AS G-D AND HEINLEIN INTENDED! Watch BMW’s awesome flying car as it makes its first flight between cities.
Wow, just wow. The way to keep top staff, build credibility and signal “transparency” is not by gagging staff. politico.com/news/2021/07/0 #FTC
Washington Post, The IRS Is a Hot Mess: Millions of Tax Returns Haven’t Been Processed, and Calls Are Going Unanswered, Including Mine:
I want to apologize to every person I’ve encouraged to be patient with the Internal Revenue Service as it stumbles through the aftereffects of the pandemic. Your righteous indignation is warranted.
The IRS is critically malfunctioning.
I didn’t fully grasp, until a recent report from the national taxpayer advocate, that the IRS has officially given up on answering every taxpayer telephone call for assistance — and that has to be fixed.
The agency is a hot mess. You are right to be mad as hell when you can’t reach somebody to help explain why your filing or refund hasn’t been processed. And, yes, I cussed, because the time to be polite and forgiving for the failures at the IRS is so over.
Right now, millions of taxpayers are waiting for their much-needed refunds and stimulus payments. Millions more are trying to settle issues with past tax returns and unable get a human being on the telephone, while interest costs potentially tick up each day things go unresolved.
- CBS News, Still Waiting For a Tax Refund? IRS Backlog Has Grown to 35 Million Returns
- The National Interest, No Tax Refund? It Might Be In the IRS's Pile of 35 Million Return Backlog
- New York Times, The I.R.S. Had a Backlog of 35 Million Returns By the End Of the Tax Season
- Washington Times, The IRS Answered Only 3% Calls on Hotline During Past Tax-Filing Season
This Flight Attendant Wrote A Hair-Raising Novel By Jotting It On Cocktail Napkins
Author T.J. Newman: “I said [to a pilot friend], ‘What would you do if your family was kidnapped and you were told that if you didn’t crash the plane, they’d be killed?’ I knew by the look on his face that I’d struck a nerve. He was terrified. He didn’t have an answer. And I knew I had a story.” – The New York Times
Key witness in Assange case admits to lies in indictment Stundin. Snowden: “This is the end of the case against Julian Assange.”
Freakonomics: Whats So Gratifying About Gossip? (NSQ Ep. 58)
Where the buffalo roam: world’s longest wildlife bridge could cross the Mississippi Guardian
Report: United States Ranks Last in Media TrustJonathan Turley (flora) Hoisted from comments
In a miniature of Humayun and Akbar, time crumples to depict an entire world of learningScroll
Developers of doomed Fla. tower were once accused of paying off officials: report NY Post
The Difference Between Terracotta, Ceramic, and Plastic Pots, and Why It Matters to Your Plants
Life Hacker: “Different pots have different uses for your home plants and planters. Plants behave differently in plastic containers than they do in glazed ceramic pots, and each pot has its own set of care instructions. So what is the difference between these various pots and planters? It comes down to breathability and moisture retention. Here are things to consider when looking for the perfect potted home for your plants…”
THE DON RUMSFELD OBITUARIES WON’T WRITE ABOUT: They loved him when things were going well. They blamed him when things went bad. And he never complained.
He should have complained. And named names, and released emails. Because being gutless and evil shouldn’t be costless. And yet for our press and our political class it usually is. They’d behave better if it weren’t
A Crow Expert Explained Why This School Warned Everyone About Angry Crows Vice
Revealed: ExxonMobil’s lobbying war on climate change legislation 4 News (dk). UK. “Keith McCoy is a senior ExxonMobil lobbyist on Capitol Hill and has represented the company in its liaison with the US Congress for the last eight years…. Mr McCoy names 11 senators who he says are ‘crucial’ to ExxonMobil: Senator Shelley Moore Capito [R], Senator Joe Manchin [D], Senator Kyrsten Sinema [D], Senator Jon Tester [D], Senator Maggie Hassan [D], Senator John Barrasso [R], Senator John Cornyn [R], Senator Steve Daines [R], Senator Chris Coons [D], Senator Mark Kelly [D,] and Senator Marco Rubio [R].” Six Ds, five Rs lol. Worth reading in full for the breath-taking arrogance.
Earth Is Trapping ‘Unprecedented’ Amount of Heat, Says NASA Treehugger l
What’s a Heat Dome? Are We in for More of Them?Bloomberg
Canada and US weather: Heatwave kills dozens of people as temperatures soar to record highs of 49CiNews