Lewis Black: Taxed Beyond Belief (2002 TV Movie)

Lewis Black: Professor Black

Quotes 

• [on tax forms] 

  Professor Black : You know what would help the instructions more? Verbs!

• Professor Black : "Take the amount in block 32A," the form says, "and move it to block 37R." And I say "Screw you! If it's so important then you move it! Are you listening, Numb Nuts? Isn't that what you get paid to do?

• Professor Black : A friend of mine recommended an income tax consultant named Ed Gerstein. Apparently he's been doing this stuff for 20 years. Imagine. I hope I get there before he jumps.

• Professor Black : As if the 10-40 form wasn't enough, there are other forms to fill out. Written in a language that has no nouns! Now because I'm self-employed, that's what they call this, 'self-employed' as opposed to 'needs psychiatric care,' I have to fill out another form. IBQ-30-kiss-my-dick!

• Professor Black : Now for the past fifteen years I've attempted to fill out this form, and there's one question and every time I read that question, I drift away. The question is 'What is your non-farm income?' What is my non-farm income? That implies I own a farm! I wonder when that happened. I know I used to do a lot of drugs but I think I'd remember the purchase of farmland! But I'd have to do a lot of drugs to buy a farm because God knows I'm not a man of the soil. It's just by the grace of God I can wipe myself!

• Professor Black : So who do we have to blame for the madness that we call our income taxes? The government, that's who! They came up with this - 6,000 pages of rules and regulations that make our country's tax code. Who do they expect to read this crap? Let me tell you something, if I want to be bored by 6,000 pages of unreadable dreck, I'd read 'War and Peace' four times!

• Professor Black : I took Economics. But it was taught at eight o'clock in the morning. And you can't learn anything out of one bloodshot eye.

• [on refunds] 

  Professor Black : All $300 does is remind people how screwed they are! $300 would've been a nice check to give somebody in 1952 when you could buy something with it!

• Professor Black : Rich people are constantly whining about how much they have to pay in taxes. And whenever I hear one of them bitch that they're paying too much, I like to turn and say to them 'Hey! Go fuck yourself!'

• Professor Black : There were these guys in Indiana and Nebraska and they argued that Indiana and Nebraska weren't states. Which was a pretty valid argument in the late 1700s. But in 1995 and 96, well I saw a map at that time, trust me, Nebraska and Indiana are shit-holes, but they're states.

• Professor Black : If taxes are so important, and taxes are math, how come nobody in the history of this country has taught taxes in a math class? No! Instead they teach you stuff like Geometry which is no help at all. I still can't play pool!

• Professor Black : Just do what I do. Pour yourself a stiff drink. Get into a tub and touch yourself in all of your dirty little places. At least for once it won't be the government screwing with you.

• Professor Black : Now, I hear tell that there are people out there who do their own taxes. But I don't believe this. They may be guessing at what their taxes are, but they have no idea. And I know they don't know what they're doing, because when they write their name in that part of the form where it says "to the best of my knowledge, what I've written here is honest and true", the next thought that pops into their head is, "Well, this is the year I'll be going to jail. Maybe I can learn something when I'm doing hard time."