Random Thoughts on a Friday

Good morning and "thank God it's Friday" to everyone. A few random observations:

Was it really less than a week ago that the White House flew the Air Force One backup plane, with two military jet escorts, through the New York City skies for a photo op? Doesn't it seem a lot longer than that? The pace of the news cycle is mind-boggling.

Is it just my computer or does the Drudge Report refresh itself about every 30 seconds, just when I'm thinking about right clicking open a link? Every two or three minutes would be quite adequate!

Thanks to the pace of the news cycle, the item about the Obama aide who acted as a carrier for the Mexican Swine flu and got members of his family sick in Washington, D.C., has already faded from view. This was yesterday, I think.

Singer Tony Bennett has declared President Obama to be a genius and gifted orator, and that he's not only happy with everything Mr. Obama has done so far, he thinks all Americans should give the president a green light on everything he should desire to do. “He has such a great way of communicating, and his thoughts and his philosophies are just astounding,” said Bennett. “He’s impressing the rest of the world." My reaction? Maybe it wasn't only his heart Mr. Bennett left in San Francisco. This is so disappointing, as I've always liked him. I wish classy entertainers wouldn't go political in their old age.

As I have warned several times, that $13 extra per week that millions of Americans are getting in their paychecks under Obama's "Making Work Pay" provisions in the stimulus bill is going to come back to bite you next year at tax time. The Associated Press is now warning that the new tax withholding tables are too generous.

But new tax withholding tables issued by the IRS could cause millions of taxpayers to get hundreds of dollars more than they are entitled to under the credit, money that will have to be repaid at tax time.

At-risk taxpayers include a broad swath of the public: married couples in which both spouses work; workers with more than one job; retirees who have federal income taxes withheld from their pension payments and Social Security recipients with jobs that provide taxable income.

The Internal Revenue Service acknowledges problems with the withholding tables but has done little to warn average taxpayers.

Now that Congress has determined that this program "sunsets" in 2011, along with the Bush tax cuts, it should make for a real fun 2012!

I'll probably have something to say about the pending retirement of Supreme Court Justice David Souter when I have time to "give it a think." Meantime, I'm puzzled over the AP's description of Souter's role on the court: "Souter was firmly among the court's liberals. . . .Of the justices who occupied the high court's middle ground, Souter was the one most likely to challenge, in exchanges of written opinions, the aggressively conservative views of Justice Antonin Scalia." Okay, I give. Was he a firmly among the liberals, or one of those who occupied the middle ground?

Most likely, the reporter thinks they are one and the same.

It's May Day. Once upon a time it was celebrated with the winding of the Maypole as happy young people honored the mother of the Christ (May is dedicated to the Blessed Virgin in Catholic circles, if you'll pardon the pun). Then May Day fell out of favor as the international communist movement used it to celebrate the birth of a new type of totalitarianism. With the Soviet Union in history's dustbin, it would be nice to think we could restore the old celebration to common use, but I doubt if that idea will generate a lot of support.