Your tax dollars at work…against you…
Tag: taxes
How Much Are Taxpayers Paying Climate Czar John Kerry? He Won’t Say, But One GOP Senator Is Demanding Answers.
John Kerry, President Joe Biden’s White House climate czar, flies around the globe in a gas-guzzling jet warning refugees that the worst is yet to come if the world does not stop emitting carbon dioxide into the air. It is unclear how much he is paid or who is on his office’s staff — which is odd, because the United States taxpayer is footing the bill for his travel and salary. After the Boston Herald was told by the government to submit a Freedom of Information Act request to find out that information, Alaska Republican Senator Dan Sullivan is demanding answers.
On Thursday, Boston radio legend Howie Carr interviewed Sullivan on his daily radio show. Carr informed the senator that Kerry’s office told the Herald — where Carr also writes a column — that they would have to submit a FOIA request and could expect to hear back by 2024 to find out how much money Kerry is taking in from government coffers.
“What? … That should be public. My salary is online,” Sullivan responded. “The Secretary of State’s is online, and the president is, too.”
NIH spends $14 million to study reproductive effects of marijuana on macaques
This week’s Golden Horseshoe is awarded to the National Institutes of Health for a $14 million experiment last year on monkeys that included feeding them marijuana edibles and then monitoring the effects, according to the watchdog group Open The Books.
The primate marijuana experiment had two parts, according to an investigation by the White Coat Waste Project (WCWP).
In the first part, female macaques were served THC edibles daily for up to four months. They were then observed to see if any changes occurred in their menstrual cycles.
In part two, male macaques were fed the edibles for up to seven months and then observed to see if any fertility changes occurred.
NIH awarded the two grants for the experiments. A $13.1 million grant was awarded to the Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU), and $1.1 million was awarded to the University of Missouri-Columbia.
“The White Coat Waste Project was only able to find the enormous price tag of this project by filing a complaint with the NIH,” wrote Open The Books CEO and founder Andrew Andrzejewski. “Federal law known as the Stevens Amendment requires labs to say what percent of the costs of the experiment come from taxpayer money, the dollar amount of taxpayer funds used, and the percent and amount of funding by non-governmental sources. The Oregon Health and Science University disclosed none of these figures in its reports announcing the research results.”
Andrzejewski also pointed out that since recreational marijuana is legal in Oregon, experiments could have been conducted on humans.
About 4,000 earmarks worth up to $10 billion slipped into $1.5T spending bill
There were about 4,000 earmarks worth between $8-$10 billion slipped inside the $1.5 trillion spending bill Congress passed, according to Republican lawmakers.
Indiana Republican Sen. Mike Braun’s office compiled a 367-page document detailing the earmarks that were tucked into the bill that passed on Thursday night less than 48 hours after it was released publicly.
Among the projects on the list, there were 142 earmarks linked to Senate Majority Leader Schumer, Braun said.
On Twitter, Braun highlighted the earmark requested by New York Rep. Jamaal Bowman totaling $496,000 for “Promoting Health Equity and Affordable Swim Access through Yonkers YMCA Pool Improvements.”
New York Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez posted on social media about winning millions of dollars for community projects in her district, including housing access and workforce development programs. The title of her post was, “Rep. AOC just won millions for community projects in NY-14.”
A 93-Year-Old Woman Couldn’t Pay Her $2,300 Tax Bill. The Government Sold Her Home and Kept the Money.
Whether or not Geraldine Tyler will live to see the resolution of her case remains unclear.
The 93-year-old left her Minneapolis condominium in 2010 after a nearby shooting and a disturbing encounter left her uneasy. But she was unable to finance both her new apartment and the property tax on her erstwhile condo, accruing $2,300 in debt.
Over the course of the next five years, the government raised that debt by over 550 percent, tacking on almost $13,000 in additional penalties, fines, and interest. And when Tyler couldn’t pay that, it seized her property, sold it for $40,000—and kept the profit.
Last month, a federal appeals court ruled that was OK.
“Tyler does not argue that the county lacked lawful authority to foreclose on her condominium to satisfy her delinquent tax debt,” wrote Judge Steven Colloton of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit. “Rather, Tyler argues that the county’s retention of the surplus equity—the amount that exceeded her $15,000 tax debt—is an unconstitutional taking.”
Put more plainly, Tyler is not contesting that she failed to pay her property taxes, nor is she trying to evade responsibility for doing so. Her suit doesn’t seek the full $40,000 value of the condo but rather the excess proceeds that the government made from the sale of her property.
The court’s conclusion: She has no right to that cash.
H.L. Mencken on taxes…
Biden to request $2.6B to promote gender equity worldwide
President Biden will request $2.6 billion for foreign assistance programs that promote general equality worldwide, he announced on International Women’s Day on Tuesday.
The funds will be part of his fiscal 2023 budget request to Congress and will double the amount requested for gender programs last year.
“On this day and every day, let us recognize that all of us have a better future when women and girls can reach their full potential — and together, let’s renew our efforts to advance dignity, equality, and limitless possibilities for all,” Biden said in a statement.
The president said International Women’s Day is a time to recognize the achievements of women and girls, celebrate progress, and recommit to work that needs to be done.
Nearly Half Of IRS Audits Target Poorest Taxpayers, Report Finds
Nearly half of all IRS audits in 2021 targeted the nation’s poorest taxpayers, according to a new study.
A report released by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) on Tuesday said that about 307,000 of the nearly 660,000 audits conducted by the IRS in 2021 were among taxpayers who claimed the Earned Income Tax Credit intended for those making the lowest incomes in the nation, those earning less than $25,000 in total gross receipts.
The poorest families in the study were audited at five times the rate of other Americans.
“Even taxpayers with total positive income from $200,000 to $1,000,000 had only 1/3 the odds of audit compared with these lowest-income wage earners: 4.5 out of every 1,000 compared to 13.0 out of every 1,000 of lowest-income earners,” the study noted.
PBS Hosts Neo-Nazi Ukraine Mayor, Blurs Image of ‘Hitler Accomplice’ Behind Him.
America’s Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) has published and promoted an interview with a renowed Neo-Nazi Ukrainian mayor, without disclosing the politician’s allegiances to World War II German leader Adolf Hitler and Ukraine’s own Nazi sympathizer Stepan Bandera.
The interview comes just days after PBS published an article downplaying the links between Neo-Nazi politicians and Ukraine’s current political situation.
On Thursday, March 4th, PBS hosted Mayor Artem Semenikhin of Konotop in the country’s North East.
Semenikhin described the Russian military as “cockroaches” before going on to thank the United States for supplying his people with weapons.
“My weapon is American, and I feel like our occupiers will be pleased that we are killing them with American weapons,” he concluded.
But Semenikhin is scarcely the liberty-minded freedom fighter PBS would have him seem. In 2015 the Jerusalem Post reported:
Two months after local elections were held across Ukraine, residents of the small northern city of Konotop are expressing shock and dismay over the behavior of newly chosen Mayor Artem Semenikhin of the neo-Nazi Svoboda party.
According to reports, Semenikhin drives around in a car bearing the number 14/88, a numerological reference to the phrases “we must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children” and “Heil Hitler”; replaced the picture of President Petro Poroshenko in his office with a portrait of Ukrainian national leader and Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera; and refused to fly the city’s official flag at the opening meeting of the city council because he objected to the star of David emblazoned on it. The flag also features a Muslim crescent and a cross.
In fact, during the PBS interview Semenikhin posed with a Bandera portrait behind him, albeit blurred out by the network in their attempts to obscure their work with Ukrainian Neo-Nazis.
Bill Hicks on the war on (some) drugs…
Hellbound and Down 
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