Mallard Fillmore, the dumb-ass Duck

[BiggJawn]

Uh, didn't "Dead-Eye Dick" Crash-Cart Tinman Cheney get 1.9 MEGABUX for a refund?

And what's worse, Getting 0 interest on $2,000, instead of .05%, or having to pay 27% to BORROW $2,000 because you sliced it too fine on the with-holding?

[Initech]

1. Mallard Fillmore = lame-ass cartoon

And what the asshole who draws the cartoon doesnt seem to get - nobody thinks it's funny! Maybe if you're a repuke who has no sense of humor... but still!

[Richard Steele]

3. No, there really isn't anyone who actually finds it funny, is there?

I suspect that it's "fans" find it a comforting source of validation
for their distorted worldviews, but I doubt they actually LAUGH at it.

[Initech]

8. Hard to say who would enjoy that crap, right?

Maybe the same people who find "New Yorker" cartoons funny...

[0rganism]

9. MF is the anti-Doonesbury

Compare right wing talking points opposite left-leaning societal observations, lackluster and obvious statements of dogma opposite subtle and clever developing storylines, and an utter lack of humor opposing Trudeau's razor-sharp wit.

[bunkerbuster1]

2. That's a great RW talking point

calling the majority of Americans who get a tax refund "idiots."

It reminds me of when I hear RWers dissing public schools (as in, "you're clearly the product of public schools)--when only 10% of American children actually attend private schools.

Keep it up, guys.

(BTW, of course it makes better personal financial sense to arrange your withholdings so's to owe the Feds a small amount on April 15. But I don't think it makes much sense to call people "idiots" for erring on the side of caution on these things.)

[endarkenment]

4. You have to pay at least as much as you paid last year or

you get fined. But I haven't even glanced at that stupid strip in years. Not even half funny. Ever.

[shoelace414]

5. What annoys me about people like this is they think

that nobody has any other financial situation other than their own. Some people use it as forced savings, because getting $40/mo doesn't mean as much as getting $480 in one swoop.

that and the government isn't some nebulous entity way off there..

WE ARE THE GOVERNMENT. THE GOVERNMENT IS US.

[seemunkee]

6. I would much rather get a refund

than pay the $2300 that I am this year

[teenagebambam]

10. Amen

[0rganism]

7. MF has a valid point, for once -- minor, but valid

The interest we miss by over-withholding isn't usually a big deal, but unlike most of the crap spewed forth by this incredibly unfunny cartoon, it's really happening. For most taxpayers who get refunds, it amounts to a portion of the previous year's salary deferred until the next year, and depreciated accordingly.

The year I bought my "starter" house, I "under-withheld" in order to get some additional financial leverage, as I was able to claim the interest on the mortgage payments as a tax deduction that wouldn't have shown up on the previous W-2. That's probably the only reason I'll ever have to do so.

[eppur_se_muova]

11. It would have been more obvious if it ran right after *'s tax "breaks"...

Remember that big tax refund that everyone got a couple of years ago -- which we quietly lost to **'s overspending? A lot of Americans were so happy about this it convinced them to put the Chimpster back in office for four more years. I think it's more a badly timed satire than anything.

FWIW, MF seemed to me to swing both ways -- attacking now one side, now the other. Haven't seen it lately, though.

[0rganism]

12. That big tax "refund" wasn't a refund at all

All that credit going to the chimpster, when it was really just a forwarding of a slightly increased deduction the taxpayers would have received anyway -- and, ironically, it was tacked on by the Democratic leadership to an otherwise top-heavy back-loaded tax cut schedule for the ultra-rich. The thanks the Dems got? An increased GOP majority in both houses and the re-election of the Worst President Ever.

In all fairness, I can't claim to have read a large sampling of MF, but every single one I have read has been an attack on prominent Democrats, labor unions, federal trade regulations, etc. Tinsley especially dislikes taxes in any form, and in this cartoon makes the taxpayers themselves out as excitable dimwits.

[eppur_se_muova]

13. That tax "refund" was actually what I was thinking of...shouldn't have

said "breaks". And yes, a whole lot of people seem to have been fooled by it.