Yesterday I took a stab at filing my 2009 taxes. I am not stating at this point that I've "done" my taxes because it turns out that I am not done - I tried using H&R Block's tax filing software this year instead of Intuit's Turbotax, my usual selection, and somehow ended up skipping past my state and local sales tax deduction. The IRS has already accepted my return, so once I have in writing that they will be issuing my refund for a specific dollar amount (the one my initial filing shows, I assume), then I will be mailing in a 1040-X to pick up the additional $50 or so I am owed back.

I hate this process. It's silly. Rep. Paul Ryan's Roadmap For America's Future contains a proposal for what amounts to a "postcard tax return" - a tax return you can do on a postcard, literally. Click the link and check it out, it's an interesting read.

On to the topic. Last year after filing my taxes I was able to come up with the profit figures of this blog. 2008 was a good year for it, turning in a return over expenses of 1948%. This year... not so much.

Paul E. Zimmerman.com did profit for 2009, but here's why the title I've given this post is an accurate description of the year:

Revenue...................$167.26
Domain registration...($34.95)
Profit:.......................$132.31

From 1948% in 2009 to... 378.5% in 2008. Ouch.

That's "ouch" relatively speaking, of course, since in and of itself, a 379% return is not bad at all. Considering how much I've slacked off on this blog over the course of 2009, I probably should consider it to be very good. This year I will remember to switch my domain registration over to a cheaper alternative, which will help. 2010 may still turn out to be an even leaner year despite that, however, as the major decrease in revenues is due to changes the blogging income sources I have relied on have undergone. The formerly largest of them, Pay Per Post, has gone through so many changes that it's hardly recognizable to me anymore, and the specific changes they've made do not inspire me to keep using them. The passive revenue streams I use (adgitize, project wonderful, etc.) continue to perform, but their performance has never been great in the first place, so they're not an alternative. That leaves me with one prediction for 2010 that will be accurate: tinkering ahead.

Here's a sample of what you'll have to look forward to if we go down the path of socialized medicine:

Industry crackdown on salt could save U.S. billions
CHICAGO (Reuters) – Working with the food industry to cut salt intake by nearly 10 percent could prevent hundreds of thousands of heart attacks and strokes over several decades and save the U.S. government $32 billion in healthcare costs, U.S. researchers said on Monday.

Eating too much salt is a major cause of high blood pressure, which the Institute of Medicine, one of the National Academies of Sciences, last week declared a "neglected disease" that costs the U.S. health system $73 billion a year.

Several governments including the United States are looking for solutions to curb salt intake as a way to head off future heart attacks and strokes that help drain healthcare systems.

[ Click here to read the full article ]
The article claims that the results of this project point to voluntary sodium reduction efforts producing greater results than a "sin tax" approach. This will result in bureaucrats selecting new taxes for things they deem "bad" over voluntary participation efforts every time, however. Why? It's simple:

1. This begins from the premise that whatever is good for the government and its programs is what is truly good; the desires of the government and the perpetuation of itself will always trump individual choice. Some other person's idealized notion of longevity will supplant your specific, personal tastes in food.

2. Voluntary programs do not create new tax revenue streams, but sin taxes do (until they destroy the thing being taxed, requiring the demonizing and taxation of yet another new threat, but that's another story). A socialized health care system will always require more money, and it will be helped by having to serve fewer people. The "better" method identified by this study will never be selected because it prolongs the lives of more people and doesn't raise any more money for the government.

Meanwhile, each and every one of us could just make personal decisions to watch what we eat and take care of our bodies. Personal initiative and responsibility, some of that liberty stuff. I know, sounds like crazy talk.

A majority of Americans think the federal government poses a threat to rights of Americans, according to a new national poll.

Fifty-six percent of people questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Friday say they think the federal government's become so large and powerful that it poses an immediate threat to the rights and freedoms of ordinary citizens. Forty-four percent of those polled disagree.

The survey indicates a partisan divide on the question: only 37 percent of Democrats, 63 percent of Independents and nearly 7 in 10 Republicans say the federal government poses a threat to the rights of Americans. [emphasis mine]

This finding makes me both happy and sad. I'm happy because a majority of those polled understand that our Federal government is out of control, that it is trashing our rights, and that it must be stopped. I highlighted the finding amongst independents because the clear majority there shows that this is not some mere partisan difference of opinion (despite the author's claim that the results do show one, unless he meant that most Democrats are in love with big government and statism). Most folks understand that the system we should have has been neglected, ignored, and broken. What makes me sad is that it's happening and the rising leviathan is real. I do still believe we can kill it though.

Now the really interesting part, who conducted the poll: CNN. I wouldn't say that those folks are known for stacking their polling groups with conservatives. Click here to read their entire article.

About 200 protesters threw rocks, bottles and gasoline bombs while riot police retaliated by firing tear gas into the crowds.

The U.S. has been paralysed by a 24-hour strike over new austerity measures being introduced by the government.

The current administration and Congress are attempting to reform the country's bloated public sector in the face of mounting national debts.

Actually, this story doesn't exist. Yet. I lifted this from an article I saw this evening about unrest in Greece. You can read it by clicking on this link.

I figured I could get away with substituting our nation with theirs because this look at their present is probably a glimpse into our future.

Two great victories for law abiding firearms owners in Washington state in one week. This is awesome!

The first:

The Washington State Supreme Court’s decision in State v. Sieyes
The Court ruled that the 2nd amendment does incorporate to the states via the 14th admendment. This is sort of redundant given our state's constitution, which in plain language asserts the right of an individual to bear arms, but it's a lovely slap in the face of anti-gunners in this state and everywhere. Hey, Kline, how did that feel?

The second:

Seattle Rule on Guns in Parks Struck Down
Washington state has a firearms preemption law, which means that county and municipal governments may not enact firearms regulations that are more restrictive than the state's. Several folks in Seattle don't see things that way and on several occasions they have tried to make further restrictions. Well, now they've been reminded in no uncertain terms that they cannot do that (and I imagine that Seattle parks are going to become a bit safer from now on).

I spent my morning today filling out little bubbles on Scantron forms. I hate doing that. It was necessary though because I was taking exams to add on to one of my commercial pesticide applicator licenses - call it career advancement.

Toward the end of one of the three exams, I found myself confronted by a question that I quickly realized was being asked as part of the exam not because it was important to know, but because the person(s) who wrote the test couldn't think up one last question to make an even hundred.

The question was something to the effect of...

"You are preparing a tank mix of pesticides when you are approached by members of the public. They ask you what you are doing, what pesticides you are using and how they work. Do you:

(A) Pretend that you don't speak English
(B) Tell them that it's top secret
(C) Spray them with pesticides until they go away
(D) Explain it all to them, and/or give them the name and contact info of your employer."

I kid you not, that was the question and those were the possible answers.

I think the whole thing was poorly written though. There should have been a fifth possible answer:

"(E) Both A and C are correct."

I haven't posted in a few days because a few days ago I thought my computer had a virus and I've been battling with it. I couldn't reach numerous web sites after deciding to try out Dungeons and Dragons online (my own blog being one of those sites I couldn't get to). They use some funky "download manager" software to distribute the game, at one point during the process my AVG software did stop a virus, and I was certain that it had wrecked my computer.

Turns out that I just needed to power cycle my fixed wireless dish. No virus, just some gummed up buffers somewhere. That was quite a relief to discover (I also deleted D&D online - it's awful).

Now that I'm back, I want to introduce you to an ideal replacement for President Barack Hussein Obama, this goat:

The goat had been steadily gaining a following on Facebook within the group, Can this goat get more fans than Barack Obama? At the time of this writing the goat has just shy of 227,000 fans. It has a long way to go to catch up with Obama in terms of Facebook fans, but the longer Obama is President, the more popular this goat will become.

If you think about it, the goat really is the ideal U.S. President. It can't talk, so chances are it won't try to tell you what to do. The goat also cannot write bad bills, so you'll have to figure out how to do things on your own, or team up with others to come up with solutions to problems rather than pretending that the government can fix things for you. Best of all, instead of signing terrible legislation puked up by our diseased House and Senate, the goat is likely to just eat the documents. Now that's a veto!

So vote goat! You could do worse (and a bunch of you did do worse).