Delusional pseudo-journalist writing for the Los Angeles Times must think he’s getting a tax cut or something

In an article oh-so cleverly titled, Anti-Obama Taxpayer Tea Parties steeped in insanity, Marc Cooper, a member of the “digital news media” asks:

What, exactly, are the protesters protesting? The marginal tax rate rising 3% for millionaires?

After an introduction where we are told that Tea Party protestors are tin foil hat-wearing, model glue sniffing, black helicopter types (followed by a charge that Glenn Beck, Neil Cavuto, and Sean Hannity are “pseudo-journalists”) we get to the, er, meat of the story:

So, if you’ll excuse the mixed metaphor, what’s the beef behind today’s protests? The Obama administration is cutting taxes for all except the very richest of Americans. Reduced withholding is already showing up in millions of paychecks.

Um, Marcy Marc, reduced withholding is not a tax cut!  Sorry to shout, but you seem extraordinarily dense.  If you weren’t a ‘pseudo-journalist’ yourself, you could have done a little, you know, journalism and checked your facts before you hit the keyboard.  Which involves a modicum of  research (not too much mind you, we wouldn’t want you to work too hard. We know things are tough at the Los Angeles Times and throughout La La Land).

To be fair, I’ll even give you a bit of a break for your own lax “journalism” because the White House Website has not been updated since the never ending Obama-Biden campaign, so it’s not a reliable source. 

Anyhoo, reduced withholding is exactly that…reduced withholding.  I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that you are one of the “workers” whose paycheck went up a bit after April 1st.  Listen carefully.  Your taxes have not been reduced.  Your tax bracket has not changed.  Dittoes for the “95% of Americans” who, like you, have been duped into thinking they got a tax cut.

Here’s a little advice for you and them -  If you are not guilty of earning more than what Obama deems “fair” and have a whopping $13.00 a week more in your paycheck, and are used to getting a “refund” at the end of the year, don’t count on that “refund” this time next year.   Not only is it likely that your “refund” (or  “loan to the Treasury”, which ever you prefer) will be significantly less, you could actually owe taxes at the end of the year because too little was…hold on for this…withheld… from your paycheck.   If you still don’t get it, here’s how actual journalists at the Wall Street Journal explain it:

As the Review-Journal’s Jennifer Robison pointed out in her coverage of the move a couple of weeks ago, "Because the tax break is coming from your withholding, you’re essentially getting April 2010’s refund now, spread out week by week for the remainder of 2009. That means you probably won’t get a big lump sum a year from now. And depending on your situation, it also means you could end up owing Uncle Sam. Check with your accountant or your human-resources department if you’re concerned about your 2009 tax liability."

Far from owing less to Uncle Sam 54 weeks from now, your tax liability will be unchanged, but (depending on how it usually works out for you) either your refund will be reduced, or you may actually have to send in more money.

Fail to do so in a timely manner, and you’ll owe interest … just as if you’d gone out and borrowed the $600 from one of those payday loan stores.

You may draw your own conclusions. As for me, I conclude that Obama has been shamelessly lying to the American people. Presumably that includes you.

By the way, Mark, I’m not a journalist or a pseudo-journalist. I’m just a news-junkie Mom who enjoys the blogosphere and knows how to use Google.  I also have something which “journalists” should have, namely curiosity and a thirst for knowledge.  To put it in the kindest possible terms, one should Trust but verify, as a certain former President used to say.  Now, I may be preternaturally skeptical, but my “trust” is limited to my friends and family (and that motto one finds on our currency); I sure as hell don’t take a politician’s word for anything.

One final point, regarding this idiotic statement:

But are common folks actually going to dump Earl Grey into Santa Monica Bay because they are outraged, simply infuriated, by the marginal tax rate rising 3% for millionaires?

Who cares about whether tea is being dumped?  What I want to know is this –

Do you think that every couple or small business owner who earns $250,001 or more a year is a millionaire?  Because if you do, your employer, the Annenberg School for Communication at USC, must be suffering from a serious brain drain.

UPDATE:

1.  WOW.  It’s a confederacy of dunces.  Pseudo-journalists at CNN are peddling the same lie about tax breaks, and in a shocking display of ignorance and arrogance, apparently think it’s their duty to ‘educate’ a tea party protester (and his debt-ridden baby) about how grateful they should be that their State (in this case Illinois) is getting taxpayer-funded Stimulus Bucks.  How does that help Michelle Obama’s the protester’s children?

2.  Heh. It just occurred to me that a better headline for this public service announcement may have been: Beware of tax cuts in The Sheeple’s clothing.

3.  Hmmmm. Do I detect a note of skepticism from Sam Stein at HuffPo?

4.  Karl notes for Patterico  and the Green Room at Hot Air:  “Marc Cooper, director of Annenberg Digital News at the Annenberg School for Communication at USC, also professes his ignorance reagrding the point of the tea party protests.” And goes on to say [He and others]  “have the resources to easily discover the point of the tea parties.” 

5. I modified the headline slightly in the interest of clarity.  I’m not a journalist so I can do that.

6.  Quin Hillyer weighs in here with unflattering comparisons to dogs and dog poop and calls him a “stuck-up prig”.

7.  D’OH. Corrected stupid error on my part. You could owe taxes if too little not too much was withheld from your paycheck.   Which is what I meant to say!

8.  UNREAL!!   This Annenberg School of Journalism that Marcy Marc works at is really something! They actually arrest journalists who ask questions. Gee,  I wonder if they got an advance copy of Janet Napolitano’s report for DHS on dangerous right wing extremists.