One of Michelle’s readers emailed her a drink recipe to get the debate party started.  Or, well, to calm your nerves as it would be in my case.  The ingredients are:

Amaretto
Cranberry
Orange juice
Rum
Nutmeg

Drink up and hope it’s all better in the morning!

Let me start this post out by saying I AM NOT A TAX EXPERT. 

That said, I decided to take a fairly quick look at Obama’s tax returns.  I easily found 2006, so I took a look at those to see just how much of Obama’s wealth is being spread around.  Obama and his wife made $983,926 in 2006.  After deductions, etc, they paid $277,431, or just over 28% of their total income. 

If you look closely at the deductions, the three big items are made up of about $60K in mortgage interest, $60K in charity, and $48K for state and local taxes. 

Now, here’s where the “I’m not a tax expert” line comes into play.  If Obama REALLY believes that he needs to use taxes to spread the wealth around, why did he make those huge $120K in voluntary deductions (the $48K deduction in taxes is totally legitimate because no one should have to pay taxes on taxes already paid)?  I mean, he even took the $60 phone excise tax which fully comes right off the top of what he owed.  That’s $60 SOMEONE BEHIND HIM could have had!

Let’s take a look at how much he cost some poor family because he decided to deduct his mortgage interest and charitable givings.  If he would have just taken the $10,300 standard deduction, the $48K in state/local taxes, and $4,400 in exemptions ($1,100 per 4 person family), he would have paid $311,457 in taxes instead, or just over 31.5% of his income. 

That’s just over $34K that he kept out of government coffers.  If he REALLY believed in his “spread the wealth through taxes” program, why didn’t he just let the government keep that money to set the example?

We have a little insight into Obama’s reading list:

Yes, this is a real picture taken by Doug Mills of the New York Times in May 2008.

In case you can’t read it, the title of the book is The Post-American World by Fareed Zakaria.  The first line of the book is, “This is not a book about the decline of America, but rather about the rise of everyone else.”  Read the description of the book and judge for yourself.

H/T: one of the many emails from Mom

These ACORN people keep getting on television and arguing about how they are looking into voter REGISTRATION fraud, not voter fraud.  One spokesman reiterates that ACORN has NEVER been accused of VOTER fraud EVER.  Well, the voters they register might not intend to vote more than once, but these people sure seemed like they wanted to.  Michelle has a GREAT article, and you should read it all.

These people intended to commit VOTER fraud.  However, voter REGISTRATION fraud can be just as bad.  Yeah, maybe Mickey Mouse will be turned away at the door, but with the network of fake IDs out there for illegals, someone could register a legitimate name at a legitimate address and go vote many times.  That’s not to mention the students in Ohio who have been ENCOURAGED to vote in both Ohio and their home states.