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Come on folks. I can't believe no one wants to have their kids enter the "Why I deserve the New Pulse SLither Drift Scooter..." Contest.

It's FREE for the kids to enter and here is the direct url for all the rules and such.

Good Luck :)

http://storiesforchildrenmagazine.org/PulseSlitherDriftScooterYouthContest.aspx

Former Republican Congressman, founding trustee of the Heritage Foundation, and national chairman of the American Conservative Union, Mickey Edwards is the author of Reclaiming Conservatism: How A Great American Political Movement Got Lost- and How It Can Find Its Way Back. In the post below Edwards refutes the claim that John McCain is not a real conservative.   Read more posts by Edwards here.

(Please note: I know Romney well, having worked in his gubernatorial campaign and later joining him frequently at Republican fundraising events in Massachusetts. I know McCain, too, having served with him in Congress. I have not, however, endorsed any candidate in this year’s presidential primaries.)

With Mitt Romney out of the race for President, the narrow circle of self-designated “spokesmen” for conservatism will find themselves growing ever more frantic in their desperate search for a candidate who can somehow stop John McCain’s march to the Republican presidential nomination. Mr. McCain’s apostasy, they contend, is that he is not a conservative and, in the words of Mr. Romney, “outside the Republican mainstream.” (more…)

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STATUS: I’m generally annoyed but can’t really talk much about why. Maybe later. In good news though, Ally Carter is still on the NYT list. Yahoo! CROSS MY HEART has been on for 8 weeks and is at #6. I’D TELL YOU I LOVE YOU has now been on for 3 weeks and we’re holding on to the #2 spot. Now that never fails to bring a smile to my face.

What’s playing on the iPod right now? THE BIG SKY by Kate Bush

IRS—that should sum up my day. Do you know what I did this week? I paid a nice hefty sum to my International tax attorney to write me up a memo that clearly outlines what the agency’s responsibilities are for tax withholding and reporting for my clients who are citizens of Australia, Ireland, and Canada.

This is something that should be accomplished via a free phone call to the IRS but after the fourth transfer and conflicting answers (see previous blog about this), I decided it was worth the money to confirm the letter of the law from an expert (and no, that would not be an IRS representative).

I have to say that Cara, the International Tax Attorney, is my new best friend. The minute I asked her my questions, it was clear that I was not speaking in a foreign language and she knew exactly what I was talking about. Such a pleasant experience.

This was a fifteen page memo that I’m really not going to sum up in one blog entry but I can hit on the high points.

And folks, I’m just sharing this for fun. This in no way substitutes for tax advice from a professional and should not be considered so.

1. Ascertain the foreign author’s country of permanent residence and whether they are a citizen there.

2. Check the tax treaty for specifics on what is the withholding percentage allowed as well as what type of royalty income is covered by the treaty. (For example, Ireland has 0% withholding on everything. Canada is also 0% withholding except for royalties earned from film/tv. Such fun to keep this all straight.)

3. Have foreign author complete W7 form for an ITIN (international tax id number) which will be needed for the W8BEN form which must be on file.

4. Have foreign author fill out the W8BEN form correctly. If they don’t, agency must withhold 30% for U.S. taxes regardless of what the tax treaty says (so this is crucial)

5. Report to the IRS amount withheld or not withheld on form 1042-S. If withholding was done, monies need to be sent to the IRS at a specific time and with a whole other form. The IRS can’t tell you what you actually need to do but woe is you if you don’t get it there in time.

So basically what I’m saying is that I’m good to go with any foreign author clients from Australia, Ireland, and Canada so query away.

If you are a non-US citizen and resident of somewhere else, it’s back to Cara and a whole new memo…and no, that wouldn’t keep me from taking you on but I’d have to especially love your manuscript to take on the trouble.

STATUS: I’m being sarcastic in that subject heading.

What’s playing on the iPod right now? LONG HOT SUMMER by The Style Council

One of the drawbacks of having foreign clients is the accounting. (Don’t worry Sarah Rees Brennan—I still love you!). Today was all about figuring out the tax issue for Sarah because she is Irish and currently lives in Ireland but we sold her book to a U.S. publisher.

Here’s what we had to do (we being all involved, me, my tax person, and Sarah’s Irish tax person). First, we looked up the tax treaty between the U.S. and Ireland (and it differs depending on the country). Luckily for me, per the tax treaty, my agency does not have to withhold any income tax and Sarah will be taxed in Ireland on the income received.

So great. I don’t have to withhold or send monies to the IRS but no, my job is not done yet. I still have to have Sarah fill out the W8-BEN form for my files. Then I have to file form 1042, 1042-S, and 1042T (transmittal form) just to show that she is exempt and I didn’t withhold monies per the tax treaty.

Which means I’m filling out numerous forms so I can simply put the number zero on all the appropriate lines.

To verify, I called the IRS just to make sure that we had all the necessary forms in hand and nothing was missing. This took 2 hours and a transfer to no less than four departments at the IRS.

Needless to say, I’m not completely confident that even the IRS knows exactly what has to be done but I’m sure they’ll tell me if I neglected a form!

One of the constant threats that small libraries have to contest with is threat of closure. In Vermont where I live many small libraries just barely stay open because people in the town advocate for them and the decision ultimately rests with the town. If they want to pay for it, they get to keep it. In Indiana there is a movement afoot to consolidate the state’s libraries to, I believe, one per county. It’s at the initial stages, a plan by the governor, at this point. Small libraries are discussion the issue wiht their boards, and other libraries. The plan would cut the total number of libraries from 238 to 92 via consolidation. This would, apparently save property tax money and “streamline” government somewhat. We’re talking about a state that has advertisements on its government site search. The Indiana State Library website doens’t have any immediately available information on this topic that I could find through basic searching.

It’s pretty clear that this would mostly shift library costs to the patron (travel, re-learning systems, fees?) and staff (lost jobs, retraining, commuting) and away from the funding bodies. So, sure there is money to be saved but would a reorganization scheme actually work? I find the concept chilling but I haven’t really started reading about it yet. For people who are interested in this issue, I suggest the Save Our Small Public Libraries blog and the INpublb archives (view by thread to find consoludation discussions) [ttw]

Here's a great contest that gets kids to read and write while connecting them to their favorite authors:

"The Center for the Book in the Library of Congress, in partnership with Target Stores and in cooperation with affiliate state centers for the book, invites readers in grades 4 through 12 to enter Letters About Literature, a national reading-writing contest. To enter, readers write a personal letter to an author, living or dead, from any genre-- fiction or nonfiction, contemporary or classic, explaining how that author's work changed the student's way of thinking about the world or themselves."

Info here: http://www.loc.gov/loc/cfbook/letters.html

It made me think about the books I read as a child and wondered who I would have written. As an elementary student, I read Nancy Drew, Trixie Belden, and books of similar ilk. But then I also read every book on World War II and being  a Catholic school girl, I read a lot of books about the saints. Then in high school, I read a lot of political fiction (Allen Drury, Fletcher Knebel), and then Arthur Hailey books plus sci-fi writers like Isaac Asimov. I also read a lot of scripts from Broadway plays, checking out the Best of Broadway book from the library each year. 

But I'm pretty sure the person I would have written would have been Gwendolyn Brooks. Her poetry really resonated with me, and as a student in the 1950s and 1960s, she was one of the few African American female writers I knew. Literature today is so much more diverse and I hope students will take advantage of this opportunity to tell the writers who speak to them how much they matter.

It is a lovely day in paradise. Unfortunately, I am inside downloading tax forms. The forms are available online (that's how I'm downloading them, duh) at DepartmentOfFinance .

The CNMI has a wonky tax form, especially if you're doing the full CM (as I do). There are a lot of places where you have to move forward, do some computation, and then come back and insert it into the form. At times, it appears nonsensical. But I'm almost adept at this.

I trace my ability to follow these arcane types of instructions, back and forth, to the missal I got in fifth grade. I felt so grown up, with a big thick missal for church, with pretty colored ribbons. And then I found out why there were ribbons--to mark your place so you could flip back and forth as you went through the Mass. One ribbon for the basic service, one for the first reading, one for the second reading, one for the gospel, and extras for inserted prayers--all of which vary from Sunday to Sunday. I became good at this kind of spatial "logic."

And then I took tax in law school. I was busy with a social life and didn't like to attend class very much. Fortunately, a very nice classmate loaned me his notebook. He had illustrated many of the legal principals with funny drawings that I found very helpful. And of course, I knew how to mark my tax code (with ribbons!) so that I could flip around and find just what I needed.

And now, I am facing the CNMI tax form, which I've done enough times to find it familiar and almost easy. But still I procrastinate.

Thank goodness for the most requested tax form-#4868--not found on the CNMI Department of Finance's site, but found here.