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Happy Tax Day! Don’t you just feel extra generous today? After all, today is the day where you get to give away so much of your money to the federal government so they can waste it on stupid programs...or $800,000 parties in Las Vegas! Do you have any charitable feelings today? Or have all the lies out of Washington and the White House’s class warfare just made Tax Day even worse than it usually is?
"There's a new study out. I believe it was a study done by George Soros that says that we feel charitable, we feel good. Tax day is a day that makes you feel good, that you actually do have that warm and fuzzy feeling," Glenn said.
"The report says that while most if not all taxpayers would prefer to hold on that their own money, there is some benefit to paying taxes. Economists generally assume that human beings get zero utility from paying taxes. That apparently means you get nothing out of it, but that's not true. This new -- this new study says that we believe that paying taxes helps others. You get some soft feeling out of it. You get -- we call this a warm glow. You feel good about helping others. Even though you don't get a direct monetary reward out of it," Pat explained.
Maybe that would be true...if you were totally tuned out and thought the government was spending your money wisely!
"We're getting a lot of waste, but there is something to be said for taxes. I have no problem with taxes, per se. We have to pay taxes. However, I do have a real problem with what our taxes are being used for. Any kind of happy feeling goes away when you think about the waste," Glenn said.
"I just feel annoyed, I mean, because we sit here and we look at these things every day," Stu said. He added he would have no problem if he knew the money was going to programs that worked, like the military.
"Well, for me it's actually worse this year because of all the lies, because of the class warfare that's going on, because of the spin that is continually -- I mean, every day the Obama administration has the American people under attack. Successful people are under attack every are under attack every single day and I'm sick of it," Pat said.
"I can't take the lies anymore. I really can't take the lies. It drives me out of my mind," Glenn added.
Glenn noted, for example, that there is an illusion being created by the White House that the wealthy pay less in taxes than the middle class - a blatant falsehood. The guys proposed paying Warren Buffet's secretary a million dollars a year and then asking her if she had to pay more in taxes or less - of course she will pay more!
Things have gotten so bad that a significant number of people are renouncing their citizenship over taxes. Newsmax reported that, much like Superman became a citizen of the world last year, a large number of American citizens are renouncing their U.S. citizenship.
Last year, almost 1,800 people followed Superman's lead, renouncing their U.S. citizenship or handing in their Green Cards. That's a record number since the Internal Revenue Service began publishing a list of those who renounced in 1998. It's also almost eight times more than the number of citizens who renounced in 2008, and more than the total for 2007, 2008 and 2009 combined.But not everyone's motivations are as lofty as Superman's. Many say they parted ways with America for tax reasons.
The United States is one of the only countries to tax its citizens on income earned while they're living abroad. And just as Americans stateside must file tax returns each April — this year, the deadline is Tuesday — an estimated 6.3 million U.S. citizens living abroad brace for what they describe as an even tougher process of reporting their income and foreign accounts to the IRS. For them, the deadline is June.
The National Taxpayer Advocate's Office, part of the IRS, released a report in December that details the difficulties of filing taxes from overseas. It cites heavy paperwork, a lack of online filing options and a dearth of local and foreign-language resources.
"Can you think of one thing you're happy the government is doing, they're doing right? Is there one thing they're doing right?"
Well, they got Osama bin Laden...and...more regulations...really expensive light bulbs...Solyndra...
Nope, not a lot of good things.
Feeling charitable yet?
Former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle KAMIL KRZACZYNSKI / Contributor | Getty Images
Two FBI agents investigate the assassin's rooftop Jeff Swensen / Stringer | Getty Images