This country definitely needs a tax reform, and as January 1 approaches and attempts to restore the economy are made, I think that two types of tax credit should definitely be eliminated. I’m talking, of course, of mortgage tax credit and child credit.

I find mortgage tax credit to be egregiously offensive. I don’t understand why people who undertook mortgage obligations they could never hope to meet and tanked our entire economy in the process should be rewarded while responsible people like me who are trying to live within our means and don’t buy until we have the money to pay for the purchase should be penalized for our responsibility. Mind you, I’m not saying there should be any tax credits for people who rent instead of taking out a mortgage. These should be private choices by private individuals and it makes me uncomfortable to see the government favoring one of such choices over the rest.

The child tax credit is also something I can’t support for the simple reason that I believe in government staying out of people’s reproductive choices. You cannot support abortion rights and accessible contraception and at the same time be in favor of child credit tax. Either the government should stay out of people’s reproductive choices or it should promote the choice it finds more acceptable. But you can’t have it both ways. Of course, if Roe vs Wade were repealed, God forbid, I would support sky-high child credits.

Please note that I’m not discussing how effective these measures will be economically. Whether they have a positive or negative effect on the economy is not that important to me. I’m not a Marxist which is why I do not believe that the economy forms the basis of everything. I believe that ideas come first and the economy catches up. During the recent presidential elections, we almost saw the “legitimate rape” crowd win. Had they won, they would have done everything in their power to invade our bodies and our private lives. Religious fanaticism has not abandoned its hope to come to power once again and to continue its fight for the control of the most intimate aspects of our existences. If we demand reproductive freedom while accepting pay-offs for our reproductive choices and personal decisions, we run the risk of losing this important fight.

Reader el writes from Israel:

I live near Tel Aviv, so yesterday & today (so far, once per day) we for the 1st time experienced hearing the warning of a rocket. From Gaza rockets were sent to Jerusalem & to Tel Aviv, my favorite city. Today in the morning we heard of the additional “Iron Dome” launcher put to protect the center of the country, and already today it succeeded in preventing a rocket from falling near / in (?) Tel Aviv.

I am more worried about our soldiers, if there’ll be a land operation too. Looks as if it will be, so far.

Citizens of the South have been getting those rockets for years, in “peaceful” times, so many, I guess, don’t want the operation to stop and them being again under fire. That’s also what somebody said on TV.

Also, for some reason, Israeli channel showed Hamas propaganda movie in Hebrew, made specially for us. How we should wait for suicide bombers on our bus stops and in cafes. Why show it, instead of only saying “they encourage suicide bombing again”, as was said on TV (more than before, I guess) ?

Wanted to add that I think very anti-Israeli people don’t understand how much of Israel lives (esp. south), that we are attacked too, not only attack ourselves. That it’s really a war over a house, so to speak.

This is a very scary situation, and I have no idea how it will be resolved. El’s comment tells us a lot about how the people in Israel are feeling right now.

If anybody has any positive prognosis to share, please do so. I want to hope for the best.

Thank you for sharing, el. Stay strong, my friend!

Whenever I see that I have a new comment from Evelina Anville, I feel happy anticipation. Evelina always has something new and interesting to contribute. She never links to any blog of her own and doesn’t share many details about herself but I have a strong suspicion that Evelina is a writer. Every comment by her is like a little work of art: aesthetically pleasing and intellectually stimulating.

I don’t think I have a single reader who always agrees with me on everything. I would consider myself a failure as a blogger if all I managed to do was bring together a bunch of indifferent sycophants who would dismiss me by agreeing with every word I write. Evelina stands probably the closest to my convictions and beliefs among all my readers, yet there are still quite a few areas where we disagree. Unlike me, however, Evelina knows how to express her disagreement gracefully and elegantly and this is a skill that I would love to master.

Evelina Anville is a feminist and an intellectual who has strong political beliefs and who defends them passionately and vigorously. I never met her in person but I have no doubt that she is a wonderful human being who is worthy of every admiration.