Happy New Year! Now here’s your smaller paycheck

Hang on a minute here. The media and politicians said the “fiscal cliff” was avoided. They said taxes wouldn’t go up on the middle class. That was the whole point of the entire drama, right? To keep taxes from increasing, wasn’t that what it was all about? 

So why is my first paycheck of the year smaller? Why is more of my money mysteriously gone? I just kicked down my general manager’s office door and demanded to know why my salary had been cut. He said it wasn’t but now it will be to pay for the door.

I’m so confused. 

Oh. Wait a minute. Just did a Google search. Apparently taxes did go up. On everyone. Yeah, you see our “payroll tax holiday” ended and our illustrious representatives in DC chose not to extend it. I love that term, by the way, “tax holiday”. If the government steals less of your money for a temporary period of time they call it a “holiday”. Do you find that insulting? You should. Hey if I lined all of our politicians up in a row and started kicking them in the face repeatedly, then after a while I took a break to eat lunch and change my shoes, could I insist they thank me for giving them a face-kick holiday? Same logic.

Are we sick of being robbed yet? Are we tired of having our lunch money stolen by these bullying bastards? Are we fed up with hearing about all the programs and departments and wars and special interest groups that are “entitled” to our money and “owed” a portion of our livelihood? Are we officially sick of having food taken from the mouths of our children? 

I know I am. And I’m not sure where to go from there. I just know you have to start by realizing how pissed off you should be.