Just why shouldn’t Trump finances be scrootin’ed the way IRS does for us?

TRUMP: On tax issue, nunya bizness is his 'tude

Monday was Tax Day, and some 50 million U.S. taxpayers (about one-sixth of the nation) waited until the deadline before filing their returns that acknowledge just how much they need to “pay up” to the guv’mint!

Yes, I must confess, I was amongst them. I made my trek to the post office Monday morning to ensure my envelopes to the Internal Revenue Service and Illinois Department of Revenue got the necessary postmarks confirming I met the April 15 deadline.

NOW BECAUSE I’M working the freelance routine, I’m constantly checking my mailbox for checks – none of which have any money withheld for taxes.

Meaning that for me, this is the time of year I have to acknowledge just how big my share of financial support for the state and federal governments during the past year was. And above all else, I have to PAY UP!

My share isn’t significant. Our nation certainly isn’t going to pay off its debts based off what I provide them.

Although it’s like the thoughts of one-time Sen. Everett McKinley Dirksen, who once said, “a billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking about real money.”

WHICH IS A thought we should keep in mind when our political people quibble over whether President Donald Trump ought to publicly disclose his own income tax returns.

DIRKSEN: A million here, a million there … 

Unlike most contemporary politicos, Trump has steadfastly refused to make his returns public – taking an attitude that’s something along the lines of “none of your business!”

Although I suspect that Trump’s real reason for so stubbornly refusing to let us see his returns – when putting together my own return this year, I couldn’t help but note the many potential tax write-offs that are available to certain people.

The write-offs that make it possible for them to significantly reduce the amount of their overall income that gets taxed. With some people being able to write off so much that they essentially wind up owing the government nothing.

IT WOULDN’T SHOCK me to learn that the roughly one-quarter I owed in taxes this year of the just under $16,000 I earned as a freelance writer during 2018 would be a larger share than what Trump has paid out.

DALEY: Scrootin'ed?

I’m also sure that the average U.S. taxpayer has an income situation closer to mine than to anything resembling the Trumpster. Which means keeping this issue low-key is more about Trump trying to keep the public from realizing how different he is from they are.

We hear talk from Trump about how his business finances are under audit and he doesn’t want to interfere with any IRS review being done. I think it’s more about him being arrogant enough to think it’s none of our business.

Because if it were our business, we’d have the kind of finances that would make us eligible for all kinds of tax write-offs. Since we don’t, he probably thinks we’re just financial chumps – but certainly doesn’t want it publicly known that he truly regards us as peons.

IT WILL BE interesting to see if House Ways and Means chairman Richard Neal, D-Mass., has any luck in swaying the IRS in releasing the past six years worth of Trump’s returns. Or will the IRS conclude that this is merely a Democratic effort at playing partisan politics against the president.

NEAL: Will he get Trump taxes?

We’ll have to see just how much scrutiny our officials want to have done on our president.

Which actually reminds me of the 2001 moment when then-Mayor Richard M. Daley spoke of the concept, saying, “What else do you want? Do you want to take my shorts? Give me a break. How much scrutiny do you want to have? Go scrutinize yourself. I get scrootin’ed every day.”

Perhaps what we really need is for Trump to be scrootin’ed by the masses to make this issue go away. Just like the rest of us are submitting our own finances to by the IRS.

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EXTRA: Rauner differs self from Trump on tax-return tactic

I almost feel sorry these days for Gov. Bruce Rauner.
 

RAUNER: Wants Trump voters, but not political baggage

He has gone to extremes to try to put distance between himself and his supposed partisan political ally – President-elect Donald Trump. To the point where his refusal to say anything about Donald has become laughable.

YET IF YOU look at the election results from Tuesday night in Illinois, we leaned largely Democrat. The only gains that can be attributed to Republicans were the pickups of some legislative seats in rural parts of the state where Trump’s presidential aspirations were predominate.

It can be argued that despite the millions of dollars that Rauner spent of his money and that of his business-oriented friends to influence the elections in his favor, the real swaying factor was Trump.

I suspect that the reason those Republicans succeeded in beating off rural Democrats was because of the Trump coat-tails. I suspect those voters wanted to pick people they thought would be allied with Trump, and probably would be more than willing to sacrifice Rauner in an instant if put to the choice.

But does this mean that Rauner is now going to have to sway himself to the ideological idiosyncrasies of the Trump types of people? I suspect Rauner himself desperately wants to stay away from that stuff. Aside from wanting to dump on organized labor, our governor has tried to stay away from other social issues.

SO HOW CAN he differentiate himself from Trump without going too far so as to irritate the many rural voters he’s desperately going to need come his own 2018 re-election bid?

Personally, I’m inclined to think that Rauner making public on Friday his income tax return for 2015 is one such step – largely because it is one that Trump himself has yet to make; and probably will go out of his way to avoid doing for as long as he lives.

It’s just enough of a gesture to appease the progressive mentality – most of which will never be able to comprehend making so much money in their lives. While not touching on the social issues that would thoroughly offend the ideologues amongst us.

MUNGER: Should she have expected larger donation?

For the record, Rauner, a former venture capitalist with personal wealth, reported having income during 2015 of $188.2 million, of which he paid $43.3 million in taxes to the Internal Revenue Service and another $6.9 million to the Illinois Department of Revenue.

WHICH IS SOME $50.2 million more paid in taxes than indicated in any tax return ever provided by Trump himself. At least we’ll have an idea now of what kind of finances our governor deals with – or how he can afford to provide so much money to try to buy political posts for people who would be allied with him in Illinois state government.

Although Rauner indicated he and his family foundation have made charitable donations totaling $11.6 million – which is something we’d all like to think we’d do ourselves if we had the kind of money to afford it.

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Guns or your money -- which action will offend the ideologues the most?

A pair of actions were announced this week that I’m sure will set off the irrational mode of the conservative ideologues of our society. I’m just not sure which one will bother them the most.

Will people blame president on guns, ...

Will it be the fact that President Barack Obama announced his desire to use executive order powers to implement a series of measures meant to better control who can purchase a firearm?

OR WILL IT be the fact that the Illinois Department of Revenue has said that in the interest of reducing tax fraud, it is going to slow up the process by which the state pays out tax returns owed to people!

On the one hand, we’re talking guns. We’re talking about people who really are irrational enough to think that their ability to own a pistol is the key to our national defense (they probably do fantasize about the day when they can shoot to kill some jihadist whom they think will come trampling through their tulips on his way to taking over the nation).

But then again, it’s our money. The money that the state contends was overcharged when taxes were withheld and that they are nearly returning.

While some people (including myself) are tax procrastinators, I do know some people who insist on filing their tax returns electronically the moment they get their W-2 forms so they can get the return payments immediately.

IT IS POSSIBLE to get a return wired into one’s bank account by the end of January, depending on how quickly one reacts.

Or at least it WAS possible. But not anymore.

For the Illinois Department of Revenue said this week they’re not making any return payments until at least March 1. And for people who wait, they can probably count on an additional couple of weeks added to the amount of time it takes to process a tax return.

... or state for outrage over our tax returns?

State officials admit they want to “slow down” the process and make sure certain information matches. They say it is meant to reduce the number of erroneous payments that are caused by trying to process so many returns at once.

CONCERN FOR OUR safety and to reduce fraud. It sounds nice? But let’s be honest, There will be those who want to rant.

I’ve already read some Internet diatribes about how this is a plot by the government to deprive the people of their money. Many have said this is a conspiracy by Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago.

Or Gov. Bruce Rauner, depending on one’s political partisanship and who exactly it is you are inclined to want to criticize. Regardless, it’s someone’s fault, and they want that person to pay.

Even though I have never understood the big deal for those who want to file early. The payment gets made eventually, and you don’t get a financial bonus for filing early. Then again, as a freelance writer who has no one withholding tax payments on his behalf, for me Tax Day is when I have to publicly acknowledge what I owe – then figure out how to pay up.

A PROCESS THAT always takes up every bit of time I can get.

But there also will be those raging about the president’s announcement related to firearms. As though more background checks on people wishing to buy a firearm is really that outlandish an idea.

Who's kidding whom? They'll blame Obama for all!

Or provisions for spending more federal funds on treating mental illness and insuring that those of us who are not quite stable have a tougher time getting their hands on a pistol or rifle. That ought to be a common-sense idea, except that Obama proposed it so they’re ready to demonize it.

Then again, it probably will be the same people complaining about both measures – largely because they feel the need to complain about something. In this case, the fact that they’ll have to wait a little longer to get that tax return they wanted to use to buy themselves another weapon for protection against the Communist/Islamist horde they’re convinced is headed this way.

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Tax Day creeping up on all of us

I have a lazy streak within me. Never put off in my personal life until tomorrow what I can do next week!

Ordeal will end here on Monday

This weekend, I’m going to pay for it.

FOR TAX DAY is coming up on all of us Monday. That is when we have to have our income tax returns to the federal and state governments at least in the mail.

And if we’re being completely honest here, I haven’t even thought about it yet. Which means this is the weekend I’m going to have to make some time to sit down and figure out just how much I owe the governments of the national and state entities in which I reside.

I doubt I will be one of those people who will be desperately trying to figure out some tax dodge Monday night, then rushing to find a post office that will be open until Midnight so I can get that all-desired postmark that confirms I “filed” my returns on time.

But it means I probably will not be a pleasant person to be around this weekend. So I’m warning those of you who have any personal contact with me to “Leave Me Alone!!!!” It’s for your own good.

ACTUALLY, MY RETURNS won’t be complex. They’ll just be painful.

I don’t have any investments or real tax loopholes that complicate the situation. I just have income – which means calculating the amount of money owed and paying up.

For one of the drawbacks to being a self-employed freelance writer is that no one is withholding income on my behalf to pay the tax collector. I’m responsible for making those payments myself.

There won’t be a refund, because for me, April 15 is all about accounting my income and reconciling my debt. I owe, and I will have to pay up.

AND NO, I don’t gain any sympathy for those ideologues who want to rant and rage about the evils of taxation and how government is wasting “their” money. I support the concept that government works on our behalf, and that there is something of an obligation to help support it financially.

So perhaps I should view this time of year as another moment of civic duty – similar to how I make a point of casting ballots on Election Day. It gives me my right to complain about what is going wrong.

But I’m not that high-minded. What I’m really going to feel is the pain of having to make payments to reconcile my accounts and ensure that the Internal Revenue Service does not take any special interest in my existence.

I’m going to be broke for awhile. So that might be another reason to “Leave Me Alone!!!” I will probably have a less-pleasant than usual personality for some time.

I HAVE TO confess, I stumbled across a long-ago friend whom I went to college to who was able to boast last month that he had finished his tax returns. A part of me was envious.

Then again, I’m also realistic enough to admit that I don’t have the energy to compute my finances because I know I’m going to feel that moment of depression when I have to confront just how much money I owe!

In fact, there’s really only one fact that brings me any solace these days. It reminds me of a time in my third year of college when I was two weeks away from Final Exams with four papers that needed to be written – and I had only barely started on one of them. What kept me from cracking up then was the constant reminder I gave myself that regardless of what happened (I wound up finishing all of them by deadline), it would all be over in two weeks. I’d be on break.

Tax Day is Monday. No matter how frazzled (and financially busted) I will wind up, it will all be over in two more days.

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