The president picked the wrong day to show up on TV, as far as I'm concerned. No, I'm not talking about preempting American Idol, although I'm sure he won a lot of fans with that brilliant scheduling move. And I couldn't listen to him long enough to know whether he was making sense or not (although I don't really have to listen to know the answer to that, since he is incapable of making me believe a word he says).

It was just hard to look at his smirking face the day I figured my income taxes and found out I have to pay the government another five hundred dollars, in addition to everything they deducted from my paycheck last year. Because I do the payroll for the company, I know that people who make more money than I do got a bigger tax break when the Republican cuts took effect last July.

And I also know that my take-home pay is less this year than it was last year, although I haven't found a way to trace that fact back to Bush. Yet.

What I also know is that between now and Tax Day, which is the day after tomorrow, I have to come up with five hundred dollars I don't have to help a president I don't like pay for a war I don't believe in. At least I wasn't forced to listen to his voice tonight. The Giants were on TV and they were winning, so I had no incentive to switch channels. None.

I guess I'll have to borrow from one of my credit cards and end up paying one of Bush's banker friends usurious interest. It's a nice double dip for the corporate execs who are actually buying what the president is selling. After all, they're buying it with my money.