I was never the type to go on road trips, but when my friend invited me to go on a fishing trip to Arkansas, I told him I was down to go. I've been fishing since I was a little boy, when my dad first taught me how to cast my bait, and I've always dreamed of catching big trout in Arkansas. The camp we'll be staying in is called Newlands. We're aiming to leave late Saturday. The time we leave all depends on my dad, Jude told me. I found it strange that we were leaving late, because the drive there would be eight hours. I guess in my mind it made sense, because the later you stay out, the less traffic there would be. So, on Friday night I packed my things and slept in late in the afternoon. When Jude and his father came to pick me up, I kissed my parents goodbye and told him I loved him. I woke up about halfway through the car ride. Through my tired and blurry vision, I was able to make out the words on a road sign because of our headlights reflecting off it. It read, Urgent Message, for Traveler Info, Tune into 1680 AM. That's an interesting sign, I said tiredly to Jude. Yeah, it's weird. That wasn't there last time when we came. Jude replied. His father tuned in to the AM channel without saying a word. At first, there was silence. That silence was somehow loud and eerie. And then, the staticky voice began playing. Warning, do not fall asleep, they're here. Reports of river crawlers seen in northern Arkansas. From the hours of 10 PM to 12 AM, do not fall asleep. Do not look outside. If you hear scratching in the ceiling, don't look up. Lock your doors. If someone is knocking on your door from the hours previously mentioned, do not open it. If you hear screaming from outside your cabin, do not go outside. If someone leaves your cabin at the hours mentioned previously, do not let them in until lockdown has been lifted. In the case where something from outside breaches your cabin, lock yourselves inside a room and turn off the lights. Stay tuned for more updates. The message ended. The car was left in silence. Was that real? Jude said, but was cut off abruptly. Boys, as long as you listen to me, we're gonna be okay. Jude's dad said calmly. We both nodded. When we got there, it was early Sunday morning. We fished the whole day and ate what we caught. I caught my first rainbow trout. I spent a few hours catching plenty of fish. I caught everything I ever dreamed of, rainbows, browns, brooks, and even a tiger trout. The river was plentiful and I was proud of myself. But soon it was dark and with the dark I remembered that radio message. Before I could remember everything that was said, Jude's dad called us into the cabin. When we went inside, the lights were off and the blinds shut. Jude's dad locked all three of us in one bedroom and turned on his lantern. We're gonna be in here for two hours and 30 minutes. I'm not chancing it, he said sternly. Dad, you're scaring me. Jude said, teary-eyed. We're gonna be okay, son. Just be silent. Keep your heads down at the floor. Just trust me, he said with a soft smile. Thank God we listened to him. Seeing Jude emotional wasn't something I saw often, so I knew he was genuinely afraid. And that's when the sounds started. First it was the footsteps from outside. At first they were soft and you could barely hear them. The footsteps were getting louder. I could feel Jude shaking next to me. And then there was silence. It's silence was broken by screams. Please help me, a woman called. They're here, please let me in. The voice cried. The voice had a dark undertone, making it sound like something was mimicking this voice. Then the banging on our front door started, let me in, please. The woman sobbed. The banging continued for another minute. It felt like my head was being shaken around by the loud noises from the front door. This thing wanted us to believe it was an agony. And then suddenly it stopped. The silence returned and then footsteps followed by scratching. It was coming from the roof. Don't look up. Look up was all I could think. It stopped, then continued, then stopped. It was like it was toying with us, begging us to look up at the source of the sound, begging us to check if it truly stopped. And then the radio in our room turned on. Urgent message, lockdown has been lifted. You are free to roam again. Stay tuned in for updates. I looked at the clock, 11.50pm. Jude began to stand up when his father grabbed him. He motioned him to sit still. So he did. That's when the front door burst open with a loud slam. It sounded as if the door came off the hinges. And then something began slamming all its weight on the door we were hiding behind. We all scooted back to the corner of the room. Then the creature screeched and the door gave in. A tall black creature on all fours bent down to come in the room. Jude's dad put his hands over our mouths. I was shaking uncontrollably. The creature had strange appendages coming out of its back. It had lanky body parts, skinny arms, skinny legs, and a slim oval shaped head. Its jaw unhinged. It had no eyes and it was roaming strictly off of hearing. When it couldn't find us, I watched it contort itself. The crunch of bones echoed in my ears. Right before my eyes, I watched the grotesque being turn into a beautiful woman. It had dark brown hair with a slim body. The most noticeable feature was its deep blue eyes. They were bluer than any ocean on earth. And then it left. Midnight came. True silence returned. In that small corner, we fell asleep. When morning came, we checked out the damage. The cabin was trashed. Blood from the creature's contortion act was left in a small pool in my room. The front door was unhinged as I suspected. The cabin next to us was less fortunate. Yellow tape was outlining the entire building, which was in worse shape than ours. When I took a glimpse inside from a distance, blood was everywhere. It covered every wall. Small bits of entrails littered the floor. Bits of flesh and brains were all over the front porch. There was no signs of life in the cabin. We packed our bags that same day and we left. That was the last day we stayed and I told myself I would never come back. I used my phone to do research on the creature that invaded our cabin during the drive back home when I searched River Crawler, a Wikipedia page came up. The River Crawlers of Northern Arkansas is an urban legend from hundreds of years ago. They are said to have lived in the deepest part of the Bull Shoals Lake. When the dam was opened to let water out due to flooding, the River Crawlers made their way into the White River. To this day, that's where they reside. Over time, they have adapted to technology. They can manipulate time, manipulate technology, and take the form of any humans they kill. The easiest way to spot them is their abnormally blue eyes. They mostly lurk during the night and they cannot survive in sunlight for long. It burns their thin skin and causes them to melt. I finished reading this in awe. Take form of any humans they kill. I went to the Newlands obituary. I looked at the most recent deaths in the town. And there, I saw her. A beautiful woman, dark brown hair, slim body, and honey brown eyes.


medical myths and dogmas die hard. Researchers creating a new body of knowledge for prevention and control of heart disease had to disprove and displace a bunch of doozies. Like we used to think that heart disease was just an inevitable consequence of aging, or that cholesterol and blood pressure just naturally go up as we age. All these are now bygone notions, refuted by massive data. But other long-standing myths and dogmas about a number one killer epidemic persist. For example, this notion that major risk factors like cholesterol account for a minority of risk, and that many people have heart attack with no risk factors, so it's just kind of a crap shoot. Not much we can do about it. Wrong. There are rare genetic conditions that give people high cholesterol, no matter what they eat, but such genetic defects occur in no more than 1 in 200 people.  The Interheart Study showed that for men and women, old and young, in all areas of the world, nine potentially modifiable factors like diet, exercise, and smoking accounted for more than 90% of the proportion of the risk of having a heart attack. And this has been confirmed in prospective studies. Follow men over time and those making healthy lifestyle choices associated with a 90% drop in risk. And with women, 92% of the risk gone. Same with diabetes, 91% of cases could be attributed to bad habits and behaviors. And the same healthy lifestyle, which includes not smoking, eating healthy diet, exercise, and maintaining an optimal body weight, may reduce the risk of multiple chronic diseases at the same time, not just heart disease and diabetes, but stroke as well. Up to 80% of strokes avoidable, with simple lifestyle changes. How does this all compare to drugs? Why change our diet? Lose weight, start exercising, if we can just pop some pills? Pharmacological therapies, including cholesterol-lowering statin drugs and blood pressure pills, typically only reduce cardiovascular disease risk, not by 90%, but only by 20% to 30%. So even on drugs, 70% to 80% of heart attacks still occur. One of the great things about this study, the Harvard Health Professionals' follow-up, is that they also looked at the effect of lifestyle changes on people already on medications. Even those on blood pressure and cholesterol-lowering drugs may still be able to get a further 78% drop in risk by eating and living healthfully. So the choice isn't diet or drugs, cardiovascular medication should be used as an adjunct to, not just a replacement for, healthy lifestyle practices. It takes time for new science to trickle down into mainstream medical practice. The practice of cardiology and medicine in general may correspond, on average, to what was being published 10 or 20 years before. So it's important to know if your doctor is still stuck back practicing 20th century medicine.


with fimbles. Ever since I got my fimbles from fimbles for you and I realized how comfortable, functional, and beautiful a fimble can be, I have a newfound appreciation for hand sewing. Who would have thought? Hand sewing is literally one of those things that I dreaded doing. I would do anything. Figure out any kind of magical way to avoid hand sewing in my projects as much as possible including just like skipping hemming or the dreaded just do a top stitch. No one will ever see and then later on down the road you're like you know I really wish I would have hand sewn that. It would have been so much prettier. But I've talked to you guys already about fimbles for you and specifically the styles of fimbles that Jan has. There's four different styles depending on how you use your fimble, whether you use the top of your finger, the pad of your finger, the side of your finger, whatever it is, she has a specific fimbles style for that kind of fimbles user. Really really great. Today I want to talk to you guys about fit. So there is such a thing as fimbles size. Obviously whenever you buy the little dimpled bucket that comes prepackaged at like any craft store that is a one-size-fits-all option. It's a little bit like buying crocs for your feet where maybe there's like a small medium-large situation but we all don't fit into small medium large. Some of us have you know feet that are in between those sizes. Some of us have wider feet narrower feet. The same thing applies to your fingers just like your feet in your toes. And so Jan does sizes for her fimbles and finding the right size for your finger is so so so important. First of all obviously it needs to be comfortable. If your fimble is just like wobbling around and you can't get any control over it, how are you going to be able to control your hand sewing and control that needle? On the other side of that if the fimble is too small and it's like shoved onto your finger well guess what that gets painful after a while and then you just literally cannot do your sewing because it hurts too much. So getting the right size of the circumference of your finger is the first step.  That's how she knows how wide around the circumference of your finger is. But that's not it because we also have finger length right. Some of us have longer nail beds. Some of us have shorter nail beds. Some of us keep a fingernail long. Some of us keep our fingernails super super short. So you may have a kind of like shorter wider finger may have a long narrow finger or whatever it is that needs to be addressed as well because if you have a lot of air in between your finger and the end of the fimble again there's no control. It's less likely that you're able to really use the tip of that fimble especially if you use the side of it that fimble is going to keep coming off and coming loose over and over and over again. Not to mention have you ever been sewing with a fimble and then your finger gets really sweaty. That is a result of all that air we're kind of circulating around in there. No way no nobody likes that. So Jan will have you take some pictures again when you place your order you'll do the paper thing for those circumference and you'll also lay your hand down flat and take some pictures of that as well so she can see kind of the shape of your finger how long your nail bed is how long your fingernails are and all those kinds of things. So she has this video evidence that kind of helps her as the expert as someone who has seen hundreds if not thousands of fingertips Jan can look at your fingers and tell what kind of fimble what style of fimble you need and about what size you are okay then she'll start to ask you some questions about the type of sewing that you're doing. If you have any blisters on your finger or if like you know where your finger hurts after you've been hand sewing for a while that will tell Jan where you push the needle up through the fabric whether it's the tip the pad the side and again that will help her determine which style of fimble it's going to be best for you. There's no point in getting a fimble that is open on the top if you use the top of your finger to push that needle through. So given all of that information Jan is going to kind of assess every all the information that you have given her she's going to ship you several different fimbles these are going to be different sizes and different styles you are encouraged to wear them like wear them around the house you're encouraged to use them and see if the style is really right for you and it's hitting you know it's covering where you you know push the needle through and then there's gonna be a variety of designs in there as well so you're able to kind of like try it before you buy it find a size that works really great for you you keep what you want and you send everything back if there's it for whatever reason it doesn't work out you just go through that process again she'll send you a whole bunch more you'll kind of tell her what you didn't like about the original shipment and then she'll shoot you out some more and I mean I can imagine you having to go through that process very many times because Jan is so good but if you did of course she would make sure that it was right and that you have a thimble that fits you have a thimble that you love using that's comfortable that works really well that happens to be beautiful because did I mention Jan is a silversmith so she actually designs all of these beautiful beautiful thimbles that are intended to kind of be heirloom pieces that you can pass down generation to generation and the idea of you sewing something with your hands passing it down to someone that you love who was also then interested in sewing and then them sewing something with their hands I don't know that whole idea of like everything coming around full circle just feels so beautiful to me maybe it's like because it's springtime I don't know but I'm just feeling like that is just such a beautiful beautiful thing to be able to do for yourself but also for you know the future generations of sewists that we have out there so if you have a current thimble maybe you bought it at a craft store maybe you got it somewhere else but if it doesn't fit it's not comfortable and you don't like using it it doesn't have to be that way Jan can fix it for you I promise I am a convert I am someone who hated hand sewing and now it's not so bad I mean still great it's not my favorite thing to do but I don't dread it and I think that that is all we can ever hope for right so I hope that you will check the description box I have a link down there for you on how to get to Jan's website thimbles for you head on over there do your thing with Jan I cannot wait for you to get a thimble that you really really love Jan is gonna take great care of you I promise and get you a thimble that you absolutely love but that is gonna do it for me today you guys thank you so much for watching and I will see you very soon


It's the start of another long day for the Marines and their Ugandan students. Ahead of them lies several hours of hard labor under a burning sun. The machine gun nests they're building on a training site still needs work hardening the roof against mortars and a trough needs to be dug around it to stand the flow of heavy rains. Before they start sweating, however, they make time to sing. About 30 Marines with special purpose Marine Air Ground Task Force 12 spent two months in Uganda training a company of combat engineers to counter Al-Shabaab, Insurgency Tactics, and Somalia. The UPDF make up more than half of the 9,000 African Union peacekeepers working to stabilize Mogadishu and bolster the Somali transitional government. The combat engineers allow for the infantry to move through the battlefield. When the infantry unit stops, they set in the defense. That's when the engineers begin to work. It's not as simple as laying down sandbags and stringing out barbed wire. The threats combat engineers must mitigate are as varied as they are deadly. What we have is protection from an up to an 82 millimeter mortar indirect fire weapon and from the sides we have protection the front and the sides we have protection from RPGs, direct fire weapons, recoilless rifles, AKs, snipers. One side of the defense and moving towards an objective enemy officers can break the momentum of an advancing infantry unit. Their mission is to go all the way to one end and blow a cache at the end of their route. But in order to get there they could face IEDs there are several of their obstacles. They have to clear them in case they need any follow-on forces to come on this route. When the patrol comes up against the locked gate they call the breach team. As they have an oval charge set up on the wall this is the breacher. It's going to leave a perfect oval shape in the wall so everyone can run through. Make sure you have control. Okay give them the commands. A bevy of explosives at their disposal. The team must decide which to use and how for any given obstacle. Now they're just designed to teach. When the combat engineers are effective the rest of the force can move quickly. You are now as a practicing assaulting objective. They took contact if they're coming through the breach point. As they're using squad rushes and bullet barriers. To assault an objective, a limited advance. I've at least achieved a load from the American marines. So now I'm also just a Ugandan Marine, a UPGF Marine. I'm strong. Basically I'm now strong according to as far as my job as a soldier is concerned. Their training mission complete. The Marines bid farewell to their students. As they leave Uganda they know that many of the Ugandans they've grown to count as friends will soon find themselves in Somalia. During the closing ceremony the Ugandan troops end the training the same way they start most every day. In Somalia, follow Uganda. I'm Corporal Jadsling.


I don't respect you brothers and sisters at all, I'll be escorted by the right honourable David Davis MP, former deputy leader of the Conservative Party, I don't know why he would do that if he thought I was the kind of man you're clearly implying that I am. David Davis is one of the great parliamentarians of today and this age, and I'll be taking my seat in the House of Commons and speaking for the people of Rochdale, that's what I was elected to do. And what is your message both sides? My message to Geir Starmer is that the skids are under you in scores of labour seats up and down the country, because you've lost the trust, you've lost the confidence of millions of your traditional loyal people. You keep referring to the Prime Minister as if that's supposed to impress me. The Prime Minister is a rather diminutive, diminished and degraded politician. He made a party political statement. I don't care about Rishi Sunak's attitude. What I care about is that the returning officer, a man of unimpeachable integrity, I'm sure you'll agree, declared a free and fair election and me as the winner, and Rishi Sunak as one of the crushed two big parties in the state. That's all that matters to me. Are you going to keep repeating the same questions to me because I have other people to talk to? So let's make this the last one, shall we? That's five times you've said that. The returning officer declared it last night you were there as a free and fair election and me as the winner.  I won. You know what it is? I'm not angry with George. We're wrestling with our politicians with these disgusting, dog-wisled politics. We've heard from them and this week and the term has been emphasised by George. George, what's going on with the media process? How did you experience that? Do you know what deprivation and suffering is? When will you die? When did you survive? What do you know about what's happening in Rochdale? Rochdale because they've been prived and there's no software and they don't have any money. And George wants to stand up for them and say that we stand up for them. I think you should know that. You just point off here, right? You're not going on what you're called, nothing else. And now you're walking off, you don't see the truth. You would say that, wouldn't you? Just like Richard Schoenach would say. I got 10,000 votes more than this candidate got. You've got to say something. But you know in future that Labour will put some more of it.  When you asked me that very question just a few hours ago, nearly hours of this one, I gave you my answer. I don't have a different answer now. George, try. I'm not sure if the wisdom is coming to us. George, you're here to celebrate your victory tonight with your support. You get crushed it. Welcome. We're welcome here. We're welcome to come and try and invalidate the election. The election's over and I won it. You won't have to get used to that. I assure you that's not what I mean. If you don't mind what your map is, you've talked about this company majority. But it was such a long turnout. It was such a long turnout. Why do you say that? It's exactly the same number as in the last election. It was higher than the most violent. Your premise is false. Can you constantly say that you represent all of the people? Of course I don't. I represent the people who voted for me, and I'll try to do my best for all the others. Your main message was to try and to achieve a success. What would you do? It wasn't my main message. That's another false premise. What was your literature? I'm not all of my literature. If you've looked to all of my literature, you know that that premise is false. It was a very strong part of your campaign. A strong part of my campaign. Genocide usually is something that occupies people's interests. The odd two at least. Have you made promises to Rochdale that you can't keep? I'm really not sure what I'm doing here. This is my victory party. What do you mean promises I can't keep? Why don't you judge whether I kept them at the end of my term? This isn't really a huge victory party. We consider that Labour really worked hard. Here as a Labour press officer, roll them out. Why are you shilling for them? But it's not the same. It's not the same kind of election. Is this the BBC? Am I paying for this? The people made the noise. Am I paying the licence fee for this? People made the noise. So whenever we talk about this election, Labour weren't there. What's your point? This isn't a normal party. It's not my fault that Labour wasn't there. You may think it was not a normal party election, but I won it. And I'm going to Parliament online, and you're going to have to get used to it. Do you expect that when the general election comes around, you'll be here on the end of this week? Absolutely. Yes! That's on the way! Even in a country like Britain, for all its imperial forces, most people, essentially, are on the side of the victims and not the perpetrator. A dozen television cameras, which seems to indicate that people are interested for good or ill in what I have to say. You said it was gate-crashed. They weren't invited. You're kind of breaking up, but let me answer that question. I hope probably. I can only do my best. I would never be a Palestinian, so hello. And it's a promise I'll make until my final breath. But I did it last night. I've got about 10,000 votes. In fact, I've got more than the Labour Conservative Liberal Democrat and Reform candidate put together. So there was a pumping majority for my stats. And there are people like me who will stand against it all over this country. Some will stand for my party, the workers' party of Britain. Many will stand as independence, including many significant figures. Like Andrew Feinstein, for example. A former South African member of the ANC. A child of Holocaust survivors. He's standing against Ustama himself. A very, very substantial man from independence. Many stand against Labour for our country. Of course, millions of traditional Labour supporters have been completely disgusted by Starmer's unequivocal. His work without qualification. His work supported all of Israel. Congratulations! Thank you very much. Nature of tonight's proceedings have become slightly confused. Most people thought they were coming here to our victory party. The division cameras have turned up to question the result of the elections.  We want a pumping majority in Rishi Sunak's works outside Downing Street in a melodramatic pantomime just a few minutes ago. No matter who is alarmed about it, the people of Rochdale have spoken. They are sending me to Parliament on Monday. I was lucky or unlucky, maybe you were or weren't. To watch the diminished degraded and soon to be the party, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, question not just our election victory, but more significantly question the right of the British people peacefully to protest against the slaughter in Gaza. He deliberately tried to conflate protests and demonstrations of hundreds of thousands of people. Most of them are not Muslims, by the way. We tried to make it a Muslim thing, but it isn't a Muslim thing. Hundreds of thousands of British people all over this country throughout the last four and a half months have been demonstrating their revulsion at the slaughter in Gaza and the support for it from the British government, the British labour opposition, and the vast majority of the British media. Hundreds of thousands have marched, but millions share their revulsion.  There are more votes than Labour, Conservative, Liberal, Reform, put together. That's the nature of our victory.  I'm not intimidated by hostile journalists and broadcasters. I'm not intimidated by cameras being pointed in my face. I'm afraid only of God, you see. I'm afraid only of God. And you will not trick me or force me into retreating from the platform on which I stood and for which I now have a mandate that I will take into the House of Commons on Monday. I'm not Jeremy Corbyn, you see. I don't turn the other cheek. If you slap me, I'll slap you back.  Maybe that's why we lost. But I didn't lose. I won. And we intend to follow up that victory with further victories. And they begin 12 weeks from now. I promised the people of Rothstein that we would try to clean the town hall clock. It was a Glasgow phrase, actually. I now realise because a lady said to me, are you sure it's awfully high? I meant it metaphorically. We're going to clean the town hall clock. We're going to clean out the town hall from the corrupt and incompetent Labour councillors in this time. They covered up the grooming scandal. They got it, the town centre. They placed a virtual demolition order on the seven sisters. They took away the markets. They allowed them to take away the maternity facilities, the A&E facilities, even the lock-up. It turns out, not only can you not be born in Rothstein, not only can you not die in Rothstein, you can't even be locked up in Rothstein. You get taken to a jail in some other town. Well, that's not acceptable, you see. And if I'd been the Member of Parliament, that would never have happened. At least it would only have happened over my dead body. Because that's the kind of Member of Parliament I intend to be. We intend to clean the town hall clock with our allies in the Rothstein Community Alliance, and I hope with Mr Tully. I mean, no wonder Rishi Sunak is alarmed about the election yesterday. He got whipped not just by me, but by an independent candidate. There'll be another hard-backed election result. But I hope that Mr Tully, whom I again congratulate for his splendid performance coming in second with the more votes than Labour, more votes than the Conservatives. And I hope that Mr Tully will join us in a grand alliance all over this bar so that we can completely defeat, eliminate at the ballot box on May the 2nd every single Rochdale councillor up for re-election. There'll be a new proof that will sweep the town hall clean. And many people are already coming forward saying they would like to be candidates. Amongst you there are others who would like to be candidates. Please let us know with your CV when your case for you being the candidate. And I believe we're going to do it, you know. The momentum that we've got. And in other parts of the constituency, the momentum that David Tully has got. Between both of us, we could really sweep these people away out of the town hall and having those Rochdale needs it. And if we do it, and then that momentum, we hope will take us all the way to victory in the general election here when it comes, and whenever it comes. What we did yesterday is catching. That's why the politicians are so afraid of it. That's why their shills in the media are so hysterical about it. Because they know if what happened here happens elsewhere also, then big changes can be expected in British politics. I believe there are hundreds of constituencies where independent candidates and workers' party candidates can compete, will compete, will defeat particularly Labour, will defeat Labour, or cause the defeat of Labour. And thus change the whole arithmetic of the forthcoming general election. I said last night that Keir Starmer paid a price and will pay a price for deliberately as a matter of deliberate policy. Kicking in the teeth, the most intense sacred feelings are the millions of Labour's traditional supporters. You can't kick people in the teeth and expect them to vote for you, at least if someone credible stands up against you and asks people to vote for you instead. And I believe that that's what will happen. I just told Al Jazeera on a live link there to Doha that let's take just one constituency. There's a man called Andrew Feinstein in London who is the son of Holocaust survivors who introduced the first bill in the Free South African Parliament about Holocaust commemoration. He was a member of parliament in South Africa. He was in Nelson Mandela's government. He was in Nelson Mandela's party and he's standing against Keir Starmer in Islid do Nol. Now, wouldn't it be a good thing if Andrew Feinstein was swept into the House of Commons just for the people that the independence workers' candidates and other smaller parties will be putting up at the general election? No wonder they're worried. No wonder Starmer's worried. No wonder Sunak is alarmed because a new political power was born here yesterday in Rocksdale. We are wave of Rocksdale pioneers. We intend to pilot a Rocksdale revival and I'm glad, proud, that all of you are going to be a part of it. We'll make change here starting on May 2. Then going on to the general election and then four or five years after that. I'm like Cristiano Ronaldo, you see. I'm reaching the end of my career but I'm ready to sign a five-year contract with a rich guy from Islid do Nol.


Internal Revenue Service IRS Tax News Filing Payroll Taxes Electronically is a Smart Business Move You're doing right paying payroll taxes is a smart business move because if you don't, the IRS will move your business off a cliff where you will hang suspended Wiley Coyote-esque like just long enough so they can pick your pockets in midair before you plummet to the distant dirt below Part of the cliff most likely landing on your head after impact with the ground the IRS then traveling down to see the wreckage not to help just so they can stick their tongue out at you a few times before being on their way It almost makes you want to plot some kind of extravagant scheme to get those IRS people possibly like drawing a fake tunnel in a cliff so the IRS will run into it or something like that IRS Tax Tip 2022-74, May 12, 2022 Business Owners can simplify things by filing payroll taxes electronically and in my opinion anything we can do to simplify the payroll taxes is typically a good thing the payroll taxes if there's an error in them can cause multiple kinds of problems one obviously you got to fix the error most likely and that could be a little bit more difficult with payroll taxes because you've got that withholding component to it if there's an error in the payroll taxes then it could mess up the future tax calculations that are going to happen because of the caps and so on that are applied to some of the withholdings for example it's also one of those things that we might not actually catch the errors until the end of the year when we summarize everything in the W-2s and the 940 kind of calculations and by that time if we find an error that's like the worst time to kind of catch it because now we've got to fix it when everything else is going on basically at the end of the year so in my opinion payroll taxes is one of those things it would be best to measure twice, cut once try to get it right the first time in other words instead of kind of tinkering with it and make sure that when you're putting the payroll system in place you have a good system that you're putting in place are you using tax software are you going to get payroll help from a third party even small payroll can start to get fairly complex and if you don't have anything basically helping you or supporting you like software or third party provider it can get overwhelming fairly quickly so e-file software performs calculations and populates forms and schedules using a step-by-step process it will also alert the filer if they are missing information which reduces the chances of receiving an IRS notice here are some of the benefits of filing these forms electronically it saves times it's secure and accurate the filer gets an email to confirm the IRS received the form within 24 hours here's how businesses can e-file employers submit the forms themselves will need to purchase IRS approved software there's a link to that here there may be a fee to file electronically so that's kind of the downside of course and obviously when you're looking at payroll and thinking about how to set up payroll payroll in and of itself is costly for the payroll and then it can be costly to get help to process the payroll meaning you might pay more for software to help you to process it and file it and so on and so forth or possibly pay a third party to do that but again those are the things that you got to take into consideration because like I say if there's errors in the payroll then it might be more costly to try to kind of fix the payroll and if you have to switch payroll providers switching from one system to the next in the middle of a year becomes difficult because of those cap calculations in the payroll and so when you got to sum everything up at the end of the year becomes kind of a problem it's possible but it's still a problem it's not too bad to switch as long as you plan to switch at the end of the year like if you're going to start in January and you can switch after that point or something like that but switching can be a problem so you'd like to get it right the first time if possible also the software will require a signature by one of the two ways the software instructs the user to apply for an online signature a PIN there's a link to that taxpayers should allow at least 45 days to receive their PIN the user can scan and attach form 8453 the EMP Employment Tax Declaration for an IRS E file return there's a link to that here employers can have their tax professional file to form for them so if you have a tax professional helping you it used to be that a lot of CPA firms would do payroll taxes but because it's kind of become more and more complicated for the payroll taxes and there's been other companies that have basically picked that up now then it's likely that you're working with a third party payroll provider rather than a more general CPA firm that's going to specialize on probably taxes and audits and that kind of stuff so but make sure if you're picking up a third party provider to help you that they're legit that you know you trust the third party provider and so on because you don't want to get messed up with the payroll taxes because you're also withholding stuff from the employees so if they don't pay the payroll taxes if there's a problem with it it's not just that you didn't pay taxes now you also withheld money from the employees because you were required to and you didn't pay their taxes which again now you got this kind of liability thing which is an added kind of issue so the authorized IRS e-file providers for individuals and business can help employers locate electronic return organitor near them originator near them so you can go through these links and try to see if you can sort one out to help search around if you would like to here are some of the forms employers can e-file so we got the form 940 employers annual federal unemployment tax return that's similar it sounds similar to the form 941 but this is the one that you file at the end of the year it's for the employers use this form to report annual federal unemployment tax not the other taxes remember the taxes we got on the payroll taxes on the federal side of things social security, Medicare, federal income tax for the employee not for us the business we pay you know whatever system we're paying on it and then we've got the federal unemployment tax the 940 at the end of the year is the federal unemployment tax then we got the form 941 employers quarterly federal tax return that's the one we have to do on a quarterly basis instead of a yearly basis most of the time employers use this form to report income tax social security tax or Medicare tax from employees paychecks they also use it to pay their portion of social security and Medicare tax so this is the big one and that's why you got to do it quarterly because the IRS wants to verify it on a quarterly basis instead of a yearly basis because of its significance and so that includes the federal income tax that you're withholding that you know from the employee because they filled out a W-4 and what not and then the social security that you withheld from them the Medicare that you withheld from them which is more of a flat tax but there's a cap on the social security which confuses things and so on and so forth and then it also includes your portion of the social security that you have to pay over and above as well as the Medicare for the employer portion so that's the big one then you got the form 943 employers annual federal tax return for agriculture employees so this is a specialized form for the specialized area employers filed this form if they paid wages to one or more farm workers and the wages were subject to social security and Medicare taxes or federal income tax withholding form 944 employers annual federal tax return so this is for small employers that use this form these are employers whose annual liability for social security, Medicare and withheld federal income taxes is $1,000 or less so that's a fairly small threshold if you're under that threshold the IRS is saying we're not going to bother taking the quarterly returns you can just file it like once a year because you don't make much and we don't really care much but if you make more than that then you got to file it quarterly that's what they're saying these employers use this form to file pay these taxes only once a year instead of every quarter the employer must contact the IRS to request to file form 944 employers are not permitted to file form 944 unless they are notified by the IRS to do so in other words usually you got to do the 941s on a quarterly basis unless the IRS says yeah whatever we'll just you know you get approval to do this this annual 944 one file form 945 annual return of withheld federal income tax there's a link to that here employers use this form to report federal income tax withheld from non payroll payments so there's links to all this payroll stuff and so you can look at it for days and years possibly months at least and read up on it and they'll be a link to this in the description