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Nov. 20, 2009
Rabbi David Aaron: How to make every second of your life come first
Caroline B. Glick: Whither American Jewry
Nov. 19, 2009
Binyamin L. Jolkovsky: Please Listen to this Godcast (5 minutes)
Jonathan Tobin: ADL Crosses the Line with Report Bashing Obama Critics
Nov. 18, 2009
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: What Judaism has to say about the secret of the Mona Lisa's smile
JWisdom.com: The (Jewish) Dating Game with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (8 minutes)
Nov. 17, 2009
Steven Emerson: How Does the 4th Amendment Impact Terror Finance Investigations?
JWisdom.com: If Frank Sinatra married Edith Piaf with Rabbi Y.Y. Rubinstein (2 minutes) Life lessons from what would be regarded as the most inappropriate lyrics ever sung
Nov. 16, 2009
The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : When borrowing is stealing
JWisdom.com: Deconstructing faith with Rabbi Warren Goldstein (9 minutes)
Nov. 13, 2009
JWisdom.com Sarah's subjective reality with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 6 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick: Obama's failure, Netanyahu's opportunity
Nov. 12, 2009
The Kosher Gourmet By Marialisa Calta : A sweet sweet potato treat
JWisdom.com Does God get tired? with Rabbi Harvey Belovski ( 5 minutes)
Nov. 11, 2009
Rabbi Avi Shafran: Jews and money: When anti-Semitism isn't
JWisdom.com Marriages are not made in Heaven with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (VERY fast 15 minutes)
Nov. 10, 2009
Michael Doyle: Author of book exposing CAIR ordered to remove supporting documents from Web
JWisdom.com If the creation so loudly shouts the existence of the Creator, why aren't more people believers? with Rabbi Naftali Brawer (9 minutes)
Nov. 9, 2009
Mark Steyn: Shooter exposes hole in U.S. terror strategy
JWisdom.com It's never too late to have a happy childhood with Sarah Chana Radcliffe (5 minutes)
Nov. 6, 2009
Rabbi Berel Wein: Choosing to hear
JWisdom.com Zero to 1/60th: How to Empower An Hour with Gavriel Aryeh Sande (7 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick The mullahs' big week
Suzanne Fields A Fallen Wall for Fallen Man
Nov. 5, 2009
The Kosher Gourmet: Three scrumptious -- but simple -- butternut squash dishes
JWisdom.com Hidden Hints: Unlocking Faith & Prayer with Rabbi Jay Yaacov Schwartz (10 minutes)
Nov. 4, 2009
Tom Hamburger and Kim Geiger: Should prayers be covered?
JWisdom.com When God played peacemaker With Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (5 minutes)
Nov. 3, 2009
Martin Peretz: Beware, Barack. Beware, Rahm. Beware, Axelrod
JWisdom.com Are you are closet idolater? With Sara Yoheved Rigler (10 minutes)
Nov. 2, 2009
Paul Greenberg: The Holocaust is now on Facebook
JWisdom.com Abraham's Strange Change With Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer (5 minutes)
Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review April 13, 2005 / 4 Nisan, 5765

Audit red flags

By Brad Dickson


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | This time of year many Americans fret about the third worst fate known to humankind (next to being incarcerated in a Turkish prison or receiving a late night call from Pat O'Brien): a tax audit. Thus, to help the American public avoid the dreaded A-word, I have compiled this list of potential audit red flags.

1) "Deducting your pets." My accountant says many Americans actually try to deduct their pets, which would be the first practical use ever for a cat. However, the I.R.S., utilizing the latest ultra high-tech, scam-targeting technology, has specially programmed computers designed to root out any return taking a deduction for a "Mr. Whiskers."

2) "Living above one's means." When you claim an income of $12,000 per year and your pad is a 5,000 square foot mansion with indoor lap pool and you own a Ferrari, those things are all okay. However, if you recently paid cash for a full tank of gasoline or a grand latte at Starbucks, that's going to raise some IRS eyebrows.

3) Attempting to deduct a losing bar bet for the time an inebriated guy named Buck claimed he could drink a glass of vodka through his nose, and you said he couldn't, and it turned out he could — red flag.

4) "Questionable requests for extensions." Everyone knows the tax filing deadline is mid April, but it's possible to file for an extension.. The following requests will elicit IRS scrutiny:

A). Filing for an extension, "until my tax preparer gets out of the slammer."
B). Filing for an extension, "until pigs fly."

C). Filing for the "Dan Rather Extension." (All the documents you turn in are fake.)

5. "Claiming a home office deduction." In order to take the home office deduction one room of your house must be used exclusively for business. When the IRS investigator shows up and sees your "home office" consists of a yellow legal pad atop a karaoke machine, adjacent an indoor batting cage, and a Jacuzzi with an inflatable woman, you may have some splainin' to do.

6) When the IRS catches one small infraction, and you ask if you can "take a mulligan" on the entire return — red flag.

7). "Claiming the neighbor kids as dependants." Although they spend 90% of their time on your front porch hawking Girl Scout cookies, Cub Scout light bulbs, every-magazine-known-to-man, "Brownie Timeshares" and "Indian Guide aluminum siding" you cannot deduct the junior Willy Lomans from next door. (Question: what do you do in Indian Guides these days — open little mini casinos?)

8) "Depreciating your spouse." We all get older, and frequently grumpier, and some of us lose our hair. However, the IRS takes a dim view of writing off your husband or wife's decline. And besides, with age comes wisdom.

9) On the portion of the tax form where it asks you to "List all income from tips" and you write, "HA-HA-HA-HA!! THAT'S A GOOD ONE. YOU GOT ANY MORE FUNNY JOKES?" you likely are in for an audit.

10) "Instead of stapling your W-2 form to your return you're so disorganized you staple your grocery list." (Florida residents only: you're so confused you staple a ballot with a vote for Al Gore to your return.)

There are literally hundreds more things you can do to trigger an audit.

At all cost avoid the following: Enclosing a dollar bill with your return so the head of the IRS can "buy a heart on Ebay;" drawing a 'sad face' inside the zeroes on 1040; and, replacing the last page of your tax form with a chain letter, informing the IRS that, "John Smith failed to send this to twenty-five friends and was found with an axe through his nose."

The important thing is to save all your receipts. I religiously saved every significant receipt in an old shoe box for seventeen years. Unfortunately, when I was audited I grabbed the wrong shoe box, and when I got to the IRS office all I had to show for my itemized deductions from 1990 — 1994 was a pair of brown penny loafers. By the time I left the office I still had the loafers, but the I.R.S. had the pennies.

Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.



JWR contributor Brad Dickson was a monologue staff writer for The Tonight Show With Jay Leno for 13 years. He's presently developing a network television pilot. Comment by clicking here.


Things not to say at the Charles-Camilla wedding!
BREAKING NEWS: We've gone berserk!
Dan Rather’s retirement speech
Rooster rumble a cockamamie idea?

© 2005, Brad Dickson

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