter how you try to soothe it and justify it and mollify it, the terrorists and their ringleaders are simply going to hate everyone and everything that fails to submit to them absolutely 100%. And any concession made by our supposed experts to address the "root causes" of terrorism is never going to be seen by them as a step towards peaceful compromise, but as weakness that should be exploited to the fullest. They have proven any number of times that they do not believe in compromise, except as a temporary measure to give them a chance to regroup and regather their strength.

We can't afford such compromises, as they only make it easier for them to kill us. But way too many in our foreign policy establishment are foolishly convinced that such a path is the intellectually superior one.

"Can't we all just get along?" No. We can't. Because they won't.

Fred Phelps is Not a Reverend

2006-09-18T08:13:00.000-05:00

Let me just say that it offends me that Fred Phelps (I refuse to dignify him with the honorific "Reverend") identifies himself as a Christian just as I do. And let me say that it also offends me that his Westboro Baptist "God Hates Fags" Church carries the same Baptist tag as the churches in which I grew up. They devoutly wish to be seen tithing their mint, dill, and cummin as they laugh off the weightier matters of justice and mercy and faithfulness (Matt 23:23).

How dare they insult grieving families by picketing funerals of soldiers, announcing that these young men and women deserved to die for serving a country soft on homosexuality? Their website proudly proclaims the number of days Matthew Shepard has spent in hell, and they boast of having announced his entry there by picketing his funeral. Now, it is not up to me to say who is and is not in hell, and thank God it is not up to Phelps, either, but even assuming that his pronouncement is true concerning Shepard's eternal destiny, I should think that it would be a matter of great sorrow, not celebration nor gleeful provocation. Their bragging seems to me to be little different than that of a KKK mob proud of having lynched a lone unarmed black man.

I'm pretty sure Christ had people like Fred in mind when he foretold of responding to boasts of faithfulness with a disgusted "I never knew you." (Matt 7:22-23)

Mind you, I am not in any sense being soft on homosexuality. I am against gay marriage and believe that true matrimony involves one man and one woman -- although I think that the frivolous treatment of marriage and divorce by multitudes of heterosexuals has to be at least as detrimental to its sanctity as is the desire of some gay couples to legitimize an already long-term monogamous relationship. But that's for another blog.

I'm not being soft on homosexuality; I'm being critical of those who view it with a magnifier that minimizes any other form of sinfulness. But Phelps is an easy target. He and his ilk seem to try hard to be noticed for being mean.

This may seem an odd thing to say for someone who has long associated himself with the Religious Right -- and will continue to do so -- but there are a number of people whose message is really just a more subtle form of Phelps' venom. And I fear that they do more harm than benefit to the cause of reaching people for Christ. (That is supposed to be the objective, isn't it?)

When Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell had their infamous conversation on the 700 Club about the causes and meanings of the September 11th attacks, I just cringed and thought "Why did they have to say that?" Their statements served no purpose other than to get their names into the mix as having made a pronouncement about the attacks.

The statements were certainly premature. But to say that the attacks were the result of homosexuality and abortion was really irresponsible. When God punished a people for sin in the Bible, it was usually pretty clear Who the punishment came from and why. If the attacks destroyed a major abortion clinic or a gay pride headquarters, the statements might have had a little more credibility. But as it is, they were insulting to the memory of thousands that died that day only because they had gone to work.

Alternative Maximum Tax

2006-09-18T08:05:00.000-05:00

Yeah, I know that the "M" in "AMT" is supposed to stand for "Minimum", but if you read my previous rants, you know that I also disagree that the "Earned Income Credit" is anything that somebody earned. No the AMT is an alternative tax that is designed to make sure you pay the maximum possible tax.

The AMT was established in the 1960's to ensure that very wealthy people hiding behind numerous tax shelters still had to pay at least some tax. Well, guess what? We've had quite a few changes to the tax code in the past three decades. Those shelters just don't exist anymore, so the entire justification for the AMT is obsolete by more than a decade. The only tax shelter I've ever seen was the novelty one my aunt gave me, consisting of three carpet tacks with a small roof over them.

But it's even more ridiculous. Back in 1969, the AMT probably snagged fewer than 30 people in the entire U.S., but the threshholds were never indexed for inflation. Again, guess what? "Very wealthy" in 1969 and "very wealthy" today are two very different things; $60K was a lot of money in '69, but today a family of four pulling in $60K/year is only borderline middle class. And what was fewer than 30 people then, now, well, you need to tack five more zeroes onto that 30. (For the math-impaired, that's three million.)

As it is, a fraction of my itemized deductions is already discounted away (it's called IRC Section 68). But then to slap an Alternative Maximum Tax on top of what I already have to cough up is simply evil incarnate.

E(?)IC Alternative

2006-09-18T07:59:00.000-05:00

Okay, so if you advocate the elimination of the Earned (?) Income Credit [see previous Tax Rant], you will of course be branded as mean-spirited, uncompassionate, greedy, etc, etc, etc. So how about some alternatives? A valid alternative would allow someone to receive the same dollar amount for which they are eligible under current EIC rules, but have that dollar amount granted in such a way as to make it 99.9% impossible to treat like a lottery windfall.

Here's one possibility: Educational Savings Accounts. ESAs already exist in the tax code, and allow you tax advantages when you spend hard-earned dough on the intellectual improvement of yourself and/or your dependents. So how about creating a special ESA into which your EIC money is deposited? You can withdraw at any time in the form of a check payable to an educational institution, but you cannot otherwise touch the money for five years, or maybe even ten. And if you do make a withdrawal that is not a check to a financial institution, the bank hosting the ESA has to report that withdrawal, and it gets charged to you as regular income. Yeah, regular income; you know, the stuff that reasonably successful people pay confiscatory taxes on.

Earned (?) Income Credit

2006-09-18T07:56:00.000-05:00

We need to do away with the EIC. It's supposed to be a "helping hand", but it's just another wealth transfer, enabling certain people to get a bigger tax refund than they actually had taxes withheld. But how many people get an EIC refund and actually invest it or otherwise apply it to the improvement of their overall financial position? No, it seems like most of them just treat it like a winning lottery ticket, and blow it on something quick and frivolous. (The lottery just being a tax on people who can't do math, but that's another rant.)

The EIC is treated like free money. Folks like H&R Block and Jackson-Hewitt make big bucks from the people that would rather get only 60% of their free money RIGHT NOW than wait three whole long weeks for the check to arrive with 100% of their free money. It would be interesting to get data from the big tax-prep companies to see what kind of correlation there is between customers who get EIC and customers who take refund-advance loans. But you probably won't see such data without a court order, because those companies' business model depends on the complexities and inequities of the tax code.

Hello

2006-09-18T07:50:00.000-05:00

Hello. I'm Steve and I occasionally write random musings that occur to me and refuse to be ignored. I did have a blog on my own home server, but since no one knew to look there, nobody ever read it. So my first few posts here are actually copies of various things I've written so far this year.