The-Asterisk

No, I am not talking about the Republican answering machine that repeats the same tired message over and over and over. Well... maybe I am. Republicans are always talking process, Democrats are always talking about how great things will be. Which goes over better: "No, you can't have a candy bar and besides, it is right before dinner and you are already too fat"? Or this: "Sure, you can have another Snickers. We are having kale for dinner, and since you won't eat kale, the candy won't spoil your dinner"? The face of the right is Newt Gingrich, John Boehner, Eric Cantor and Paul Ryan (pushing Granny over the cliff.) The impressionable 'yoots' of America see Ann Coulter as a caricature of herself and Sarah Palin has been rendered a into holographic cartoon character. Is anyone on our side even the least bit cool? Even the highly respected Clint Eastwood was reduced to wacky curmudgeon status after a one stand-up bit at the Republican Nation...

If you go back 40 years and follow the progression of taxes, rates, brackets, loopholes, dodges, etc., it becomes readily apparent that people don't like to pay taxes and will do just about anything to avoid them. It also is true that the middle and lower classes (i.e. the famous 50%) pay very little income taxes. Back in the 1950s and 1960s, everyone paid around a 20% effective tax rate regardless of what bracket they were in. Jealousy and greed kicked in when Congress decided to make the wealthy pay more for wages over $1 Million. Corporations pushed back by capping wages at $1 Million and providing deferred compensation to make up the difference. Thus began the fulfillment of the law of unintended consequences to where today we have CEOs and other corporate leaders making hundreds of millions of dollars, and the same group of people is still jealous. . I personally think that everyone should pay some taxes so that they have at least a little skin in the game of funding our...

I'm no Alton Brown , but I have a quick and easy recipe for a fluffy omelette that I kinda, sorta made up. It is really tasty and not hard to cook, which is a prerequisite for any kitchen adventure on which I embark. First, the ingredients: Eggs Optional ingredients: Cheese Tomatoes Lobster (or other meat) So here's the deal. I use one of those non-stick skillets that has a curved side so that I can flip the omelette.  This is the skillet that I use  (and no, I didn't pay that much for it. It was part of a set.) You take your eggs (my omelette today had 5 eggs) and separate the whites from the yolks. The yolks can go into a small bowl, but the whites need to go into a mixing bowl. Since we used cheddar cheese this morning, I dumped some shredded cheddar onto a cutting surface and just chopped the cheese up until it was in small little pieces which makes it better for quick melting. I then poured the cheese into the yolks and mixed them together into a thi...

Watching the Sunday morning news shows today, it amazes me the perspective of Dems vs Republicans. Rep. Chris Van Holling (D-MD) was on Fox News Sunday with Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH). The juxtaposition between the left and the right could not have been clearer, nor could it have been more stark. Van Holling shook his head in disgust at Jordan's assertions on the budget as well as gun control. "Balanced" this, and "comprehensive" that... everything to him is a compromise. They all pine for a bi-partisan resolution to disagreements. That is how progress is made, isn't it? It is only fair to give a little for the American people, right? What we are really seeing is the math of the Democrat Two-Step . It is a variation of the famous "one step forward and two steps back" but in this case it is "two steps forward and one step back" with a twist. While Republicans are pragmatic and are quite happy to leave most things as they are, the Democrats alw...