Drudge Shines Light on Ignorant Media - March 24, 2014 BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: I think the mainstream media is pig-ignorant of practically every discipline except party discipline. Now, heres basically what happened. Matt Drudge is a self-employed small businessman. As a result, Matt Drudge pays himself. He does not have an employer. Therefore he does not the get paychecks that contain all kinds of withholding for taxes and Medicare and FICA, Social Security, and whatever else. He has to pay all of his taxes separately and independently because theyre not deducted. As such, as a small businessman, Matt Drudge and millions of others just like him -- including your harmless, lovable little fuzzball host -- pay our taxes every quarter. We have to pay what are called quarterly estimates. This is what Matt Drudge does, and it can get a little complicated. April 15th, the first payment is due. June the 15th, the second payment is due. September 15th, the third payment is due. And on January 15th of the next year, the fourth and final payment is due. Therefore, the first payment for the 2015 income tax year, Matt Drudge has to pay it on April the 15th, as does everybody else who files quarterly estimates. This simple fact is something that the smartest (by reputation) mainstream media reporters simply cannot understand and cannot get their arms around. Matt Drudge sent out a tweet on Friday in which he said that his first quarterly estimate coming up in April he will be paying his Obamacare penalty for not having insurance. In his tweet, he called it a liberty tax, and the media jumped all over him! They called him a liar. They told him he didnt know what he was talking about. Mainstream media reporters! The White House jumped all over Drudge with their agents on Twitter, Facebook, and the rest of the mainstream media. They said that Drudge was lying to embarrass Obama, that Drudge didnt know what he was talking about, that Drudge was stupid and that you dont have to pay your Obamacare penalty until 2015 because its been delayed for a year. Matt Drudge pointed out, No, not for us. I have to pay my 2015 taxes starting in April of 2014, and they cant understand this. It is amazing the degree of ignorance. He has talked to three or four of these people in person. The last one he talked to has admitted that hes probably not lying but that he still doesnt have to do what hes doing. The fact of the matter is, when you file your taxes next April for this year, in 2015 for 2014, everybody will have to pay the penalty. Except those of us who pay quarterly estimates have to pay our taxes during the year. As independent contractors, we have to pay everything thats due (estimated) as it goes. The estimates can be very complicated. You cant simply take what you earned last year and divide it by four and make those payments, because if you underestimate how much you owe, you get socked with a huge penalty. So the safest thing to do is overpay a little bit. So Drudge went ahead and made a payment on his penalty for not having Obamacare insurance because hes not gonna buy it. Hes gonna pay the penalty. At his income level, his penalty would be 1% of his annual income, cause the penalty formula is its either 1% of your income or some other thing. Its the greater of the two, not the lesser of the two. Heres how Breitbart reports the story. A White House aide set off a stampede of liberal media criticism for Internet news pioneer Matt Drudge over Obamacare -- but his critics dont seem to understand how small businesses pay taxes. The brouhaha started when Drudge tweeted, Just paid the Obamacare penalty for not getting covered... IM CALLING IT A LIBERTY TAX. Jesse Lee, the Director of Progressive Media at Barack Obamas White House, responded that that was a Flat lie, no fee for previous year, adding, Scary how much influence he once had. So Obamas own acolyte, Obamas own White House smear merchant, doesnt even understand. Matt Drudge is not paying last years taxes in April, like you will be. He is paying the first payment the government is due this year, as is everybody else. When Matt Drudge files his return, if he waits til April 15th -- or maybe hes already done it. Lets say he hasnt. If Matt Drudge files his April 15th payment, hes already paid his taxes in four statements. Hes just filing the return. Hes already paid the money. Matt Drudge paid the bulk of this years taxes last year, and hes paying the bulk of next years taxes this year, as is everybody. Every small businessman who is an independent contractor and files quarterly. Yet heres this White House tweeting out, Flat lie. No fee for previous year. Hes not paying the previous year. Drudge is paying this years taxes. Hes paying taxes on the year that the penalty will be imposed. He knew it and his accountant knew it. He has to make the first payment on the penalty by April 15th. He went ahead and did it. He filed early just to be safe. Scary how much influence he once had? Was he talking about Obama? Moreover, why is there even a director of progressive media at the White House? Is there a director of conservative media there? (Just kidding.) Now, Lees response to Drudge set off a firestorm in the liberal media, with many mainstream media and left-wing reporters countering him on Twitter and in their own articles to claim he does not have to pay Obamacares Individual Mandate tax until next year. The individual mandate went into effect Jan. 1 of this year, and most people paying their taxes right now are paying taxes for 2013. Dude, theres no penalty until next yr, Sahil Kapur of the leftwing Talking Points Memo tweeted. Kapurs colleague at TPM Dylan Scott wrote a full story with a headline alleging Drudge was probably lying. Americans dont pay a penalty for not having health insurance until they file their 2014 taxes -- in 2015, Scott wrote. So either Drudge is lying or he paid a huge penalty a year earlier than he needed to. Penalty isnt collected until 2015, Sam Baker of National Journal tweeted at Drudge. The Huffington Posts Jeffrey Young wrote a full article in which he described Drudges tweet as weird and a little head-scratching because the Obamacare tax does not kick in until the 2014 tax year. Drudge indicated in his follow-up tweets that since he is self-employed as the proprietor of The Drudge Report, he files as a small business. According to the IRSs website for self-employed individuals, they are required to pay taxes quarterly. As a self-employed individual, generally you are required to file an annual return and pay estimated tax quarterly, the IRS website reads. So, when they file and pay those 2014 first quarter taxes, such individuals have to pay the Obamacare Individual Mandate tax if they opted to not have health insurance... Its on the IRS website, and still the media is running around calling Drudge a liar. Drudge is abiding by the law. They are calling him a liar; theyre accusing him of trying to damage Obama. He is now referring to them as The Obama Media. Additionally, ladies and gentlemen, the IRS form (1040-ES) for estimating quarterly taxes... The ES there is for estimates, for those of you in Rio Linda. Additionally, the IRS form (1040-ES) for estimating quarterly taxes specifically recommends adding the mandate penalty to line 12 for other taxes -- to pay before the first quarterly deadline of April 15. It is true that thousands of small businesses will be forced to pay Obamacare taxes quarterly in 2014, a Senate Budget Committee aide told Breitbart News on Friday afternoon. Breitbart tracked all this down. You would think mainstream journalists would. Maybe they cant be bothered to this case down such minor details. Drudge even indicated as much in follow-up tweets... Hey, the law says it. Go look at the website. Hes gotta make the first payment on this penalty before April 15th. [B]ut the left-wing reporters --and the White House -- have left their criticisms of him intact. Dazed team Obama media reporters think Opt-Out tax year away? Drudge tweeted. Not for small businesses that file Qtr estimates. Were there NOW, baby, and I can tell you, Drudge is right. Im in the same boat, folks. But the point here is that this is total, willful ignorance, on the part of people who are supposedly, as members of the media, experts on taxes and economics. They are at least supposed to know more than you do so that they can tell you what all this means when its discussed in the news!
Posted on: Mon, 24 Mar 2014 20:24:48 +0000
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