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11 photos of what America might look like if we all followed Donald Trump's tax advice.

Former Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, "Taxes are what we pay for civilized society."

For Donald Trump, it seems a little light anarchy might just be the price of a really sweet deal.

Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images.


Following the bombshell New York Times report that in 1995, the businessman and current presidential candidate claimed losses so staggering that he might not have paid federal income taxes for 18 years, two possibilities have emerged:

One is that Trump truly did lose almost a billion dollars in one year. The other — the one Trump would prefer we all believe — is that the former casino, university, vodka, and steak mogul is so adept at gaming the system that, with one genius pen-stroke, he was able to avoid any of his hard-earned dollars going to Uncle Sam for nearly two decades.

It's a dubious claim, at best. But suppose we take Trump at his word. Suppose we extrapolate that out a little. I mean, I like to think I'm smart. You seem smart too. And Trump has a point: Not paying out 10-40% of our annual income is certainly tempting. If taxes are optional, why shouldn't we all benefit?

What if we were all so smart that we didn't pay our taxes?

Here's a snapshot of what that version of America might look like:

1. The George Washington Bridge at rush hour might look like this.

Without the Federal Highway Administration and various state and local port authorities and departments of transportation, commuters would have to cross rivers the old-fashioned way.

On the plus side, the plastic kayak industry would boom and your upper body would be much stronger.

2. Your house might look like this.

Even worse? If your house ever caught on fire, no fire department would come because fire departments cost tax money. Pretty, though!

3. Yellowstone National Park might look like this.

For a mere $3 billion per annum, the National Park Service provides every American with the opportunity to stare slack-jawed at a bison out of their rental-car window as often as they like for as long as they like.

Without it, America's most iconic hydrothermal hotspot would just be another empty plot of land. Maybe not entirely empty. Someone would probably put a parking lot there. Who knows?

4. Aretha Franklin performing "A Natural Woman" would look something like this.

Aretha Franklin photo by Bill Pugliano/Getty Images. Background image via iStock.

Washington, D.C.'s John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts opened in 1971, eight years after Congress authorized $23 million of federal funds to build it. Which means that without your tax dollars, Franklin's iconic late-career performance of "A Natural Woman," which brought President Obama and Carole King to tears, never would have happened.

Actually, the performance might have still happened, but it would have happened in an empty field with no one around to enjoy it. Sad!

5. The Purge might be real.

Without the hundreds of millions of dollars we contribute in taxes to state law enforcement budgets, there would be no police to stop The Purge from happening.

True, even well-funded police aren't perfect, but if there's one thing cops are probably good at, it's keeping the crazed cannibal armies at bay. And for that, we at least owe them our thanks and a small cut of our paychecks.

6. After eating eggs from the supermarket, you might look like this.

Photo via iStock.

Who doesn't enjoy a round of salmonella roulette?! Without the $1 billion we send the Food Safety and Inspection Service annually, it wouldn't matter because you wouldn't have a choice but to play!

7. Ducks might look ... kind of like this.

A small but not insignificant 0.48% of federal spending goes to funding America's critical scientific infrastructure, including the Duck Research Laboratory in Eastport, New York, which studies basic duck care, duck nutrition, and duck housing and management.

Suffice it to say that you don't want to think about how America's ducks would be doing if we didn't pay taxes.

8. Your boat after a boating accident might look like this.

When no one is paying taxes, don't expect the Coast Guard help you flip your turtled sailboat. Your nautical accidents are your own damn problem. Up by your bootstraps! Self-reliance!

9. Yankee Stadium

We can debate the merits of funding private sports stadiums with taxpayer money all night and all day, but if you thought the beer selection was terrible at Yankee Stadium now ... yikes.

10. The internet might not exist.

W-E-L-L A-C-T-U-A-L-L-Y. Photo by Javier Capella, U.S. Navy/Wikimedia Commons.

Your tax dollars helped build the internet, which means probably no email, definitely no Facebook, and super-definitely no cat-stands-on-two-legs-cause-it-thinks-it's-a-person GIFs.

You would finally finish that screenplay with all the time you'd save, though.

11. And Washington, D.C., might look a little something like this.

National defense makes up nearly a quarter of the federal budget. It's an important quarter because (good-faith disagreements about appropriate levels of military spending aside) without that money, we'd be sitting ducks for a Norwegian invasion force. They wouldn't even have to send an army. A bunch of children could do it. Here is their victory parade.

Taxes pay for a lot of cool stuff. Necessary stuff. Most Americans, it turns out, agree with that.

Sure, you might think taxes are too high. Or you might think they're too low. You might object to some of what they pay for. But hey, it's nice to have highways! And schools. And relative safety. And society.

Maybe Trump's right and it takes a genius to get away with not paying taxes. Lucky for America, we're not all so smart.

Planet

Easy (and free!) ways to save the ocean

The ocean is the heart of our planet. It needs our help to be healthy.

Ocean Wise

Volunteers at a local shoreline cleanup

True

The ocean covers over 71% of the Earth’s surface and serves as our planet’s heart. Ocean currents circulate vital heat, moisture, and nutrients around the globe to influence and regulate our climate, similar to the human circulatory system. Cool, right?

Our ocean systems provide us with everything from fresh oxygen to fresh food. We need it to survive and thrive—and when the ocean struggles to function healthfully, the whole world is affected.

Pollution, overfishing, and climate change are the three biggest challenges preventing the ocean from doing its job, and it needs our help now more than ever. Humans created the problem; now humans are responsible for solving it.

#BeOceanWise is a global rallying cry to do what you can for the ocean, because we need the ocean and the ocean needs us. If you’re wondering how—or if—you can make a difference, the answer is a resounding YES. There are a myriad of ways you can help, even if you don’t live near a body of water. For example, you can focus on reducing the amount of plastic you purchase for yourself or your family.

Another easy way to help clean up our oceans is to be aware of what’s known as the “dirty dozen.” Every year, scientists release an updated list of the most-found litter scattered along shorelines. The biggest culprit? Single-use beverage and food items such as foam cups, straws, bottle caps, and cigarette butts. If you can’t cut single-use plastic out of your life completely, we understand. Just make sure to correctly recycle plastic when you are finished using it. A staggering 3 million tons of plastic ends up in our oceans annually. Imagine the difference we could make if everyone recycled!

The 2022 "Dirty Dozen" ListOcean Wise

If you live near a shoreline, help clean it up! Organize or join an effort to take action and make a positive impact in your community alongside your friends, family, or colleagues. You can also tag @oceanwise on social if you spot a beach that needs some love. The location will be added to Ocean Wise’s system so you can submit data on the litter found during future Shoreline Cleanups. This data helps Ocean Wise work with businesses and governments to stop plastic pollution at its source. In Canada, Ocean Wise data helped inform a federal ban on unnecessary single-use plastics. Small but important actions like these greatly help reduce the litter that ends up in our ocean.

Ocean Wise, a conservation organization on a mission to restore and protect our oceans, is focused on empowering and educating everyone from individuals to governments on how to protect our waters. They are making conservation happen through five big initiatives: monitoring and protecting whales, fighting climate change and restoring biodiversity, innovating for a plastic-free ocean, protecting and restoring fish stocks, and finally, educating and empowering youth. The non-profit believes that in order to rebuild a resilient and vibrant ocean within the next ten years, everyone needs to take action.

Become an Ocean Wise ally and share your knowledge with others. The more people who know how badly the ocean needs our help, the better! Now is a great time to commit to being a part of something bigger and get our oceans healthy again.

Pets

Family brings home the wrong dog from daycare until their cats saved the day

A quick trip to the vet confirmed the cats' and family's suspicions.

Family accidentally brings wrong dog home but their cats knew

It's not a secret that nearly all golden retrievers are identical. Honestly, magic has to be involved for owners to know which one belongs to them when more than one golden retriever is around. Seriously, how do they all seem have the same face? It's like someone fell asleep on the copy machine when they were being created.

Outside of collars, harnesses and bandanas, immediately identifying the dog that belongs to you has to be a secret skill because at first glance, their personalities are also super similar. That's why it's not surprising when one family dropped off their sweet golden pooch at daycare and to be groomed, they didn't notice the daycare sent out the wrong dog.

See, not even their human parents can tell them apart because when the swapped dog got home, nothing seemed odd to the owners at first. She was freshly groomed so any small differences were quickly brushed off. But this accidental doppelgänger wasn't fooling her feline siblings.

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Video of sisters trying to fix a DIY haircut perfectly captures the chaos of sisterhood

“This is THE sisters experience…you captured the whole thing."

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But there’s also a beautiful loyalty. Sure, sisters can turn from friends to enemies on a dime, but in those purer moments, you’ll see them stop at nothing to help one another.

And it’s all these aspects, and everywhere in between, that were captured in a hilarious TikTok as three sisters banded together to fix a DIY haircut gone wrong…the day before school picture day, no less.
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The music of Queen has a profound visceral effect on everyone. Few pieces of art can cause complete strangers to put aside their differences and come together in song, but by golly, “Bohemian Rhapsody” is one of them. It would be cheesy if it weren’t so absolutely beautiful.

This pertains even to non-English-speaking countries, it appears. Recently, thousands of Harry Styles concertgoers in Warsaw, Poland, began cheering as those iconic beginning piano notes penetrated the air.
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Mom tells wild story of how her daughter kidnapped a 'chocolate baby' while out grocery shopping

People have a sneaking suspicion that the little girl has seen 'Corina, Corina' one too many times.

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Sometimes we hear a story that makes us collectively confused. Should we be offended? Laugh? Donate to a parents future bail fund for their children? It's really a toss up but the consensus on this mom's eyebrow raising story is that laughter and bail money are both appropriate responses.

Maranda Arbogast, a mom that runs the TikTok page, momma.chaos, shared a hilariously mortifying story of a time she took her three daughters grocery shopping and somehow wound up in a, "one of these things is not like the others" moment. The mom of three leads into the story by explaining that she is raising children that will likely have run ins with the law.

"Some families gotta save money for medical expenses or college funds. We gotta save money for bail because we are raising criminals, especially my middle daughter. It's always the middle child," Arbogast jokes. "She's gotta be frisked before we leave anywhere."

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Period simulators gave cis-gendered men a painful glimpse of what women go through on a monthly basis. But what about going through life with an actual human growing in their belly?

That’s where the watermelon challenge comes in.

TikTok’s watermelon challenge is a simple concept, where dads-to-be strap watermelons, weighing somewhere around 14 pounds, onto their bellies in order to simulate what it’s like for pregnant moms. Bonus point for taping mangos onto the chest because #lactation.

The results are both hilarious and illuminating.

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Over the past few years, "Don't Say Gay" bills have been introduced across the U.S., sparking widespread controversy about how LGBTQ issues should be addressed in schools. Supporters argue they protect children from inappropriate content by restricting discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity in educational settings.

Opponents believe these bills marginalize LGBTQ individuals by fostering stigma and potentially infringing on teachers' ability to openly address students' questions or experiences.

Currently, 11 states have banned LGBTQ discussion in public schools, and 5 require parental consent.

Author and comic book expert Marc Tyler Nobleman recently found himself at the center of the controversy, and his simple rationale for using the word “gay” in his school presentations presents an age-appropriate and inclusive way to approach at the issue.

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