Wrong on so many levels.

That this story by Richard Connelly even made it to the website should cause the on-line "editor" over at the Press to be reprimanded....

Tax Day: The 5 best things about it, Richard Connelly, Houston Press

I'm just going to point out a few things:

Today is deadline day for filing your federal income taxes.

No it's not. Tomorrow (April 17th) is the deadline for filing your federal income taxes. Today (April 16th) is Emancipation Day in D.C. so there's a one day extension. This has only been all over the news for the past month.

We've never actually heard of anyone who's been penalized for filing one day late, but the media coverage of Tax Day leads us to the only logical conclusion: Being even one minute late must result in terrible, sadistic results. We imagine waterboarding is the least of it. So enjoy a little shadenfreude today because you won't be facing all that.

Actually, you'd be subject to a non-filing penalty. Again, all over the news. You can avoid this (on the filing, not on the payment) by filing an extension.

In which case some CPA-wannabe will take joy in pointing out that if you'd filed earlier, you'd be getting interest on that cash instead of letting it sit in Uncle Sam's vault.

Real CPA's (the toughest professional certification out there) would advise you to estimate your taxes so you get the smallest refund possible. A refund is nothing but a 0% loan to the Government after all.

GE and Verizon are people too, Mitt Romney says, so we should all be happy for them that they manage to pay no federal taxes on their billions in income

No, the Supreme Court of the United States said so in the "Citizens United" decision (most recent example) but Corporations have long been held as personal entities by law in the US. Oh, and GE is a HUGE Obama supporter and benefited from many of his green tax "loopholes". So not only is Connelly wrong here, his bias slip is showing.

I understand this is just the blog of the Houston Press and that typical editing standards don't apply. Were this just a personal blog I'll admit that I'd have no problem with it and let it go. Coming from a fully staffed alt-news organization however readers have a right to expect better. This is just the latest example of sloppy journalism/writing for Connelly, who might want to think about hanging it up if his heart's not in it any longer.

Sloppy. And inexcusable from a professional organization. (Of course, by the time you read this the post might be taken down*** so don't be surprised. I did cache it on Diigo however.)

I've stated before that political blogging is a dead medium. Posts like this are prime evidence of that. Basic fact-checking (instead of fact-check journalism) would've gone a long way here.



UPDATED: Living up to media blog tradition the Press made changes with no mention of said changes. Unfortunately there's a glitch in the system that keeps me from seeing their comments, so I'm going to have to assume one of their three commenters brought it to their attention.