Bruce Hodgkins (bhodgkins): An Appreciation

I Hate Canton got a late start Monday, so we'll jump right in.

Bruce Hodgkins, aka bhodgkins aka Hodgie, aka Hodgie-Baby is one our our favorite posters.

He's not malevolent like ocean and her incarnations. Like Bummy (see "characters" sidebar) you just can't hate Bruce. Of course you don't have to love him, either. He and Don Cirelli and TAC/Henry Rollins, have had more go-rounds than Starbuck's has coffeshops, yet, at least for us, there's a certain loveablity about the coot. A self-described conservative of some mysterious stripe, Bruce embraces, corporations, international banking, and globalism. (We're unsure about war.)

Systemic rot is not in Hodgie's vocabulary. If you're out of work, it's your own damned fault. You should have taken a second or third job, majored in something "relevant," saved more money, not bought that cell phone or DVD player, and kissed your boss' ass. Most importantly, you should have never joined that union.

Bruce appears to get most of his news and news analysis from Worldnet Daily Jerome Corsi, and Orly Taitz. His favorite"historian" is Glenn Beck University and rightwing Texas Republican political operative David Barton. According to Hodgie, Glenn Beck has never uttered an untruth. Bruce thinks Snopes is a leftwing website. Rep commenters are leftwing liberal, socialist, communist pinkos: Democrats.

We occasionally agree with Bruce, but most of the time we, well...laugh at him. He's sort of an antebellum Protestant (may the Pope forgive him!) poker-up-the-ass, time machined into a 21st century vanity fair fighting desire, temptation, hedonism, atheism, bright lights, consumable goods, and welfare mothers. No matter how often his facts are documented to be unfactual, Bruce is always right. We think he spends a lot of his time swatting commies hiding under his bed.

We were especially amused to see Hodgie-Baby's comments Sunday under a Letter to the Editor, The Other Side of Dependency, Outsourced, then Part-time written by the improbably named Richard Pickles of North Canton (btw, he's real; IHC located him) grouching about outsourcing and crap jobs for those left behind lucky enough to get them, while corporations run unchallenged in post capitalist America.

Mr. Pickles wrote in part:

The part-time income (28 hours), a minimum-wage job ($7.40 an hour in Ohio) at the local burger joint, grosses just over the allowed amount of income to qualify for state cash assistance (around $400 a month).

Never having been in a situation like that, it seems difficult to imagine living there willingly. Multiply this hypothetical family by several million, and worrying about a few welfare cheats seems to miss the point.

With huge corporations paying no taxes at all, cutting the deficit off of middle-income people and the retired, and allowing the wealthy to get by with no increase, is also less than fair.

Mr. Pickles remarks must have given Bruce post-Communion gas. He whipped off the following comment

What is the matter with the liberal mind? Why can't people keep what they earn? It is un-American for the government to forcefully take money from one group of people and give it to another. Not only that, it is a stupid practice to take money from the job creators. corporations don't pay tax, they collect taxes from people that buy or use their products and services. Pretty soon the business becomes non-competitive and moves their operation out the country. How about lowering the income tax on the wealthiest 5% and eliminate corporate income tax entirely. Mr. Pickles would soon be back at work.

I Hate Canton actually agrees with Hodgie. Income tax is un-American, though we'd probably come up with a better phrase if we had the time.

We, however, find it difficult to support Hodgie's claim that corporations should be exempt from paying income tax because they create the jobs and "collect taxes" from people that buy or use their products and services." According to Bruce, it's OK (in a manner of speaking) for the government to dun taxes from individuals who profit from working for corporations (secretaries, mill hands, truck drivers, store clerks, landscapers, scientists, computer engineers, nurses, house painters, brick masons, mechanics) but it's not OK for the government to collect taxes on the profits that corporations themselves make from selling their goods and services, which are generated from the labor of those it's OK to tax. IOW, Bruce seems to think that only those who make money for corporations should have to pay income tax. Corporations that profit from the work of their employees should not. Next ,we supposed he'll tell us that we should all pay our bosses for the privilege of working for them.

Excuse us for a moment while we uncross our eyes.

Our original intention was to name Bruce our Village Idiot of the Day for May 22. He received the honor earlier this month for claiming that the Great Depression started with FDR when Herbert Hoover was clearly overseeing the country during the unfortunate events of October 1929. Besides, there are so many Hodgieisms that are deserving of daily awards. We apologize for keeping them from you while we were on hiatus.

IHC, however,decided to write a simple appreciation of Bruce. He has lot of awards coming so why not start out with a big I Hate Canton hug and go from there? After all, if it weren't for Hodgie, the Rep would be a much more boring place to visit.

Oh... btw. According to Intellius, Mr. Pickles, is 79 years old. As soon as the Walton family gets their Hodgkins Tax Break and Wal-Mart becomes a "non-profit," our letter writer can start a brand new career as a greeter.