As if I needed another reason to avoid Chicaco...

They're going to apply a 9% tax to the internet ("Electronically delivered amusements" and "nonpossessory computer leases").
Money quote:

These intentionally broad new tax rules affect more than just Chicagoans who want to stream their favorite show on Netflix or play a new album on Spotify. The 9-percent hike also applies to businesses that use could[sic] services, such as realtors who access real-time listings and attorneys who rely on Internet court databases.

Fiscal Irresponsibility and Intellectual Dishonesty

CBS just pissed me off. In a recent article about a Republican Senator attacking the Democrat budget plan, they mentioned taxes that were raised on incomes over $400,000 at the beginning of the year, but conveniently forgot to mention that taxes went up for everyone.
I am no high income earner. My yearly income is a rather small fraction of $400,000. Yet my taxes went up too.
At the beginning of this year, I got a $30 raise (I'm assuming it was inflation based). My Social Security taxes went up along with my pay. I now pay 35 dollars more in Social Security taxes than I did before.
Last year I paid $247.22 in total taxes a month (Federal Income, Social Security, Medicare, and State Income).
In January of this year I paid $284.87 in total taxes.

Given that my pay also went up, the increase in taxation is hardly backbreaking, however, it indicates a clear dishonesty upon the part of CBS. The end of the "payroll tax holiday" is a tax increase on everyone.

And in the end, the federal government is just going to continue wasting the money.

No new taxes... That's funny

From CBS:

Obama says no to new taxes, yes to ending Boy Scouts' gay ban

My taxes have already gone up. Our Republican House, Democrat Senate, and Democrat President have together, already caused my taxes to go up. In December I paid $69.61 in Social Security taxes. Last month, I paid $104.62 in Social Security taxes. When the POTUS says he doesn't want to raise taxes anymore, I think of George H.W. Bush, who used "No New Taxes" as a campaign slogan - and who was hoist by his own petard when he reneged on that promise. I judge based upon performance, and based upon performance, I'm going to be voting for new senators in the next two elections (2014 and 2016), and against whomever the sitting POTUS supports for election in 2016.

RMS on too-big-to-fail-companies

Richard Stallman (RMS) is famous for the free software movement.

He is not a fan of Microsoft (neither am I, and its due to the absurdly large market share that they can abuse). RMS doesn't like Microsoft because they don't release the source code for the software.

So why is RMS saying anything about "too-big-to-fail" companies?

The State Income Tax, dying out?

From Fox News:

Republican governors' plans for no state income tax lauded, criticized

I know exactly how much I pay in taxes every month. If my state (CO) would get rid of its income tax, I would get an additional $46.70 more per month or $560.52 per year. It doesn't sound like much, but I could definitely think of something to do with it, and when one is at the bottom of the pay scale, every bit helps.

Corruption in Washington

From Fox News:

Fiscal crisis package loaded up with special-interest tax breaks

This is corruption, plain and simple. Corruption that complicates the tax code so much that no average citizen can understand it (no politician can either, and they're supposed to know). Get rid of the tax code as it currently exists and replace it with something that makes sense, and that doesn't require that one specialize in the tax code in order to understand it. Perhaps the FairTax or a flat income tax. Either one would be fine, so long as the tax code uses fewer words than go into a Novella (not long enough to be a novel, not short enough to be a short story, between 17,500 and 40,000 words, according to Wikipedia). As it stands, the current tax code takes up more than twice as many words as the longest novel yet written (an estimated 1.2 million words in 7 volumes and 4,211 pages, again according to Wikipedia) at roughly 3.8 million words. I shouldn't have to go to college to understand the tax system.