A husband, thinking he was being funny, said to his wife, "Perhaps we should start washing your clothes in "Slim Fast". Maybe it would take a few inches off your butt!" 

The next morning the husband took a pair of underwear out of his drawer. "What the heck is this?" he said to himself as a little cloud appeared when he shook them out. 

He hollered into the bathroom," Why did you put talcum powder in my underwear?" 

 She replied "It's not talcum powder; it's 'Miracle Grow'."

What candidates favor the FairTax legislation?

Below are the candidates stands on the Fair Tax. My comments will follow the candidates remarks.

Michelle Bachman: Favors - "I love the FairTax. If we were starting over from scratch, I would favor a national sales tax." However, she has refused to co-sponsor HR 25 because she believes "we would end up with a dual tax, a national sales tax and an income tax."

I personally think that she might favor it, but she's afraid to commit to it. Ending up with a dual tax seems to be a common thread among those who don't understand that the legislation provides for repeal of the IRS tax codes. She, and others, need to actually read the bill.

Herman Cain: Favors – He strongly supports the FairTax but advocates a gradual transition to it through his 999 plan which eliminates most federal taxes and combines a 9% individual flat tax with a 9% national sales tax.

I'm okay with this - as long it's transitional.

Gary Johnson: Favors - “The fair tax is leading my list” for tax code reform but also promotes simplification such as untaxing savings and investment while eliminating corporate income taxes.

Gary who?

Ron Paul: - Favors - "I'll vote for the FairTax if it comes up because I have made a promise that I would do anything to get rid of the income tax and the IRS, and repeal the 16th amendment and that FairTax certainly moves it in that direction."

He gets it.

Rick Perry: – Favors - “Another option would be to repeal the Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution… altogether, and then pursue an alternative model of taxation such as a national sales tax or the Fair Tax."

Again, someone who hasn't read the bill.

Newt Gingrich: Neutral - Although briefed multiple times by FairTax experts he maintains “...the FairTax is a good idea but I’m not yet convinced it’s a doable idea...” He supports a dual system of the current tax code and an optional flat income tax which keeps payroll taxes and the IRS.

Huh? Apparently he wants to keep the status quo.

Jon Huntsman: Unknown – Supports removing loopholes and deductions and combing the income tax into three rates while eliminating capital gains taxes, dividends taxes and the AMT and lowering the corporate tax rate.

Thaddeus McCotter: Unknown - Proposes to “Reform our tax system to reduce the burden on working families and small businesses by cutting taxes, while eliminating loopholes.” (dropped out of the race 9/22/2011)

President Barack Obama: Unknown - His economic team was briefed on the FairTax and he has stated a sales tax would be regressive.

Again - hasn't read, doesn't understand. What he does understand is that by giving people their power back in the form of money, they lose their hold over a vast majority of their base. They'd rather have that hold than free the citizenry from taxation.

Mitt Romney: Neutral – Likes the idea of a consumption based tax but wants it to be structured in a way that it doesn’t provide a windfall for the wealthiest or burdens middle income Americans.

Again, doesn't understand the FairTax.

Rick Santorum: Unknown – Supports lower taxes in general and none on manufacturers.

In the queue at the supermarket, the cashier told the older woman that she should bring her own grocery bag because plastic bags weren't good for the environment. The woman apologized to her and explained, "We didn't have the green thing back in my day." 

The clerk responded, "That's our problem today. The former generation did not care enough to save our environment. 

She was right, that generation didn't have the green thing in its day. Back then, they returned their milk bottles, soft drink bottles and beer bottles to the shop. The shop sent them back to the factory to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. They were recycled.

But they didn't have the green thing back in that customer's day. In her day, they walked up stairs, because they didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. They walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time they had to go two blocks. 

But she was right. They didn't have the green thing in her day. Back then, they washed the baby's nappies because they didn't have the throw-away kind. They dried clothes on a line, not in a 220 volt energy gobbling machine - wind and solar power really did dry the clothes. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing. 

But that old lady is right; they didn't have the green thing back in her day. Back then, they had one TV, or radio, in the house - not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief, not a screen the size of a cricket pitch. In the kitchen, they blended and stirred by hand because they didn't have electric machines to do everything for you. 

When they packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, they used a wadded up old newspaper to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. They didn't have air conditioning or electric stoves with self cleaning ovens. They didn't have battery operated toys, computers, or telephones. Back then, they didn't fire up an engine and burn fuel just to cut the lawn. They used a push mower that ran on human power. They used hand operated clippers to trim the shrubs. They exercised by working so they didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity. 

But she's right; they didn't have the green thing back then. They drank from a glass filled from the tap when they were thirsty instead of using a plastic bottle every time they had a drink of water. They refilled their writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and they replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull. 

Back then, people walked or took the bus and kids rode their bikes to school or rode the school bus instead of turning their mums into a 24-hour taxi service. They had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And they didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 2,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest pizza joint. 

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful the old folks were just because they didn't have the green thing back then?

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Is She Serious???

Rep. Schakowsky was asked the following question on the Don Wade & Roma show on WLS-AM: “Out of every dollar that I earn, how much do you think that I deserve to keep?”

 Here idiotic response was: "I’ll put it this way. You don’t deserve to keep all of it and it’s not a question of deserving because what government is, is those things that we decide to do together. And there are many things that we decide to do together like have our national security. Like have police and fire. What about the people that work at the National Institute of Health who are looking for a cure for cancer."

She was further pushed about how much Schakowsky thinks she should pay in taxes to which she said was willing to pay more. So the obvious was brought up. “Why don’t you pay more?”

Jan Schakowsky retorted with the most brilliant and thought-out answer.

Are you ready for it?

"That’s just ridiculous." 

Kitten here: I'm speechless...

Get angry and pass this on!

Remember, not only did you contribute to Social Security but your employer did too. It totaled 15% of your income before taxes.

If you averaged only $30K over your working life, that's close to $220,500.

If you calculate the future value of $4,500 per year (yours & your employer's contribution) at a simple 5% (less than what the govt. pays on the money that it borrows), after 49 years of working you'd have $892,919.98.

If you took out only 3% per year, you'd receive $26,787.60 per year and it would last better than 30 years (until you're 95 if you retire at age 65) and that's with no interest paid on that final amount on deposit! If you bought an annuity and it paid 4% per year, you'd have a lifetime income of $2,976.40 per month.

The folks in Washington have pulled off a bigger Ponzi scheme than Bernie Madhoff ever had.

Entitlement my ass, I paid cash for my social security insurance!!!!

Just because they borrowed the money, doesn't make my benefits some kind of charity or handout!!

Congressional benefits ---- free healthcare, outrageous retirement packages, 67 paid holidays, three weeks paid vacation, unlimited paid sick days, now that's welfare, and they have the nerve to call my Social Security retirement entitlements?

We're "broke" and can't help our own seniors, veterans, orphans, homeless?

In the last months we have provided aid to Haiti, Chile, and Turkey. And now Pakistan......home of bin Laden. Literally, BILLIONS of DOLLARS!!!

Our retired seniors living on a 'fixed income', receive no aid, nor do they get any breaks while our government and religious organizations pour hundreds of billions of dollars and tons of food to foreign countries! They call Social Security and Medicare an entitlement even though most of us have been paying for it all our working lives, and now when it’s time for us to collect, the government is running out of money.

Why did the government borrow from it in the first place?

 Imagine if the *GOVERNMENT* gave 'US' the same support they give to other countries.

 Sad isn't it?


Kitten here: (I received the above in email) Governor Perry said what I've been thinking and saying for years: Social Security is a Ponzi scheme. Presidential candidates, Congress critters, newspapers, the right, the left and anyone can cry and scream all they want that it's not. They are either promoting their own agenda, have their heads in the sand, live in another dimension, or just not willing to admit the truth. 


The definition of a Ponzi scheme is using new "investors" to pay off old investors. What else is it when new wage earners are paying money into SS that then pays that money to current and new retirees? 


I have only one disagreement with the above essay: use of the term "fixed incomes" when referring to retired senior citizens. I don't know about you, but I haven't had a pay raise in three years and will not be getting one again this year. That puts me on a fixed income. One good thing about it is that I'm now in training to receive SS.


Speaking of being in training for SS, I'll be eligible for SS in just five years, so this is an important subject for me. I don't agree with Ron Paul and his isolationist agenda, but we do need to take care of "our own" before being the world's checkbook. 


Maybe we need to look at where the money we're sending to other countries as "aid" (money and goods) and see if it's really necessary, and if it's actually getting to the people who need the aid - it doesn't always. When aid is sent because of a natural disaster, I'm all for it. But it should end at some point. We've been sending aid to some countries for generations. Usually because of that natural disaster, but also because we've been blackmailed (North Korea ring a bell?) When does it end? 


Millionaires don't need SS. Our own middle class and poor do - sometimes desperately. Bill Gates may have paid into SS, but I think he and Warren Buffet can get along without it. Not to mention most of our Congressional "employees". Run a Google check on Congressional millionaires. I think you'll be surprised. 


And what 67 paid holidays do they get? I get 12 and I work an awful lot of those. 


We really need to get behind the FairTax. It would broaden the tax base and take the pressure off revenues to SS and the true entitlement programs: Medicaid and Medicare. 

To all the girls who are in a hurry to have a boyfriend or get married, a piece of Biblical advice: 

"Ruth patiently waited for her mate Boaz." 

While you are waiting on YOUR Boaz, don't settle for any of his relatives: Broke-az, Po-az, Lyin-az, Cheatin-az, Dumb-az, Drunk-az, Cheap-az, Lockedup-az, Goodfornothin-az, Lazy-az, and especially his third cousin Beatinyo-az. 

Wait on your Boaz and make sure he respects Yoaz.

Kitten here: it's good advice. And, remember, if you don't respect yoaz, he won't respect it either.

No one believes seniors . . . everyone thinks they are senile. 

An elderly couple was celebrating their sixtieth anniversary. The couple had married as childhood sweethearts and had moved back to their old neighborhood after they retired. Holding hands, they walked back to their old school. It was not locked, so they entered, and found the old desk they’d shared, where Andy had carved “I love you, Sally.” 

On their way back home, a bag of money fell out of an armored car, practically landing at their feet. Sally quickly picked it up and, not sure what to do with it, they took it home. There, she counted the money - fifty thousand dollars!

Andy said, “We’ve got to give it back.” 

Sally said, “Finders keepers.” She put the money back in the bag and hid it in their attic.

The next day, two police officers were canvassing the neighborhood looking for the money, and knocked on their door. "Pardon me, did either of you find a bag that fell out of an armored car yesterday?” 

Sally said, “No.” 

Andy said, “She’s lying. She hid it up in the attic."

Sally said, “Don’t believe him, he’s getting senile.” 

The agents turned to Andy and began to question him. One said: “Tell us the story from the beginning.” 

Andy said, “Well, when Sally and I were walking home from school yesterday ...”

The first police officer turned to his partner and said, “We’re outta here!”

I was in a public restroom. I had barely sat down when I heard a voice in the other stall say: "Hi, how are you?"

Me (embarrassed), "Doin' fine, thanks." 

Stall: "So what are you up to?" 

Me: "Uh, like you, just sitting here." 

Stall: "Can I come over?" 

Me: (now with an attitude) "No, I'm a little busy right now!!" 

Stall: "Listen, I'll have to call you back. There's an idiot in the other stall who keeps answering all my questions!"

If you never were broken, Then how would you know that I can make you whole?