[
Dear IRS,

Enclosed is my 2004 tax return showing that I owe $3,407.00 in taxes.
Please note the attached article from USA Today, wherein you will see
the Pentagon is paying $171.50 for hammers and NASA has paid $600.00
for a toilet seat.
I am enclosing four toilet seats (value $2400) and six hammers (value
$1029), bringing my total remitted to $3429.00.
Please apply the overpayment of $22.00 to the "Presidential Election
Fund," as noted on my return. You can do this inexpensively by sending
them one 1.5" Phillips Head screw (article from USA Today detailing
how HUD pays $22.00 each for 1.5" Phillips Head Screws is enclosed for
your convenience.)
It has been a pleasure to pay my tax bill this year, and I look
forward to paying it again next year.
Sincerely,
A Satisfied Taxpayer !!!!!!!!!!!
]

On Wed, 18 Jan 2006 00:22:38 -0500, Cliff
wrote:
Dear IRS,
Enclosed is my 2004 tax return showing that I owe $3,407.00 in taxes.
Please note the attached article from USA Today, wherein you will see
the Pentagon is paying $171.50 for hammers and NASA has paid $600.00
for a toilet seat.
I am enclosing four toilet seats (value $2400) and six hammers (value
$1029), bringing my total remitted to $3429.00.
Please apply the overpayment of $22.00 to the "Presidential Election
Fund," as noted on my return. You can do this inexpensively by sending
them one 1.5" Phillips Head screw (article from USA Today detailing
how HUD pays $22.00 each for 1.5" Phillips Head Screws is enclosed for
your convenience.)
It has been a pleasure to pay my tax bill this year, and I look
forward to paying it again next year.
Sincerely,
A Satisfied Taxpayer !!!!!!!!!!!
===============
Some, but not all, of this is cover for "black programs." It
shows the danger of allowing these hidden costs/programs as it is
no longer possible to tell if the US taxpayers is getting
gouged/ripped off, and/or by whom.

At the core Congress is at fault for not having the cajones to
insert non-fungabality and geographic limitation clauses in all
the authorization/appropriations bills, and not demanding
separate authorization/appropriations bills for the at least the
functions [think matrix organization structure] if not the
individual agencies.

It is wisely said that if we don't get what we want, we get what
we deserve.

Uncle George

On Wed, 18 Jan 2006 19:49:23 GMT, zadoc wrote:

But after the Second World War, under the pressure of the Cold War,
expenditure on the military grew, grew so enormous in fact, that half
of all Federal spending was for the Department of Defense. And it is
of course, kept going. As some of you may know, the Brookings
Institution actually did a retrospective study of spending by the
United States on military weaponry, and on the military, and concluded
that in current dollar terms, the United States since the Second World
War has spent roughly $24-trillion on the military, with roughly
one-third of that alone going just for nuclear weapons.

The neocons may have spent more dollars (not constant dollars)
on their wars than WW-II cost ....
--
Cliff

"zadoc" wrote in message
...
So what is it all being spent on? Well, as it happens I was listening
to an interview with John Kenneth Galbraith on Radio National [which
is also Radio Australia] a couple of days ago...

snip

As much as I like the old codger, take that with a big grain of salt. The US
budget is a cornucopia for anyone who likes to cook with statistics.

If you take the whole US budget, including Social Security, military
spending runs around 19% of the budget. For comparison, Medicare (our
medical insurance for seniors) is 13% of the budget. Medicaid, which is
medical insurance for the poor, is 8%. Social Security is 21%. (These are
the New York Times figures, which are respected in the financial community
and in other places where people really want to know what the numbers are,
and aren't trying to use them for propaganda.)

But Galbraith is old, and remembers when we didn't count SS in the budget
(pre-1965, I think). In those terms, if you accept the (probably twisted)
statistics of the anti-war crowd, military spending in total looks like 48%
of the budget. I seriously doubt if it's that high.

So, pick the numbers you want to fight with, and go for it. Just keep in
mind that no one will believe any of it. g

--
Ed Huntress

Major major problem is that the Federal Budget/annual report is
no more, and most likely much less, reliable than was Enron's.
The old joke about embezelement hold true -- The horses never
come in but the auditors always do [although lately these seem to
have been apointed by the bankruptcy courts].

I have to go no -- got to get another layer of sandbags over the
bunker while theres still time.

Uncle George


On Wed, 18 Jan 2006 21:03:16 -0500, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:

"zadoc" wrote in message
.. .
So what is it all being spent on? Well, as it happens I was listening
to an interview with John Kenneth Galbraith on Radio National [which
is also Radio Australia] a couple of days ago...

snip

As much as I like the old codger, take that with a big grain of salt. The US
budget is a cornucopia for anyone who likes to cook with statistics.

If you take the whole US budget, including Social Security, military
spending runs around 19% of the budget. For comparison, Medicare (our
medical insurance for seniors) is 13% of the budget. Medicaid, which is
medical insurance for the poor, is 8%. Social Security is 21%. (These are
the New York Times figures, which are respected in the financial community
and in other places where people really want to know what the numbers are,
and aren't trying to use them for propaganda.)

But Galbraith is old, and remembers when we didn't count SS in the budget
(pre-1965, I think). In those terms, if you accept the (probably twisted)
statistics of the anti-war crowd, military spending in total looks like 48%
of the budget. I seriously doubt if it's that high.

So, pick the numbers you want to fight with, and go for it. Just keep in
mind that no one will believe any of it. g

On Wed, 18 Jan 2006 21:03:16 -0500, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:

"zadoc" wrote in message
.. .
So what is it all being spent on? Well, as it happens I was listening
to an interview with John Kenneth Galbraith on Radio National [which
is also Radio Australia] a couple of days ago...

snip

As much as I like the old codger, take that with a big grain of salt. The US
budget is a cornucopia for anyone who likes to cook with statistics.

If you take the whole US budget, including Social Security, military
spending runs around 19% of the budget. For comparison, Medicare (our
medical insurance for seniors) is 13% of the budget. Medicaid, which is
medical insurance for the poor, is 8%. Social Security is 21%. (These are
the New York Times figures, which are respected in the financial community
and in other places where people really want to know what the numbers are,
and aren't trying to use them for propaganda.)

But Galbraith is old, and remembers when we didn't count SS in the budget
(pre-1965, I think). In those terms, if you accept the (probably twisted)
statistics of the anti-war crowd, military spending in total looks like 48%
of the budget. I seriously doubt if it's that high.

So, pick the numbers you want to fight with, and go for it. Just keep in
mind that no one will believe any of it. g

And paying interest on the rapidly rising deficits? Don't
forget to repay the borrowings from the Social Security system.
And as interest rates rise ...

See "Allocating $5.6 Trillion Surplus 2002 - 2011"
"Overview of the President's 10–Year Budget Plan"
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/usbud...nt/budiii.html

"Unfortunately, this 2001 view of the world proved far removed from
subsequent budgetary reality."
http://www.cbpp.org/9-7-04bud.htm

"In Fiscal Year 2005, the U. S. Government spent $352 Billion of
your money on interest payments* to the holders of the National Debt.
Compare that to NASA at $15 Billion, Education at $61 Billion, and
Department of Transportation at $56 Billion. For the current FY06, at
$133 billion, it's already the third largest expense of our budget!"
http://www.federalbudget.com/
--
Cliff

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 08:06:30 GMT, zadoc wrote:

The experts and Gailbraith know far more than we do
about such statistics,

[
Last updated: 01/19/2006

John Kenneth Galbraith

Field: Finance

Info: Economist

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date of Birth:
Current Age: 10/15/1908
97
]

He retired in 1975.
This seems to be 2006 ....
--
Cliff

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 08:06:30 GMT, zadoc wrote:

I don't have time at the moment to chase down construction and
maintainence cost for the joint US/Russian space station but I do know
that many think it hasn't justified its construction and the money
could have been far better spent elsewhere.

Don't worry. Under the neocons the US cannot even get a
dependable payload up there anymore it seems.

And who canceled the SCSC after it was almost finished?
http://www.cato.org/pubs/briefs/bp-016.html (scroll down)
Who stopped almost all of the LASER ignition facility
(National Ignition Facility) construction & research?
http://www.aip.org/fyi/2005/100.html

WHY does a certain party so hate science & things that
are not faith-based (not counting wars here, folks)?

OTOH It looks like China's plans for a manned Lunar base
may have slipped out to 2020 ...
http://www.astronautix.com/articles/china.htm

BTW, China just had a record year .... IIRC Their
government just collected more in taxes (Communism, you see)
than the neocons spent all year on their wars ... just barely.
--
Cliff

"zadoc" wrote in message
...

Note that Galbraith wasn't talking the figure for a single year, it
was for all years since WW2. He was also quoting the Brookings
Institute and obviously believes their figures or he wouldn't have
quoted them.

Of course. All economists quote the figures they believe.

But, as Harry Truman used to say, what we need is some one-armed economists.
"My economists are always telling me, on the one hand, but then on the other
hand..." g

The experts and Gailbraith know far more than we do
about such statistics, and I, for one, see no reason to question the
estimates.

As someone who spent nearly a year of his life researching for some articles
on world trade, talking daily to top economists in and out of government, I
wouldn't believe any estimates from any of them.

Galbraith is (was, actually) an expert on price theory, price controls,
monopoly and oligopoly, and theories of money. That's enough to put on an
economist's late for a lifetime, but it's still a very small slice of
economics.

Others probably will, but I suggest that anyone who wants
to question them carefully read, or listen, to the full interview.

After all, Gailbraith has far more experience, and more Ph.D.s, than
anyone on this group.

He's too old. His last book (I've read most of his books) was the work of a
somewhat enfeebled man. It made me sad, because I enjoyed his writing more
than that of any other economist.

There is much better introductory writing today on economics for the layman.

But Galbraith is old, and remembers when we didn't count SS in the
budget
(pre-1965, I think). In those terms, if you accept the (probably
twisted)
statistics of the anti-war crowd, military spending in total looks like
48%
of the budget. I seriously doubt if it's that high.

I don't. I've heard about the $500 toilet seats before, and thought
the figure was higher than that actually.

You heard that around 25 years ago...or you did, if you were listening at
the time. It's now ensconced among the legends of economic polemics in the
US.

What you're actually looking at is artifacts of accounting. There are
hundreds of them. Toilet seats and hammers became journalists' favorites
because they produce a resounding thud when used in an article.

However even a $600 toilet seat sounds extravagent to me. Let alone
the hammers at $171.50. Still, have seen a whole _lot_ of surplus
gear that struck me as vastly overpriced.

Of course. I used to have a WWII National Radio Jeep transceiver, that I
kept just to look at. The entire inside of the thing was silver plated. g

If any reader isn't convinced, and the US military is still disposing
of their surplus gear by bidding list, lay your hands on a few and
check the cost pricing. They used to send them out for nothing on
request.

I think most of us here have been doing that since we were little kids. I
quit when I decided I had enough junk.


So, pick the numbers you want to fight with, and go for it. Just keep in
mind that no one will believe any of it. g

Some on this group would disbelieve [or believe] anything which
confirmed to their wishes and preconceptions. :-)

Most would.


And paying interest on the rapidly rising deficits? Don't
forget to repay the borrowings from the Social Security system.
And as interest rates rise ...

When you pull enough together to produce a fresh idea on the American
economy, let us know. Right now you're dabbling with the playthings of
propagandists and polemicists. They aren't for beginners.


I don't have time at the moment to chase down construction and
maintainence cost for the joint US/Russian space station but I do know
that many think it hasn't justified its construction and the money
could have been far better spent elsewhere.

Many can be gathered to claim that expenditures on anything could have been
better spent elsewhere. It's a national sport.

--
Ed Huntress

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 07:43:15 -0500, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:

But, as Harry Truman used to say, what we need is some one-armed economists.
"My economists are always telling me, on the one hand, but then on the other
hand..." g

It is always irritating to the "suits" (who always have the "one"
right answer) to realize that many circumstances are so complex
and fluid that there is no one "right answer," and given the
interrelatedness of the world, indeed no single condition, but
rather only a single aspect they are concentrating on at the
time. Remember the seven blind wise men and the elephant....

As someone who spent nearly a year of his life researching for some articles
on world trade, talking daily to top economists in and out of government, I
wouldn't believe any estimates from any of them.
Right on!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

For one thing the estimates aren't even consistent. For example,
one countries exports must be another countries imports, thus the
total of global imports and global exports must sum to zero,
which they do not from the published figures. Are we sending
this stuff to Mars?

The assumptions economists make in order to mathmatically
represent and analize economic activity are real howlers. My
favorate is "assuming zero transaction costs." A close second is
"Assuming perfect information." I can assume that my aunt has
some cajones too, but that dosen't make her my uncle, and she
never will be.

Uncle George

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 01:27:21 -0500, Cliff
wrote:
snip
And paying interest on the rapidly rising deficits? Don't
forget to repay the borrowings from the Social Security system.
And as interest rates rise ...
snip
Those whom the gods would destroy they first make proud....

Our governmental policy makers while chanting the ever popular
"free market -- free market --" have set the interest rates [too]
low to ostensibly "stimulate the economy," but in actuality to
minimize the amount they must pay on the ever growing [ain't
compounding wonderful] national debt.

As has been discovered many times over the last 5,000 or so years
you can control the price [in the case of money/capital --
interest] or you can control the supply of a commodity, but you
can't do both.

We now have the situation where many people quite rationally have
decided that savings is non productive [indeed, you have a
negative return for most investments when inflation and "tax
affect" are considered].

Uncle George

In article , F. George McDuffee
says...

We now have the situation where many people quite rationally have
decided that savings is non productive [indeed, you have a
negative return for most investments when inflation and "tax
affect" are considered].

It does seem that 'investing' or 'saving' means that one does
whatever one can, to minimize the loss of value of ones assets.

IOW you can't win, you can't break even, you can't get out of the game.

Jim


--
==================================================
please reply to:
JRR(zero) at pkmfgvm4 (dot) vnet (dot) ibm (dot) com
==================================================

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 07:43:15 -0500, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:

I used to have a WWII National Radio Jeep transceiver, that I
kept just to look at.

My 62 Mercedes 220SB had shortwave, 7 bands IIRC.
Signal seeking with the usual AM-FM .... I MISS that radio.
Radio Moscow, Voice of America, BBC, Radio Havana, ....
--
Cliff

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 10:43:25 -0600, F. George McDuffee
wrote:

one "right answer,"

It's lies & more guns, right?
Gunner, Strider & Stewie will give me Gold Stars.

This stuff is GOOD: http://www.goldstarchili.com/history.asp
--
Cliff

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 11:08:02 -0600, F. George McDuffee
wrote:

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 01:27:21 -0500, Cliff
wrote:
snip
And paying interest on the rapidly rising deficits? Don't
forget to repay the borrowings from the Social Security system.
And as interest rates rise ...
snip
Those whom the gods would destroy they first make proud....

Our governmental policy makers while chanting the ever popular
"free market -- free market --" have set the interest rates [too]
low to ostensibly "stimulate the economy," but in actuality to
minimize the amount they must pay on the ever growing [ain't
compounding wonderful] national debt.

Look at how fast that will rise with rising interest rates ...
(going from almost zero interest) and then subtract that
from the federal taxes collected .. what's left?
--
Cliff