Doug Shulman to be new IRS commish

Douglas H. Shulman has been tapped as the next commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service. He will replace Mark Everson, who resigned earlier this year to head the American Red Cross (blogged here).

The announcement of the "intention to nominate" came from the White
House last Wednesday. I was swamped with last minute work/Turkey Day
duties and it slipped right by me. So in case you missed it, too, here’s a little bit about the next head of the IRS:

Shulman now is vice chairman of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, previously known as the National Association of Securities Dealers. He has some tax agency-related experience, having served as Senior Policy Advisor and then Chief of Staff of the bi-partisan National Commission on Restructuring the Internal Revenue Service. In that capacity, he worked on legislation which eventually led to the IRS Restructuring and Reform Act of July 1998.

You can review Shulman’s full bio here.

The Administration’s official announcement on Shulman’s impending nomination is here. And Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson also had nice things to say about Shulman here.

Big challenges ahead: If Shulman’s nomination and Senate confirmation move quickly, he’ll be settling into the commissioner’s office just as the IRS has to deal with an expectedly chaotic filing season.

Because Congress has yet to finalize short-term AMT legislation that will impact millions of taxpayers, they and the IRS will be playing catch-up when any changes finally are made.

Capitol Hill has busted the deadline needed for the IRS to get its systems updated to conform to any tax law changes. The IRS’ warning about this potential disaster — specifically, the delay of refunds — was blogged about here.

"At least 50 million taxpayers are looking at a filing fiasco next spring because Congress has not acted in a responsible time frame to protect them from an unintended liability from the alternative minimum tax," Sen. Charles E. Grassley, R-Iowa, ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, told the tax publisher CCH.

"Any patch that’s passed now may be too late to avoid delays in refunds that are due and a lot of other paperwork confusion. The next IRS commissioner needs to be ready to get on top of these problems and provide whatever leadership is possible for taxpayers, in the absence of Congress getting its job done."

These kids today: One small observation about the commish in waiting. Is it just me or does Shulman look quite young?

Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Given the situation he’ll face as soon as the Senate gives its OK, he’ll need all the youthful energy he can muster.

But I’m just saying that in his bio photo above, Shulman looks like he would get carded at any of D.C.’s many bars.

Of course, I must, under much protest, admit that I am getting older and lots of folks nowadays look like whippersnappers. In fact, I fear I’m heading into geez territory.

One clue is the use of the word "whippersnappers." But I got another indication the other evening (technically, the very early morning) when I was flipping through the cable channels.

I actually stopped on the Time-Life infomercial for its Rock Ballads collection. Musical tastes notwithstanding, such nostalgia is definitely a road sign posted on Avenue Old.

Older: I sat through the whole spiel and enjoyed it.

Oldest: I briefly considered buying the CDs!