Jun 27thMichael Jackson…

…The king of Pop sadly passed away. I know I am 2 days late in postign anything however I thought I should pop in here and do so. I won’t reiterate what everyone says about his music and how it has influenced people’s lives, countless numbers of performers and so on – it just goes without saying.
What pisses me off is that a slew of music stars, celebrities, TV hosts, radio hosts, newspaper reporters and so on are thumbling head over heels to sing him praises, and give testimonies of how great he was (and still is). You’re probably saying to yourself “why is this a bad thing, and how can it piss you off?” I’ll tell you why. It is because none of those people where anywhere to be seen when the sex scandal was going on a few years ago. Where was that outburst of emotion, support, display of what he’s done when he was being charged?
Nobody wanted to be anywhere within a spitting distance from Michael then, because it was not the cool thing to do. God forbid somene say something nice about him then. Now when it’s all “the cool thing to do” everyone is a friend of Michael’s, everyone loves him, everyone respects him and misses him (ok maybe not everyone but the vast majority of people and certainly 100% of the national media outlets).
I can’t stand the media all too very often, and it’s usually of bullshit like that.
As for me – I loved Michael’s music when it was the cool and the uncool thing to do. I always thought all those allegations against him were bogus and a way for parents to mooch off money because their kids happened to be taken care of by Michael. I was one of the few to love Michael when it seemed the taboo thing to do, and it pisses me off that all these fair-weather “friends” are popping up like ants at a picknick and the general population eats it up without a single thought.

Rest in peace Michael.

Mar 3rdThe Metrolink Crash in Los Angeles

Investigation finally turned up “stunning” results as of today. Apparently the people controlling the trains were texting. It took about 6 months of investigation to figure it out and confirm it apparently. The crash was in September 2008 – it’s March 2009 now. It took them 6 months to figure it out folks. That’s what I call efficiency. Call me simple minded if you will but it shouldn’t take more than half an hour: find out what the guy’s phone number is, get a subpoena for the phone records, using said subpoena check if there were text messages going in or going out at around the time of the crash. It’s not that difficult to figure it out.
I don’t even want to think about how much money and people time was spent on what knows what during those 6 months. So yeah good work on that!

Feb 25thThe Octuplets mom story ….

….needs to die out. It is seriously getting on peoples’ nerves (mine especially). The whole story is like a cockroach that will never die (much like Aniston’s break up – some people still talk about that to this very day). Every website in the known world seems to cover it day, after day, after day (I guess I am guilty of it now too – but I promise it’s just this once).

I can’t browse 3 consecutive web pages without getting a headline somewhere about her and her children, newspapers, magazines, you name it. Not to mention every single news channel, or news program on any channel for that matter. It’s crazy. I don’t care if she got 653 more children – good for her – bad for all the kids. I’d love to see how she will provide for all those children – you know like a good parent. Stuff like food, shelter, education (imagine a college bill multiplied by 14 – WHOO!). I know – maybe she’ll star in a porno and get that cool 1 mil! Who will watch it I honestly have no idea. Trying not to judge here but she’s not the sort of woman I like to see in my porn.

I don’t care if she got 3 or 7 liposuctions, or got her lips done, or got 3 sizes bust increase or who the dad (dads?) are and so on. Stop feeding this senseless story or it will consume us and she will become the “Time” magazine person of the year. My fear though is that it may be all too late to stop that now.

Feb 20thWhere is the money going?

I had a lot of time to think on what I wrote today during my ride home. I had all that time because it took me 52 minutes to drive 3.9 miles (to be honest it usually takes me 25 minutes on average). The biggest delay was a stretch of road that is 1 mile long that took me 30 minutes today. I could have literaly WALKED that distance TWICE for that same time. The reson behind that huge delay was that they’ve blocked off a large section of one of the main intersections – on Friday evening. Not that they were working on it – no. There was not a single worker anywhere in sight not to mention at work.

Once I was out of that stretch and was “speeding” with the rest of the traffic at neckbreaking 20 mph I was greeted by countless potholes, some of which are the size of Texas. So that got me thinking on where does all that tax money go. You know the same money that I am paying to the federal and state government – all 40+% of my income.

So I hope that closure does not turn into one of the other places I “have” to drive through in my neighbourhood like one of the freeway underpasses that has been 50% closed for repairs for the last 6 YEARS. Or my favorite freeway overpass that is a main arterie in that part of town that has been in repairs for the last 11 years. I keep hoping that it will be repaired by the time I die of old age so that I at least get to ride on the overpass in my casket in peace.

The potholes and miserable road conditions are the least of our problems. One would think that with so much tax revenue and the fact that we’ve run into the largest deficit ever we’d have something to show for it. I started looking at what do we have to show for it:

We certainly don’t have healthcare to show for. The condition of the US healthcare is miserable … and I am one of the few lucky people that have what is considered a “good health insurance”. So that’s not something we have to show for. I know – how about our University and school systems! Nope that’s not it either, they are just getting even more funding cut from them and they’re already in a miserable situation as it is. How about parks, the beach, public areas in gerenal? Nope that’s not it either becase at least around here all of those things are left behind and are slowly but surely deteriorating. So what is there? I thought and I thought and I could not find anything that pops in my mind. If any of you people thinks of something please let me know – I’d love to know what I did not see.

But wait there’s more ™ – There’s even more billions of dollars being pumped somewhere (I’d love to be more specific but can someone really show where all these money is going to and what results it brings) in bailouts after the previous bailout had near zero effect on the stock market, on the housing situation, on the economy as a whole. So there’s more good money thrown after bad with nothing to show for. Higher ups get more perks and bonuses and money to blow, while the average and lower class people get shafted yet again.

Feb 19thCalifornia Budget crisis “solved” …

Yes, today after a very long and tedious deliberation California finally has a budget for this fiscal year (if governeor Schwarzenegger signs it which I don’t doubt he will). What will it do – well in short do what we impeached Gray Davis mostly for – raise taxes.

I happen to live in Los Angeles where our sales tax is currently at 8.25% charged on pretty much everything people buy (food for the most part is “generously” excluded). With the budget’s tax increase of 1% and the soon to be effective 0.5% increase for the L.A. county our effective sales tax will be 9.75%. That’s 10% folks for us who round up and like to deal with easy numbers, but who’s counting.

I am your average Joe my effective federal income tax rate is about 23.9% a year (after deductions and such), my California income tax rate is 10.3% so after all is said and done when I receive a paycheck I have already been taxed 34.2%. That’s more than a third, now thanks to our brand new budget I will be charged another 10% on anything I buy, which is another income tax of sorts making my tax that I pay the federal government and state government a total of 44% give or take of my income. Does that sound crazy to anyone else?

I happen to come from a small eastern european country and we were under slavery about 100 years or so. My grandparents were being “charged” 10% flat on anything and everything they made. That was it – 10%! How does that compare to more than 4 times what I will very shortly be paying.

My solution for now will be the following – buy everything I need as much as I can from online retailers in other states and avoid the California tax. If more people do this it will hurt local businesses even more than they already are hurting, adding insult to injury. This in turn will keep prolonging or even worsening our situation. I would feel bad, but I have to look out for myself because obviously nobody else will.

The whole thing baffles me. I have a lot more to add to this but I need to take a breath and get back to my job so I can give Uncle Sam and uncle Schwartzenegger 44% of everything I make.

What do you think? Where do you stand? Voice your opinions!