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.
Are 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.
It looks like the Senate may end up passing a stimulus bill that’s smaller (spending-wise), larger (tax-cut-wise), and far less likely to work than the bill passed in the House.
I don’t know about you, but I’m sick and tired of Senate Democrats letting Republicans blackmail them with the mere threat of a filibuster. Here’s a thought: Instead of caving in to GOP demands, how about telling them to go filibuster themselves?
Find out if they’re bluffing. Make them work for all those concessions. Let the American public see GOP venality and obstructionism in action!
And that brings me to my latest verse:
Hey Republicans, Go Filibuster Yourselves!
By Madeleine Begun Kane
Dear Republicans, stop all your bluster—
Your obstructionist taunt: “Filibuster!”
Just go through with your threat.
Dems, please make these guys sweat,
And we’ll see what support they can muster.
I am betting they don’t have the numbers,
That they’re bluffing. (Dems let them — the bumblers.)
But majority rules
When they don’t act like fools.
Dems, we need a good bill. Don’t be fumblers!
(Updated first paragraph for clarity.)
I 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.
Rachel 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!
According 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.
After 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?
Even 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.
Here’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.
For some reason, blithe Dana Perino’s blasé response to a question about Bush’s $2 trillion Iraq war reminded me of two things:
1. Bush’s false claims to have inherited a recession from Bill Clinton; and
2. Bush’s vow to “solve problems, not pass them on to future presidents and future generations.”
And that brings me to my latest haiku:
The White House isn’t
Concerned about the war’s cost.
Isn’t that special?
Poor 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]
In an apparent reversal of his anti-tax-increase position, Bush is expected to use this week’s State of the Union address to announce tax increases for some workers whose employer-provided health plans cost significantly more than the national average:
Read His Lips: Tax The Middle Class
By Madeleine Begun Kane
George Bush has at last found a tax
That he’s fond of and backs to the max:
If your boss pays big bucks
For your health plan, the crux
Of Dub’s scheme is your taxes will wax. [tags]Bush Tax Increase, Health Insurance, Middle Class Tax Increase, Health Plans[/tags]
Every time I start thinking the press may finally be doing its job, I run across another example of media laziness and gullibility.
For instance, the record shattering August U.S. trade deficit received minimal coverage, almost as if it were a non-event.
Yet many “journalists” seemed all too eager to report, unchallenged, Bush’s “halving the budget deficit” claim, though this assertion is patently false.
But perhaps I’m not being fair. Cause let’s face it, Bush style accounting could improve just about anybody’s budget. Think how rosy yours would look if, with the flick of a black pen, you moved major expenses (housing? energy?) off budget.
And now it’s time for a limerick duo:
Trading On Fiction
By Madeleine Begun Kane
The trade gap is higher than ever.
Will Republicans fix it? No, never!
Yet the GOP yells:
“The economy’s swell.”
Don’t forget to click “Dem” with that lever.
Budget Reality Gap
By Madeleine Begun Kane
The deficit’s halved, claims George Dub.
But it’s gone way, way up. There’s the rub.
Yet the press prints and buys
Georgie Dubya’s big lies.
Once again, hard reality’s scrubbed.
For your reading (and viewing) pleasure:
* Norm at OneGood Move brings us the always hilarious Lewis Black.
* Skippy brings us a Kerry cahones video. (Now he grows a pair?)
* From Kevin Hayden, GOP’s Top Bloggers Abandon Ship, While Remaining in Denial.
* From Don Davis, Top Ten Things The Bushies Are Saying Behind The Evangelicals’ Backs.
* From The Talking Dog, an interview with Dr. Steven Miles, medical professor at the U. of Minnesota, and author of “Oath Betrayed” discussing medical complicity in torture, prisoner abuse, et al, in the war on terror.
[tags]Deficit Spending, Budget Deficit, Trade Deficit, Trade Gap, Press Humor, Gullible Journalists, Budget Lies, Off Budget Items[/tags]
Mad Kane (Madeleine Begun Kane) is a writer, musician, and "recovering lawyer." She won the Robert Benchley Society Award For Humor and enjoys writing limericks, song parodies, and current events haiku.
You can email her at madkane@madkane.com, visit her non-political humor blog, or stop by her home page.
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Tough Negotiators, Those Bushies!
Thursday, March 19th, 2009I practiced law for over a dozen years and negotiated lots of contracts. And, unlike the Bush administration, I always kept my poker face. Why? Because if you want the best possible deal, you must make the other party think that he needs you more than you need him.
So, for example, when you tell banks that they’re too big to fail, you disincentivize them from cooperating, or even telling you the truth. That’s why I’m not surprised that 13 of the “top 23 private recipients of taxpayer-funded bailouts under the $700 billion program” enacted by the Bush administration “owed more than $220 million in unpaid federal taxes” and that they lied about it on their TARP contracts.
Why bother being honest? After all, it’s not as if Bush’s Treasury Department made them back up their statements with actual tax records. Of course not — they were too big to fail.
This brings me to my latest limerick:
Tough Negotiators, Those Bushies!
By Madeleine Begun Kane
Dear bank, we can not let you fail.
You’re too big. Pay no mind if we wail
That you owe us back tax.
Do not worry. Relax!
Cuz that huge bailout check’s in the mail.
Tags: Bailout Humor, Banks, Bush, Contracts, Law Satire, Legal Humor, Lies, Negotiating, Paulson, TARP, Taxes, Taxpayers, Treasury
Posted in Banking Humor, Ben Bernanke, Business Humor, Corruption Humor, Crime, Economy Humor, Fiscal Policy, George Bush Satire, Henry Paulson, Law Satire, Paulson Plan, Political Commentary, Political Limericks, Political Verse, Politics Satire, TARP Humor, Tax & Budget Humor, Tim Geithner | 4 Comments »