A special ‘Happy Tax Day’ message from your Uncle Sam!
By Duganz
April 18, 2011
Dear America,
Well, another year another dollar, right? Okay, I know. It’s wwwwaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyy more than “a dollar.” For many of you it’s the equivalent of a month’s salary (post-tax that is), and for some–GE–it’s nothing. It’s important to note however that GE makes TONS of shitty investments that they can then write off. Couple that with their already ample tax loopholes and you’ve got a big fat nothing from this giant multi-national.
Now that’s what I call freedom!
Speaking of freedom, remember today that your Uncle Sammy supports the troops, and so do you! It’s a de facto support, meaning that if you didn’t support the troops through taxes we’d haul your ass to jail faster than the decent of a crumbling Southwest Airline plane (which your tax dollars subsidize by the way)! And what is that “support” costing you? Well, providing freedom in two non-America nations costs money (we’re starting that third, but, dang it, getting the Republicans to fight a black man’s war is much harder than it was getting Democrats to fund two wars under a neocon).
The breakdown is this: It cost $685,000/per year/per soldier in Iraq, and $1.2million/per year/per soldier in Afghanistan. Now, just so you know, we’re not paying these guys and gals big money. No. The majority of this cost is just fuel costs to bring them there and feed them–it sure ain’t to keep ’em safe! So, we spend tons on the 117,000 troops in Iraq, and tons on the 98,000 in Afghanistan. Yessir.
Ya know, that’s cheating just using that word “tons.” You deserve better from me. (I mean, look at me with that odd beard and top hat combo–I look like an older Slash meets KFC!)
We spend $80,145,000,000 on troops in Iraq, and $117,600,000,000 in Afghanistan. That’s nearly $200billion to keep men and women in countries that the current president was elected saying he’d end! He even got a “peace” medal for it.
Ready to sing some Lee Greenwood? Well, hold on tight kids cause I’ve got a great comparison that will help you sleep after you tuck in the little ones tonight.
It costs on average $11,000 per year to get a kid educated in public schools K-12. That’s a total cost of $143,000! In other words, it costs, on average 88percent less to give a kid a high school diploma than to keep him in Afghanistan for a year. Hell, we could put a kid through four years of public college for only $36,000 more! Note the use of “could,” as in, “We could, but we don’t.” Costs too damn much! And the kids are dumb as shit! Better to send them to other countries so they can get shot for the sake of…um…
Well, anyhow, it’s getting late and I know most of you have waited until the last minute to file your taxes. So quit reading and press send on your eFile report (or, I guess, lick a stamp like a troglodyte or call your accountant to check the balance of your foreign untaxed accounts).
Thank you again for taking part in this great society. America, fuck yeah!
Love,
Your Uncle Sam
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4&20 blackbirds 
April 18, 2011 at 8:35 pm
To be fair, Duganz, Obama said he would withdraw combat troops from Iraq. We still have far more troops there than we need for the support role they are supposedly playing, but he has withdrawn a great many troops and has overseen a precipitous drop in both American and Iraqi casualties.
And Obama is also doing precisely what he would do in Afghanistan – step up our efforts to defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan. It may not be a step you or anyone else agrees with, but it is exactly what he promised to do.
April 18, 2011 at 9:19 pm
wolf, you forgot to say FUCK YEAH!
April 19, 2011 at 8:32 am
I’m not interested in arguing this with you again, Lizard. I’m merely pointing out that America and the Nobel Committee all knew exactly what Obama was going to do, because he said it publicly and he’s done basically that. None of this should come as a surprise and in fact its exactly what America voted for. You are well within your rights to oppose the course of action the president has chosen, just don’t act like it’s some betrayal of the progressive cause. If Obama left Afghanistan, he’d be betraying not only the Afghan people who have agreed to participate in the new governing system and thus put their lives at stake, but the moderate voters who elected him believing that he would see this war to its finish.
April 19, 2011 at 9:32 am
It’s that word “finish” that sticks in my craw, Wolf. Finish is something he said he’d do. There was talk of timetables, and endings. The man was elected to make the credits roll, so to speak–even with the promises to push further war in Afghanistan. There was always talk of an end game.
Withdrawal was always something promised, even if more troops were talked about. More troops now! Home soon!
Here we are though, wars still going and more being made. More money pissed away. Feel free to be okay with it, that’s okay and I don’t begrudge you those feelings. But we used to talk about coming home. We don’t do that anymore. We just accept it.
And I am growing more and more tired of having my money spent on this BS.
April 19, 2011 at 10:58 am
ditto. i’m putting up a post later about our liar-in-chief and you can tell me then how wrong i am. oh, and did you notice how our tax money has been funding Syrian opposition groups? that little bit, reported by Democracy Now, came courtesy wikileaks. bad, bad wikileaks, making the world less safe for imperialists and their hegemonic ambitions.
April 20, 2011 at 9:05 am
And lizard –
So, wikileaks has exposed and endangered the Syrian opposition, which has been braving gunfire to try to weaken a governing dynasty with a history of democide, because they took money from the US in order to get around little facts like, they can’t legally raise money and their message is regularly censored.
In this scenario, playing out in parallel universe lizard world, The US is the bad guy for supporting an end to the Assad regime, the Syrian opposition is bad, or at least deserves to be ‘outed’ and have their lives put on the line, for the crime of taking money from the US, and wikileaks is the good guy because they leaked US secrets, even if the effect of that is to strengthen the Syrian state?
Lizard universe is a strange place indeed.
April 19, 2011 at 5:07 pm
Man Duganz, I sure wish I didn’t have to pay for the Iraq war, either. But the majority of Americans at the time didn’t feel that way. But I am more concerned about our casualties than my money, and Obama has performed admirably in that regard. Our casualties in Iraq have dropped by 50% every year he has been in office, and Iraqi civilian casualties have similarly been in decline.
Afghanistan is a different story, but as much as I also wish we were ‘finished’ in Afghanistan, you and I both know that’s not the case. there is still an active insurgency killing people who are trying to participate in a free society. Obama may have been overly optimistic about the speed with which he could finish the Afghan war, but he has stuck with his promise to see it through. Talk about coming home proved to be overly optimistic. Like I’ve said, no one here to my knowledge has strategic training. Perhaps it would be better for the Afghan government if we withdrew, and if that is the determination of people who know what they are talking about I’ll support it. But leaving merely because we’re tired of paying for it is deciding not to replace the spark plugs for your Ferrari because NOW it’s too expensive.
April 20, 2011 at 10:25 am
“…leaving merely because we’re tired of paying for it is deciding not to replace the spark plugs for your Ferrari because NOW it’s too expensive.”
It’s actually nothing like that.
I never “bought the Ferrari.” Elected leaders bought it. And it’s a lemon. Changing the sparkplugs now comes after an engine rebuild, a new alternator, new exhaust system, new wiring, new interior, two sets of new tires, new breaks, new break pads, new shocks, fixing the driver side mirror after a small collision, replacing the passenger door following a surprise collision… get my point? We never truly kicked the tires on this shit.
When you laud the fact that casualties are down 50percent, I cringe, because there are still dead soldiers, and limbless soldiers, and plane loads of guys coming back who will never be able to deal with the time their friend Rick exploded.
I want to take away the money because I never gave my permission for this war, or any war. I never “bought the Ferrari.” The foreign policy of the last 10 years has been shoot first and write the check later.
Essentially I’m with Teller (of Penn&Teller): “We’re spending money we don’t have, to kill people we don’t know.”
Sorry that my moral opposition to third parties spending my money on lemons is bothering me. I just can’t live in your worldview, Wolf, I find it deliberately morally ambiguous.
April 20, 2011 at 10:35 am
I know you oppose the war, Duganz, and I respect that. All I’m saying is that Obama didn’t lie to you about where he stood. He’s winding down Iraq and committed to staying in Afghanistan until its finished. Our definitions of finished may vary, but no one would argue that Afghanistan meets it. Obama may not agree with your position, but on this at least he has been consistent.
As to spending money – yes, we’d all love to decide exactly where our tax dollars went. But if everyone did that, we’d be entering John Galt territory.
April 20, 2011 at 11:07 am
I never claimed Obama lied to me.
What I am saying is that we remain in limbo concerning when the end will come, when we will stop killing people for ambiguous reasons I do not and have not ever condoned.
But what’s wrong about adopting certain libertarian precepts about taxation? I’m not saying to allow Atlas to shrug, but I’m not alone in thinking that government spending is out of control, or that the tax system we have is, by it’s very nature, immoral.
The first non-war income tax imposed by Congress was a 2percent tax on incomes over $4,000. That was 1894 and only 10percent of all households had to pay anything. Right now EVERYONE is supposed to pay on all income and only a few percent are taxed at $0–ironically the very poor, and the very rich. Anyone eeking over the poverty line loses 15percent of their income, the equivalence of one month gross salary (a non-existant 13th month).
So I’m not advocating for a John Galt America, but I am for tax reform, and reducing defense spending by at least 12percent. Imagine what we could to with the extra $82.2billion that that reduction would bring in (based on 2010 figures). Maybe Missoula wouldn’t have the shittiest bridges in the state of Montana. Maybe tuitions could come down. Maybe people could get government backed loans to help debt relief.
Wolf, I don’t know what we’d do with the money. But I do know that we’d spend it on better things than body bags for young men and women.
April 19, 2011 at 3:19 pm
Polish Wolf;
Why do you interpret the piece as an attack on Obama?
The piece barely mentions Obama.
The piece is an attack on American foreign policy. It’s not an attack on Obama’s policy, per se, but America’s policy.
if you want to defend our empire building, great do it. But don’t hide behind the straw man of defending Obama when you are in fact defending the hegemony of the US, and the policy of the last five Presidents.
i oppose my tax dollars being used for Empire building and maintenance. i was opposed during Reagan, I was opposed during Bush I and II and I was opposed during Clinton and now I’m still opposed during Obama. (I was also opposed during Johnson, Nixon, and Ford)
i guess you favor that use of your tax dollars. Why not just say so?
April 19, 2011 at 12:13 am
You forgot to mention Libya:
April 19, 2011 at 8:19 am
You missed it Pogo, but the reference is there. I wouldn’t forget it.
April 19, 2011 at 10:42 am
Thanks a lot, Duganz, now I have the “America, Fuck Yeah” song going around-and-around in my head.
April 19, 2011 at 12:05 pm
FYI. Taliban are principally in Pakistan.
“Defense” spending continues to increase. Our troops can’t even feed themselves anymore without private contractors. Some of our most “advanced” aircraft can’t even fly. Military families need food stamps to make ends meet at home. Suicide, depression, homelessness, all unaccounted for in the rush to “fund our troops.”
All this with perpetual war, perpetual funding, and no coherent foreign policy.