It’s become a hackneyed phrase, a cheap sneer easily tossed off by the uncreative. And though Judge Nega doesn’t say it in haec verba, that’s the result for E. T. Ryder, Esq., although he earns a Taishoff “Good try” for his creative approach to pushing the envelope, lowering the bar, and moving the goalposts in Patricia Jindra, Docket No. 5060-19L, filed 1/27/22.

It’s a CDP off a TFRP, and Patricia claims the IRS tab is more than she can pay. E. T. tries to use daily compounding of interest and penalties to boost Pat’s liability over her RCP, but the SO scuppers that. E.T. tries to use an adjoining (higher-priced) county’s housing costs, because Pat’s dwelling is “two steps away from the county line,” as Paul Simon sang it. That doesn’t survive summary J. “Petitioner’s representative also argued that SO S should have calculated petitioner’s future net income using a twelve-month multiplier, instead of using the length of the remaining period of limitations for collection (known as the Collection Statute Expiration Date or CSED).” Order, at p. 3. (Name omitted).

The CSED is graven in stone; once the SOL runs, game over.

E. T. also tries an illustration of housing hardship from the IRM to argue for an upward deviation from the guidelines, but the SO isn’t buying, and neither is Judge Nega.

E. T. and Pat lose, but anybody can fold and lose. The whole point of effective representation is finding arguments that pass the smile test in the case you’ve got (and not the case you wish you’d got), and urging them.

Edited to add, 1/28/22: Before any of my readers give me the Psalm 141:5 treatment, I do recall that I my own self invoked the hackneyed phrase I now virtuously decry. See my blog post “Creativity,” 8/19/19.