The Rampage in Tucson

This shooting in Tucson has, of course, commandeered the front pages of the news media. My comments, in no particular order:

1. The media is making a big deal over the fact that a Congresswoman, Gabrielle Giffords, was seriously wounded. Relegated to the end of the story (if it is even in the story) is that there were six people actually killed -- including Judge John Roll, and a 9-year-old girl, Christina Green. But now, it looks as though Christina will start getting more ink, but only because she was the granddaughter of Dallas Green, who served as Manager of the Phillies, Yankees and Mets.


2. The MSM has been implicitly -- and sometimes, explicitly -- blaming it on the various right-wing political philosophies that have been expressed of late. But the shooter was connected with some anti-Semitic organizations whose party lines have had more in common with the far left. Why aren't those people blamed?

3. Amongst some of circles I frequent, much has been made of the fact that Congresswoman Giffords is the offspring of a non-Jewish mother, and therefore not technically Jewish. This, to me, is both accurate and irrelevant! This should not be about my philosophical disputes, or anyone else's, with the so-called Reform Judaism; nor even about my political differences (or anyone else's) with Gabrielle Giffords (of which I have many). I respect Ms. Giffords as an accomplished woman who, notwithstanding her political orientation, has displayed far more rationality than many at either extreme of the political spectrum. I wish her the very best.

4. Judge Roll's murder was a tremendous loss to America's judiciary. But even if he had been a lesser legal light, his murder would still strike a blow to law and order.

5. A number of pundits and commentators (many of whom do not merit such an honorific) have been blaming the shooting on Sarah Palin's public pronouncements using firearms metaphors. I am willing, to an extent, to find possible validity to the theory. After all, words and ideas do have consequences. But quite notably, one of these people who has been blaming the likes of Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck has been none other than Jane Fonda. I daresay that Hanoi Jane's extreme and public statements some years ago, before the Internet age enabled the quick and expeditious communication to the masses, contributed to the killing of far, far more Americans and South Vietnamese. Jane Fonda, no less than Sarah Palin, ought be held to the same standard, and called to account for her lethal statements.

Sarah's Charity & Other Odds & Ends

My family has just broken the Yom Kippur fast. The Day of Atonement has ended. We wish everyone Muchos Años!

Now for some tax odds and ends:


(1) President Bush has signed H.R. 6893, which is now officially Public No: 110-351 [At this writing, the GPO has yet to put it into the United States Statutes at Large; give them a few days.] The popular name for the legislation is the "Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008."

Of interest to this ex-IRS attorney is Section 501 of the Act, which clarifies the Internal Revenue Code's definition of a child for dependency exemption purposes. In order to qualify as a dependent for income tax purposes, the child must be unmarried and younger than the person claiming the exemption. And if the person claiming the credit is not the child's parent, the claimant's adjusted gross income must exceed that of the child's parent or parents.


(2) On 15 September this Blog commented on the Presidential candidates' tax returns. Sarah Palin has released her tax returns for 2006 and 2007. The Tax History website has posted them (along with the other candidates, etc.). Sarah's stats (actually, Sarah and Todd's joint stats) are as follows:

2007:

$166,080 Adjusted Gross Income.
Cash donated to charity: $2,500 (1.5% of AGI).
Plus $825 non-cash goods donated to Salvation Army.


2006: $127,869 AGI.
Cash donated to charity: $4,250 (3.3% of AGI).
Plus $630 non-cash goods donated to Salvation Army.


My comments:

1. Sarah is sort of in the range of where Barack Hussein Obama was in 2003 and 2004, before he became a national messianic idol. Her AGI is approximately half of Biden's, but her charitable giving (disregarding the Salvation Army rummage donation) is than twice in percentage, and, at worst, more than fivefold in dollars. Like the other candidates, she is well below McCain.
2. Sarah's decrease in charitable dollars from 2006 to 2007, despite a significant increase in AGI, is not entirely comforting. There may well be reasons; it may well be a temporary thing. I don't know because there are only 2 years of tax returns to go with. But if she has any class whatsoever, there will be an increase come 31 December 2008.

3. Sarah's philanthropic exploits are really nothing to write home about, and I am somewhat disappointed in her. There are many people whose household income is far less than hers, but who give more. Now that Sarah strives for a position of national leadership, should start leading by example.

The Returns Have Returned

Ah, Taxes!! This former IRS agent is once again posting about taxes.

The Tax History Project has posted some Presidential Tax Returns on one of its webpages. (Caution: They are PDF files, and they are long downloads). In addition to FDR, Nixon, Carter, Bush I and Clinton, they have the current Bush II & VP Dick Cheney. Now, they also have Barack Hussein Obama and Joe Biden, and some of McCain's. Sarah Palin has promised to release her tax returns soon, and Tax Analysts, the sponsors of the Tax History Project, has promised to post Sarah's there when they become available.

This posting will show the statistics in the following format:

Year: Charitable Contributions / Adjusted Gross Income (Charitable contributions as percentage of AGI)


BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA:

2007: $240,370 / $4,139,965 (5.8%)
2006: $60,307 / $983,826 (6.1%)
2005: $77,315 / $1,655,106 (4.7%)
2004: $2,500 / $207,647 (1.2%)
2003: $3,400 / $238,327 (1.2%)
2002: $1,050 / $259,394 (0.4%)
2001: $1,470 / $272,759 (0.5%)
2000: $2,350 / $240,505 (1.0%)



JOE BIDEN:

2007: $995 * / $319,853 (0.3%)
2006: $380 / $248,459 (0.2%)
2005: $380 / $321,379 (0.1%)
2004: $380 / $244,271 (0.2%)
2003: $260 / $231,375 (0.1%)
2002: $260 / $277,811 (0.1%)
2001: $360 / $220,712 (0.2%)
2000: $360 / $219,953 (0.2%)


* Joe Biden's 2007 charitable contributions consisted of $595 cash + $400 other property.


JOHN MCCAIN:

2007: $105,467 / $386,527 (27.3%)
2006: $96,758 ** / $338,809 (28.6%)


** John McCain's 2006 charitable contributions include a $32,063 carryover from a prior year.

CINDY MCCAIN:

2006: $569,737 / $6,066,431 (9.4%)


My comments on the foregoing statistics (in no particular order):

1. Within the past week alone, I drew more checks to charitable organizations than Joe Biden did in all of 2006 and 2007 combined. Being that this is Rosh HaShanah season, there will, no doubt, be more drawn within the next 2 weeks.

2. Unless Biden is doing some significant charitable works off the books, his charitable giving habits are a disgrace! There are households which are really, really, poor, but which give way more than he does in any given year.

3. Notice the difference in Barack Hussein Obama's charitable giving habits after he became a national idol in 2004. Prior to 2004, his charitable giving habits were rather disgraceful (though a little bit more honorable than Biden's). If this is just Obama getting religion, then I welcome Barack into the camp of the charitable donors. The real test is what kind of charitable donations will he make at such time as he no longer is bucking for the public approval in the voting booth. Given the entitlement attitude of Barack (and, even more so, Michelle), I'm not willing to bet that he will not revert to his pre-2004 charitable giving patterns.

4. For the purposes of this posting, I shall not concern myself with the political or religious or social orientation of the donee organizations which received the various candidates' charitable bounties. The only question is whether and how much they gave. In a certain sense, I can respect BHO's contributions to his spiritual advisor Jeremiah Wright's Church of Hate Whitey & G-ddamn America more than Biden's extreme overprotectiveness of his own funds.

5. John McCain's situation is somewhat different from Joe Biden's and BHO's because he and Cindy filed separate returns. This is an option which married couples have, and, given the McCains' situation, I think it was well-advised.

6. Cindy McCain's 2006 tax return has been disclosed. Where's her 2007? I do not know about Cindy's personal 2007 tax affairs, but I do know that she, like everyone else, can get an extention to 15 August for the asking, and another one until 15 October if she can show good cause (which is not difficult to do). My guess: She might not have even filed it yet.

7. The McCains have a McCain Family Foundation in their financial picture. The Foundation's returns for 2006 and 2007 have been disclosed and are posted on the website. The Foundation is the recipient of John and Cindy's charitable contributions. The Foundation distributed $182,639 to various charitable causes in 2006, and $78,250 in 2007. I note that neither John nor Cindy (nor anyone else) received any compensation or employee benefits from the Foundation; some private foundations do confer such benefits upon their contributors (or friends and relatives thereof).

8. The McCain Family Foundation had a little problem with the IRS. Seems that it contributed $5,000 to what was initially thought to be a general education fund, but which turned out to be a private fund to pay for the college education of some deceased person's children. The Foundation was charged a 20% excise tax ($1,000) for the transaction. The Foundation's Director requested John and Cindy to reimburse the Foundation the $6,000 in non-charitable distributions related to the transaction. In the general scheme of things, that little error is analogous to receiving a ticket for overtime parking. I do not impute any negativity of character to McCain on account of it.

9. And likewise, Obama's tax returns reflect penalties for not fully paying the estimated tax. I just cannot get upset over it because it is often difficult to predict what your required estimated tax payment should be until after you owe it. This is more a failing of the Internal Revenue Code than of Barack Hussein Obama.

10. Given my criticisms of the various candidates, I shall disclose my own household's charitable habits: Our charitable contributions tend to run just a bit above 7% of our AGI. If you subtract from our AGI the Federal and State income taxes we pay, and the Social Security & Medicare deductions taken from our paychecks, and the union dues which are maced from us by the public employees unions to which my wife and I respectively belong, our deductions come to a bit more than 10% of our take-home income. In fact, we have a second checking account at our bank, and whenever we deposit the paychecks or my legal fees or any other income, we skim off 10% into the second account, from which we write our charitable checks.

And some of our charitable contributions are not claimed (or claimable) as deductions. The small change I deposit into the pushke at whichever shul I go to daven, and, this year, the wad of money (approximately $100 U.S. dollar equivalent) I distributed to various poor people in the Holy City of Jerusalem when we were there.

11. And what of Sarah Palin's tax return? What interesting facts and factoids will it tell us? I do not know, but if her charitable giving habits are anywhere near as paltry as Joe Biden's (or, for that matter, pre-2005 Obama), then she deserves whatever negative criticism she receives. If the government is to encourage a strong charitable sector, then the government leaders must personally set the public example.

Skirting the Election

Am I the only one who has this impression? It seems that ever since Sarah Palin was chosen by John McCain to be his running mate, the women on the street seem to be more into wearing skirts and/or pantyhose. While Hillary Rodham Clinton and Michelle Obama were the leading ladies in the news media, it seemed that more women followed Hillary's cue and wore pantsuits, and Michelle's point blank statement that she abhors wearing pantyhose.

Now, I seem to see more skirts and pantyhose on women. Including the college campus where I teach (and college campuses are among the last place one would expect to find an increase in skirts or pantyhose these days).

Is it just the cooling weather? [Not likely.]. The seasonal shift of the calendar to September? Or is Sarah Palin actually exerting a subconscious influence upon so many women in America?

My family hasn't been in the apparel business since my grandfather retired from Gimbels in the early 1970's (he went there after trying his hand in a failed clothing store and a bankrupt garment manufacturing shop). Does anyone out there have any data on the latest women's apparel sales trends for the past few weeks?