August 21, 2015
Dear Everyone:
Have you ever noticed a marked resemblance between
Donald Trump and
Donald Duck?
Flies into a rage at the slightest provocation.
Hilariously inadequate communication skills.
Constantly insulting anyone he doesn’t like for any reason.
Bullies everyone around him.
Stridently demanding to be the Center of Attention in anything
and everything.
Which Donald am I talking about?
Well, that’s the point.
People like Donald Trump because he says he’s not a politician, and
they’re all “sick of politicians”.
Most of these people are not “seasoned” enough to remember when
Jimmy Carter ran on the same platform.
Although he had been a
senator in the state of Georgia, as well
as the
Governor, he wasn’t a “Washington insider”.
Then, when Jimmy made it into the
White House, he discovered that
he didn’t know how to work with all those “Washington insiders”, i.e.,
the Senate and
House of Representatives.
Oops.
Let’s not even go into the whole
Iran-Hostage Crisis thing.
Been there, done that.
Can you believe it’s been 36 years since that happened?
Talk about Ancient History!
In the meantime…
My car is officially eleven years old.
Yes, in other words, “ancient”.
Our maternal grandfather used to have a saying.
Actually, he used to have a
lot of sayings.
One of my favorites was:
“They want ice water in hell, too.”
That covers a so many situations.
In this case, his saying was:
“A car reaches an age where it nickel and dimes you to death.”
Which means, of course, all the little things that go wrong with a car
begin to add up as the car gets older.
The last time I took it in for “routine maintenance” it wound up
costing me over $1600. Ouch.
However, a new car would cost a great deal more than that.
On the other hand, I could look into leasing a car.
All the commercials I see on television suggest that the cost of
leasing is substantially lower than the monthly payments on a 6-year
loan.
However. Those advertised
lease payments don’t mention the
sales tax, which is included, but
“extra”. Also, there can be
a limit on the number of miles driven per year.
And there’s the question of the
license plate. My current
car has a special plate that allows me to park in those
spaces marked
for persons with disabilities, commonly called “disabled parking”, less
commonly called “blue spaces”, or “cripples-only parking”.
I have no idea if a leased car can be equipped with a
“Handicapped Plate”.
Clearly, more research is needed.
And, while we’re on the subject, what about paying off the
mortgage on
my condominium? I have heard
from some other retired people about doing that.
To a person, they complained about the “tax bite”.
Let’s say I pull $230,000 out of my
401(k) and use it to pay the balance
on my home loan. At $1724.81
per month, I’d save $20,697.72 in the first year.
That would be nice.
However. The IRS would
consider that $230,000 as taxable income and charge me accordingly.
Assuming a 10% rate, that’s an extra $23,000 to be paid on that
year’s return. Plus state,
of course. In other words,
the cost would exceed the savings.
But only in the first year.
After that, it would be clear sailing.
At least in theory.
Obviously, more research will be required.
Love, as always,
Pete
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