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What about those free cellphones for the poor? Why are they called Obama Phones? Actually this program was instituted during the Bush administration. Obama has recently given it emphasis, but if you want to blame someone, blame congress. Well, that's what the Tea Party is currently doing--attacking not only that welfare program, but the many others that we cannot afford.
By the way, the free phones will help politicians stay in touch with the poor, especially during election years. You can bet that the poor will get an earful from Democrats, and maybe even Republicans at election time via mass, recorded political messages disguised as "information" to those free, Government-provided cell phones. They do not have all the privacy protections that the more expensive cell phone plans have.
I recently added a cell phone to my account with my cell phone provider. Immediately, I started getting calls from dozens of bill collectors. I'll bet that one of those deadbeats with a free phone had that number before I got it. The cell phone provider said that they wait several months before they re-issue cell phone numbers...oh well. Anyway, I had to go back to the provider and get a new number. I got better service when I once had a pre-paid cell phone as a second phone during an emergency.
Another problem with providing cell phones (and up to 70 free minutes, which will soon be extended) to the poor is that they keep the air waves flooded most of the time with trivial calls to their many children and grandchildren. Don't count out drug dealers, pimps, prostitutes and those other professionals who inhabit our poverty-stricken communities. If we ever have a disaster, "the poor" won't be able to understand messages to stay off the phone--since most do not understand simple English. In the interest of "cultural diversity," left-wing political activists encourage new immigrants (legal and illegal) to keep their native culture and to resist assimilation. We spend more billions on a bureaucracy called OBEMLA to ensure that they do not assimilate. I would call all this a conspiracy to destroy us, but Americans are better at self-destruction than destruction by our enemies. How else could a Bush or a Carter or an Obama come to occupy the Oval Office?
Come on Tea Party. It may not be too late to save America. We need to not only clean out the Oval Office, but finish the clean-up of Congress and keep reminding congressmen who they are working for.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Monday, August 22, 2011
Do Illegal Aliens Really Pay Taxes?
One of the most repeated (and absurd) myths propagated by the advocates of open borders (i.e., non-enforcement of immigration laws) is that illegal aliens earn their keep by paying their share of taxes. The truth: thousands of illegal aliens shake down the U.S. Treasury for thousands of dollars every tax season and pay little or no income taxes at all.
Here's how it works:
A married couple filing jointly are not required to file an income tax return if their net income is less than $18,700 per year. Very few of the breadwinners of illegal aliens are required to file an income tax return because most do not earn $1500 per month of reportable income.
However:
Most illegal alien families DO file an income tax return even if their income is very low--say $10,000 per year, or less. They do it to collect the "shakedown" money called "tax credits," particularly those tax credits under line 49 and 51 of IRS Form 1040, education tax credits for their children (who attend public schools without paying non-resident tuition), and tax credits for children (for up to three).
How do they file an income tax return if they have no valid Social Security Card?
The IRS will issue any illegal alien an ITIN (Individual Tax Identification Number) for the purpose of filing a tax return, regardless of their income.
Top the above off with the fact that welfare income (food stamps, medicaid, two free school lunches per day, free cell phones (see "Obamaphones") + 250 free minutes per month, and dozens of other "entitlements" for which illegal aliens are entitled, DO NOT COUNT as "earned income," and do not affect eligibility for these handouts.
The Government's estimate for the number of 12 million illegal aliens in the U.S. is probably far to low. There are probably more Mexicans than that. Some estimate that there are over 30 million illegal aliens here.
Considering the above, could anyone wonder how, as a nation, we are $16 trillion in debt?
Here's how it works:
A married couple filing jointly are not required to file an income tax return if their net income is less than $18,700 per year. Very few of the breadwinners of illegal aliens are required to file an income tax return because most do not earn $1500 per month of reportable income.
However:
Most illegal alien families DO file an income tax return even if their income is very low--say $10,000 per year, or less. They do it to collect the "shakedown" money called "tax credits," particularly those tax credits under line 49 and 51 of IRS Form 1040, education tax credits for their children (who attend public schools without paying non-resident tuition), and tax credits for children (for up to three).
How do they file an income tax return if they have no valid Social Security Card?
The IRS will issue any illegal alien an ITIN (Individual Tax Identification Number) for the purpose of filing a tax return, regardless of their income.
Top the above off with the fact that welfare income (food stamps, medicaid, two free school lunches per day, free cell phones (see "Obamaphones") + 250 free minutes per month, and dozens of other "entitlements" for which illegal aliens are entitled, DO NOT COUNT as "earned income," and do not affect eligibility for these handouts.
The Government's estimate for the number of 12 million illegal aliens in the U.S. is probably far to low. There are probably more Mexicans than that. Some estimate that there are over 30 million illegal aliens here.
Considering the above, could anyone wonder how, as a nation, we are $16 trillion in debt?
Monday, August 1, 2011
Whitewashing El Paso
The El Paso Times online edition used to be a good source of humor, especially the column by Ramon Renteria. Renteria is essentially a social commentator disguised as a "human interest" columnist. For years, critics have enjoyed chiding him each Sunday about his quasi illiteracy and mixture of "cholismo" with a not-so-fluent English. He often writes and rails about race and ethnicity issues, with a heavily biased tilt against Anglo American culture. Most clowns are actors, but Renteria is the consummate buffoon because he takes himself seriously.
Criticism of Renteria once got so bad that the El Paso Times online edition came out with a new editorial policy, requiring that all those posting comments on the erstwhile Topix message board (once available for a few carefully selected Times articles), now must identify themselves by posting through Facebook, or other means whereby they can be identified. Apparently, the Times thought that identifying each messenger would intimidate Renteria's critics from posting negative comments. In last Sunday's column, he lashed out at an anonymous telephone caller, claiming all his critics were afraid to confront him to his face. That brought on a surge of old critics, now identifiable by their Facebook profiles, to the comments section of his article, but nearly all were edited out, mostly no doubt by Renteria himself.
Well, the new Times policy did not deter any negative comments, but it made it much easier to delete them for no reason at all other than the fact that, though truthful, they were "offensive to the offenders"--such as Renteria. Before the new policy, other amateurish Times reporters also caught their share of criticism for poorly worded, poorly organized articles not infrequently containing misspellings, malaprop and other affronts to the conventions of our mother tongue. Apparently, they now let one or two negative commentators get through their censorship, to give Renteria's column a false appearance of being "fair and balanced," but most criticisms of Renteria and the City of El Paso are now edited out for no other reason than being negative, no matter how truthful and honest.
I enjoyed the negative posts and admit that I was sometimes a contributor. After all, teaching by antithesis is the method most preferred by the scribes in the Holy Bible. Unfortunately, in spite of heavy criticism, Renteria's writing has not improved at all. While his critics used to be 90% negative, now, thanks to careful censorship, and no doubt contributions by shills with multiple Facebook accounts, they are 90% positive. This new Times policy coincides with the El Paso Chamber of Commerce's, and City Hall's, efforts to censor anything negative about the City of El Paso. They sometimes censored even Topix comments if they reflected too negatively on the city, no matter how sincere and well stated, but back then it took more than just a click of a mouse.
Censorship of honest, quality and eloquent criticism smacks of totalitarian-type policies and reminds one of the government banishment of the best writers in Russia to the Caucasus as border guards in the mid 19th century (most of whom did not return alive). In spite of the City's and the C of C efforts, most outsiders are not convinced that El Paso is as "safe" a city, as they claim. The fact remains that it is also a "sanctuary city" where illegal aliens enjoy (illegal) immunity from arrest by the police for immigration-related crimes. Sanctuary cannot be limited to illegal aliens, for many of them are also criminals of various types, and sanctuary is therefore a dangerous, political practice.
The City of El Paso and its newspaper, the El Paso Times online edition, are ill advised in their new "image conscious" campaign. El Paso has never been seen by most Americans as a "tourist mecca," and never will be. With so many politicians and public figures being indicted in an ongoing FBI clean-up campaign of official corruption, whitewashing efforts are futile. But so are clean-up campaigns futile, for corruption and unethical conduct is embedded in the El Paso psyche and culture by tradition and have no doubt been influenced by affinity with its sister city across the Rio Grande.
Many outside visitors to El Paso and Juarez, have historically been motivated mostly by "slumming" urges. I remember when soldiers from as far away as Fort Carson, Colorado used to carpool and go down there for a wild weekend of debauchery and carousing. Common sense now dictates a more prudent selection of places to carouse, in spite of El Paso's newspaper, and the city's, whitewashing efforts. If, metaphorically speaking, tourists prefer "a clean, well-lighted place," as did Hemingway's deaf mute in the story by the same name, they won't go to El Paso or Juarez to find it.
Criticism of Renteria once got so bad that the El Paso Times online edition came out with a new editorial policy, requiring that all those posting comments on the erstwhile Topix message board (once available for a few carefully selected Times articles), now must identify themselves by posting through Facebook, or other means whereby they can be identified. Apparently, the Times thought that identifying each messenger would intimidate Renteria's critics from posting negative comments. In last Sunday's column, he lashed out at an anonymous telephone caller, claiming all his critics were afraid to confront him to his face. That brought on a surge of old critics, now identifiable by their Facebook profiles, to the comments section of his article, but nearly all were edited out, mostly no doubt by Renteria himself.
Well, the new Times policy did not deter any negative comments, but it made it much easier to delete them for no reason at all other than the fact that, though truthful, they were "offensive to the offenders"--such as Renteria. Before the new policy, other amateurish Times reporters also caught their share of criticism for poorly worded, poorly organized articles not infrequently containing misspellings, malaprop and other affronts to the conventions of our mother tongue. Apparently, they now let one or two negative commentators get through their censorship, to give Renteria's column a false appearance of being "fair and balanced," but most criticisms of Renteria and the City of El Paso are now edited out for no other reason than being negative, no matter how truthful and honest.
I enjoyed the negative posts and admit that I was sometimes a contributor. After all, teaching by antithesis is the method most preferred by the scribes in the Holy Bible. Unfortunately, in spite of heavy criticism, Renteria's writing has not improved at all. While his critics used to be 90% negative, now, thanks to careful censorship, and no doubt contributions by shills with multiple Facebook accounts, they are 90% positive. This new Times policy coincides with the El Paso Chamber of Commerce's, and City Hall's, efforts to censor anything negative about the City of El Paso. They sometimes censored even Topix comments if they reflected too negatively on the city, no matter how sincere and well stated, but back then it took more than just a click of a mouse.
Censorship of honest, quality and eloquent criticism smacks of totalitarian-type policies and reminds one of the government banishment of the best writers in Russia to the Caucasus as border guards in the mid 19th century (most of whom did not return alive). In spite of the City's and the C of C efforts, most outsiders are not convinced that El Paso is as "safe" a city, as they claim. The fact remains that it is also a "sanctuary city" where illegal aliens enjoy (illegal) immunity from arrest by the police for immigration-related crimes. Sanctuary cannot be limited to illegal aliens, for many of them are also criminals of various types, and sanctuary is therefore a dangerous, political practice.
The City of El Paso and its newspaper, the El Paso Times online edition, are ill advised in their new "image conscious" campaign. El Paso has never been seen by most Americans as a "tourist mecca," and never will be. With so many politicians and public figures being indicted in an ongoing FBI clean-up campaign of official corruption, whitewashing efforts are futile. But so are clean-up campaigns futile, for corruption and unethical conduct is embedded in the El Paso psyche and culture by tradition and have no doubt been influenced by affinity with its sister city across the Rio Grande.
Many outside visitors to El Paso and Juarez, have historically been motivated mostly by "slumming" urges. I remember when soldiers from as far away as Fort Carson, Colorado used to carpool and go down there for a wild weekend of debauchery and carousing. Common sense now dictates a more prudent selection of places to carouse, in spite of El Paso's newspaper, and the city's, whitewashing efforts. If, metaphorically speaking, tourists prefer "a clean, well-lighted place," as did Hemingway's deaf mute in the story by the same name, they won't go to El Paso or Juarez to find it.
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