Image Transcription:
An 8-panel Phoebe Teaching Joey meme.
The first panel is Phoebe from Friends saying "Russia".
The second panel is Joey from the same show replying with "Russia".
The third panel is Phoebe saying "has invaded".
The fourth panel is Joey repeating back "has invaded".
The fifth panel is Phoebe saying "Ukraine".
The sixth panel is Joey repeating back "Ukraine".
The seventh panel is Phoebe saying the completed phrase "Russia has invaded Ukraine".
The final panel shows Joey proudly proclaiming "NATO just started a proxy war".
This seems like a win/win/win. We have a huge stockpile of weapons we built up almost explicitly to fight Russia (if need be), and now it gets to be used against them. And it doesn't cost any American lives, which would make it seem like we're exploiting another country to fight for us. But we're not, we're actually helping them repel an invader, so we get to be the good guys while getting everything we want! If we stopped sending weapons, Ukraine would be screwed. So everybody wins except the Russian!
It's rare in this world that a situation like this comes along, and we should be able to feel good about finally being the good guys.
I'd like to opt out and take my portion of this expense as a income tax rebate please.
Firstly, we'll save a lot more money than that by auditing the DoD like Katie Porter and Jon Stewart keep advocating for. I would much rather take my portion of a DoD audit on my next tax return.
Secondly, would you like your next tax return to include shares in a Patriot missile system? Because I don't know about you, but I don't actually have any use for soon-to-be decommissioned weapons.
Were you planning on overthrowing the bourgeoisie with your share of those missile systems?
I was thinking if taking my family out to dinner. Maybe vacation, I'm not too sure what my cut would be.
Given that you're worried about income taxes, your cut is very small.
In the name of equality, my family share would be total cost / 331.9million * 3.
That's not how income taxes work (you already got paid a rebate for your dependents) and equality in taxation is not a thing you actually want.
I don't care what you call it. I want a rebate, covid money, bailout, stimulus check, of my family share of all the aid sent to Ukraine, as of June this year that's about $1,000 total and counting. That will cover a weekend trip to Big Sky this winter!
He couldn't handle Ukraine before the aid even started flowing, any American concerned now that Russia is a threat to the US is bonkers. The selfish ones are everyone in Europe who thinks the US needs to help Ukraine at all. There's no reason the US should be out spending the entirety of Europe combined.
Yep, I want my ski weekend. Europe is perfectly capable of preventing a nuclear armed Russia from marching over eastern Europe without my $1000. If Germany started marching all over Eastern Europe again, I might get slightly concerned.
Oh I'll have my ski weekend, multiple of them every winter no matter what. It would be really nice to get a tax return for once in my life since college. Oh! and watch the language little one, we are trying to be adults here.
Europe can handle Russia without a single dollar from the U.S. that is a fact like the Sun rises in the East. Until you can admit that, cope and seethe I guess.
Hey, I've invested in a gas generator and a upgraded AC system to battle the rising temperatures due to climate change so don't lecture me about discomfort. It's not cheap to remain comfortable.
Awe... sad day
Well, wish in one hand and shit in the other and let me know which hand fills up.
lol no shit. Maybe they can put "Sponsored by Luckyhunter" on some unnamed conscripts grave as a consolation prize.
I'd love it if I could sponsor a bomb or artillery shell, NGL.
No. Go sit in the corner Tommy.
Cool Id like to opt out of all the help you have recieved or will recieve. Please dont accept medicare or medicade.
Also please stay off the of the portion of highways that I payed for.
Thanx.
I will only use the government services I pay for, I promise. And I pay for every inch of road i drive on with my fuel tax so don't worry about that!
Actually you didn't. I paid for some of those roads and I want that money back!
Take it up with the people who you wrote the check too!
Then I call your debt to me for my portion of the taxes I paid for the highways you drive on, the social security you'll claim when your older, and the 12 years of public education we paid for you and your children....
What? Don't want to pay that back? Then stfu and deal with it. Taxes are paid for the services rendered (education, medical expenses, highways, etc).
After you pay for the services that money isn't yours, it's the government's. You don't get to tell other people how to spend their money. You choose to live in society so you choose to accept the services and their costs. The government uses this income, which is their money, and spends it how they see fit.
Don't like it? Too fucking bad. I didn't think I would have to explain basic middle school economics to somebody who's almost definitely a fully grown adult today.
My roads are paid for by my fuel tax, my social security (which I'm sure will never come back to me) is payed by myself now to get back negative returns later in life, and I pay for my children's education. I'd love to opt out of social security actually, they can even keep what I've paid in to date. You've contributed nothing to me actually, and the government isn't someone else or a corporation spending profit, it's all of us.
You're just proving more and more you don't understand tax theory and American economics.
What part is wrong? my fuel isn't taxed? I don't pay SS tax? I don't pay my kid's tuition? I'd love to know what phantom taxes I can stop paying.
You do realise that regardless of whether you pay tuition, public education taxes were still collected on the assumption your children would possibly go to public schools. Your taxes alone do not fund your SS. Your taxes alone do not fund the things you would have benefited or do benefit from in America.
That's why they're paid for with taxes. So you don't pay as much.
But I guess literal taxation theory 101, the fucking bare basics of tax theory, literally the simplest of the simplest concepts in economics was too difficult to conceptualise for you that you needed it stated plainly.
So to summarize, I'm forced to pay taxes on things I don't want, and wont use, so I don't pay as much.
And I don't know how you you think social security is funded, but as a business owner I fund mine 100% by my self, I'm forced to participate in a ponzi scheme with a negative rate of return under the threat of the full authority of every 3 letter federal agency.
"I'm forced to pay taxes on things I don't want" no
"And don't use" nope.
"So I don't pay as much" if you use them
Again you're fundamentally misunderstanding taxation. You're not paying taxes for those services (I mean, in a way you are but indirectly through cost of services) you pay for the benefits of living in society. You use public roads, you 100% cannot say you don't because that's near impossible in America. You use public roads, your utilities get sent through public infrastructure (even when provided by private corporations they utilise public infrastructure in 87.6% of cases), you 100% do use publicly funded services and benefit from taxation.
Anybody who honestly thinks they don't is fucking delusional.
So for these services and goods, you pay money to the government. Then the government uses THEIR MONEY (because it is NO LONGER YOUR MONEY) to pay for other things. Things you might not use, but it's not your fucking money. So you don't get to decide how they spend it. Because it is not your money.
Once paid, that is the government's money. Not yours. That's how capitalism fucking works. It's literal capitalism 101, I learned this in 5th, 7th, and again in 10th grade. Oh, right.... you didn't use public education..... guess you should ask the private school you sent your kids to for a refund.
Edit: A list of things you almost definitely use, even if only occasionally, that are funded by taxes
GOVERNMENT GETS THE MONEY FROM ME! GOVERNMENT IS ALL OF US! THAT'S THE WHOLE DAMN POINT.
Yes, I'm forced to pay taxes on things I don't use, that's just a fact. I don't understand why you'd waste energy trying to tell me otherwise since you are factually wrong.
Except I'm not. The only way I'm wrong is if you misunderstand how taxation works. You only pay taxes because you use the services of society. You literally cannot say you don't, it is next to fucking impossible not to if you have access to the internet in America. You 100% live somewhere that I can guarantee you benefit from tax funded programs. Meaning you are using the services. Those services have a cost, you pay taxes to cover the cost, they use THEIR MONEY (it doesn't matter if they get it from you, it is THEIR money after you pay it.... that's literally how capitalism works).
Also govt is not all of us. We are NOT a democracy. We are a republic. The govt is made up of REPRESENTATIVES that WE elect to REPRESENT us.
I honestly am surprised you managed to graduate high school given this is information we learn in elementary school. If you struggle with literal 5th grade civics, I'd hate to see how you did in 10th grade economics.
Edit: it's funny tho that the taxation is theft crowd is often the same ones to defend capitalism. Without capitalism taxation wouldn't be necessary as you'd decommodify those publicly funded programs. Commodification is a symptom and function of capitalism.
Fundamentally speaking, arguing for the abolition of taxation means you're advocating for something that began with the Communists.
I didn't say that. I said I'm forced to pay for things I DON'T USE. Not "I nEvEr UsE aNy Of It!" Wanting to opt out of social security is completely reasonable. School vouchers programs are in many great states.
Except you pay for those you do use. And then the govt uses the money you pay them for those things and funds all the others as well, because you've given them the money it is now their money to do with as they please. That's capitalism. You're arguing a point that's basically proving you don't understand capitalism and taxation theory.
Which doesn't surprise me, the American education system is one of the worst in the world.
That's not how social security and school funding works in the US. You really should stop, this is just silly.
I wasn't talking about only school funding and social security. I was talking about taxes. Now I'm very concerned about the quality of your education if you couldn't read and understand a three letter word.
I was. You went off on a general tax tangent and I was trying to keep you focused but failed.