h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Yes, GargleBlaster has very strong opinions! I haven't heard from BlueBottle since GargleBlaster jumped in and, eh-hem, expressed his strong opinions!

How is a flat tax unfair? If someone makes $30,000 per year and pays 25% income tax, he/she will pay less money than someone making $100,000 and paying that same 25%?!?!!? There used to be a "luxury tax" which was slapped on expensive cars, boats, furs, and the like, but the dealers of that expensive stuff complained that it was ruining their business so that tax was repealed. Sales taxes and the so-called luxury tax tends to hit the rich people the most. I do agree that people making minimum wage or close to it could be exempt from paying any tax, as they are today.

Are you near a park or something? Where do these foxes actually stay? What do they live on? I wonder if they would attach a cat, or would a cat attack them? My cat is fond of catching lizards in my backyard. She got one last night, unfortunately.

Besides lizards, the Southern US has a perfect climate for termites! I have seen mosquitoes that were almost 2 inches long!! That thing made me nervous!

The reason I regard flat taxes as unfair is an extension of your reasoning for those on minimum wage or close too it being exempt from tax.
Employing a flat tax scheme increases the tax paid by those in low income (but above the exemption threshold) and reduces the amount paid by those better off compared with a progressive tax scheme.

The current UK income tax figures based on a single person are :-

the first £4,335 tax free (personal allowance)
the next £1,500 is at 10%
the next £26,500 is at 22%
all income above that is taxed at 40%


As far as I know the foxes have made a home for themselves in a gap between the backs of two rows of garages, its about 6 feet wide and full of bushes.
They could attack a cat but both seem to avoid each other, since a cat would be able to inflict quite a lot of injury in a fight.
The foxes are mainly raid dustbins (trash cans?) although they will also catch rats mice or any thing else they can get at, its a good job no one round here keeps pet rabbits in their gardens or they would be a ripe target.

As we dont have a lot of lizards around here the cats tend to content themselves with catching birds.

I could deal with your tax scheme provided that the write-offs were eliminated. That is where the most of the unfairness and abuse is, in my view. I believe that the exemptions mostly benefit the very wealthy, so just by getting rid of the deductions they (the rich) would pay more taxes. I don't see the working poor taking advantage of tax write-offs and utilizing accountants to help them hide their income!

Do you have any form of social security over there? Social Security is what we call the program to give the retired elderly each month. It's a very small amount, and it doesn't come close to a private pension, but it's all that some of the old folks have.

Do the poor get free medical care in England? Do you have programs to give money and/or food to the poor? I have no idea what sort of welfare system (that's what we call it) you have over there. What about free or low cost day care for working mothers? We don't have that at ALL here.

Hey there Blondie... I was checking mail before jetting out the door when I posted that... I know that you have seen the banner.. On the note of bankers hollidays, I know those well. I was in contracted employ by a local bank. I did not work on any of the official federal/bank hollidays, but I was also not paid for those. Untill I was hired on by the bank I recieved no holliday pay at all. Banks also get the benefit of being closed on state and local hollidays too. On the official state holliday here in Utah (July 24) I did not work, but every other business in the state was open it seemed. Also the town "Founder" day was time off. There are ways around all the supposed rules for hollidays. I once worked for a company for two years and was never approved for vacation. I was required to take it before the year ran out if I wanted the benefit. But because I wished to take it during the x-mas shopping season (this was a retail job) I was refused. Every time I requested the vacation time I was denied for whatever reason. I later found out that the management refused *all* vacation requests. These two experiances have made me look at the benefits packages much more closely before taking a job.

Yes, every job is different it seems. I have learned that your boss can make or break a job, and that's why I insist on getting to know my boss BEFORE I took a new job. I worked in the corporate office of a MAJOR nationwide retail chain for almost 11 years. In fact, they moved me from NYC to Dallas when they relocated their headquarters down here. When it came time to move, the job market was a party for computer programmers/analysts. This was the spring of 1998. I insisted on meeting with my potential bosses, despite firm and generous offers on the table. I know that a b*****d for a boss can make no amount of money worth the hassle. To make a long story shorter, my current employer LIED about a bunch of things during the job interview, up to an including my direct boss. What really pisses me off is that I had asked the question, and had I been told I would have turned down the job offer at any price because I read this woman for what she is/was, a controling, insecure liar who would never let anyone working for her shine. Thank God I got out from under her, but it took a long time and I was actually physically SICK from the job. The job still sucks, but I'll stay until I have a good opportunity to move on.

P.S. Thanks for not mentioning last night's game. It CAN'T get any worse, that's the good news!

I heard on the news here that there are big protests of the fox hunts in Britain. I hope they don't shoot your little visitor!!

I was being nice...

Our social security sceme provides a lot of benifits for the less well off as well as a state pension payable to men over 65 and women over 60 everyone gets the same from the state scheme. its not a lot of money but its better than nothing.
In addition most people have pensions from their work or private pension schemes.
We also have a National Health scheme which means that you don't pay for medical treatment when you need it, but you do have to contribute towards the costs of drugs unless you are on a low income, instead we have to pay national insurance, which is deducted from your wages like income tax.

As for child care there are some schemes but they are not very developed yet.

There are big protests against fox hunting with hounds in the UK, there have been attempts to get it banned, with a bill being proposed in parlement.

As for shooting we don't have anything like as many guns over here, Handguns were banned completely a few years ago.

I've just found out that channel 5 are showing the games live (early hours of the morning here)

Well, are you gonna watch?!?! The game that begins in about 15 minutes is in DALLAS!! I would have gone, but the cheapest seats were $500 each!!

I'll respond to the other notes after the game!

I've got it on...
But it all depends on how long I can stay awake

I got as far as the end of the first period, then my eyelids won.
Well it was 2am here

Having finally caught up with the result on teletext.

Sorry to see the stars lost 2-1.

Oh s**t

It would appear the very act of me watching part of one of their games is enough to destroy their chances I see they lost the monday game 3 - 1

Hi Bloke! Sorry I have been absent for a few days. I have begun to work out again and at the same time I am "on call" for work and they have been calling!

Yes, my Stars are in deep doo-doo, they lost last night (I was called to work with 8 minutes left in the game, btw) and now they are behind in the series 3 games to 1. NJ just needs one more win and they get The Cup. The next game is Thursday night here, from NJ, at 8pm Eastern time. I guess that is Friday morning there?

So, I can blame YOU for this!!! Funny, just this afternoon my boss was asking me what's happening to The Stars. They are just not playing up to snuff. I can deal with losing, but they are not playing like they are able to. Now I that I know it's YOUR fault, I can go in tomorrow and explain!

Even if NJ wins on Thursday, it might be fun for you to see The Cup and hear about some of the traditions. It's very unique, and it's well over 100 years old. Each player on the winning team will get to spend a day with the Cup, and a chaperone goes along with to help prevent the dents that occurred in the past!!!

So what's going on otherwise over there? It's hot here. If you saw the beginning of the games broadcast here in Dallas you probably know that. Do you get our ESPN feed? Or do you have your own broadcasters? Perhaps you get the Canadian TV feed?

I remember when I used to be on call
Answering phone calls at three in the morning isn't easy when your brain is completly disengaged and it gets worse when you have to drive to site while still not awake.

I think channel 5 take their live feed from ESPN, it can get amusing as we have less advertising breaks so they keep flitting back to the studio commentators while ESPN go off to a break and the studio team are not always ready

As the games are on live they don't finish until 3:30 or 4am here so I can't watch the mid week ones, well I could but I'd be bugger all good at work
So your stars should free of the curse of baldbloke for the next game

As for whats going on over here
We have the European championships (Soccer!!!!!)
However I have a feeling that the England team won't do that well, I don't know why, but its the way I'm feeling on it at the moment.
It might well be an adverse reaction to all the hype thats going on in the press.

The other big news tonight come from your side of the pond, and what might happen to Micro$$$$.
Although as I understand it the legal process has a long way to go.

Over here the weather was a bit better today (it got as high as 22 C (72 F))
We have just had record rainfall in may and floods in the midlands and north (unheard of in May and June), a small tornado was spotted on the south coast yesterday, these are aparently not that uncommon but I've never seen one, don't worry they are nothing like as big as the ones you get in the states.

I see it worked,
They won

Now, let's see... our original bet was that the banners had to be up for two weeks after the Stars won the Cup... as the Stars have not won the Cup, has our obligation been met?

And alas, nobody gave the Devils much of a chance, but coach Larry Robinson worked wonders with that bunch. Which just goes to show what he might have accomplished in Los Angeles, had they made a commitment to picking up some talent sooner. Sigh...

GargleBlaster the Opinionated

OOPs and lost the most important one