Dear Mr. President,
Hi, how are you doing? I have a favor to ask of you…got a second?
You probably don’t remember this because you must have been….oh, 12, 13 or so, but I was a very hard working young mom raising and supporting 4 boys with no help from our government. I know, silly, right? That’s just the kind of gal I am.
Anyhow, I married a very hard working young guy in November, just 2 short months before the new year began.
When the time came to file our income tax returns, we had to pick a filing status. I couldn’t file as single head of household anymore because I was married now and that would have constituted fraud, even though my kids and I had lived on my pay for 10 of the previous 12 months. Oh, well.
If we’d filed as married, filing singly, we both would have had to pay extra taxes, so we filed as married filing jointly, and waited for our $132 federal refund.
Still with me?
One month later my bank called. I had bounced 5 checks. Never bounced a check in my life, Mr. President…never. How did this happen? I’ll tell you…
My new husband made an honest mistake on our return. He printed my name first, before his. Honest to God! Each of us had received our own return in the mail with our own name on the label, so we had to get a return from the post office and print our names on it. Because we lived in my house and I made more money than he did, he put my name before his on the return.
What does this have to do with bouncing checks you may ask?
The IRS considered this to be a “Frivolous Return”. An IRS agent drove to my bank, walked in with an official letter instructing my bank to turn over all the funds under my name to him. All $600 of it.
$600. Let it sink in, Mr. President. I had $600 to my name, and the United States government took it because my husband printed my name before his on our federal tax return.
My mortgage payment check bounced. Yes sir, I owned a house and was actually paying a mortgage all by myself…no federal bailout for this gal. The check to the utility company bounced. The nursery school called….check bounced. Grocery store, car payment, bounced, bounced.
The day after the money was taken from my checking account we received a letter from the IRS informing us that we had committed a crime by filing a “Frivolous Return” and, as a result, we owed penalties in the amount of $600. What a coincidence!
I went to my bank to try to get a loan to cover my bills and was turned down. How could they lend money to a tax cheat?
I had to borrow money from my father, Mr. President. He charged me interest but that’s another story.
Why am I telling you this story? Because I want you to know the difference between an honest mistake and tax fraud. I think you need to know these things considering you are the President of the United States of America. I guess you didn’t need to know anything about tax law as a community organizer or state senator, but I think the job qualifications for president may be a little more stringent, and I’d hate to see you make a fool out of yourself by nominating a tax cheat to an important…… oh….sorry, I guess I should have written you earlier.
Affectionately,
Twyla Rants-Daschle-Geithner.
