It is difficult not to feel like a Republican when you are filling out your tax return. Despite your paltry income and those supposedly lucrative tax credits and deductions Congress passed to get you buying cars or putting solar panels on your roof, the size of your tax bill always seems too high, while the tax refund you were expecting to pay next month’s bills with won’t even cover the cost of tomorrow’s lunch. As you cut your check to the  Treasury Department, it is hard not be resentful of those faceless bureaucrats in Washington who are undoubtedly wasting your hard-earned money on pointless government spending.

Thankfully, the political Jekyll and Hyde lapse should last only a few moments.

You quickly realize that while paying taxes is certainly not fun, it is a necessary cost of residency. Of every dollar you pay in federal taxes, 20 cents are spent on national security.

Another 20 cents go to fund Social Security, while health programs such as Medicare and Medicaid take two more dimes, more or less. Subtract the 6 cents you pay as interest on the national debt, and you are left with the final 30 cents or so that help kids go to college, make needed investments in infrastructure, fund food stamps and support scientific research.  Filing your tax return may be painful, but it’s easy to be proud of what your money will help accomplish.

Tea Party supporters would undoubtedly disagree. Those who gathered in Washington on April 15 holding “Don’t Tread on Me” signs denounce taxation as a form of tyranny and are frustrated by what they see as bloated government spending  and a White House committed to expanding government’s role in our lives.

Their positions are unfounded, and their anger is misdirected.

President Barack Obama has passed 25 separate tax cuts, including the largest middle-class tax cut in history. According to Citizens for Tax Justice, provisions in the Recovery Act lowered taxes for 98 percent of all working families. These tax policies have led the non-partisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities to estimate that middle-income families are paying historically low levels: The average family of four is paying only 4.6 percent of its income in federal income taxes — the second-lowest level in 50 years.

Rather than face the facts, it is easier to believe untruths about how the poor pay no taxes or that Americans work four months of the year to cover our federal tax liability.

It is easy to advocate for smaller government, but there is a disconnect over what should be cut. According to a New York Times/CBS Poll, Tea Party supporters, being disproportionately older, want to keep their Social Security and Medicare — the two largest spending drivers. If you include defense spending in the untouchable category, you are left with a small number of discretionary programs that could be cut. Unsurprisingly, you don’t see anyone clamoring to slash NASA, National Institutes of Health or transportation funding.

The energy we witness today, rather than being wasted, should be channeled toward Republicans who supported policies in the past that favored Wall Street, big banks and the wealthy and allowed them to sink America’s economy. The anger should be directed at those Republicans who again stand with Wall Street and the big banks to block financial reform and new consumer protections. Want to make a difference? Start there.

Matt Verghese is a graduate student in public policy. He can be reached at verghese at umdbk dot com.