Turning the tables on the IRS

Trying Not to Rub It In

By Rick Horowitz

In Fantasy Sequence No. 323, I'm sitting behind a desk the size of an aircraft carrier. It's a vast and empty space of such perfectly polished grandeur that anyone who lays eyes on it, no matter how high and mighty, feels compelled to drop to his knees and beg for mercy. I am fair, but I am firm.

I gaze across my desk today and see quivering before me: the Internal Revenue Service.

"There seems to be a problem," I say, and then I say no more.

In the silence, I can hear beads of sweat rolling down agency armpits. The IRS is attempting to put up a brave front, a touch of their normal confidence, even arrogance. It does them absolutely no good. In Fantasy Sequence No. 323, I am trained to recognize fear -- and to instill it.

"It says here" -- I have the new General Accounting Office report in my hand, of course -- "that the IRS 'cannot do some of the basic accounting and record-keeping tasks it expects American taxpayers to do.'" And I fix them with my most withering gaze.

"We can explain," they say.

"I'm all ears," I reply.

What I don't do -- what I'm trained not to do -- is laugh. Not that a laugh wouldn't be appropriate under the circumstances. A satisfied snicker, even a full-tilt guffaw. Just think of it: the IRS brought low by a government audit. Sloppy bookkeeping. Faulty data security. Millions in fraudulent refunds. Billions in uncollected taxes.

And all of it, the whole sloppy mess, revealed just weeks before John Q. Patsy forces himself to sit down once again at the Great American Kitchen Table to try to shoehorn his family's random life and finances into the neat rectangular spaces of a Form 1040. The irony is exquisite!

My face shows none of this. I am remote. I am unreadable.

"We know it's in here someplace," the IRS stutters, shuffling desperately through the shoebox full of scraps that now clutter my desk. "Where is that darned..."

"Tell me about the Blazer," I say. They look up from their search, foreheads damp, eyes wide with panic.

"The Blazer?"

"The Chevy Blazer. It says here you're missing a Chevy Blazer."

They try to disagree -- try to disagree with me, sitting behind a desk the size of an aircraft carrier. The Chevy Blazer isn't "missing," they explain. It went back to the leasing company. They just neglected to take it off their books. An accounting oversight, that's all.

They offer equally lame explanations for the missing televisions and the missing VCRs and the missing fax machines. Not to mention -- the words are coming in a shallow-breathing rush now -- the missing laptop computers and the missing laser printer, and --

"A $300,000 laser printer?" I inquire, my voice an icy interruption.

"It's not like it was stolen or anything," they insist.

"So you've just lost track of it," I suggest. "A $300,000 laser printer. It might turn up...eventually."

They're quick to agree with me. (Do they even know what sarcasm sounds like?) They strain to look contrite, but the excuses never stop -- their computer system is ancient, some top-level employees left and weren't replaced quickly enough, and on and on. I've heard this all before.

"I've heard this all before."

But there's more. Putting everything right and keeping it from happening again will take at least a decade, they say.

The IRS wants an extension. In Fantasy Sequence No. 323, the IRS is asking me for an extension.

This one I keep.

Posted 3/2/99. They won't be pleased with us.

Search the Web Search Rick's!