Governor Kathleen Sebelius' Tax Missteps, and How Insignificant They Are, Relatively Speaking.

I'm gonna just run out in front of this and say that the first person to criticize Governor Sebelius for having inadvertently left certain taxes go unpaid between 2005 and 2007 had better be awfully careful.  For instance, I'd like very much to hear that person take responsibility for having, possibly, also made errors when completing their annual tax forms, and even be willing to have those tax records pored over with tooth and lice comb to determine that they are, indeed, blameless as they currently assume they are, as they busily, eagerly cast red-herring-shaped stones at the Democrats being placed currently by the Obama administration.

See, I just did my family's taxes for the year a few weeks ago, using the H&R Block software available at the local Target, the one created for people who work and have an at-home business.  And, despite my very best intentions, I screwed up.  After working for several hours running on all of the tedious details, I pressed the send button and hey, presto!, the IRS assumed I'd done right by my numbers, as had I, and they approved of what I sent.  Only I realized later that evening where I'd screwed up, and in the morning, I went back and fixed the glitch.  So now I'm in the process of having to amend my returns, both federal and state, in order to pay them back for my mistake.  One mistake, and it took the return I was supposed to receive from both fed and state combined down by a few thousand dollars.  It was such a dumb move, and all I had to do to avoid it was not push the send button until I'd slept on the thing.  But that isn't what I'm trying to say.  What I'm saying is, dude.  I made a mistake.  It's ridiculously simple to do with taxes, even if someone else prepares them (which I'm assuming is true in the case of the Governor, who's already pretty busy being a Governor).  She had no intention of making these mistakes, any more than you or I do when we prepare our own taxes, due to the need to save the money we would spend on hiring someone else to prepare them, or through the hiring of someone else, someone who has been referred to us because they are competent and capable and there's a string of seemingly inscrutable letters after their name signifying their capacity to manage the taxes (mostly) without error.

But here's the thing that really matters: people who make mistakes on their taxes through honest intentions generally are found owing, give or take, a few thousand bucks.  Because it was an oops.  An error.  A miscalculation, made because the tax preparer is not perfect.

People who hire the brilliant scam-artists who know their way in, out, through, over and around the tax laws, are more loop-hole savant than anything else, are intent on cheating the government (and their fellow tax-payers) out of what they owe.  And it isn't in the thousands-of-dollars range.  Nuh-uh.  It's in the millions.  At least.

(Well, and there are plenty of examples to point to in the recent Republican-run Congress regarding people who absconded with millions of dollars in taxpayer money that didn't even come to them as a result of loopholes.  Nay, they did other things, like make shady deals with government-funded contractors.  Etc.  Deals involving millions upon MILLIONS of dollars.  Taxpayer dollars.  And I won't even touch on how their loosening of, and dismembering of, laws created to protect homeowners and the banking system and the taxpayers, caused the current financial maelstrom we're grappling with, the situation that earned some shady monsters billions upon BILLIONS, while the rest of us poor saps are trying to keep our forty-grand-a-year -- if we're lucky -- jobs.  Yeah.  Pointing fingers would be easy.)

This is not that.  And I would like very much to see the Governor not being given the run-around by those members of the media who are prone to aiming at creating discord for discord's sake, and instead be allowed to gracefully take on her new role as HHS Secretary.  She's got quite enough to manage in that capacity without being challenged stupidly, for the purpose of a media whirlwind and the ensuing ratings-fest, by the moronic, imbecilic partakers of such.

Even though I know I'm wasting my breath in hoping they'll drop this.  Even though I'm aware of how this sort of thing will play out, I can't help wishing the throwers of clay, shaped-and-painted-to-look-like-red-meat, would recognize how they lower our discourse.  The disservice they do to people, not just the ones in our nation, but people everywhere, solely for their own, miniscule fifteen-minute feast.

It's a damn shame.

Comments

[Karoli]

AAAAAMEN. You preach it, sister.

The reason that people pay accountants a lot of money to have their taxes done is to do their best not to cross any of the tax laws. But get this: Even if their return is flawless, every single line filled out correctly, woe to them under audit. The IRS starts with the presumption that the return is wrong, and they fully expect to come away from an audit with something that will bring in revenue. Many times taxpayers - particularly taxpayers who have small businesses - don't have the resources to pay a tax lawyer and accountant to fight them, so they pony up whatever it is that they have to pay for an error they didn't make, and the IRS goes away.

It's government extortion and it happens every single day. I will get my panties in a bunch when every Republican serving in office or government subjects themselves to a tax audit for the past three open filing years and comes away clean. Which is to say, never.

[Julie Pippert]

Point WELL MADE, and I'm so glad you made it.

[Sarah Burkett]

When my husband I read the headline, we immediately assumed human error. Maybe it's because of the good things she's done for this state [I live in Kansas], but we immediately assumed innocent [or not guilty] on doing it fraudulently.

The others, we didn't really like, and the fact that they immediately pulled out afterwards made us think: okay, scam artist. With Sebellius, we believed in her first.

Okay, comment makes no sense. Sorry.

[Sarah Summer]

Nowdays democrats in our country rarely pay proper taxes!

[Sarah]

Excuse me if that was meant as a joke, Sarah S, but that kind of generalized, partisan tripe does nothing to find common ground or solve our country's problems. The sooner we can stop with the "all Democrats are mooches" and "all Republicans are buttheads" the better.

I agree with this post, Debbie. This would only be a real news story if the Governor hadn't corrected the problem. Thousands of taxpayers have to file amended tax returns every year. The very fact that there is a procedure for filing a correction is proof that the feds know innocent mistakes happen.