MOVE YOUR MONEY

 

Study: State Taxes The Poorest, Gives Breaks To Rich

Most of Michigan’s income and local taxes come from the state’s poorest residents, resulting in a regressive tax that “no one” would intentionally design, according to a report released Wednesday by the Institute on Taxation & Economic Policy.

While non-elderly residents who make less than $15,000 per year typically pay about 9 percent of their income toward taxes and those who make between $32,000 and $54,000 pay nearly 10 percent, the very rich pay about a third less, said the study, titled: Who Pays? A Distributional Analysis of the Tax Systems in All 50 States.

The rich, defined as those with average annual incomes of $1.1 million, typically pay about 6.4 percent toward taxes, the study said.

“No one would ever design an income tax with lower tax rates for the best-off taxpayers,” said Matthew Gardner, executive director of the institute and the study’s lead author. “But that is exactly what Michigan’s tax system overall does: it allows the very wealthiest individuals to contribute less of their income, on average, than middle and lower-income families must pay. In other words, Michigan has an unfair, regressive tax system.”

The League for Human Services, which has been focusing heavily on getting lawmakers to increase revenue rather than make cuts to the state’s poorest residents, said this news should be a wake-up call to make the changes now that will right-size taxation, while bringing in much-needed revenue.

The group recommends extending the sales tax to more services that they say people with more disposable income use. The league also wants to move from a flat tax to a graduated income tax, as well as ending what it calls “preferences” for wealthier seniors, such as exempting most pensions from income taxes.

“It’s time we look to reforming our revenue structure to make it adequate, stable and fair,” said League President Sharon Parks. “This report makes it crystal clear that our system disproportionately depends on those struggling households that are least able to contribute.”

The report found that Michigan’s reliance on sales and property tax made it more regressive. Despite Michigan’s flat income tax, which is usually considered regressive, Michigan’s income tax is slightly progressive, due to the state earned income tax credit, a homestead property tax credit and personal tax exemptions indexed to inflation.

 

Lehrer’s Rules

Lehrer’s Rules
By Michael Getler
December 11, 2009

Last Friday evening, Dec. 4, was the final broadcast of what has been known for many years as The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. The following Monday, Dec. 7, the new-look version of the venerable, one-hour, weekday nights, news broadcast made its debut as the PBS NewsHour. Lehrer was still in the anchor chair but his name was gone from the logo and some things had changed. I’ll come back to that.

One of the things that has not changed, however, is Lehrer’s unwavering approach to journalism. So, in closing that final broadcast on Dec. 4 and providing a glimpse of the forthcoming new look, Lehrer said:

“I promise you, one thing is never going to change. And that’s our mission. People often ask me if there are guidelines in our practice of what I like to call MacNeil/Lehrer journalism. Well, yes, there are. And here they are:

* Do nothing I cannot defend.

* Cover, write and present every story with the care I would want if the story were about me.

* Assume there is at least one other side or version to every story.

* Assume the viewer is as smart and as caring and as good a person as I am.

* Assume the same about all people on whom I report.

* Assume personal lives are a private matter, until a legitimate turn in the story absolutely mandates otherwise.

* Carefully separate opinion and analysis from straight news stories, and clearly label everything.

* Do not use anonymous sources or blind quotes, except on rare and monumental occasions.

* No one should ever be allowed to attack another anonymously.

* And, finally, I am not in the entertainment business.”

Source: PBS

 

U.S. vehicle fuel efficiency has increased only 3 mpg in 80 years

Gizmag is always on the lookout for alternative means of powering vehicles and saving precious fossil fuels. But, in truth, the vast majority of us still drive exclusively petrol-powered cars. And the even sadder truth, outlined in a new research from the University of Michigan, is that the average fuel efficiency of a US vehicle has improved only three miles per gallon since the days of the Ford Model T…

Source: Gizmo Emerging Technology Magazine

 

A French Revelation, or The Burning Bush

By JAMES A. HAUGHT

Incredibly, President George W. Bush told French President Jacques Chirac in early 2003 that Iraq must be invaded to thwart Gog and Magog, the Bible’s satanic agents of the Apocalypse.

Honest. This isn’t a joke. The president of the United States, in a top-secret phone call to a major European ally, asked for French troops to join American soldiers in attacking Iraq as a mission from God.

Now out of office, Chirac recounts that the American leader appealed to their “common faith” (Christianity) and told him: “Gog and Magog are at work in the Middle East…. The biblical prophecies are being fulfilled…. This confrontation is willed by God, who wants to use this conflict to erase his people’s enemies before a New Age begins.”

More: A French Revelation, or The Burning Bush

Also, here and here.

 

Alter: Our Heath-Care System Is Just Fine As Is!

Go ahead, shoot me. I like the status quo on health care in the United States. I’ve got health insurance and I don’t give a damn about the 47 million suckers who don’t. Obama and Congress must be stopped. No bill! I’m better off the way things are.

I’m with that woman who wrote the president complaining about “socialized medicine” and added: “Now keep your hands off my Medicare.” That’s the spirit!

Why should I be entitled to the same insurance that members of Congress get? Blue Dogs need a lot of medical attention to treat their blueness. I’m just a regular guy and definitely deserve less.

I had cancer a few years ago. I like the fact that if I lose my job, I won’t be able to get any insurance because of my illness. It reminds me of my homeowners’ insurance, which gets canceled after a break-in. I like the choice I’d face if, God forbid, the cancer recurs—sell my house to pay for the hundreds of thousands of dollars in treatment, or die. That’s what you call a “post-existing condition.”

Source: Newsweek

 

Mike Huckabee’s Religious Authoritarianism: Authoritarian, Vertical Politics

By Austin Cline

Many expressed concern that Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee was more of a Christian Nationalist than he let on. His claim that Christians must win America for Christ was highly suggestive, and his desire to amend the Constitution to align it with ‘God’s standards’ was worse. There are also less explicit ways to communicate authoritarian and theocratic principles to those who are in the know, for example with Mike Huckabee’s rhetoric about ‘vertical politics.’

Mike Huckabee revealed some interesting views while delivering a sermon in a church:

“When we become believers, it’s as if we have signed up to be part of God’s Army, to be soldiers for Christ,” Huckabee told the enthusiastic audience. …Huckabee mixed homespun jokes into his sermon and added a more religious tone than in his political speeches, not just quoting from the Bible but citing specific verses and talking about the serious side of faith.

“When you give yourself to Christ, some relationships have to go,” he said. “It’s no longer your life; you’ve signed it over.” Likening service to God to service in the military, Huckabee said “there is suffering in the conditioning for battle” and “you obey the orders.”

Source: The Washington Post

A person’s life is no longer their own? Christians have to “obey the orders” in some “battle”? This makes more sense in light of his statement in the New Hampshire debate that Americans are “tired of everything being horizontal — left, right, liberal, conservative, Democrat, Republican. They’re looking for vertical leadership that leads up, not down.”

What did Huckabee mean by “horizontal” and “vertical” leadership? These are code words: horizontal leadership means limited authority among equals while vertical leadership means an authoritarian system with one or few absolute leaders at the top while the rest “obey the orders” they are given because their lives do not belong to themselves anymore.

Read the whole thing here: About.com

 

“C Street” Cabal of Anti-Democracy Fundamentalist Senators and Reps Wouldn’t Turn Over Child Rapist Among Them to Police?

By Mark Karlin

Kudos to Rachel Maddow for latching on to the captivating and chilling story about not just the lascivious and potentially illegal activities of some of the “C Street” Family, but — more importantly — focusing on their belief that they are chosen by God to lead and infiltrate our governnment.

The low-key author, Jeff Sharlet, of “The Family:The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power” is a credible chronicler of this cabal that is like a dagger in democracy. He writes:

Family leaders consider their political network to be Christ’s avant garde, an elite that transcends not just conventional morality but also earthly laws regulating lobbying. In the Family’s early days, they debated registering as “a lobby for God’s Kingdom.” Instead, founder Abraham Vereide decided that the group could be more effective by working personally with politicians. “The more invisible you can make your organization,” Vereide’s successor, current leader Doug Coe preaches, “the more influence you can have.” That’s true — which is why we have laws requiring lobbyists to identify themselves as such.

But David Coe, Doug Coe’s son and heir apparent, calls himself simply a friend to men such as John Ensign, whom he guided through the coverup of his affair. I met the younger Coe when I lived for several weeks as a member of the Family. He’s a surprising source of counsel, spiritual or otherwise. Attempting to explain what it means to be chosen for leadership like King David was — or Mark Sanford, according to his own estimate — he asked a young man who’d put himself, body and soul, under the Family’s authority, “Let’s say I hear you raped three little girls. What would I think of you?” The man guessed that Coe would probably think that he was a monster. “No,” answered Coe, “I wouldn’t.” Why? Because, as a member of the Family, he’s among what Family leaders refer to as the “new chosen.” If you’re chosen, the normal rules don’t apply.

Yes, you read that right, the son of Doug Coe, the “spiritual leader” of the Family and his heir apparent, would consider a Family member raping a child a test of the member’s choseness and to be resolved inside of the fellowship, without reporting it to the law authorities, it appears.

This is how dangerous they are. They apparently believe even child rape is something that God wants them to keep secret amongst themselves!

Source: Buzz Flash

 

Jimmy Carter Leaves Church Over Treatment of Women

After more than 60 years together, Jimmy Carter has announced himself at odds with the Southern Baptist Church — and he’s decided it’s time they go their separate ways. Via Feministing, the former president called the decision “unavoidable” after church leaders prohibited women from being ordained and insisted women be “subservient to their husbands.” Said Carter in an essay in The Age:

At its most repugnant, the belief that women must be subjugated to the wishes of men excuses slavery, violence, forced prostitution, genital mutilation and national laws that omit rape as a crime. But it also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair access to education, health, employment and influence within their own communities.

The truth is that male religious leaders have had — and still have — an option to interpret holy teachings either to exalt or subjugate women. They have, for their own selfish ends, overwhelmingly chosen the latter. Their continuing choice provides the foundation or justification for much of the pervasive persecution and abuse of women throughout the world.

Source: Politics Daily

 

White House Meeting Marks New Milestone for Nontheists

June 1, 2009 - The nontheist movement reached a new milestone when the Secular Coalition for America had its first individual meeting with White House officials last week. Although the Secular Coalition had met with White House officials before, this meeting was significant as it was the first private meeting focused solely on nontheists’ interests.

Read the rest of this post at: Secular Coalition for America

 

Ireland Makes Blasphemy Illegal | Paliban Daily

Ireland Makes Blasphemy Illegal

As part of a revision to defamation legislation, the Dail (Irish Parliament) passed legislation creating a new crime of blasphemy. Update: The bill went to the Seanad on Friday, July 10, passing by a single vote. This attack on free speech, debated for several months in Europe, has gone largely unnoticed in the American press.

• Atheists can be prosecuted for saying that God is imaginary. That causes outrage.
• Pagans can be prosecuted for saying they left Christianity because God is violent and bloodthirsty, promotes genocide, and permits slavery.
• Christians can be prosecuted for saying that Allah is a moon god, or for drawing a picture of Mohammed, or for saying that Islam is a violent religion which breeds terrorists.
• Jews can be prosecuted for saying Jesus isn’t the Messiah.

Source: palibandaily.com

 

Mac vs PC

 

HOWTO ask good skeptical questions - Boing Boing

In this Richard Dawkins Foundation video, Skeptic Magazine’s Michael Shermer explains the ten criteria we can use when confronted with claims about how the world works that serve as a “baloney detection kit.”

Source: Boing Boing

 

The House of Death: An Interview with DEA Whistleblower Sandy Gonzalez

Radley Balko, senior editor of Reason magazine, says: “Federal agents looked the other way while one of their drug informants [Guillermo Ramirez Peyro, also known as “Lalo”] participated in a series of gruesome murders. They knew about the murders, but refused to call off the drug investigation. When an outraged DEA agent [Sandy Gonzalez] blew the whistle, the DEA, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), and DOJ forced him into early retirement. The government is now trying to deport the informant they’ve paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to over the years. They want to send him to Mexico, where he’ll almost certainly be killed.”

Reason: The DEA administrator at the time, Karen Tandy, has admitted in court testimony that she gave you the only poor performance review of your career because of your letter calling for an investigation into the murders. That led to your retirement. Have any of the ICE officers who handled the Lalo case been held accountable –criminally, professionally, or otherwise?

Gonzalez: Not to my knowledge. I doubt it. I would have heard about it.

Reason: Have you had any indication that Congress might step in? Have you talked to anyone on Capitol Hill?

Gonzalez: Back in 2005 I went and briefed the senior staff of two senators.

Reason: Which ones?

Gonzalez: [Iowa Sen. Charles] Grassley and [Vermont Sen. Patrick] Leahy. I think what happened is one of the members of Leahy’s staff was a Justice Department officer who was on loan on a detail to the senator’s staff. I think she knew [U.S. Attorney] Johnny Sutton. She worked out of the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys. She knew Sutton personally and throughout the whole interview she was antagonistic. My guess is that she railroaded the whole thing.

An Interview with DEA Whistleblower Sandy Gonzalez

Source: Boing Boing

 

Sight restored in less than a month using stem cell contact lenses

The humble contact lens has long been used to improve people’s vision, but now researchers have restored sight in patients suffering corneal damage using a technique where contact lenses are cultured with stem cells. Fast, cheap and non-invasive, the groundbreaking technique even has the potential for regrowing skin and other organs…

Source: Gizmo Emerging Technology Magazine

 

YouTube - Former Interrogator Rebukes Cheney for Torture Speech

 

Obamabot to be installed at Disney World, will robotically cover up torture, suspend habeas corpus

An incredibly lifelike advanced Obamabot is ready to be installed in the Walt Disney World Hall of Presidents. It’s traditional for the current president’s robot to give a little speech at the end of the show. Presumably, Obamabot will explain how the reasonable middle-ground demands suspending habeas corpus, covering up war crimes, and blocking the prosecution of participants in illegal wiretapping programs.

The Obama figure is the result of attention to minute details by Disney sculptors, animators, engineers and even anatomists who pored over presidential photographs and video of him and then drew on the latest advances in robotic technology.

Thus the audio-animatronic Obama purses its lips to pronounce its b’s and p’s in a way frighteningly evocative of the real one, and raises its hands, open-palmed, while shrugging its shoulders, in a way that can only be described as Obamaesque. Even the president’s wedding ring, with its braided design, has been recreated.

Animatronic Obama Going to Disney World With High-Tech Style

(Thanks, Eloisa!)

Source: Boing Boing

 

Mobile News Network

Wis. nurse called out of surgery and laid off

Published: Yesterday

MADISON, Wis. (AP) - A nurse was called out of surgery so a manager could tell her she was being laid off. Dean Health said the surgery was minor and the patient wasn’t affected, but the manager who summoned the nurse from surgery violated medical protocol. Dean Health spokesman Paul Pitas said the incident happened at Dean’s West Clinic in Madison on Wednesday or Thursday.

Read the rest here.

Source: apnews.com

 

Jared Diamond lecture on the evolution of religion

Here’s a fantastic lecture by Jared “Guns, Germs and Steel” Diamond at the USC College Center for Religion and Civic Culture on the “evolution of religion” — the evolutionary forces that shape religions and cause some to prevail and others to wane.

Source: Boing Boing

 

British cops identify 200 schoolchildren as potential terrorists

200 children in the UK, some as young as 13, have had files opened on them by the British anti-terror cops as potential terrorists — even though they have committed no crimes. The children were reported to the anti-terror squad by their teachers on the basis of school work, journals and conversations that, in the teachers’ view, indicated that the children were susceptible to extremist beliefs. The programme is only 18 months old and has already identified 200 children who should be treated as terrorism suspects. At this rate, every child in Britain should be on the watch list by, what, 2018?

The police say it’s all right, though, so that’s OK.

A Home Office spokesman said: “We are committed to stopping people becoming or supporting terrorists or violent extremists. The aim of the Channel project is to directly support vulnerable people by providing supportive interventions when families, communities and networks raise concerns about their behaviour.”

Police identify 200 children as potential terrorists

Source: Boing Boing