April 15th, Tax Day!

Today is April 15th, the day that everyone knows as the last day to file your income tax forms. My accountant prepared my taxes a week ago, but because it is April 15th, I got to thinking about the people who purposely DON'T file their taxes because they owe money. I did some research and found out that people who are delinquent on their taxes, settle, on average, with the tax board for 30% of what they owe! And if they owe more than $100,000, the percentage drops to below 20%! Where as, those of us who are law abiding, follow the rules kind of people, pay 100% of what we owe. How fair is that? What if everyone that owes, settled for 30 cents on the dollar?? This is another example of how the law abiding majority pays for the law breaking minority.

Chas

Tent City and it's Future in Sacramento

For those of you that work and live in the Sacramento area, you are well aware of the number one issue that the city is having to deal with, the Tent City that the homeless in our area have created. Mayor Johnson has gone on record, regarding the Tent City issue, saying that he does not want for people to live in a "third world" environment and that a "Tent City" will ruin the reputation of Sacramento and possibly attract more homeless to come to Sacramento and live in a Tent City.

Sacramento's homeless population should not have to live in a third world environment and the sanitation issue at Tent City can be solved quite easily. Portable toilets and washing stations are and have been available for some time and are used quite effectively for temporary sanitation solutions at events and in times of emergency. I am sure that one of our local sanitation suppliers would be willing to donate their equipment and services providing that they get a tax write off for their effort. People, including myself, are donating to the people, "down on their luck", of Tent City, food, water, clothing, shelter and whatever else we can spare. Being that location of the homeless is known and they are not scattered throughout the city, it makes it easy to give, and giving to the less fortunate has it's own rewards on a personal level.

Yes, Mayor Johnson, we may have a Tent City and hundreds of homeless occupying it, but how one treats it's poor and less fortunate is a true measure of a civilized society. If done right, OUR Tent City can be a model for the country and the world to follow. And if our compassion helps to improve Sacramento's reputation, so be it, but that byproduct is only incidental to the greater good of helping our fellow mankind.

Mayor Johnson, do the compassionate thing and support the current Tent City. Put all of the other issues (ie entertainment, sports teams, etc) on the back burners or better yet off the stove until the MOST important things, Sacramento's citizen's issues, homeless or not, are resolved.

Chas. Fenner
3rd Generation Sacramento (Gardenland) Resident

Obama to help get rid of "Monkey Grass"?!?

On the Morning Joe show, Joe Scarborough in an interview with Steven Pearlstein from the Washington Post states that "...is he (Pres. Obama) going to get rid of Monkey Grass in your backyard..." first the New York Post with their "chimp" cartoon and now Joe Scarborough with a monkey reference towards President Obama, when is it going to end?? Racism is alive and well in the USA in 2009.

Chas

DTV Delayed Until June 2009

Have we become a country that cannot be counted on to do what we say we are going to do?

Today it was announced that the digital television switch that was mandated by the federal government to take effect on February 12th has been delayed until June of this year. The government stated that we are not ready for the switch. I fear that in the eyes of the rest of the world, we are going to loose even more credibility than we already have.

In 1975 Congress passed the Metric Conversion Act which "suggested" that the US start to use the Metric System (SI) as the preferred measurement standard. It set no time limit for the conversion and to this day, we are a nation of the Imperial System.

In 2004 the US finally decides to put a deadline in place at which all US citizens must posses a passport for international travel, December 2005. Later in 2005 the deadline was changed to December 2006. In September of 2006 the deadline was changed to January 2007. The current deadline is June 2009.

So this June will be a busy time for us. You will need to get a converter box for your rabbit ears, you will need to have your passport and what the heck, you will need to know your height and weight in Meters and Kilos.

All kidding aside, if you have ever hired a company or an employee and they promise to meet all of your deadline and at the last minute have an excuse on why they won't be able to, how likely are you to trust them when late won't do?

Chas

SCHIP Signed by Obama

Late yesterday Obama signed the SCHIP expansion into law which raises money for the children in need of health care who live at 200% below the poverty line . Besides the fact that most people don't know what the poverty level is and would be unable to calculate 200% of that number, all this does is to burdon one segment of the population for another. The bill increases the current 39% federal tax on a pack of cigarettes to 100%. For other tobacco products, such as cigars, it puts a 53% tax on each cigar with a maximum of $3. The funny thing about taxing tobacco is that if everyone quit today, where would the money come from? As many of you may know, Obama is a cigarette smoker. He kept it hidden during the campaign for fear of alienating voters. Don't get me wrong, I like Obama and voted for him, but be a man and fess up to your vices.

Chas

Emoji on iPhones outside of Japan

Greetings,
Yesterday while listening to one of my favorite podcasts, Macbreak Weekly hosted by Leo LaPorte, one of Leo's guests, Justine Ezarik from the blog "Tasty Blog Snack" had a great tip regarding enabling emoji on iPhones outside of Japan. For those of you who don't know what emoji is, it is little pictographs (icons) used in Japan as keyboard shortcuts to communicate quickly in text messages and emails. Check out Justine's blog to get complete instructions for enabling emoji. FYI: you will want to enable them BEFORE you update your iPhone to 2.2.1.

Chas