Im 74 years old. Why do I still have to fill out income tax forms? Doesnt President Bush know I hate it?

The President likes lowering taxes. Why not drop income taxes on pensions, annuities, and Social Security. That would let a lot of us old folks off the hook for life. It should start the day you turn 70 years old. He could set a limit of $50,000.00 to keep everybody happy. The rich people would have to keep paying. They don't do their own taxes anyway.

All in favor of the above proposal say, YEP! IM IN!

What would we do if we didnt have tax software?

I still have to guess sometimes at what the correct answer should be to a question my tax software asks me, but if the error checker says all is okay, I agree. I transmit the form to the BIG G and the State of Idaho, and Im done.

Sometimes, after I send in my return, I get a letter back from BIG G. It says that Ive made a mistake.

Sometimes it actually corrects the error for me for me and asks if I agree with BIG G.

I always tell my good friends at IRS that they are correct and say, Check enclosed.

I think that once I paid too much and they increased my refund. Most of the time, they lower my refund. As long as Im done for the year, I could care less.

Let me tell you why I love the IRS. I may be the only one that can say that.

When I graduated from the University of Utah for the first time in 1957 I was as poor as a church mouse.

(Writers: that's what we mean by a cliche. Never use them.)

My boss paid the first months rent on the house.

The son of the local car dealer took the $1.37 I had in my pocket for down payment on a 1939 Chevy convertible.

(That Green Demon would climb from Golden, Colorado up Lookout Mountainwhere Buffalo Bill is or is not buriedin high gear. Some of the high school kids who had been looking at the car about died when I drove it off the lot with my wife our first son.)

Back to the subject: So we were doing pretty good after I got a check for $135.00 for my first weeks work. All was well until tax time in 1958.

Because I had earned money during the first six months of the previous year and not paid any taxes, my new job put me in a higher tax bracket and I owed $300.00. I may as well have owed a million, I had no extra money to blow on the IRS.

I waited until the last minute to send in my tax forms. I wrote a note that told the IRS that I owed $300.00 and that $50.00 was enclosed for the first of 6 installments.

I got a quick answer from the IRS.

I was told that the IRS had no way to take installment payments. That was followed by a letter saying that IRS was coming after everything we had.

I wrote back with my next months check of $50.00 that we really had nothing of value, but they could do what they had to do.

I got another letter. It said IRS had no way to handle our $50.00 installment payments.

I sent them another $50.00 on schedule and told them that I had some very good news in that someone in the IRS had handled my previous checks and they should have that person handle this one.

I didnt hear another word from the IRS until the last check was due. They were coming after me. I sent them the last check and thanked them for treating me so well; handling my checks every month even though they had no way to do it.

From this day I think the guy handling my account had decided I was doing the best I could and he held back several monthly form letters until I got to the last month.

I never heard from the IRS again on that matter.

Ive heard from them a number of times since as I stated earlier. Ive never had a bad experience with that organization. Im sure that if I went in for an audit they would show me the deductions that I didnt bother to make over the years and would give me a check that would send me and my wife to Hawaii.

I always say, be good to the IRS and they will be good to you.

I know that as soon as the White House Chief of Staff reads this article he will run into the Presidents office and say, Mr. President. I think I know how the Republicans can assure the next election.

Well, I don't know which party will win the next election. I chose the option to contribute to a political party. I checked a party for my wife and a party for me. Naturally they were the same party. Wrong! We've been canceling each other out for years. They never should have given the women the right to vote.

I'm only joking, Ladies. Lighten up!