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pig slut lisa
Mar 5, 2012

irl is good


Mo_Steel posted:

Prepare the floodgates:



I expect a lot more of this coming up. It's a relatively minor thing, but why do conservatives hate the Post Office? I can send a piece of paper pretty much anywhere in the United States for under fifty cents and expect it to get there in less than a week. I can send a letter just about anywhere on the entire planet for about a dollar. I put it in a box outside my home and some guy in a truck shows up, almost daily, takes it, puts it on a plane or a boat or however the gently caress they deliver mail to Kenya should I be so inclined. For a dollar. How much more efficient could it possibly get, should they write the letter for me while I dictate to them?

I mean I probably know the answer is that the Post Office flies directly contrary to preconceived notions of government being universally terrible and thus is a sort of mental neon light disturbing the otherwise bland peacefulness of their broadly simplistic view of how society functions, but is there more to it than that?

USPS employs lots of people who don't look like the Tea Party :ssh:

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Blarghalt
May 19, 2010

Dr. Arbitrary posted:

Maybe I had an unusual experience with the IRS but they were really helpful and kind to me in a situation where I had been VERY irresponsible with my taxes. They located every form I needed and a copy of all the related documents and mailed it all to me along with instructions.

Everyone I've met who has serious complaints about the IRS has seemed like they were up to some shady stuff.

Someone on these forums, and I don't rememeber who, did some internet detectiving and found out that a lot of the Tea Party websites on the internet were started by people with a pretty long history of scams/spam.

Push El Burrito
May 9, 2006

Soiled Meat
The post office is great and UPS and FedEx depend on them for last-mile service and they all 3 use the same planes and things. If USPS went out of business, prices would go crazy for FedEx and UPS. Meanwhile, it costs the average person in the US precisely $dick in taxes to keep it running.

It destroys their idea that the government can't do anything right so they have to kill it.

Edit:

Blarghalt posted:

Someone on these forums, and I don't rememeber who, did some internet detectiving and found out that a lot of the Tea Party websites on the internet were started by people with a pretty long history of scams/spam.

It's not surprising since the Tea Party itself is tied to big tobacco.

http://www.ucsf.edu/news/2013/02/13507/study-tea-party-organizations-have-ties-tobacco-industry-dating-back-1980s

Soviet Commubot
Oct 22, 2008


Dr. Arbitrary posted:

Maybe I had an unusual experience with the IRS but they were really helpful and kind to me in a situation where I had been VERY irresponsible with my taxes. They located every form I needed and a copy of all the related documents and mailed it all to me along with instructions.

Everyone I've met who has serious complaints about the IRS has seemed like they were up to some shady stuff.

I've lived overseas for the last 3 years and only found out last year that I was still supposed to file US taxes and the IRS people I talked to were really helpful and accommodating. Of course, I'm a student and my yearly income is only about 10% of what it would take for them to tax me, so I guess they figured I wasn't trying to hide anything. Still, from all of the horror stories I've heard I expected a whole lot worse.

seiferguy
Jun 9, 2005

FLAWED
INTUITION



Toilet Rascal

Soviet Commubot posted:

I've lived overseas for the last 3 years and only found out last year that I was still supposed to file US taxes and the IRS people I talked to were really helpful and accommodating. Of course, I'm a student and my yearly income is only about 10% of what it would take for them to tax me, so I guess they figured I wasn't trying to hide anything. Still, from all of the horror stories I've heard I expected a whole lot worse.

Once I had to prove for a background check that I had worked at a summer job for a company that had since gone out of business. I didn't have my W2s but lo and behold a quick trip to my local IRS office, and they were able to print me out a copy quite efficiently. Got me the job I have now. Thanks, IRS!

rkajdi
Sep 11, 2001

by LITERALLY AN ADMIN
As someone who does his own long form by hand every year, I'm utterly baffled by how scared most people are of the IRS and tax forms in general. I think part of it is fear-mongering from the for profit tax return business, but just the idea that the IRS is going to come down on you like a ton of bricks only makes sense if you do things without documentation. Keep your forms and receipts, do things by the book, and there's nothing to fear from the IRS. It's only an issue if you lie on the forms or poorly document stuff.

Guilty Spork
Feb 26, 2011

Thunder rolled. It rolled a six.

Mo_Steel posted:

I expect a lot more of this coming up. It's a relatively minor thing, but why do conservatives hate the Post Office? I can send a piece of paper pretty much anywhere in the United States for under fifty cents and expect it to get there in less than a week. I can send a letter just about anywhere on the entire planet for about a dollar. I put it in a box outside my home and some guy in a truck shows up, almost daily, takes it, puts it on a plane or a boat or however the gently caress they deliver mail to Kenya should I be so inclined. For a dollar. How much more efficient could it possibly get, should they write the letter for me while I dictate to them?

I mean I probably know the answer is that the Post Office flies directly contrary to preconceived notions of government being universally terrible and thus is a sort of mental neon light disturbing the otherwise bland peacefulness of their broadly simplistic view of how society functions, but is there more to it than that?
There's this thing that government isn't perfect by any means, but Republicans have a way of making their notions about it being terrible and inefficient come true. Like, FEMA has never been awesome, but it was a hell of a lot better under Obama's appointee (an expert in disaster relief) than Bush's (a crony whose main field of expertise was in equestrian sports). The Postal Service is the one branch of the U.S. government that is pretty thoroughly successful, albeit partly because it's incredibly demanding of its employees. Apparently it's not enough to say "government sucks, and the USPS is the exception to the rule." Republicans have pretty blatantly sabotaged its finances, and despite that so far the big change is that they're planning to stop delivering on Saturdays. (Which sucks, but could be a hell of a lot worse.)

Blarghalt posted:

Someone on these forums, and I don't rememeber who, did some internet detectiving and found out that a lot of the Tea Party websites on the internet were started by people with a pretty long history of scams/spam.
The phenomenon of organizations scamming conservatives predates the Tea Party by a considerable margin. Charities for conservative causes can have "overhead" costs that gobble up more than 90% of donations, and conservative media is rifle with snake oil, couched in terms of "the cure THOSE LIBERALS :freep: don't want you to have."

Duncan Doenitz
Nov 17, 2010

There are four lights.
This wasn't actually shared/forwarded to me, just "liked" by a FB friend, and it's pretty much the purest YAL/Paulbot rant I've ever seen firsthand.

quote:

Reasons I'm spending today in silent reverence and contemplation, instead of partaking in regulated revelry for something that has long been squandered in this country; Liberty:

Such has been the patient sufferance of these states: and such is now the necessity, which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present government is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let the facts be submitted to a candid world.

The government has refused to assent to laws of the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

This government has allowed illegal immigration into the states to go unfettered which imperils the security of the populace of the states.

The government has endeavored to prevent the population of the states; for that purpose obstructing the laws of naturalization of foreigners.

The government has obstructed the administration of justice by refusing to abide by the original Constitution and Bill of Rights enacted by the people of the United States of America.

The current Government of the United States of America is operating outside the constitution from which it derives it's just powers to govern, and as such have ceased to be a just and legal government.

The government has allowed the Judiciary to rule unjustly without regard for the Constitution and the Bill of Rights of the people of the United States.

The government has allowed the Congress to erect a multitude of new offices and agencies, and sent said officers to harass our people and implement taxes to take away their substance.

The government has allowed the confiscation of personal property by redefining eminent domain to mean personal profit and more taxes to local government.

The government has denied freedom of speech and freedom of religion to certain religious groups in the states.

The government has enacted laws that deny the freedom of speech in private conversations as hate speech if held in a public place.

The government has enacted laws that tax the people without the consent of the people of the states.

The government has allowed the Judiciary the power to murder the lesser of us by the removal of sustenance.

The government has combined with others outside of the United States to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws, giving assent to their acts of pretended legislation:

For limiting our military effectiveness, and demonizing the forming of a legitimate militia by The People.

For imposing taxes on us without our consent

For the passage of trade agreements with foreign governments where the sole benefit is for those governments and corporations and not the states.

For the passage of agreements with foreign governments where the purpose is to subjugate the citizens of the United States of America to the laws of a foreign power, namely the United Nations.

For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering, fundamentally, our form of government.

For allowing a foreign entity, the power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever on a global scale.

For allowing a foreign entity to limit our access to the seas for sustenance, research and travel.

For allowing a foreign government access to intellectual property which could be detrimental to the safety and security of the people of the states.

For allowing a foreign entity access to information as to the population and gross domestic product (GDP) of the states.

For allowing a foreign entity to subject the populace of the states to its foreign agencies laws and regulations.

For signing the Charter of the Organization of American States which upon this action the people of the United States became subjects of a foreign entity.

This made the people of the United States subject to the laws of said entity,

This made the people of the United States subject to the payment of monies to said entity,

This made the people of the United States subject to the mandates of said entity,

This made the people of the United States relinquish their sovereignty to said entity.

The government has constrained our fellow citizens, taken their homes, made laws, which relinquished our right to bear arms,

The government has excited domestic insurrection among us.

The government is endeavoring to create laws and rules to remove our freedoms of speech, religion and peaceful assembly.

In every stage of these oppressions, we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms; our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A government whose character is thus marked by every act, which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the government of a free people.

It probably goes without saying that this guy is a white male. The Agenda 21 stuff is what put it over the top for me.

Dr. Arbitrary
Mar 15, 2006

Bleak Gremlin
I posted a picture a while back of an ad for audit protection that featured a young man that looked like he was college age.

I'm guessing that very few college students have anything to worry about in an audit. The tax company probably takes in a thousand bucks for every dollar they spend for audit defense.

gradenko_2000
Oct 5, 2010

HELL SERPENT
Lipstick Apathy





This is the first time I've encountered a conservative coming right out and saying "Yeah, I would have liked to go back to the 1950s. Much better times", along with a healthy dash of reverse racism and everybody's-already-equal

Mister Bates
Aug 4, 2010

gradenko_2000 posted:






This is the first time I've encountered a conservative coming right out and saying "Yeah, I would have liked to go back to the 1950s. Much better times", along with a healthy dash of reverse racism and everybody's-already-equal

Frog Act
Feb 10, 2012



Duncan Doenitz posted:

This wasn't actually shared/forwarded to me, just "liked" by a FB friend, and it's pretty much the purest YAL/Paulbot rant I've ever seen firsthand.


It probably goes without saying that this guy is a white male. The Agenda 21 stuff is what put it over the top for me.

Idiocy of content aside, the drooling retard who wrote this has no understanding of tenses. Or grammar at all, really. This is just technically infuriating (also regular infuriating).

Regalingualius
Jan 7, 2012

We gazed into the eyes of madness... And all we found was horny.




Fandyien posted:

Idiocy of content aside, the drooling retard who wrote this has no understanding of tenses. Or grammar at all, really. This is just technically infuriating (also regular infuriating).

Yeah. I honestly just gave up and scrolled to the end after the first few lines of grammatical fuckups. It's just... Why should I give a gently caress about your platform if you didn't take the time to make sure it's actually coherent to anyone that's outside of your echo chamber on the most basic levels?

Blarghalt
May 19, 2010

Fandyien posted:

Idiocy of content aside, the drooling retard who wrote this has no understanding of tenses. Or grammar at all, really. This is just technically infuriating (also regular infuriating).

I believe the point is to make it sound like a quasi-declaration of independence. Which it fails at on every level.

Fulchrum
Apr 16, 2013

by R. Guyovich

Batman: A sane, rational person whose ideas of normal human interactions and socialising should be emulated by others.

As a reminder, Batman has, no less than twice, had plans to kill everyone he has ever cared about.

Fulchrum fucked around with this message at 00:43 on Jul 5, 2013

Blarghalt
May 19, 2010

Conservatives love the Nolan Batman movies. No idea why! :v:

Vorpal Cat
Mar 19, 2009

Oh god what did I just post?
Ah yes the 1950s a wonderful time when no one was singled out as different for being gay, black, women, or communist. Why would anyone not want to go back and live in that magical decade :eng99:.

Fulchrum
Apr 16, 2013

by R. Guyovich

Blarghalt posted:

Conservatives love the Nolan Batman movies. No idea why! :v:

Didn't Rush Limbaugh spend an episode whining that Dark Knight Rises was a liberal ploy by Obama, because Bane was used to make people think about Bain Capital?

That was before we figured out there were far, far better reasons to whine about Dark Knight Rises

PoizenJam
Dec 2, 2006

Damn!!!
It's PoizenJam!!!

Blarghalt posted:

Conservatives love the Nolan Batman movies. No idea why! :v:

It's so intellectually dishonest because it's not even like the type of people who would repost that crap really care about working together 'as a united front'. I bet whatever conservative posted that would, in his next breath, curse unions and any other form of socialist 'working together' suggestions.

Mitchicon
Nov 3, 2006

Fulchrum posted:

Didn't Rush Limbaugh spend an episode whining that Dark Knight Rises was a liberal ploy by Obama, because Bane was used to make people think about Bain Capital?

That was before we figured out there were far, far better reasons to whine about Dark Knight Rises

Conservatives can't figure out whether to love those movies or hate them.

Handsome Ralph
Sep 3, 2004

Oh boy, posting!
That's where I'm a Viking!


So I've seen this gem of a website posted a few times today on FB...


http://fauquierfreecitizen.com/seventy-two-killed-resisting-gun-confiscation-in-boston/

The best part is the end, where they state

quote:

And this fellow Americans, is how the American Revolution began, April 20, 1775.


Yes, let's ignore the 15-20 years of context behind why said events happened and just chalk it up as "They came for our guns, so we took their colonies! Watch out Obummer!" :freep:

Mo_Steel
Mar 7, 2008

Let's Clock Into The Sunset Together

Fun Shoe

Handsome Ralph posted:

So I've seen this gem of a website posted a few times today on FB...


http://fauquierfreecitizen.com/seventy-two-killed-resisting-gun-confiscation-in-boston/

The best part is the end, where they state



Yes, let's ignore the 15-20 years of context behind why said events happened and just chalk it up as "They came for our guns, so we took their colonies! Watch out Obummer!" :freep:

Crash Course has been pretty decent about making basic historical concepts understandable in what amounts to a 10 minute time span, and they have a decent video about the general lead up to the Revolution:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eytc9ZaNWyc

I find the shock pen segments immensely corny but hey, you can't have it all in tiny bites of semi-entertaining history tidbits.

e: The 4th of July special is pretty amusing too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIoYdC1Gkq8

Mo_Steel fucked around with this message at 03:07 on Jul 5, 2013

VideoTapir
Oct 18, 2005

He'll tire eventually.

Dr. Arbitrary posted:

Maybe I had an unusual experience with the IRS but they were really helpful and kind to me in a situation where I had been VERY irresponsible with my taxes. They located every form I needed and a copy of all the related documents and mailed it all to me along with instructions.

Everyone I've met who has serious complaints about the IRS has seemed like they were up to some shady stuff.

Shady stuff like living overseas. FFS.

To be fair, the employees are helpful, it's the systems that are poo poo; and that is mostly either the fault of Congress, or a result of the IRS having been really on the ball re: computerization and therefore now being saddled with a bunch of awful legacy systems.

FCKGW
May 21, 2006

The first time I filed my taxes they sent me a letter saying I did it wrong and they fixed it and gave me another refund check of deductions I missed.

I loving love the IRS.

Pope Guilty
Nov 6, 2006

The human animal is a beautiful and terrible creature, capable of limitless compassion and unfathomable cruelty.

I want the healthcare equivalent of paying fifty cents to mail a letter across the loving continent in four days.

Push El Burrito
May 9, 2006

Soiled Meat

FCKGW posted:

The first time I filed my taxes they sent me a letter saying I did it wrong and they fixed it and gave me another refund check of deductions I missed.

I loving love the IRS.

I did mine wrong once because I did extra work for a company, and I owed them more than I thought. The next year they said "Hey, you owe us this much, so we're taking it out of your refund." and that was that. No big deal and totally my fault. My one and only time in 13 years of dealing with them that I've had an issue.

Dr. Arbitrary
Mar 15, 2006

Bleak Gremlin
If I could be king for a day, I'd have the IRS calculate your taxes and email you the forms all filled out. If you're okay with the numbers they came up with, do nothing and get a check in April. If you think you can do better, do the taxes yourself.

muscles like this!
Jan 17, 2005


My sister posted this really bizarre message on Facebook today

quote:

Just remember as we celebrate the 4th of July with our friends and family that FREEDOM ISN'T FREE! Take the time to thank a Vetran today. Even though we are celebrating the independance of our Nation, those Veterans are the ones on the front lines ensuring that we remain free. That we can still celebrate Independance Day. Thank you to all my friends and family that have fought to keep our country free.
Not sure where this came from as (other than our Grandfathers) nobody in the family has been in the service.

pig slut lisa
Mar 5, 2012

irl is good


Dr. Arbitrary posted:

If I could be king for a day, I'd have the IRS calculate your taxes and email you the forms all filled out. If you're okay with the numbers they came up with, do nothing and get a check in April. If you think you can do better, do the taxes yourself.

Congratulations on having a great idea that will never happen

Pope Guilty
Nov 6, 2006

The human animal is a beautiful and terrible creature, capable of limitless compassion and unfathomable cruelty.

muscles like this? posted:

My sister posted this really bizarre message on Facebook today

Not sure where this came from as (other than our Grandfathers) nobody in the family has been in the service.

Veterans... on the front lines? :raise:

VideoTapir
Oct 18, 2005

He'll tire eventually.
As though the term "front lines" has meant anything since Korea.

Mister Bates
Aug 4, 2010

muscles like this? posted:

My sister posted this really bizarre message on Facebook today

Not sure where this came from as (other than our Grandfathers) nobody in the family has been in the service.

Something similar to this has been posted by virtually every single person I know on Facebook, including most of my more left-leaning friends and all of the conservatives on my feed.

This includes my entire family - with one exception, anyway, and that's my grandfather, the only currently-living combat veteran in our family. We used to be a military family, see - three military families, in fact: my dad's ancestors fought for the Confederates in the Civil War and then for the US in several later conflicts up to WW2, my mom's white-side ancestors fought for the Union in the Civil War and then for the US in later conflicts up to Korea, and my mom's native-side ancestors fought against the US until finally being subjugated around the tail end of the Indian Wars. The last person in my family to serve was my grandpa, who enlisted in the Marines in time for the Korean War and participated in a lot of heavy fighting, including the landing at Inchon. He spent several months as a POW, was severely injured several times, lost a lot of friends, killed a lot of people, and ended up seeing the entire operation ending with things more or less exactly the same as they were at the start of the war. He left for Korea a cheerful, optimistic, gung-ho jingoist kid and came back a severely traumatized and jaded pacifist. His experiences and stories are one of the primary reasons that particular family tradition has stopped with his generation.

I have a great deal of respect for the men and women who sacrifice themselves by serving in the military, and that's why I will never participate in the creepy 'ARE TROOPS' worship the right indulges in. My grandfather told me that he finds it deeply insulting to be worshipped and fawned over for what he did, and I'm pretty sure his opinion is not unique. I make a conscious effort to just treat the combat veterans I know like normal people - my friends, my family, my classmates and coworkers, unique individuals with widely differing personalities and beliefs and experiences, all of whom have much more to them than 'was in the military once'. Were I in their shoes I'd loving hate being put up on a pedestal all the time.

Mitchicon
Nov 3, 2006

Mister Bates posted:

I have a great deal of respect for the men and women who sacrifice themselves by serving in the military, and that's why I will never participate in the creepy 'ARE TROOPS' worship the right indulges in. My grandfather told me that he finds it deeply insulting to be worshipped and fawned over for what he did, and I'm pretty sure his opinion is not unique. I make a conscious effort to just treat the combat veterans I know like normal people - my friends, my family, my classmates and coworkers, unique individuals with widely differing personalities and beliefs and experiences, all of whom have much more to them than 'was in the military once'. Were I in their shoes I'd loving hate being put up on a pedestal all the time.

Another problem is that, "Support Are Troops" doesn't actually mean poo poo. Look at the state of veteran's affairs, people just say those three words to make themselves feel like they're doing something. On top of that, the right quickly drops its pro-military angle the second a soldier is gay/non-christian/female.

Blarghalt
May 19, 2010

Not to mention they're always fighting for are freedoms. Like the only thing stopping the Taliban from sailing over here and overthrowing the government is all our wars all over the planet. Maybe people don't want to face the unpleasant reality that soldiers die for complicated and often pointless reasons, so they invent this romantic ideal of what soldiers do and why.

Soonmot
Dec 19, 2002

Entrapta fucking loves robots




Grimey Drawer
That Paula Deen thing I posted a few days ago was actually a toned down version of a post I made in response to an image macro. In the days sense it's gotten a pretty good number of direct replies that end up popping into my notifications. Nothing really special until just now:

quote:


Miguel Angel Miquel the term friend of the family is not a racial term . who cares what sheh said 20 years ago . it was a different time.


edit: \/\/\/I wasn't going to respond, but that is too good not to use.

I am now arguing with a friend over whether or not Jim Crowe laws were there to disenfranchise blacks after explaining what Section 4 of the VRA actually did.

Soonmot fucked around with this message at 07:47 on Jul 5, 2013

Shrecknet
Jan 2, 2005


Soonmot posted:

it was a different time.
:psyboom: It was 1993.

Bill Clinton was President.

Fishstick
Jul 9, 2005

Does not require preheating

Dr. Arbitrary posted:

If I could be king for a day, I'd have the IRS calculate your taxes and email you the forms all filled out. If you're okay with the numbers they came up with, do nothing and get a check in April. If you think you can do better, do the taxes yourself.

This is almost literally how online tax works in Belgium.
You log in to the taxonweb website using 2factor authentication which uses your electronic ID. Most numbers are filled in because they already have your income tax info from your employment and any registered property. You can then add some deductions like loans, and hit submit. It gives you a calculation on what your refund will be and asks to confirm again, and a few months later the amount is dropped in to your bank account. The whole process takes minutes.

VideoTapir
Oct 18, 2005

He'll tire eventually.

Tharizdun posted:

:psyboom: It was 1993.

Bill Clinton was President.

Are the Paula Deen defenders unaware of the 2007 incident, or are they deliberately lying?

SMILLENNIALSMILLEN
Jun 26, 2009



VideoTapir posted:

Are the Paula Deen defenders unaware of the 2007 incident, or are they deliberately lying?

It's a deliberate conflation of the issue to downplay it. Alot of the people saying are probably honestly ignorant of the real situation and just parroting what they've heard, it's not like everybody's idiot friends on facebook all thought of the same bullshit at the same time.

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Kat R. Waulin
Jul 30, 2012
Grimey Drawer

VideoTapir posted:

Are the Paula Deen defenders unaware of the 2007 incident, or are they deliberately lying?

Any attempt at enlightening them about her more recent offenses, either gets deleted or ignored.

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