5 Feet of Fury

Mark Steyn: It’s that time of the year when a young man’s fancy turns to …his tax return

Mark Steyn writes:

“Tax season,” as it is called. Baseball should have a season, mating should have a season, but, when tax has a season, something is seriously wrong. Guest-hosting for Rush on Monday, I took a call from Patricia in Indiana, who’s just received notice from the IRS that she’s going to be audited for her 2013 taxes. Which she hasn’t filed yet. Because they’re not due until April 15th.

So she’s being preemptively pre-audited. It’s like the tax collector’s version of Philip K Dick’s “thought crime”: Just in case she’s thinking of claiming a refund in a month’s time, they need to nip it in the bud now. What could possibly set off such alarm bells? Patricia said she and her husband had an entirely normal, boring tax profile – but they had made a small donation to Mitt Romney.

Next it will be the TSA showing up at the door for your secondary patdown even though you’ve no plans to fly anywhere.

The IRS is corrupt, and should be abolished, and replaced by an agency with far fewer powers. Instead, Republicans dither ineffectually.