The saving grace of it all is that even the President and Vice President must also pay their taxes. So how much did they pay? And how much did they earn?

According to Y! Buzz, the Obamas’ earned a combined income of over $2.6 million in 2008 and paid upwards of $1 million in taxes. That’s light years ahead of the Bidens’ income. They earned a measly $270,000.

So how did the Obamas’ manage to rake in that much moola? Simple: Obama wrote two books, you may remember “Audacity” and “Dreams”, which accounted for the majority of his income last year.

Now you can rest easy tonight knowing full well that the President and Vice President suffered just as much as you did if not more.
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Rush Limbaugh, in all of his mumbled wisdom, believes that the AIG bonuses shouldn’t have been taxed.  But what he fails to appreciate is that the money allocated was wasted.  Yes, normal bonuses shouldn’t be so heavily taxed, but perhaps the bonuses shouldn’t have been paid at all.  And maybe, those funds could have been used more proactively.

It’s also disappointing that the government didn’t have a provision to prevent such misuse of the bailout money.  But I suppose that’s simply politics as usual.  At any rate, I applaud the taxation of these bonuses.

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O.J. didn’t kill his wife and her “friend”. Bush didn’t lie to the American people about WMD’s and the Iraqi invasion. And the Sasha and Malia beanie babies aren’t named for Obama’s daughter. If you don’t believe those first two falsehoods, then you certainly shouldn’t believe the third either.

Ty, creators of Beanie Babies, claim that their latest dolls named “Sweet Sasha” and “Marvelous Malia” are in no way based upon Sasha and Malia Obama. Yeah, right!

According to an AP story, the naming of the two dolls was not an intentional attempt to mimic Sasha and Malia:

“[Ty] chose the names because ‘they are beautiful names,’ not because of any resemblance to Malia and Sasha Obama, said spokeswoman Tania Lundeen.”

“There’s nothing on the dolls that refers to the Obama girls,” Lundeen said. “It would not be fair to say they are exact replications of these girls. They are not.”

Not exact replicas? You must be joking. Obviously the dolls wouldn’t mirror the first daughters, but clearly they are based on them, so isn’t that sufficient?

I’m in the Internet marketing industry, so I understand advertising and the concept of building on demand. But this is completely outrageous. If the Sasha and Malia beanie babies truly aren’t based ont he first daughters, then why are they named as such? And why couldn’t Ty have gotten some sort of “permission” perhaps from the Obama’s press team?

I would venture to say that you shouldn’t purchase the Sasha and Malia beanie babies. And possibly any other Ty products. Those shoddily made dolls are a merely a dead fad from the 90s.
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Read the full story, here.
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*Photo courtesy of Jason Cragg

I was surfing the net (surprise there), and I came across this funny post on DCist. In effect, during the impending presidential inauguration, portions of DC will be designated “Prostitution Free Zones” (PFZs). As provided by the law, a PFZ is an area in which no acts of prostitution or “prostitution related offenses” can occur.

My reaction is similar to that of the poster’s: shouldn’t prostitution, I don’t know, always be illegal?! Why do we need a “prostitution free zone”? I mean, if a restaurant only serves lunch specials Monday – Friday, then that means on Saturdays and Sundays, those specials aren’t offered right? So, a sign explaining that isn’t really necessary, correct? Well, that should be the case here, but leave it to MPD to not truly think these things through carefully.

Next time your DC, make sure you stumble into a “Prostitution Free Zone”.
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According to a story from U.S. News & World Report bidding for sex with Natalie Dylan is over $3.7 million. I suppose the other info I had was not current.

But wait, there’s more! Dylan has reportedly signed a book deal and want Kim Kardashian.

Just FYI.
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