As all eyes and ears are on the state of the government and the current debit crisis, perhaps a little distraction in the form of Tax collection circa 1962 might be a good idea (or not).

Mortimer Caplin was director of Internal Revenue under the JFK Administration and was given the somewhat onerous task of revamping what had become (even in 1962) an archaic and largely loophole-ridden institution.

Caplin was the one who introduced Computer technology (however Neanderthal at the time) to the IRS and tried to get some uniformity to the tax code.

See . .it's not just 2011 - it's forever.

Here is Meet The Press from April 1, 1962 featuring Lawrence Spivak and the usual suspects interviewing Mortimer M. Caplin on the state of our Internal Revenue.

While our own particular grasp on Planet Earth goes wildly askew today, I thought it would be least sympathetic to look back on another particular April 29th as some sort of assurance that yes, the world has always been at least a little wacko.

So April 29th 1998 comes flashing on the screen - and maybe a dull one by comparison, but not without its own brand of nutiness as a reminder.

On April 29th 1998 the Senate Finance Committee investigated abuses by the IRS, with hearings bringing out stories of thuggery and Police state tactics. Meanwhile, the inimitable Kenneth Starr was shoveling his own stall of detritus with the Whitewater Hearings. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was visiting China, ahead of a state visit by President Clinton. Imelda Marcos, giving a tear-filled concession speech, ended her bid for Presidential election in the Philippines and the hopes for a "get out of jail free" card in the process. Prosecutors in the Unabomber case recommended Ted Kaczynski get Maximum Security Prison since it was felt he was capable of doing anything. Child Day Care workers were discovered to be making on average of $12K a year and most thought that was wildly unfair. Speaking of offspring, there was a call to ban infertility treatments that would result in multiple births. And scientists in England discovered a potential cure for tooth decay by using strains of Tobacco.

But don't take my word for it - here is a broadcast of the CBS World News Roundup for April 29th, 1998.

And if your finger is poised on the "download" icon you might want to also consider poising your finger of the "donate" icon too. That way you'll get to hear more of these and I won't disappear anytime soon.

Vivien Kellems is a name probably not rolling off the tongues of many people these days, but she is a figure of some renown in the Tax Revolt movement. A very successful Business Woman who sought to take on the IRS over their system of Withholding Tax, she waged a running war with the IRS from 1950 well into the 1960's.

Here she is, appearing on the weekly Sunday talk show Today With Mrs. Roosevelt, discussing the Tax system in the U.S. with Eleanor Roosevelt, along with screen legend Gloria Swanson, who also has a few words about the Tax Laws. Defending the IRS (more or less) are Roy Blough, then-Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago and Leo Chern, Executive Secretary of the Research Institute. The program was first broadcast on March 3, 1950 and since this was an early television program, the likelihood that any film of it surviving is doubtful (but you never know). But the audio is here and it's a lively discussion.

Vivian Kellems: “As you know, Congress can pass all of the laws it wishes to. The President may sign all of the laws that he wishes to. But no law is a valid law in our country, until it has been declared constitutional by the Supreme Court. Any citizen doubting the constitutionality of a law has the right, and in my opinion the duty, to break the law in order to provide a test case. That is all I did. At the same time that I broke the Withholding Tax Law, and asked for a test case, Mister Philip Murray broke the Taft-Hartley Law, the publicity provision of the Taft-Hartley Law you remember. He was immediately indicted and rushed through the lower courts so fast that Justice Felix Frankfurter accused the lower courts of collusion. I broke the law and asked for a test case, but Secretary Snyder has refused to indict me. Although he has been told that if he does, I will immediately start collecting the taxes, pending the outcome of the suit.”

In later life, Kellems was a huge supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment and credited with being one of the early figures in the Feminist Movement. Listening to this program and hearing Blough and Chern twist themselves in knots in a "don't-worry-your-pretty-little-head" sort of way, you get the idea she had a battle on her hands.

Yes, it was a lot different then.

(Suburban Lawns - where would we be without Art School?)

Continuing my dig through the top-shelf box of 45's. Tonight it's Suburban Lawns and a staple of KROQ and several other "like-minded" radio stations at the time. Janitor was, if I remember, played to death.

And why not? The inimitable voice of Su Tissue was a little like Yoko Ono on glue and it was so weird it was actually rather hypnotic.

Sadly, the band from CalArts didn't last very long. Almost long enough to get signed to a big label (well . . .I guess you could say IRS was a big label at the time), do an album and ep and call it a day by 1982.

Still, there was a time in 1980 where you couldn't go for more than 15 minutes without hearing it someplace.

That's got to be worth something.