…because there is a plague headed your way.  And, no I’m not talking of the H1N1 pandemic Kvatch spoke of earlier this week, I mean the “Foreclosure Plague”.  Yes foreclosures aren’t just a financial inconvenience wreaking havoc across the U.S. economy, they are now a plague.  CNNMoney.com this week issued a post with the tagline, “Foreclosure Plague:  Don’t Catch It”.   It is basically a list of “hot spots” in America where foreclosures are still going strong.  The headline, however, made we want to go into decontamination.  Foreclosure is a plague?  And it’s spreading?  Does that mean I could, uh, catch it?  Wait, I don’t own a home, whew, I’m probably immune.  The rest of you, watch out!

My first thought was, “Somebody lost big in the Market”, then I read the article and realized it’s been a hell of a past 9 years.  Here are some of the highlights:

-  Y2K:  We waited, we stockpiled and in the end it all amounted a hill of beans

-  Tech bubble bursts:  Thousands lose their jobs

-  9/11:  The worst day ever.  Period.

-  Afghanistan:  We attack, we declare victory, we are still there.

-  Iraq: See Afghanistan…

-  Asian Tsunami, Hurricane Katrina, Chinese earthquake: It’s like a 1970’s disaster movie on endless loop

-  George Bush:  He alone could get the decade declared the Decade from Hell

-  Housing bubble bursts:  Foreclosures, market meltdowns, Madoff

The big question here is, “Will the next decade be better?”  In American history if one decade is bad then next is usually good.  Typical cycle of win and lose.  I wonder though if we’ve finally come to the end of the line.  What do you think?

Our society is overrun with parasites, blood-suckers who have no thought for anything other than making as much money as possible for themselves (…and maybe for their kids…if the kids are lucky).  It corrupts our government, warps our educational system, and has turned our country into a service economy whose only real industry is one that pushes money around.  We need to change the system and change our perspective on what constitutes a contribution to society.  Here’s how…

• Every dollar derived from one’s labors that falls above the federal poverty level for a family of four (> $22,050)—salary and bonuses, from waiting tables to managing mutual funds—gets taxed at a flat 30% rate…no god-damned exceptions!
• Income that falls between 10X and 100X ($220,501 – $2,205,000) of the federal poverty level is taxed at a flat 60% rate.   You make above $220K?  You’ve got more than enough to live on…suck it up!
• Income that falls above a level 100X (> $2,205,000) of the federal poverty line is taxed at a flat 90% rate.
• The notion that capital gains are somehow more valuable, by virtue of lower tax rates, than the fruits of one’s labor is absolute, nonsensical BULLSH*T!  So…from here on out, capital gains *ARE* income and get taxed accordingly.  End of story.
• Deductions are eliminated.  Need a house?  Learn to pay for it!  Took a huge loss on your investments?  Tough!  Charitable contributions?  Good for you!  But you don’t get to deduct them.
• Corporations don’t get any more breaks!  Is your headquarters in the US?  Then pay your f*cking taxes, and do it at a rate of 45% of every dollar you make…anywhere in the god-damned world!
• …and no more corporate investment that isn’t directed to growing a business or providing jobs.  You make one single dollar from a non-productive, non-related enterprise (i.e. capital gains), you pay $.90 to Uncle Sam (90%).
• And finally…we have a word for people who don’t want to work, who don’t want to contribute to society.  We call them bums, and if you want to be a bum then fine, but you don’t get to be bum and live like a king forever on mommy and daddy’s income.  Inter-generational wealth transfers are taxed at 45% up to 100X of the federal poverty level.  Above that, and the rate is 90%.

In addition…

• Repeal the War Power’s act.  The Constitution already has a fine mechanism for aggressively deploying our military forces.  So no more starting a war and then getting permission afterwords just so we can put our defense contractors on government welfare.
• Legalize everything and tax it.  From marijuana to meth-amphetamine, cut the rug out from under the illegal trade in controlled substances, close a whole lot of prisons, and make a bundle of cash in the process.
• And finally… No more contributions to federal political campaigns…PERIOD!  Whether you’re a grandmother from Bayonne or the CEO of Exxon, you don’t get to put a single dime in a politician’s pocket…EVER!  All campaigns are to be financed using federal money at no more than 1/50th of the prevailing level for House and Senate races.

This isn’t some f*cking game.  The debt hole that we’ve dug is one that we’re not likely ever to climb out of, and if we want to fix health-care, fight many simultaneous wars, and pay for the comfy retirement of all of our parents, then we better be prepared to pay for it.  Time for the United States to grow-the-f*ck-up.

You can thank me later for giving you back the week that you spend every god-damned year acting as an accountant for Uncle Sam.

Read Part 1 – “Tax Rates for Parasites – The Problem“

This country is afflicted by parasites.  From the kleptocrats who throw millions in donations to our elected officials, to the officials themselves who indemnify incompetently run corporations, and in doing so destroy, through the creation of unassailable deficits, what little prosperity is left to most citizens.

The corporate CEO, bailed out with billions in tax-payer funded giveaways, bleating pathetically about how he’ll quit if he doesn’t get more money, is a parasite.  The hedge-fund manager stripping hundreds of millions from his clients, and then paying himself in capital gains to avoid taxes…is a parasite.  The pampered teenager who gets a multi-million dollar trust from mommy and daddy, ensuring that she’ll never have to work or contribute in any way to society…is a parasite.  The corporation that moves jobs, facilities, and business offshore, then fraudulently books its transactions as nontaxable foreign receipts…is a parasite.

Unfortunately there’s only one way to fix this nation. We need to act like adults and not greedy children; need to pay for the programs that provide a social safety net and not balance the cost on the backs of our children; need to act like every other westernized democracy, generating the greatest good for the greatest number, not howl about the evils of socialism while our parents suck at the biggest social teat this nation has ever created.   In short, we need to f*cking grow up!   Here’s the solution…

The State of California this week began hitting up it’s tax base for Payday loans.  A little discussed change embedded in the crisis budget the State passed allows California to raise state withholding to 10%.  This isn’t a tax increase though.  Oh no, it’s a short term loan.  California will refund your money in your tax return.  Sure they will.  They expect to pull $1.7 billion into the State Treasury thereby making California appear solvent (as if), and giving the state “wiggle room” during their current financial meltdown.  All I can say is Kvatch and I got out in the nick of time.  So long suckahs!

Not having steady work for six months has certainly helped me commit to the Frogette’s and my upcoming travel plans. But California and San Francisco have done there level best to make sure that I don’t regret leaving.  Some of the things I won’t miss about California:

• Dozen’s of bloody ballot initiatives, requiring hours of reading and research, every time I step into the voting booth
• Hi-tech companies that the think that ‘all the junk food you can eat’ is a better way to retain talent than decent wages and health care
• Crap on the sidewalk outside my flat…every damn day!
• Drunks, addicts, hookers, and bangers…barfing, shooting-up, turning tricks, and stabbing each other at all hours of the day and night!
• Graffiti-f*cking-vandals!  “Artist” is too good a word for these talentless amateurs.
• The SFPD, whose idea of effective law enforcement is shuffling the junkies around the neighbourhood.  “Arrest him?  Do you know how much paperwork I’d have to fill out?”
• Arrogant mayors. Absentee council members. Illiterate Governors. Paralysed legislators.
• The f*cking 405!  (Asshole drivers,  sh*tty second-rate pavement.  Everything that is wrong with America in small.)
• CAGERS!  Cagers on their cell-phones.  Cagers who won’t yield!  Cager’s who use their 2-tons metal cocoons like f*cking weapons!
• San Francisco MUNI — The most comprehensive public transit system in the US with the rudest, laziest, most entitled employees you’ve ever encountered.
• San Fran— “I left my trash in…” —frisco!
• Retire, join the G.O.P, or just f*cking Die-ane Feinstein!
• Floods, fires, earthquakes, rivers running dry with…dust, $80 Cabernet and Britney-god-damned-Spears.
• It ain’t 1906 but the SFFD likes to run their f*cking sirens like it is!
• Skynet’s calling you home Ahrnult.  Take the f*cking hint.

In short, I’ve had enough!  True there are still opportunities out here, but if it means living in a shitty Silicon Valley apartment because every decent house for miles is owned by some vulture capitalist, no thanks.  I’ve got skills, and will bloody-well take them elsewhere.

If you’re looking for the “f-A-k-e. P.” logo here you’re not going to see it.  The great State of California really is running an online garage sale.  Gov. Schwarzenegger hopes to sell off extra vehicles from our state fleet, confiscated items, unused computers, desks and even an antique piano (?).  You see our guv figures if he signs these items, given his celebrity, they will be valuable and will bring much needed cash to the coffers of California.  He sure isn’t going to balance our budget the old fashioned way.  So he’s harnessed the power of eBay and Craigslist to move our junk.  So grab your pennies and stop by.  You never know when you’ll find a great deal on one of those nine Hummers parked out front of the governor’s mansion.

Recent transport economic figures in Australia provide a horrifying view were mass transit falls short of delivering any real solutions. It is instructive to note that the greater LA area has a higher population than the whole Australian continent.

“traffic congestion is costing the Australian economy $12.8 billion a year and, without urgent action, will hit $30 billion a year in 2015.” Paralysed in commuter gridlock

Sydney ranges close to 4 million population, with many residents forced, by cost, to live beyond the transport infrastructure. “Sydney congestion this year at $4.58 billion – $12.5 million a day – and forecasts that will increase to $7.76 billion by 2020, or $21 million a day.” (IBID)

According to Sydney’s Lord Mayor, Clover Moore:
”The No. 1 infrastructure issue for Sydney is the need for new public transport and this has to be the priority for both state and national governments.
”What’s needed in Sydney is a massive expansion, particularly the suburban railway network and a high-capacity light rail system in the inner-city areas where congestion makes buses completely inadequate to the task of moving large volumes of passengers efficiently.”

Kvatch put the issue into perspective: Mass transit everywhere isn’t just AN alternative. It’s the ONLY alternative.

Most of us around the world think American’s have no humour (humor to you), in fact the story is that Ellis Island is just a big hospital doing ‘humorectomies’. Well if you don’t think that is funny try Buy American.

But listen up, you gotta make stuff to sell stuff. Maybe there should be a Build American campaign first, like have American stuff for people to buy.

The Canadian’s have their knickers in a twist over this campaign, but they should be laughing. To start with there is the American wastewater construction program; try and buy a General Electric water filter. GE makes them in Canada. Or the bolts and ‘manhole covers’ (sexist language not mine…)

Oh! Then there is the gas. I’m sure you won’t see separate pumps marked ‘American’ and ‘imported’ anytime soon. The fact is, it is just not that simple in this global economy we had to have.

It doesn’t bother Australians of course. Where else are you going to get your canned kangaroo or your camel steaks? But perhaps we need to start thinking about what we’ll do after we’ve culled the roos and camels and dug out and shipped all the coal and iron ore.

There’s no question that online bill payments—the ability to pay your credit-card bills, mortgage, or car payment with the ease of a single click—are a great convenience.  But now banks and financial institutions are abusing this system to inflate their profits and are destroying people’s credit ratings in the process.

From The Consumerist we hear about two instances where customers had their credit destroyed by predatory corporations who played games with their automated payment systems.  In the first instance, Nissan Auto Finance reversed one woman’s car payments—made on time—in each of six consecutive months without notice and without explanation, then reported her as delinquent to the credit bureaus and refused to correct their error…as they are required to do by law.

In the second, AT&T simply stole $157.00 + from one of their customers by claiming that the customer’s payment via credit-card was declined (it wasn’t) and then auto-debiting the same amount (plus hefty fees) again the next month.  Now, despite proof that AMEX didn’t decline the initial charge, AT&T refuses to do anything about the situation.

These criminals are banking on the fact that their customers don’t have the resources to sue the cr*p out of them, and for the most part they are correct.  So…when dealing with corporations that are willing to resort to out-and-out theft to keep their balance sheets in the black, what’s a consumer to do?  RETURN TO CASH, that’s what!  It is, if fact, the only alternative.  Buy your car in cash.  Pay your bills with checks.  Don’t give these bastards even a single opportunity to rip you off.