Are we going split hairs here? Archives

A Multitude of Big 4 Auditors Can Confirm This

[J]ust because a person has the initials CPA after his/her name does not mean that he/she knows his/her arse from a hole in the ground when it comes to preparing 1040s.

That comes courtesy of the Wandering Tax Pro, Robert D. Flach. It got the attention of Joe Kristan, who came to the defense of CPAs everywhere but did admit that some CPAs have no business being near tax forms:

[Robert] then spends his next 10 paragraphs elaborating on our shortcomings. And that’s fine, to a point. Not all CPAs are qualified tax preparers. By the same token, not every lawyer is capable of defending you on a murder charge. But the guy you want by your side when the state wants to send you to the chair is definitely going to be a lawyer. And while not all CPAs should be your tax advisor, many of the best tax advisors are CPAs.

Case in point: many relatives and clueless friends of auditors still ask said auditors to prepare their tax returns. In most cases, a) this is a HUGE mistake and b) they don’t want to help you anyway.

Technically, Flying a Plane into an IRS Building Is Not Terrorism

That’s according to Janet Napolitano. Who knew that the Homeland Security Secretary was such an adept hair-splitter?

From the Washington Post 44 Blog: “To our belief, he was a lone wolf. He used a terrorist tactic, but an individual who uses a terrorist tactic doesn’t necessarily mean they are part of an organized group attempting an attack on the United States,” Napolitano said.

We decided to get to the bottom of this. Here’s the definition of “terrorism”:

The systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion

Okay then. The applicable definition of “terror”:

Violent or destructive acts (as bombing) committed by groups in order to intimidate a population or government into granting their demands.

So “groups” is the key word here. Fine but does that include Facebook groups because, “His name is Joseph Stack” has 357 members. And did she run this past Treasury? Geithner and Shulman might have a different opinion.

In semi-related news, the SEC has announced that they will determine a “single high quality global definition of terrorism” within five years, at which time, any attacks on SEC facilities will be appropriately classified.

Napolitano rules out terrorism in IRS plane crash [WaPo]