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Tax Attacks

Note: This is my annual column on how to fill out your income-tax return. As you read it, please bear in mind that I am not a trained accountant. I am the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court. Nevertheless, if you have any questions whatsoever about the legality of a particular tax maneuver, you should call the special Toll-Free IRS Taxpayer Assistance Hotline Telephone Number in your area and listen to the busy signal until you feel you have a better understanding of the situation.

There are a number (23,968,847) of significant differences between this year’s tax form and last year’s, but let’s first look at the two things that have not changed:

1. The commissioner of Internal Revenue is still named “Roscoe,” and

2. Roscoe is evidently still doing situps under parked cars, because he once again devotes the largest paragraphs on page one to telling us taxpayers how we can send in “voluntary contributions to reduce the federal debt.”

As I interpret this statement, Roscoe, by using the word “voluntary,” is saying that even though your government finds itself in serious financial trouble owing to the fact that every time an Acting Assistant Deputy Undersecretary of Something changes offices, he spends more on new drapes than your whole house is worth, the IRS does not require you to send in extra money, beyond what you actually owe. No sir. You also are allowed to send in jewelry, stocks, canned goods, or clothing in good condition. Roscoe is a 42

regular.

Everything else about the tax form is different this year, but it shouldn’t be too much trouble as long as you avoid Common Taxpayer Errors. “For example,” reminds IRS Helpful Hint Division Chief Rexford Pooch, Jr., “taxpayers who make everything up should use numbers that sound sort of accurate, such as $3,847.62, rather than obvious fictions like $4,000. Also, we generally give much closer scrutiny to a return where the taxpayer gives a name such as Nick ‘The Weasel’ Testosterone.”

With those tips in mind, let’s look at some typical tax cases, and see how they would be handled under the new tax code. TAX CASE ONE: Mrs. Jones, a 7 1—year-old widow living on social security with no other income, is sound asleep, one night when she has an incredibly vivid dream in which her son dies in an automobile crash in California. Suddenly, she is awakened by the telephone; it is a member of the California Highway Patrol, calling to remind her that she does not have a son. Stunned, she suffers a fatal heart attack.

QUESTION: Does Mrs. Jones still have to file a tax return? ANSWER: Yes. Don’t be an idiot. She should use Form DPFS-65, “Dead Person Filing Singly,” which she can obtain at any of the two nationwide IRS Taxpayer Assistance Centers during their normal working hour.

TAX CASE TWO: Mr. and Mrs. Smith, both 32, are a working couple with two dependent children and a combined gross net abstracted income of $27,000. During the first fiscal segment of the 1984 calendar year, they received IRS Form YAFN-12, notifying them that according to the federal computer, they owe $179 billion in taxes. They have a good laugh over this and show the notice to their friends, thinking that it is such an obvious mistake that the IRS will correct it right away and they might even get their names in the newspaper as the victims of a typical humorous government bonehead computer bungle.

QUESTION: Can the Smiths deduct the cost of the snake-related injuries they suffered when they were fleeing the federal dogs through the wilderness? ANSWER: They may deduct 61 percent of the base presumptive adjusted mean allocated cost that is greater than, but not exceeding, $1,575, provided they kept accurate records showing they made a reasonable effort to save little Tina’s ear. Except in states whose names consist of two words.

TAX CASE THREE: Mr. A. Pemberton Trammel Snipe-Treadwater IV has established a trust fund for his six children under which each of them, upon reaching the age of 21, will receive a subcontinent. One afternoon while preparing to lash a servant, Mr. Snipe-Treadwater has a vague recollection that in 1980—or perhaps it was in 1978, he is not sure—he might have paid some taxes.

QUESTION: What should Mr. Snipe-Treadwater do? ANSWER: He should immediately summon his various senators and congressmen to soothe his brow with damp compresses until he can be named ambassador to France.