More on the Tax Shelter Controversy

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TaxProf summarizes a number of recent articles and documents regarding the ongoing IRS battle with the major accounting firms over 1990’s Tax Shelters. Perhaps most interesting is this 6MB PDF memo sent by several current and former KPMG partners to the US DOJ and the media. This is a fascinating look at the internal politics of a large organization. Lynnley Browning has more:

The accounting firm KPMG is quietly putting the boxing gloves back on. Even as KPMG is in discussions with federal prosecutors to settle a criminal investigation over its sale of what the Internal Revenue Service says are bogus tax shelters, the firm has been taking on former clients who have sued it over those same shelters.

What is RSS?

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These small xml icons are popping up all over the internet. Clicking on them allows the reader to view a link to the site’s RSS (Really Simple Syndication) page and subscribe to them using a NewsReader. These “feeds” allow the reader to quickly scan headlines and, if interested, view a summary (or in some cases the entire) article. RSS is a very efficient method of reading and sharing information.

Sites can have many RSS feeds, such as Channel3000 or the Washington Post. Isthmus’s Daily Page has a feed, as does WisPolitics.

Getting Started:
Download a NewsReader:

RSS FAQ.

I’ve also posted a brief screencast that demonstrates my use of a RSS NewsReader (NetNewsWire). 13MB Quicktime

Be Your Own Security

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Mark Hoekstra:

The world is an increasingly dangerouse place. Research has shown that people need to get inspected to feel secure, even if the actual inspection is a complete farce. Yet as a society we cannot hire half the population to perform bogus inspections on the other half in order to keep up with market demand for perceived security

Classic – read it all.

Favre Yearns for Quiet

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Larry Weisman:

He recently had the windows of his truck tinted a dark shade to secure perhaps a little anonymity on the roads in this football-mad city of 100,000. Any Packers player is recognizable here. Favre? Anywhere, anytime.

“When I stop at a light, I don’t stop beside a car in the next lane,” he says. “If there’s two cars, I’ll pull up between them. I notice where I’m going to park. I envision what’s going to happen if I park there or here. People say, ‘It’s terrible you have to live like that.’ But it’s not. I love playing football. Some people live for being known, for sitting and being seen, but I always joke that I’m going to be like Don Meredith and suddenly be gone.”