Finally, An Up Side To Filing Tax Returns (Limerick)
By Madeleine Begun Kane
When paying my taxes great pains
Always shoot through my muscles and veins.
But for once there’s relief
From an oft taxing beef:
Schedule D won’t show capital gains.
Archive for the ‘Fiscal Policy’ Category
Finally, An Up Side To Filing Tax Returns
Monday, March 9th, 2009Rep. Hensarling Channels Rumsfeld
Thursday, February 26th, 2009Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) spouted these enlightening remarks on C-SPAN today:
I don’t think we can figure out how to outlaw recessions any more than we can outlaw tornadoes or outlaw hurricanes. … Economic growth has never gone in one straight line up. It goes in a zigzag line. It’s a part of freedom. Sometimes freedom can be messy. Sometimes freedom has reversals. But it certainly beats the alternative.
Just three questions for Rep. Hensarling:
1. Are non-democracies recession-proof?
2. Are you trying to make Governor Jindal look insightful?
3. If we fight to end the recession, do the terrorists win?
Oh, and please tell me who exactly is trying to outlaw recessions. Because that phantom person may just be the only living being who out-idiots Rep. Hensarling.
Mad Thought Of The Day
Sunday, February 8th, 2009Are Republicans insane? Their bombastic rants and stimulus bill obstructionism could easily lead to that conclusion.
But I think there’s a more basic explanation. Republicans are simply being consistent with their long-held GOP credo:
If at first you don’t succeed, make sure your successors don’t either.
No Quid? No Quo!
Thursday, January 29th, 2009I was glad to see that at least some House and Senate Democrats want to take back the economic stimulus package concessions they gave Republicans in return for what turned out to be a grand total of zero votes. After all, as my latest limerick says, “No Quid? No Quo!”
No Quid? No Quo!
By Madeleine Begun Kane
The stimulus bill was jam-packed
With concessions the GOP backed.
Yet the whole GOP
Nixed the bill. Seems to me
That the Dems should those changes redact.
Wall Street Journal Profiles Financial Poets … Including Me
Monday, January 12th, 2009Mary Pilon, of the Wall Street Journal, wrote a delightful article about financial poetry entitled Fannie, Freddie, Bear & Hard Times: Wall Street’s Collapse, Told in Rhymes. And I was delighted and honored to be one of several financial poets Ms. Pilon profiled in her article.
Banks To Taxpayers: Drop Dead!
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2008Rachel Maddow says “We should all become banks.” Why? Because all it takes for banks to get lots of taxpayer TARP money is a simple two page application. And the best part is that banks don’t have to account for the cash. (Bush’s Treasury Department requires no transparency or accountability.)
That calls for a limerick, don’t you think?
Banks To Taxpayers: Drop Dead!
By Madeleine Begun Kane
Where’s your money? You’ve no right to know.
Banks account for your dough? Ho! Ho! Ho!
We are rich and white collar —
Won’t help if you holler.
Go pester a unionized co!
Who Needs Oversight, When You’re Spending Money You Don’t Have?
Wednesday, December 3rd, 2008According to the GAO, TARP (the gazillion dollar Troubled Asset Relief Program) is seriously lacking in oversight. Why? Because of a single Senator’s anonymous block on the program’s IG (Inspector General) nominee.
Sen. Max Baucus, the fellow who made sure the TARP bill provided for an IG, isn’t too pleased. And that brings me to my latest limerick:
I’m never a person to carp,
But nobody oversees TARP.
One anonymous “hold”
Stopped the process out cold
Of confirming an IG who’s sharp.
Where’s My Personal Shopper?
Thursday, October 23rd, 2008After seeing Sarah Palin prance around in so much stylish, pricey-looking apparel, I wrongly assumed Alaska was so sort of fashion Mecca. But sorry, Alaska. It turns out that Palin’s $150K wardrobe hails from Saks Fifth Avenue in St. Louis and New York and Neiman Marcus in Minneapolis, all courtesy of the RNC and personal shopper Jeff Larson.
So here’s what I want to know: Does John McCain’s tax plan provide a $150K tax credit for personal shoppers?
Where’s My Personal Shopper?
By Madeleine Begun Kane
Gov. Palin, you’re taking some heat
For your clothing which, granted, is neat.
But with budgets austere
Why wear clothing so dear?
And just who are you calling elite?
An Ode To Crybaby Republicans
Tuesday, September 30th, 2008Even The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page thinks Republicans are crybabies about the bailout bill:
House Republicans share the blame, and not only because they opposed the bill by about two-to-one, 133-65. Their immediate response was to say that many of their Members turned against the bill at the last minute because Ms. Pelosi gave her nasty speech. So they are saying that Republicans chose to oppose something they think is in the national interest merely because of a partisan slight. Thank heaven these guys weren’t at Valley Forge.
An Ode To Crybaby Republicans
By Madeleine Begun Kane
Republican leaders assert
That the plan that attempts to avert
A depression just failed
Cuz Pelosi’s speech nailed
Bush’s failures — their feelings were hurt.
They are patriots first, they proclaim,
But when action’s a must they hurl blame,
Rushing out to condemn
“Hurtful” words from a Dem.
They treat critical bills like a game.
Ode To Corporate Vultures
Wednesday, September 24th, 2008Here’s my latest haiku (senryu) about the Wall Street meltdown and the $700 billion (or much more) Bush-Cheney-Paulson-Bernanke rip-off-the-taxpayers bailout plan:
Financial vultures
First gobble up our assets,
Then demand dessert.
Wham! Bam! No Thank You, Phil Gramm!
Thursday, July 10th, 2008John McCain and his economic advisor Phil Gramm should really get their stories straight:
John McCain’s campaign says in their new ad that the economy is “in shambles.” …
In an interview with the Washington Times, Gramm says the economy is in relatively decent shape — and much more.
“You’ve heard of mental depression; this is a mental recession,” he said.
Moreover, Gramm said: “We have sort of become a nation of whiners. …”
Naturally, Gramm blames our “mental recession” on the media. And that brings me to my latest political verse:
Wham! Bam! No Thank You, Phil Gramm!
By Madeleine Begun Kane
We’re “a nation of whiners,” says Gramm.
Our economy’s not in a jam.
It’s a “mental recession,”
This public obsession
With price hikes and jobs on the lam.
So who is at fault? It’s the press.
Yes, says Gramm, they have brought on this mess.
It would seem that reporting
The news isn’t sporting.
Vote McCain for continued “success.” [tags]Phil Gramm, Economy Verse, Media Poem, Campaign Satire, Election Humor, Vote McCain, Mental Recession, Nation Of Whiners [/tags]
Curb Your “Age Of Turbulence” Enthusiasm
Sunday, September 16th, 2007Poor little innocent Alan Greenspan is shocked, SHOCKED, I TELL YOU, by the Bush administration’s budget deficits and loss of fiscal discipline. What a shame that the brilliant Greenspan was never in a position to do something it about it and maybe even prevent it.
Oh … wait. Never mind!
So are you planning to run out and buy Greenspan’s self-serving, history-rewriting The Age of Turbulence? 
Curb Your Age Of Turbulence Enthusiasm
By Madeleine Begun Kane
Panning fiscal acts
He once endorsed, Greenspan feigns
Bystander status. [tags]Alan Greenspan, Federal Reserve Chairman, Political Memoirs, Fiscal Discipline, Bush Administration, The Age Of Turbulence, Budget Deficits, Self-serving Memoir, Innocent Bystander, U.S. Budget Humor[/tags]
Quote of the Day
Saturday, February 28th, 2009“The great irony of where we are today is that we had a Bush-Obama big-spending program that was bipartisan in its nature. We got big spending under Bush, now we’ve got big spending under Obama.” (Newt Gingrich as quoted by the New York Times)
Funny, but I could have sworn that Dick Cheney was Bush’s Veep.
Tags: Budget, Bush, Cheney, CPAC, Economy, Gingrich, GOP, Hypocrisy, Obama, Republicans Humor
Posted in Dick Cheney Satire, Economy Humor, Fiscal Policy, George Bush Satire, GOP Humor, Newt Gingrich Humor, Political Commentary, Quote Of The Day, Republicans Humor | Comments Off on Quote of the Day