Taxable Talk:  “Mr. Davis wanted to lower his 2007 income taxes.  He had earned $784,537 and that means a lot of tax. . . . It’s illegal to deliberately structure transactions to avoid currency reporting requirements . On one day Mr. Davis withdrew $534,544 in cash from various banks, all in amounts under $10,000.  That was not a good idea.”

CNNMoney.com:  “Strapped states hike taxes and fees by $24 billion for fiscal 2010.  Residents pay more for speeding, entering horses in races and digital downloads. . . . a record $23.9 billion in tax and fee hikes and $7.7 billion in other revenue increases enacted by states in fiscal 2010, according to a report released this week.  This is a massive jump over the $8.1 billion in revenue hikes instituted the previous year.   ‘These are the highest tax increases ever,’ said Scott Pattison, executive director of the National Association of State Budget Officers, which co-produced the semi-annual report with the National Governors Association.”

The Tax Lawyer’s Blog says this about our tax and spend elected officials:

It is one of the tragic facts of our current predicament that in the midst of a recession politicians find it easier and more politically palatable to take money from the citizenry they purport to represent than to do the hard work of cutting spending and eliminating waste. As long as our elected officials remain indolent and cowardly, government will continue to grow and the power of “we the people” will commensurately shrink.

For the 2007 federal income tax year, 46,655,760 income tax returns (32.6%) showed no tax owed or claimed a refund.