Up For Getting Screwed Again?

Up for Getting Screwed Again?

Got this from a client

This isn’t political, although if you don’t like my politics, you’ll have to learn to stomach them.  In fact, let me take a moment right here to clarify where I stand for those whom this kind of thing is important. Politics is part of my history, I’m sad to say. I ran for Congress once and came in second. I learned a lot during my two year campaign. I learned that neither Republicans nor Democrats have your interests at heart or give a rats a## what you think. Neither side can be trusted. I love the old saying, “To tell when a politician is lying, watch for his lips to move”. As far as I’m concerned, every time they open their mouths, a lie comes out.

Whatever your political leanings you’re probably opposed to paying more taxes to make life easier for a big, profitable company that pays millions of dollars in bonuses to it’s senior executives. The company I’m talking about today is the beloved J.P. Morgan, probably not near and dear to your hearts.

J.P. Morgan was recently penalized many billions by the U.S. government (that’s billions with a B) for mortgage lending abuses.  This is not unlike two thieves calling each other names, but let’s save that for another post. Today, lets concentrate on the ludicrousness here (real word).

Remember back to 2008 when the mortgage lending debacle hit the news, tore our economy to shreds and dug a hole we are still trying to crawl out of?  You may also remember that bailing out the banks with trillions of dollars wasn’t exactly a popular move. Certainly it wasn’t with me. They crammed that down our throats. You may also remember that a lot of that money was paid out in bonuses to the very managers who guided their companies to break the law and get their companies into the trouble they were in. In other words, they were getting bonuses for screwing up. And your money paid them. But they did it. And so did the government. So we have to live with it.

Now they’ve been penalized for the illegal acts they performed in the process. Normally, penalties and fines are not tax deductible. Also apparently, according to the link below, some people and some companies, particularly Wall Street Companies, can get away with deducting penalties because the government looks the other way. Which means they are actually screwing you again with the complicity of the government.  (By the way, I’m not claiming that any of that money found it’s way into the bank accounts of politicians, but that would be interesting to know.)

The link below takes you to a petition to make sure J.P. Morgan pays their taxes without being allowed to flaunt the law.

Take a look. Follow your conscience.

http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/no-4-billion-tax-break-1?source=s.em.mt&r_by=9391940