IRS Gets Called Out In Offer In Compromise Case

 

I am looking at an offer in compromise (OIC) case.

These cases are almost futile for a taxpayer, as the Tax Court extends broad deference to the IRS in its analysis of and determinations on OICs. To win requires one to show that the IRS acted in bad faith.

COMMENT: I have soured on OICs as the years have gone by. Those commercials for “pennies on the dollar” stir unreasonable expectations and do not help. OICs are designed for people who have experienced a reversal of fortune - illness, unemployment, disability, or whatnot – which affect their ability to pay their taxes. It is not meant for someone who is irresponsible or inexplicably unfettered by decency or the responsibilities of the human condition. Not too long ago, for example, one of the clients wanted us to pursue an OIC, as he has racked up impressive tax debt but has no cash. I refused to be involved. Why? Because his cash is going to construct a $2-plus million dollar home. I am very pro-taxpayer, but this is not that. Were it up to me, we would fire him as a client.

Let’s look at the Whittaker case.

Mr. W is a veteran and was a self-employed personal trainer. Mrs. W worked in a local school district and had a side gig as a mall security guard. They were also very close to retirement.

The Ws owed everybody, it seems: a mortgage, student loans, the IRS, the state of Minnesota and so on.

In 2018 the IRS sent a notice of intent to levy.

The Ws requested a collection due process (CDP) hearing.

COMMENT: The Ws were represented by the University of Minnesota tax clinic, giving students a chance to represent clients before the IRS and courts.

The IRS of course wanted numbers: the Form 433 paperwork detailing income, expenses, assets, debt and so forth.

The Ws owed the IRS approximately $33 grand. The clinic calculated their reasonable collection potential as $1,629. They submitted a 20% payment of $325.80, per the rules, along with their OIC.

In the offer, the Ws stressed that their age and difficult financial situation meant that soon they would have to rely on retirement savings as a source of income rather than as a nest egg. Their house was in disrepair and had an unusual mortgage, meaning that it was extremely unlikely it could be refinanced to free up cash.

The IRS has a unit - the Centralized Offer in Compromise unit – that stepped in next. Someone at the unit calculated the Ws’ RCP as $250,000, which is wildly different from $1,629. The unit spoke with representatives at the clinic about the bad news. The clinic in turn emphasized special circumstances that the Ws brought to the table.  

That impasse transferred the OIC file to Appeals.

It was now March 2020.

Remember what happened in March 2020?

COVID.

The two sides finally spoke in September.

Appeals agreed with an RCP of $250 grand. The Settlement Officer (SO) figured that the Ws could draw retirement monies to pay-off the IRS.

Meanwhile Mr. W had retired and Mrs. W was gigging at the mall only two weekends a month.

The SO was not changing her mind. She figured that Mrs. W must have a pension from the school. She also surmised that Mr. W’s military pension must be $2,253 per month rather than $1,394. How did she know all this? Magic, I guess.

The W’s argued that they could not borrow against the house. They had refinanced it under something called the Home Affordability Refinance Program, which helps homeowners owing more than their house is worth. A ballon payment was due in 2034, and refinancing a house that is underwater is nearly impossible.

This did not concern the SO. She saw an assessed value of $243,000 on the internet, subtracted an $85 thousand mortgage, which left plenty of cash. The W’s pointed out that there was deferred maintenance on the house – a LOT of deferred maintenance. Between the impossible mortgage and the deferred maintenance, the house should be valued – they argued – at zero.

Nope, said the SO. The Ws could access their retirement to pay the tax. They did not have to involve the house, so the mortgage and deferred maintenance was a nonfactor. She then cautioned the W’s not to withdraw retirement monies for any reason other than the IRS. If they did so, she would consider the assets as “dissipated.” That is a bad thing.

Off to Tax Court they went. Remember my comment earlier: low chance of success. What choice did the Ws have? At least they were well represented by the tax clinic.

The Court saw three key issues.

Retirement Account

The W’s led off with a great argument:

 

  

This is Internal Revenue Manual 5.8.5.10, which states that a taxpayer within one year of retirement may have his/her retirement account(s) treated as income rather than as an asset. This is critical, as it means the IRS should not force someone to empty their 401(k) to pay off tax debt.

The SO was unmoved. The IRM says that the IRS “may” but does not say “must.”

Yep, that is the warm and fuzzy we expect from the IRS.

The Court acknowledged:

We see no erroneous view of the law and no clearly erroneous assessment of facts.”

But the Court was not pleased with the IRS:

But there may be a problem for the Commissioner – this reasoning didn’t make it into the notice of determination …”

The “notice of determination” comment is the Court saying the files were sloppy. The IRS must do certain things in a certain order, especially with OICs. Sloppy won’t cut it.

Home Equity

The W’s had offered to provide additional information on the loan terms, the deferred repairs to the house, the unwillingness of the banks to refinance.

The IRS worked from assessed values.

It is like the two were talking past each other.

Here is the Court:

The IRS does need to take problems with possible refinancing a home seriously.”

The Whittakers have a point – there’s nothing in the administrative record that states or even suggests that the examiner at the Unit or the settlement officer during the CDP hearing asked for any information in addition to the appraised value.”

There is no evidence in the record of any consideration of the Whittakers’ arguments on this point.”

Oh, oh.

Here is the first slam:

We therefore find that the settlement officer’s conclusion about the Whittaker’s ability to tap the equity in their home was clearly erroneous on this record. This makes her reliance on that equity in her RCP calculations an abuse of discretion.”

COVID

The W’s had alerted the IRS that Mr. W had completely retired and Mrs. W was working only two weekends a month. The SO disregarded the matter, reasoning that the W’s had enough pension income to compensate.

Which pension, you ask? Would that include the pension the SO unilaterally increased from $1,394 to $2,253 monthly?

The Commissioner now concedes that the settlement officer was mistaken, and that Mr. Whittaker had a military pension of only $1,394 per month.”

Oops.

There was the second slam.

The IRS – perhaps embarrassed – went on to note that the Mall of America opened after being COVID-closed for three months. Speaking of COVID, the lockdown had inspired a nationwide surge in demand for fitness equipment. Say …, wasn’t Mr. W a personal fitness trainer?

The Court erupted:

Upholding the rejection of the Whittakers’ offer because Mrs. Whittaker’s mall job may have resumed or Mr. Whittaker might be able to run a training business using potential clients’ possible pandemic purchases is entirely speculative.”

True that.

The settlement officer ‘did not think that the loss of the Whittaker’s wage income or self-employment income … sufficiently mattered to justify reworking the Offer Worksheet.’”

The Court was getting heated.

The settlement officer’s explicit refusal to rework the worksheet despite the very considerable discrepancy in the calculation before and after the pandemic is a clear error and thus an abuse of discretion.”

The Court remanded the matter back to IRS Appeals with clear instructions to get it right. It explicitly told the IRS to consider the material change in the Ws’ circumstances – changes that happened during the CDP hearing itself - and their ability to pay.

We said earlier “almost futile.” We did not say futile. The Ws won and are headed back to IRS Appeals to revisit the OIC.

Our case this time was Whittaker v Commissioner, T.C. Memo 2023-59.

The IRS Caught Dumping A Collection Case

Let’s look at a taxpayer win on an issue not known for taxpayer wins.

Thomas Hamilton was an attorney and Edith Hamilton was a chaplain. They filed a 2016 tax return showing tax due of almost $72 thousand. They however did not pay the tax in full.

The IRS assessed.

The IRS then issued a Notice of Federal Tax Lien (NFTL) to secure its assessment.

This presented a procedural option: the Hamiltons could request a Collection Due Process (CDP) hearing. If they could work-out a payment agreement perhaps they might avoid the lien. Liens can be embarrassing.

They requested a CDP hearing.  

The IRS Settlement Officer (SO) asked for a lot of information, including:

(1)  Proof of 2018 estimated tax payments

(2)  Their 2017 personal tax return

(3)  Six months of bank statements

(4)  Three months of pay stubs

(5)  Proof of various expenses for the preceding three months

The SO also wanted the law practice to catch-up on its (mostly payroll-related) tax returns from 2015 through 2017.

The SO did stagger some of the due dates for the above: some were due on October 17, others were due October 24. The hearing itself was November 15, 2018.

The Hamiltons did not provide any documents by October 24.

Oh oh.

They did write a letter on October 31, explaining that their (now) previous bookkeeper failed to keep many documents, a fact which came to light as they were trying to comply with the SO’s request. They hired a CPA, who was helping reconstruct records as well as representing them during the CDP hearing. Finally, they had reordered online bank statements and would forward the requested documentation as soon as possible. They reiterated their desire for a payment plan.

Let me retract the “oh oh” comment, although they should have responded – in some manner - by the October 17 date.

Why? To discourage the SO from thinking that they were stalling.  

Between November 2 and November 15, the Hamiltons sent five faxes totaling hundreds of pages. They sent bank statements, copies of bills and some (but not all) of the payroll tax returns for the law practice.

The day before the hearing they also faxed personal and business financial information (Forms 433-A and 433-B) as well as a copy of their 2017 individual tax return and its electronic acceptance by the IRS.

The SO had spent no time on the case from October 1 to the date of the hearing, when she spent an hour preparing beforehand.

At the hearing the SO pressed on the following:

·      They had not filed their 2017 individual tax return.

·      They had not provided proof of their expenses.

·      They were not making 2018 estimated tax payments.

·      They had not filed payroll returns for the law practice.   

The CPA chimed in:

·      They had filed their 2017 tax return and provided proof of electronic acceptance by the IRS.

·      They had provided bank statements and documentation for the vast majority of their expenses.

·      They would be current with their 2018 estimated taxes as soon as the following month.

·      They had file some of the payroll returns the SO was considering unfiled.

The SO said she would recommend filing the NFTL.

Mr Hamilton requested additional time to provide the missing information.

The SO said: no chance.

The IRS sustained the filing of the NFTL for 2016 and also rejected their request for an installment agreement.

Sheesshh. That CDP hearing blew up.

And so we get to Tax Court.

Let’s set up the issue:

·      There was a proposed lien

·      To which taxpayers requested a CDP hearing

·      And got turned down for not complying with the SO’s documentation requests

You can take one of these to Tax Court, but it is very tough to win. In short, you must show that the IRS was capricious and abused its discretion. 

The Court went through the file:

1. The Hamiltons sent an 11-page fax on November 9. The fax included one of the payroll tax returns the SO considered missing.

    The SO had included the fax cover sheet in her record.

    But not the other 10 pages.

    One wonders how accurate the SO’s records were.

    Human error, one supposes.

2. They had filed their 2017 individual tax return and had faxed the SO a copy. They had also informed her of this filing at the hearing.

    But the SO had included the non-filing as a reason for her bounce.

    Odd.

3. Between November 2 and the November 15 hearing date, they had sent at least five faxes, totaling hundreds of pages of financial documentation

    But the SO said they had not provided documentation.

    Here is the Court:

The failure of the administrative record to capture some documents makes us question the completeness of the administrative record that the settlement officer considered and that we are reviewing.

    And here the case turned.

    The third strike.

The Court pointed out that the Hamiltons made efforts to keep the SO apprised – of the bookkeeper debacle, of the request for copies of documents and bank statements. They asked the SO to apprise them of any questions or issues while they could still react.

Then the Court emphasized that the SO had not even looked at the file until the day of the hearing.

The hearing where she nonetheless chastised the Hamiltons for not having provided all the paperwork.

Here is the Court:

She did not take them up on that offer; her doing so would have allowed the Hamiltons to address any issues before the November 15, 2018 hearing.”

The Court continued:

… the settlement officer made up her mind after a cursory one-hour review of the Hamiltons’ materials and failed to give proper consideration to the issues they raised …”

The cumulative effect of the settlement officer’s conduct in this case was to deprive the Hamiltons of fair consideration of their issues and concerns. The Hamilton’s conduct was by no means perfect, but it reflected consistent cooperation and good-faith effort throughout the CDP process.”

The SO’s decision was found arbitrary and lacking sound basis in fact or law.

The case was returned to IRS Appeals for another hearing.

The SO had gotten the case off her desk.

But she had not done her job.

And there you have a rare taxpayer win in the CDP arena.

Our case this time was Hamilton v Commissioner, T.C. Memo 2022-21.

Memphian Appeals An Offer In Compromise

I am looking at a case dealing with an offer in compromise.

You know these from the late-night television and radio advertisements to “settle your IRS debts for pennies on the dollar.”

Yeah, right.

If it were so easy, I would use it myself.

Don’t get me wrong, there are fact patterns where you probably could settle for pennies on the dollar. Unfortunately, these fact patterns tend to involve permanent injury, loss of earning power, a debilitating illness or something similar.

I will just pay my dollar on the dollar, thank you.

What caught my attention is that the case involves a Memphian and was tried in Memphis, Tennessee. I have an interest in Memphis these days.

Let’s set it up.

Taxpayer filed tax returns for 2012 through 2014 but did not pay the full amount of tax due, which was about $40 grand. A big chunk of tax was for 2014, when he withdrew almost $90,000 from his retirement account.

Why did he do this?

He was sending his kids to a private high school.

I get it. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard from Memphians that one simply cannot send their kids to a public school, unless one lives in the suburbs.

In December, 2016 he received a letter from the IRS that they were going to lien.

He put the brakes on that by requesting a Collection Due Process (CDP) hearing.

Well done.

In January he sent an installment agreement to the IRS requesting payments of $300 per month until both sides could arrive at a settlement.

The following month (February) he submitted an Offer in Compromise (OIC) for $1,500.

That went to a hearing in April. The IRS transferred the OIC request to the appropriate unit.

In late August the IRS denied the OIC.

Let’s talk about an OIC for a moment. I am thinking about a full post (or two) about OICs in the future, but let’s hit a couple of high spots right now.

The IRS takes a look at a couple of things when reviewing an OIC:

(1)  Your net worth, defined as the value of assets less any liabilities thereon.

There are certain arcane rules. For example, the IRS will probably allow you to use 80% of an asset’s otherwise fair market value. The reason is that it is considered a forced sale, meaning that you might accept a lower price than otherwise.

(2) Your earning power

This is where those late-night IRS settlement mills dwell. Have no earning power and near-zero net worth and you get pennies on the dollar.

There are twists here. For example, the IRS is probably not going to spot you a monthly Lexus payment. That is not how it works. The IRS provides tables for certain categories of living expenses, and that is the number you use when calculating how much you have “left over” to pay the IRS.

Let’s elaborate what the above means. If the IRS spots you a lower amount than you are actually spending, then the IRS sees an ability to pay that you do not have in real life.

You can ask for more than the table amount, but you have to document and advocate your cause. It is far from automatic, and, in fact, I would say that the IRS is more inclined to turn you down than to approve any increase from the table amount. I had a client several years ago who was denied veterinary bills and prescriptions for his dog, for example.

The IRS workup showed that the taxpayer had monthly income of approximately $12,700 and allowable monthly expenses of approximately $11,000. That left approximately $1,700 monthly, and the IRS wanted to get paid.

But there was one expense that made up the largest share of the IRS difference. Can you guess what it was?

It was the private school.

The IRS will not spot you private school tuition, unless there is something about your child’s needs that requires that private school. A special school for the deaf, for example, would likely qualify.

That is not what we have here.

The IRS saw an ability to pay that the taxpayer did not have in real life.

Taxpayer proposed a one-time OIC of $5,000.

The IRS said No.

They went back and forth and agreed to $200 per month, eventually increasing to $700 per month.

COMMENT: This is not uncommon for OICs. The IRS will often give you a year to rework your finances, with the expectation that you will then be able to pay more.

The taxpayer then requested abatement of interest and penalties, which was denied. Generally, those requests require the taxpayer to have a clean filing history, and that was not the case here.

The mess ended up in Tax Court.

Being a court, there are rules. The rule at play here is that the Court was limited to reviewing whether the IRS exercised abuse of discretion.

Folks, that is a nearly impossible standard to meet.

Let me give you one fact: he had net assets worth approximately $43 thousand.

His tax was approximately $40 thousand.

Let’s set aside the 80% thing. It would not take a lot of earning power for the IRS to expect him to be able to repay the full $40 grand.

He lost. There really was no surprise, as least to me.

I do have a question, though.

His monthly income was closer to $13 grand than to $12 grand.

It fair to say that is well above the average American monthly household income.

Private school is expensive, granted.

But where was the money going?

Our case this time was Love v Commissioner, T.C. Memo 2019-92.

The Goose And Gander Tax Bill

Here is something that will catch your eye:

It is undisputed that the Debtor failed to file its tax returns for the years 2006 to 2008; and that for such failure, the Debtor incurred penalties totaling $3,662,000."

It is a bankruptcy case from Delaware.

COMMENT: You may wonder how a tax case wound up in bankruptcy court. Bankruptcy law keeps its own beat, and a bankruptcy court can have near-extraordinary powers. For example, the court can determine the amount or legality of any tax, any fine, or any penalty relating to a tax. That is what happened here. The IRS assessed a penalty, the taxpayer protested, the IRS decided it was right (surprise) and submitted the penalty as a claim to the bankruptcy court.

And I find the IRS position so extreme as to constitute bad faith. I further think the IRS should be required to reimburse the professional fees incurred defending against its reckless behavior. You miss a filing deadline by a day or two and one would think the Treasury underpinnings of the nation are in mortal throes. Have the IRS bankrupt you while enforcing some capricious tax argument, however, and you are expected to be a good sport.

I would like to someone (ahem, US Senator Paul) take up the cause. It could be called the Good For The Goose, Good For The Gander - Time For The IRS To Take Responsibility - Act. If the IRS can penalize you for unreasonable positions, then the IRS should also be subject to penalties for unreasonable conduct.  The penalty would be paid to the affected taxpayer.

Our protagonist (Refco Community Pool) formed in 2003 as a partnership. It was an investment group, and their thing was to track the S&P Managed Futures Index. To do this, they needed an investment advisor. They found one in the Cayman Islands (Sphinx Managed Futures Fund). The advisor (Sphinx) in turn used a clearinghouse (Refco, LLC) to execute trades and whatever.

OBSERVATION: Right off the bat, we have two Refco's going - "Pool" and "LLC." Set this aside, as it is not relevant to our story.

Here is what happened:

1. In 2005 Refco LLC filed for bankruptcy. This caused a run, meaning that ...
2. Sphinx yanked out $312 million. However, ...
3. Sphinx had to return $260 million as was deemed a "preference" action.
4. In 2006 Sphinx went into liquidation. As part of the process, the Court appointed two liquidators.  
5. The liquidators soon found very serious accounting issues. They in fact advised that they could not assure the accuracy of tax and accounting information provided investors.
6. Refco Pool wanted its money from Sphinx, but all they received was something called "special situation shares." They were special because no one knew what they were worth until the liquidation was complete, a process which stretched into 2013. 

The IRS noticed that Sphinx was not filing tax returns and issuing K-1s. The Sphinx liquidators explained that it would cost between $5 and $7 million to reconstruct records to even approach a tax return. The two sides came to an agreement, and Sphinx was absolved of filing K-1s from 2005 to 2007.

Let's back up a bit. Who invested in Sphinx? It was Refco Pool. The IRS next went after Refco Pool for not filing its tax return and issuing K-1s.

COMMENT: Here we have a conundrum. Refco Pool has one main asset - special situation shares (whatever that means) in a bankrupt entity with accounting problems severe enough that its liquidators advise against using any numbers. A tax return requires numbers. What to do?

           

Refco Pool argued reasonable cause for abatement of the penalty. You may as well have Refco Pool discover a new planet as get a tax return out of whatever information they could pry from Sphinx.

No, no, no, said the IRS. Refco Pool could have used selected files and summaries and reports and disbursement statements and a receipt from its last visit to Dairy Queen to reconstruct records that Sphinx should have provided but did not because the IRS said it was OK not to and then Refco Pool could have filed its own partnership tax return....

Well ... yes, Refco Pool could. However, the information was unreliable if not completely inaccurate. In fact, the matter went further than that. Even if Refco Pool could do some Harry Potter alchemy, it would not know how to separate the separate tranches, meaning it could not determine its share. And, since we are talking about it, Refco Pool would have no idea what to do with the "special" part of its share - which was certainly less than 100% but not certain to be more than 0%.

The Bankruptcy Court explained:           

As an accrual method taxpayer, the Debtor cannot recognize income until 'all the events have occurred which fix the right to receive such income and the amount thereof can be determined with reasonable accuracy.'"

One could persuasively argue that Refco Pool could not meet this threshold.

The IRS persisted that Refco Pool could have assembled numbers - however fragile - and filed a tax return had it really wanted to.

ANALYSIS: The judicial standard however is not whether Refco Pool exhausted all possible alternatives. The standard is whether Refco Pool exercised the level of care that a reasonably prudent person would under the same circumstances. 

The Court pointed out the tax risk that Refco Pool would have assumed by filing a tax return:

By knowingly filing inaccurate returns, the Debtor had a reasonable cause for concern given the specter of accuracy-related penalties it might incur ...."

The IRS could have penalized Refco Pool if the numbers proved to be substantially inaccurate.

Wait, there is more.

Refco Pool had approximately 1,600 partners to whom it was obligated to issue K-1s. Had those K-1s gone south, the partners too could have gone after Refco Pool.

The Court was unconvinced whether Refco Pool could even sign a tax return:           

Based on this knowledge, a reasonable person would likely be concerned with signing the jurat clause at the bottom of Form 1065..." 

COMMENT: The jurat clause is the one at the bottom of the tax form that reads "... to the best of my knowledge and belief, it is true, correct, and complete."

The Court concluded: 

Based on the evidence presented, the Debtor proved that it carefully considered its filing obligations and undertook appropriate steps in an effort to avoid the failure. Accordingly, the Court holds that the debtor acted in a responsible manner both before and after the failure to file occurred."

The Bankruptcy Court disallowed the IRS penalties.

I grant you, this is an extreme case, but perhaps it takes the extreme case to spotlight outrageous government behavior.

Tax penalties can generally be abated for "reasonable" cause. The problem is that the IRS has redefined "reasonable" in a completely unreasonable way. Why? Many suspect that it wants to keep the penalties to supplement its Congressional funding. Is that really what we want: for the IRS to self-fund by automatically assessing penalties and then imperiously decreeing that any request for abatement of said penalties is not "reasonable"?

I propose a compromise if we cannot get the Goose & Gander bill passed: all IRS penalties are to be returned to Treasury. They are then to be re-budgeted as Congress determines, with no assurance that the monies would return to the IRS.  Perhaps that would cool the IRS jets a bit.

Now You Say You're Leaving California

I have stumbled into our next story of outrageous state tax behavior.

I was skimming (quickly, trust me) the Supreme Court decision in Franchise Tax Board v Hyatt. It involves a resident of Nevada who sued California. California invoked sovereign immunity, a legal doctrine arising from the era of royalty and asserting that the king can do no wrong and is therefore immune from legal action.

Handy, if you are the king  … or any of California’s countless government agencies.

This case goes back a long way. Gilbert Hyatt moved from California to Nevada in the early 1990s. More specifically, he said he moved in September, 1991. California says he moved in April, 1992.

COMMENT: Sounds like a “poe-tae-toe” versus “poe-taw-toe” moment, on first impression.

California said this meant he owed the state $10 million in taxes, interest and penalties from patent income.

            COMMENT: Of course.

Problem is that the California Franchise Tax Board took some … questionable steps in developing their case against Hyatt:

·        They went through his mail

·        They rifled through his garbage

·        They contacted third parties, including estranged family and people who did not have his best interests at heart

He brought suit … in Nevada courts. There was a previous Supreme Court decision (Nevada v Hall) that allowed a private citizen to bring legal action against a second state, without the second state's consent.

The jury verdict was almost $500 million in damages and fees.

Then California appealed, arguing that Nevada's law limited damages in similar suits against its own agencies to $50,000.  

California got the Nevada Supreme Court to reduce the verdict to $1 million. The Court reasoned that California went a bit further than Nevada would allow, so the $50,000 cap did not apply.

COMMENT: Folks, we need our own state. We could do whatever we want and then hide behind sovereign immunity, hakuna matata or whatever other multi-syllabic nonsense springs to mind.

California was still not happy, arguing that Nevada was exhibiting a “policy of hostility.”      

California appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the Constitution applied. The Supreme Court agreed, using words such as "comity" to reduce the damages to $50,000.

My thoughts?

I allow that there may have been a legitimate disagreement at the very beginning of this whole matter. Let’s say that you move most, but not all, of your possessions to another state. You leave some furniture there, as the realtor said that it would help to show and sell the house. You then have a California tell you that you had not really moved until the last chair and framed art had left the state. What are you going to do: sue? You are not moving back to California just to sue. That means that you are suing from another state and California is going to invoke the doctrine of the king’s pantaloons or whatever.

Still, doesn’t it feel … wrong … to have California going through your mail and trash, peering through your windows and contacting estranged relatives? This is behavior beyond the pale. We are not talking about homeland security, where some argument might possibly be made to excuse the king’s overreach. 

We are only talking about taxes.