8 February 2012 E-file and be done with it

Yesterday at 1400 I sat down to file our 2011 tax forms.  By 1500 I was done with the paperwork.  Granted, I used the free version of TurboTax obtained via the IRS.  Granted I had most of the paperwork organized.  But mostly, we generate so little revenue that we have fallen from the former middle class into the near poor class.  As do far too many Americans, we live from payday to payday.  We haven’t been to a movie theater in more than 7 years.  (Yes, we’ve been to several concerts in that period, primarily family and old friends).  We don’t buy DVDs, don’t rent movies or stream them.  We read a lot.

           We don’t buy meat or seafood that isn’t on sale.    As for box meals, junk foods, soft drinks, and other such items that load the average grocery cart, we gave those up long ago.  Our largest expenses are medical and pharmaceutical. 

          This isn’t the life we imagined, watching ourselves dropping down the social ladder rung by rung while the political and social structure becomes more and more like pre-industrial Eastern Europe.  However, it could be far worse.  No one is shooting at us over internet remarks.  There will be someone to vote for this year, running against Phil Roe, whom I can vote for without lying to myself.  In addition, the IRS accepted our tax forms.  We’re through for another year.  There is no refund to wait for.  There is no unpaid tax bill to worry about. 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/post/rick-santorum-wins-colorado-missouri-minnesota-beyond-the-sweater/2012/02/08/gIQAMQ79xQ_blog.html

Posted at 01:08 AM ET, 02/08/2012

Rick Santorum, beyond the sweater

By Alexandra Petri

            “Santorum’s pitch has always been old-fashioned. One would expect nothing less from a man whose sweater vest is his most constant companion. He spoke of the Declaration of Independence, to which the Founders pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their “sacred honor.”

            Sacred honor is not a term you hear flung around very much nowadays. Since Ms. Blackman, Honor has taken a bit of a downturn. But that’s what Santorum is all about – restoring the America of the Founders. Especially the honor bit. And, if he’s lucky, the parts where no one in the country has access to any form of birth control not available in Colonial times, and gay people not only can’t get married but are liable to be tried for witchcraft…”

Cassi Creek:  Santorum’s performance in Missouri is not at all surprising.  St. Louis and the outward population expansion were largely fueled by French Catholics, German Catholics, and German Lutherans.  The southern part of the state is overgrown with Pentecostal, evangelical, fundamentalist, and bible thumpers of every sort.  This is a state that remembers what “Southern Baptist” means.

           In the 1990s, a woman was appointed Postmistress for the town of Nevada MO.  She happened to be Black.  The town of Nevada MO has an annual celebration commemorating the town being burned by Union troops during the civil war because locals had helped William Quantrill stop a hospital train and murder the wounded troops aboard it.  At that time, the total black population of Nevada MO was 0.  There was suddenly no housing available in the entire town.  The new Postmistress wound up living in neighboring Fort Scott KS 25 miles westward, where housing was available. 

          While Catholics are also a very small portion of the populace, Santorum’s rabid fundamentalism fits the voter base in the Southwestern MO.  I have no doubt that Santorum and the GOP carried the town of Nevada MO and most of the surrounding counties.