By the Comics CurmudgeonWhat is the single most important event to have occurred in recent U.S. political history? If you said “the election of our first black president” or “the financial crisis and the associated large-scale government intervention in the financial markets” or “the various wars” you would be WRONG, WRONG, WRONG. No, the watershed moment in our current political life came earlier this week, when a bunch of jackasses protested a tax increase that won’t happen for years and will happen to other people when it does by aimlessly waving teabags at their elected representatives, or, when those representatives could not be located, at baffled passersby. Did any of America’s unrepentantly liberal elitist political cartoonists dare to draw cartoons that presented these so-called “teabaggers” as the heroes that they are, or at least acknowledge their existence?
For the most part, no, obviously. The following cartoon (click it and all others to make them larger) was the only one I could spot that addressed the burning teabagging issue:
Even this cartoon only vaguely mentions the “teabagging” concept in passing in banner form, and by referring to it as a “tea party,” reduces it to the comic image of a group of little girls and stuffed animals enjoying tea while sitting around an adorable tiny table, instead of giving it the strong, masculine image that the word “teabagging” inherently connotes. Anyway, the thrust of this cartoon is that it is LAUGHABLE HYPOCRISY for anyone protesting an existing law to comply with those laws while they remain on the books. Every teabagging protester should be burning his 1040 forms and all his receipts in a massive bonfire on the White House lawn, and then should try to kill the nearest cop, with his bare hands.
(By the way, “Don’t Tax Me Bro” is funnier than pretty much any teabagging sign I saw, with the possible exception of Obamurkel.)
So what did these awful cartoonists write/draw about when they should have been writing/drawing about TEABAGGING? Let’s find out!
Most cartoons contain some kind of visual pun or twist or allegorical image or interesting take on a common situation, but this one doesn’t do any of those things. Instead, its message is chillingly simple: “Doing your taxes will make you mad!” To bring that message home, it depicts a dude doing his taxes, and getting mad as a result! Pretty crazy, huh? I suppose keyboards generally don’t bend when you punch them, but that’s pretty much all that stands between this cartoon and mind-numbing realism.
Here is the thing, America. Doing your taxes basically involves two steps: doing math, and reading instructions. But because this is America, where everyone is ignorant, doing math on your own, instead of paying some egghead to do it, or using the terrible Tax Cut that caused Tim Geithner so much trouble, is considered something terrifying and dangerous, like the feats performed by circus acrobats. “Wait, how do I figure out what fifteen percent of this number is? I don’t know how to do percents! I MIGHT AS WELL HURL MYSELF INTO THE JAWS OF A LARGE ALLIGATOR, SINCE DOING MATH IS LITERALLY WORSE THAN HAVING MY FLESH TORN FROM MY BONES BY SAVAGE REPTILES!”
OK, so maybe the instructions are difficult to navigate, and surely the IRS bureaucracy lacks a gentle touch. But is the process of doing your taxes really the equivalent of a Kafka-esque nightmare, as this cartoon suggests? “Why do they make you feel so guilty here?” asked S. “Because you are guilty!” replied the functionary. “The moment you put pencil to paper to determine your tax liability, the moment you cast your first vote, the moment your drew your first breath, you were guilty. The tiniest cog in the machine is guilty of the worst crime that the machine commits, even if that crime is the elimination of the cog from the machine’s functions. Deep in your heart, you know this to be the case.”
Here is a hilarious cartoon giving wacky reasons why we aren’t filing our taxes! Its format totally isn’t borrowed from any other humor source, no sir.
{ 31 comments }
Oh balls, I’ve been so busy with teabagging I forgot to file my taxes.
Yah, the taxes thing…these morans. I am lucky enough to be employed etc and have a kiddie and a mortgage. I’m not one of those mathie types so I make sure Unca Sam gets his dough first because unless it’s Mrs Tommy wearing something naughty, I don’t like surprises.
End result…I get the nice size check back. Sheesh. What, Turbo Lover Tax says I’m in the 10-15% range.
George: I’m sorry I spanked your boy, Homer. Homer: Woo hoo! In your face, Bush. Now apologize for the tax hike.
Actually, most people don’t even have to do anything as complicated as “percents.” All you have to do is addition and occasional subtraction to get your taxable income, then they give you a printed table to figure out what you owe. At least they did last time I did my taxes on paper. Tax prep software makes it even more trivial.
Basically, unless you own a small business or do a lot of day trading or got a large inheritance, doing your taxes isn’t much harder than filling out a job application. And if you’re with-it enough to make one big folder or box labeled “TAXES” and put charitable receipts and 1099s and such in that box as they arrive at your house, it shouldn’t take more than an hour or two.
I never understood this “oh noes taxes is hard!” meme. I suspect it’s like golf jokes. Comic strips depend on golf jokes because cartoonists have a lot of free time on weekdays; comic strips think taxes are awful because cartoonists are self-employed and take home office deductions.
And The Onion’s format totally isn’t borrowed from
anybody else, no sir.
“Don’t Tax Me Bro”. I agree that that is far, FAR more clever than anything the teabagging douchetards came up with. And more timely as well.
And now for something completely different:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/glasgow_and_west/8003067.stm
[re=292969]Tommy Says Soooo, Jugdish![/re]: I’m with you. Even when I had capital
gainslosses to report, four years in a row, it’s not like they make you figure out or guess how to do it. They give you this thing called ‘instructions’ right there in the booklet (also available online!) The whole thing is pretty straight forward if you remember to chuck everything that arrives in your mailbox marked “Important Tax Document” in a box and then have it there when you fill out the 1040.BTW, what’s with the creepy avatar? Bring back the boobies.
I say, if you don’t pay your taxes, stay off my damn roads.
The maker of the second cartoon probably has a file of perennial themes with one picture and a rotating caption and probably just forgot to stick some clever populist trope at the bottom — because he glanced at it for three seconds while watching American Idol. Since I’m in a charitable mood I will contribute my own:
“It says here on WebMD that an inability to do simple math and having teeth bigger than your head are both symptoms of ass cancer. I blame the socialists!”
You missed the real Kafka-esque nuance in that second to last comic. Note that the cartoonist graphically accentuated the lawyer/accountant’s response by putting the word guilty in bold face. Now what you’d expect to be the normal inflection of that response is an intensification of the verb “are”. That is “they treat you like you’re guilty because you ARE guilty.” But in a gesture of intensity shifting worthy of Borges the cartoonist has the lawyer stress “guilty” as though it meant something slightly different than “guilty” as used by the audited tax-payer. And that’s the real Kafka twist, leaving the absurd tax-payer unsure even of what “guilty” means. Brilliant really.
[re=293010]Min[/re]: There was a token liberal protester at the Waco Tea Party that I snapped a photo of that I think you’d like. I want to marry that girl.
This satire video of Newt Gingrich is just priceless. He wants my tea bags, but not getting them!
http://www.governmentalityblog.com/my_weblog/2009/04/newt-gingrich-wants-your-tea-bag.html
[re=293008]Lascauxcaveman[/re]: I probably will. But the idea of Hitch being waterboarded gives me a moment of pleasure. I think it’s also an attempt to dispel every seeing a soapy Hitchens too.
Awesome. First Republicans thought they invented war, now they think they’re the first to discover taxes. I wish there was a bulldozer big enough to bury the “me generation” with.
[re=292996]chapka[/re]: No, not the same as golf jokes – it’s more malevolent than that. Complaints like these are often followed by “that’s why we need a FLAT tax.” As if progressive rates are the reason taxes are complicated. And stupid people, who would pay far more under a flat tax, fall for it.
Jesus, I’m self-employed, work out of my house, go to school and moved last year — six tax form altogether that took me about three hours to complete. My fellow Americans are a bunch of WATBs. Too bad they couldn’t work up any anger when Dubya and his cronies were looting the treasury to kill brown people and line Big Oil’s pockets.
[re=293016]InsidiousTuna[/re]: I saw that. A girl after my own heart.
[re=292969]Tommy Says Soooo, Jugdish![/re]: You are a big stoopy head becauz you let the guvermint use your own mony that you shud have for yurself.
[re=293019]Tommy Says Soooo, Jugdish![/re]: …the idea of Hitch being waterboarded gives me a moment of pleasure.
Well, that’s fine, we can all support that. But the picture looks almost like Sir Andrew Homo Lloyd Webber getting ready for some sexytime with his gimp, so cut that shit out, already.
Bring back Salma before I start an on-line petition!
[re=293016]InsidiousTuna[/re]:
A hot sarcastic socialist! Sign me up comrade.
My dad owns a small business, so the first few times I had to pay taxes, I used his accountant. Then, when I was filling out the FAFSA for college, I was looking over my old 1040EZ forms, and I said, “Dad, you payed HOW MUCH per hour for this?”
Math is hard. That’s why Barbie pays Ken to do her taxes for her. And by “pay”, I mean gently massage the small smooth lump of plastic where his gonads should be.
The question Josh is what percentage of Teabaggers are also Pluggers?
[re=293016]InsidiousTuna[/re]: She’s a keeper. We should all bring to the pick axe to hack up the tarmac, and mail the chunks to republican representatives (tarbagging?).
[re=292996]chapka[/re]: Taxes are hard…if you’re trying to hide your money in various losses abroad or something. Purchasing ageing Swiss locomotives for tax purposes! *That’s* hard.
The tiniest cog in the machine is guilty of the worst crime that the machine commits, even if that crime is the elimination of the cog from the machine’s functions. Deep in your heart, you know this to be the case
Dude. That was deep.
Also, what are you doing posting here when you’re “on vacation” from the Curmudgeon?
[re=293016]InsidiousTuna[/re]: “I want to marry that girl.”
Hopefully that guy holding the “Just Say No to Stop Lights” sign (behind her and to the left) didn’t beat you to it.
[re=293097]facehead[/re]: Yes, but we mustn’t use tap water to wash ourselfs after hacking up the tarmac. And no flushing, neither. Big Guvmint can keep their underground pipes and such.
[re=292969]Tommy Says Soooo, Jugdish![/re]: [re=293008]Lascauxcaveman[/re]: They even tell you how to do the hard math: Enter 85% of the total here (multiply the total by .85). The only reason I remember this is that I did my 1040 on April 14 in about 3 hours and my wife checked it over in another hour. I billed myself $200 per hour for the time spent.
Actually there are a number of bendable keyboards available now, just do a web search for “flexible keyboard”. Here’s one.
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