Hondo
21st February 2010, 18:41
I don't know if the across the pond set has seen this but the Yanks have. The other day a gentleman with a short list of people and organizations he doesn't like, set his house on fire and then took off in his private aircraft, a Piper Cherokee, and crashed it into the ground floor of the Internal Revenue Service building in Austin, Texas. Of course he was killed along with one IRS employee.
The Austin police has so far treated it as one of those criminal acts of desperation that people tend to do when they become more fed up with or more afraid of living than they are of dying. A Muslim group is upset because if they get angry and fly planes into buildings out of hatred, they are all terrorists but this gringo does the same thing and is a "nut case".
I can identify with all of them on this one. Like Jag said in another thread, the US tax code is way too complicated. The only reason for a tax code to be complicated is for concealment. You complicate so the citizen won't easily be able to figure out where he is being robbed, how he is being robbed, how often he is being robbed and most of all, how much you are actually getting him for. I understand the need for taxes but not the wasting of tax money. I wouldn't mind a flat tax, or even better, a 15-20% national sales tax with unprocessed food, medicines, housing, medical care, utilities, and clothing with an individual garment cost of $200.00 or below exempted.
Amongst favored IRS tatics is allowing alleged violations to sit and fester for a couple of years before acting on them to allow penalties and interest to build up. Their second favorite is to keep all but the very high profile cases out of criminal court. In criminal court the burden of proof is on the IRS to prove you are guilty of what they accuse. Keeping the case civil and in their jurisdiction means they only have to accuse. Like any other predator, their favorite targets are individuals or small companies that can not afford to fight them for very long, if at all. A tax attorney will always get his money up front, he already knows what the verdict will be.
The Austin IRS had a go at me 4 times during my stay in Texas. Only 1 incident was my fault. My wife at the time did our taxes that year and transposed 2 digits of my SS number. I didn't notice it either and signed the form. Three years later, I get a letter, short story, looked at copy of return, filled out amended return, filed amended return and paid like $60.00 in interest, no penalty.
The last go they had at me was a demand (3 years after the event) for some $35,000.00 in additional taxes, interest, and penalties for income I failed to report. I asked for supporting documentation and they sent me a copy of a 1099 form with my name, SS number, amount, and company name. I never heard of the company. I couldn't find a phone number number for the company. I went to the library and checked the listings for the year in question and the preceding and following years. No listing, no company. I reported all this back to the IRS, they didn't care...PAY US. Over the course of the next two years, I found out that the company tax return had been filed electronically, they didn't have any hard supporting documentation. They couldn't find the company either. I showed them where they issued a Tax ID number to a dead man. Don't care, PAY US. I was going to lose this. They wouldn't go to criminal court with it and I couldn't afford to fight it in their domain. I was furious and can understand where the man with the plane was coming from. One afternoon at a software sale table I got a 3.5 floppy called the Great American Gripe Disk for $5.00. I looked up IRS and found one entry for an office in Washinton D.C. that didn't seem to be connected with the IRS. It cost $50.00 to copy everything I had relating to the case and mail it all to DC with a letter detailing my side of the story. The following week I got a letter from DC saying my case had been reviewed and the package I sent them was being forwarded to Austin with "recommendations" and I would hear from Austin within 2 weeks. Great. I know whats coming next...PAY US NOW! A week later I get an IRS letter from Austin, but it has been addressed by hand, not typed. Inside was a hand written letter of apology from the head lady of the collections branch explaining that, had she known all this, the situation should not have gotten so far and the matter would be dropped. I would receive the official letter within 30 days. It's true Jag, I still have the letter. Jag knows the IRS never, ever admits they were wrong much less apologize. But this lady did. I got the final letter saying that this matter had been reviewed and was being dropped and no further action was required on my part. I swear, I would've sued them but you have to get their permission to sue them. I received a follow up phone call from this lady making sure I had received the closure letter and at the same time she inquired if I was interested in coming to work in that branch as an investigator. I'm not very proud of it and probably should have been more gracious in victory but I was fed up with these alleged people and told her she could suck 'ol Buck and hung up on her. I haven't had an IRS problem since.
As far as the guy with the plane in Austin goes, I tend to view it as an anti-terrorist strike. But you have to have really been through it with those people before you can understand that.
The Austin police has so far treated it as one of those criminal acts of desperation that people tend to do when they become more fed up with or more afraid of living than they are of dying. A Muslim group is upset because if they get angry and fly planes into buildings out of hatred, they are all terrorists but this gringo does the same thing and is a "nut case".
I can identify with all of them on this one. Like Jag said in another thread, the US tax code is way too complicated. The only reason for a tax code to be complicated is for concealment. You complicate so the citizen won't easily be able to figure out where he is being robbed, how he is being robbed, how often he is being robbed and most of all, how much you are actually getting him for. I understand the need for taxes but not the wasting of tax money. I wouldn't mind a flat tax, or even better, a 15-20% national sales tax with unprocessed food, medicines, housing, medical care, utilities, and clothing with an individual garment cost of $200.00 or below exempted.
Amongst favored IRS tatics is allowing alleged violations to sit and fester for a couple of years before acting on them to allow penalties and interest to build up. Their second favorite is to keep all but the very high profile cases out of criminal court. In criminal court the burden of proof is on the IRS to prove you are guilty of what they accuse. Keeping the case civil and in their jurisdiction means they only have to accuse. Like any other predator, their favorite targets are individuals or small companies that can not afford to fight them for very long, if at all. A tax attorney will always get his money up front, he already knows what the verdict will be.
The Austin IRS had a go at me 4 times during my stay in Texas. Only 1 incident was my fault. My wife at the time did our taxes that year and transposed 2 digits of my SS number. I didn't notice it either and signed the form. Three years later, I get a letter, short story, looked at copy of return, filled out amended return, filed amended return and paid like $60.00 in interest, no penalty.
The last go they had at me was a demand (3 years after the event) for some $35,000.00 in additional taxes, interest, and penalties for income I failed to report. I asked for supporting documentation and they sent me a copy of a 1099 form with my name, SS number, amount, and company name. I never heard of the company. I couldn't find a phone number number for the company. I went to the library and checked the listings for the year in question and the preceding and following years. No listing, no company. I reported all this back to the IRS, they didn't care...PAY US. Over the course of the next two years, I found out that the company tax return had been filed electronically, they didn't have any hard supporting documentation. They couldn't find the company either. I showed them where they issued a Tax ID number to a dead man. Don't care, PAY US. I was going to lose this. They wouldn't go to criminal court with it and I couldn't afford to fight it in their domain. I was furious and can understand where the man with the plane was coming from. One afternoon at a software sale table I got a 3.5 floppy called the Great American Gripe Disk for $5.00. I looked up IRS and found one entry for an office in Washinton D.C. that didn't seem to be connected with the IRS. It cost $50.00 to copy everything I had relating to the case and mail it all to DC with a letter detailing my side of the story. The following week I got a letter from DC saying my case had been reviewed and the package I sent them was being forwarded to Austin with "recommendations" and I would hear from Austin within 2 weeks. Great. I know whats coming next...PAY US NOW! A week later I get an IRS letter from Austin, but it has been addressed by hand, not typed. Inside was a hand written letter of apology from the head lady of the collections branch explaining that, had she known all this, the situation should not have gotten so far and the matter would be dropped. I would receive the official letter within 30 days. It's true Jag, I still have the letter. Jag knows the IRS never, ever admits they were wrong much less apologize. But this lady did. I got the final letter saying that this matter had been reviewed and was being dropped and no further action was required on my part. I swear, I would've sued them but you have to get their permission to sue them. I received a follow up phone call from this lady making sure I had received the closure letter and at the same time she inquired if I was interested in coming to work in that branch as an investigator. I'm not very proud of it and probably should have been more gracious in victory but I was fed up with these alleged people and told her she could suck 'ol Buck and hung up on her. I haven't had an IRS problem since.
As far as the guy with the plane in Austin goes, I tend to view it as an anti-terrorist strike. But you have to have really been through it with those people before you can understand that.