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I read an article in the LA Times today about Emeka Okafor, who is a star on the University of Connecticut's NCAA basketball team. I was struck in the article about how academics played more than a passing role in his life and was encouraged by it.
Makes me glad I picked U. Conn to win the NCAA tournament. Go Huskies!
So I'm doing my taxes tonight using Turbo Tax, and get to a screen that shows a summary of the income tax brackets for 2003 compared to 2002. I started reflecting on what I recall this administration saying about their tax cuts. Things like, "helps all Americans", "not just for the rich", etc.
So, the folks that have incomes in the middle of the chart did receive a tax cut. However, the two lowest tax brackets, probably the people that need the most relief from taxes received no tax cut. But wait, there's more. The topmost income bracket received almost twice the tax cut that anyone else got.
I'm no economist or tax strategist or anything like that, and if it wasn't for Turbo Tax, I'd probably still be doing my taxes from 1996, but it seems to me like the folks that got the biggest tax cut are the wealthiest people in the country. I believe that wealthy people should pay taxes and I believe that if everyone else gets a tax cut that wealthy people should get some too. However, I don't think it's a good thing to give tax cuts to EVERYONE but the people who make the least amount of money.
The crazy part is that a tax cut to low income taxpayers is inexpensive compared to cuts in higher tax brackets. So, it seems to me like our friend in the white house could have knocked a few percentage points off the lower income brackets for not too much money and told the democrats to suck wind because he would have given everyone a tax break. Nope, that's not what happened. Now I'm a democrat too.
I think we need fiscally conservative policies in our president and we're sure as hell not getting them from the one we've got.
Here's a screen shot from Turbo Tax, just so you can see what I'm seeing. (the rates are for married people filing jointly)
To use a Chris-ism, you do the math and let me know what you come up with.
David Hasselhoff, best known from Baywatch and Knight Rider, recently released this stunning music video (you gotta hit the play button once you get to the site).
That's some fine work. Nice job David.
William Pickering, the director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory died Monday at his home in Pasadena. He was the director of JPL during the bulk of the space race and his work in telemetry put us on the moon and other planets. The full LA Times story is a good one.
The contributions over his career are many and NASA would not have landed their recent missions on Mars had Dr. Pickering not put us there first, 40 years ago.
So, on this St. Patrick's day, raise a toast to Dr. Pickering and to everyone out there exploring places we've never been before.
We've been selected by a birth mom in the Chicago area. More info on the adoption page.