NeuroTypical

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As opposed to when I talk with you, and one of us always ends up fleeing in tears.

I was trying to get all excited and maga and whatnot, but I'm left sobbing onto my mail in ballot because you basically nailed it. It's not who will be the best for the nation, it's not who shows the most fiscal discipline, or who's going to apply the fixes to our issues the best. It's who'll do the least damage while in office.

I always must chuckle at statements like this. Who are "the wealthy" and how do you define "loophole"? The answer will say a lot about someone's moral take on taxes.

That's a good way to sum it up, but one last thought: I remember when I heard someone sum up HIPPA compliance from a business perspective. Sometimes, they said, the only way to know if you're HIPPA compliant, is you get sued for not being compliant, and you are not fined or not found guilty. There is a little light between HIPPA and taxes, but I'm thinking not as much as people might think. I will never confuse taxes for some sort of moral obligation. "Fair share" is a fiction sold by politicians seeking votes. We covenant to be honest in all our dealings with our fellow men. We are subject to laws and rulers and governments, etc. We should never cheat or embezzle or attempt to defraud. We are commanded to render unto Caesar what is Caesars. But when it comes to taxes, I care much about the letter of the law, and not so much about the spirit. The IRS tax code is soulless and has no spirit.

If "per se" means "the incorrect definition most people believe", than you're correct. I think words are important, so I'll stick with the correct definition. Andrew Johnson Impeachment Date: February 24, 1868 Impeached for violating the Tenure of Office Act by removing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, a Lincoln appointee, without Senate approval. Acquitted by one vote. Bill Clinton Impeachment Date: December 19, 1998 Impeached on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice related to his extramarital affair with Monica Lewinsky. Acquitted. Donald Trump (First Impeachment) Impeachment Date: December 18, 2019 Summary: Impeached on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress related to his dealings with Ukraine. Acquitted. Donald Trump (Second Impeachment) Impeachment Date: January 13, 2021 Summary: Trump was impeached on the charge of incitement of insurrection following the January 6 Capitol riot. Acquitted. I started watching impeachment proceedings with Clinton. The pomp is kind of cool to watch, with a real "founders" vibe to it. If it's a Republican getting impeached, it's a huge media event and there's guards and crowds and talking heads to cover it and talk about it. Clinton's impeachment delivery got zero coverage - I think I was able to watch it on CSPAN or PBS or something - there are no videos that I can find. But the House impeaches and bangs the gavel. Then the House person and entourage walk across the hall from the House to the Senate. He goes through the doors of the senate, almost like an unwanted guest, demands the floor even though he's not part of the senate, and reads out the articles of impeachment. (I'm going off of memory here, but either the 1st Trump impeachment, or the Clinton impeachment, the guy had no microphone and was proudly yelling from the floor up at the seated Senate.) This forces the senate to pick up the matter whether they want to or not. It's all there as part of the checks and balances built into our federal government, as a way of ensuring that no one person or party ever gets so powerful they can act above the law.

Somewhere between Carb's and JJ's take, is where the IRS stands. A few notes: - The ability of the IRS to audit returns tends to be quite low. Dems want to fund a billion auditors, Republicans want to neuter the IRS. Since hiring/training/deploying auditors takes several years, the result is you have an almost zero chance of being audited, unless you have at least multiple millions of taxable wealth. - That said, the IRS does everything it can to run automated checks and flags that will trigger automated rejections or demands for documentation. Not really an audit, you can't call it an investigation. The IRS can refuse to complete a return, and then start charging interest and applying penalties because you don't have a completed return. - Painting a well-documented and reasonable sounding tax profile is an art and a science. People openly engaged in fraud can be good at it and never get touched. Totally honest people can be bad at it and get in years of expensive painful trouble. So, if you have a small business, here are some of the flags: - Low to zero profit, or losses, across years. Nothing says "this is a fake business I use for a tax dodge" than zero profit or a loss. That's a flag to get a human auditor taking a personal look. - The IRS looks at what you're claiming for lunches and computers and furniture and whatnot, and if they're what some algorithm considers "reasonable", then there's no flag. The algorithm always changes, and I don't think any human actually fully knows what it does. But if your deductions are higher than other similar sized businesses, that's a flag. - Deducting residential space. This is a deduction you have to fight for, not something you just fill out the form and everything is fine. The IRS figures everyone is guilty unless they can do some hefty documenting and proving. Again, this isn't an audit/investigate thing, this is more like "your tax return is on hold until you provide additional documentation" followed by "we lost your documentation, here are your penalties and fines that will continue until you prove your case or amend your return." (I'm not a CPA either, but I did do a year at the tax desk of one of the national chains, and they trained the crap out of me on this stuff.)

lol it’s funny watching the politicians go at each other over the federal govt hurricane response. Harris and Desantis sniping at each other: Biden taking the opportunity to attack Trump: It’s called “The politics of personal destruction”. Rush Limbaugh made a 30+ year radio career over pointing it out. The situation doesn’t matter, use it as an attempt to smear your opponent. The 80s through 2000s were decent times for the right, we were happy to sit back and point out how the left did this and we never did. That changed, and now we do it as much as anybody. I’m sad to see that change. But yeah, the left did it first, and the left continues to do it best. else remember the left reaction to President Bush during hurricane Katrina? Kind of the exact opposite to what they’re saying now, right?

@mordorbund nailed it. I'm constantly amazed at the vast numbers of people with the gut-reflex negative reaction to jumping through hoops to pay less tax. Then I remind myself the left has waged class warfare for decades, with calls of "rich people using loopholes to not pay their fair share", and it makes sense. Folks assume you fill out the form, and the result is "your fair share". They'll write up any form of advantageous tax planning as a rich trick to get out of "your fair share". Pro tip: The there's absolutely nothing fair about the tax code. It is a massive amalgamation of laws written by politicians seeking votes. It's a self-contradictory and ever-growing pile of welfare and punitive punishment on various classes of people. You know what happens when you have a rare or unique situation that isn't covered in tax code? The IRS will sue itself, in IRS tax court, in order to get the "correct" answer. "Fair" and "US taxes" have very little to do with each other.

"Wind energy", from what I understand, is a meteorological term referencing the energy it takes to have bits of air moving around. Doesn't have anything to do with electricity. It might hasten or slow the rotation of the earth by a femtosecond or three.

Continuing the theme: Hey DEI people - are you aware the mental health folks are launching an assault on your acronym?

The news tells me Gator is standing in front of his ruined house waist deep in water. Poor guy must have checked out of reality to be so calm and delusional.

Well, between your tithing generosity, and your participation on Thirdhour, that is practically guaranteed.

And here I thought the US tax code was the only one like that! Yeah, there are a few "tax advantaged" ways to pay tithing in the US, and I know a few people who do it that way. Some of them are like "lock in your money for higher interest, and pay taxes and penalties if you withdraw funds early - unless it's for charity". I know a guy who lost money doing it this way, because he didn't factor in a small recession. Would have been cheaper just to pay tithing.

That's a win. This girl, no matter what her life is like, no matter what choices she's been making or how they've been turning out, remembered she has you in her toolkit as a resource she can call on. And when she called, you did your part. Good job Carb.

Wow. So, Trump wasn't lying, and the "Harris turned it into a magic wand" blather was actually on-point? February 2023 people were saying this?: OoOOOOOOOOOOO00O0OOO SNAP So when folks think "oh, that app has been around forever" and "That's Trump's app", folks are basically believing a lie? A lie reinforced, re-told, dug in and defended by Democrats and fact checkers and "impartial" debate moderators alike? Crap @Phoenix_person. I believe you when you speak out against lies. How does this make you feel?

Well, yes. I was only half-paying attention myself, but it is true that Clinton, House, and Senate had an opportunity to not shrink budgets and keep spending at cold war levels, but they didn't. Must keep in mind that the 104th congress hit in 1995, and both houses flipped from Dem to Republican, with Newt Gingrich and his Contract with America sort of running things. I think the R's even had a veto-proof margin at the time, although I might be wrong. It was the last time I was proud of the Republicans on the federal level. Watching the Contract pass, watching Maxine Waters screaming about how the welfare reform would result in "bodies stacked like cordwood". Plus, it killed the national 55MPH speed limit mandate, which was probably my favorite part. A decade later I was chuckling even more, when the dems started claiming that the 1995 welfare reform was their baby because Clinton signed it. It had worked so well, you see. *Sigh*. And now it looks like if Trump gets into office, he'll make it worse than the Dem plan which is already horrible.

It's my understanding that awesome drop off in the '90's was due to the fall of the USSR. Basically, Reagan won the cold war, and the world went from 2 competing global superpowers trying to outspend each other, to just 1 global superpower.

Musk illustrates the principle "Just because you're a once in a generation genius transforming the world in wonderful ways, doesn't mean you're right about everything."

Gator prepping:

No matter who wins, I promise to be crotchety and cantankerous and mad, because of this: Neither side is doing anything besides talk about that. Both sides will make the problem worse. Nobody's calling anyone out on it, because both sides are equally as guilty.

Getting back to this thread: I'm not in favor of lies, no matter who they're from. That said, far too many characterizations of events, far too much outraged blathering, far too many differences of opinion and policy are characterized as "lies". As far as "resulted in increased danger", I'm rarely a fan of such talk. I mean, I'm against increased danger. I'm opposed to people hearing speech and choosing violence. No matter who ends up doing the violence or on what side they're on. That said, speech, claims, arguments in the public square are the bedrock of our democracy. The 4th branch of government exists in all of us to a greater extent than ever before. But no, arguing we need to suppress speech we don't like, because some nutjob may go ballistic, isn't an impressive argument. I'm not in favor of illegal immigrants getting beat up. Or Trump supporters trying to have a rally. So very, very, very much violence done by the left against people trying to exercise speech in 2020-2021. It's not to be tolerated no matter who is committing it. But no, the solution to speech we don't like, is more of our own speech. It's not to silence people saying things we don't want them to say. It's certainly NOT drawing analogies between ICE letters and Nazi Germany for pete's sake. Just to make sure the ICE data gets the attention it deserves: Now, I'm with you on the link between desperation/poverty and lesser crimes like burglary/larceny/robbery. Even maybe a portion of the assaults, and some of the weapon offenses, many of the traffic offenses. But an "oh, he's just poor and desperate" defense doesn't work for me when we're talking homicide, sexual assault, kidnapping, and sex trafficking. Does it work for you? Further, if you're gonna cross a border, any border, legally or illegally, you need to be on your best dang behavior and not break the laws. If you do, if you drive without a license, if you start a fight, if you decide to carry a gun, if you beat up or rape or kill someone, if you pimp out some of your fellow migrants - even if the reason is "I'm poor and desperate", then the folks who already live there should boot you back across the border. This isn't even a US specific thing. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has heard stories about drunk college kids in Tiajuana ending up in a mexican prison or forcibly deported back to the US. I mean, at it's heart @Phoenix_person, we LDS folks think a lot about the line between mercy and justice. Scripture tells us mercy can't rob justice when God is involved. We don't know quite how that's accomplished, we're told Christ pays the price, but the guilty still has to have certain attitudes. And yes, here on earth, the humans all suck to one degree or another trying to find the good balance between mercy and justice. I'm glad to hear you're in favor of deporting illegal immigrants who have been convicted of sex trafficking or murder or such things. We can talk about driving without a license or even getting in a fight.

Not bad for an AI generated image. The tells: Dude is somehow wearing a trooper's hat, a ball cap, and also has half of a "mystery brim" of a third hat coming out the left side of his ball cap. Pretty funky font they're using on that license plate, if they can't even have two sixes look the same. Dude is holding a piece of paper, a cell phone, and also a bit of used toilet paper coming out the bottom? And he's using the edge of the truck bed wall for some reason?

Dennis fang is one of my favorite opiner about geopolitics and wine nations do things.