April 14, 2001

The Bushes and Cheneys Release Their Tax Returns As income tax day approaches, President Bush and his wife, Laura, released their federal income tax returns for 2000, showing that they received $744,682 in income and paid $240,342, or 32 percent, in taxes. Vice President Dick Cheney and his wife, Lynne, reported income of $36,086,635, on which they paid $14,295,058 in income taxes, or 39 percent. Most of the president's income came from interest earned on his profits from the sale of his stake in the Texas Rangers baseball team in 1998. The Cheneys' income reflected the closing out of Mr. Cheney's accounts at Halliburton, the global oil services company where he was chief executive until he resigned on Aug. 10 to run for office. [Page A1.]

NYC column on Police Comr Benjamin Kerik's injecting himself into mayoral race by accusing Democrat Alan G Hevesi of playing politics by airing commercial that criticizes department's current operations and policies; city's tradition of keeping police out of politics has eroded under Mayor Rudolph Giuliani (M)

Photos of pre-Easter preparations in realm of dresses, jelly beans and lilies

If you have made it through the annual tax-filing ordeal -- and more than 80 percent of taxpayers have by now -- here's some good news for next year: Tax simplification is on the way, if not from Congress, then certainly from the leading tax software companies. Indeed, with new features allowing taxpayers to download more and more data from the Internet, something like the 30-minute tax return may not be that far in the future. First, however, more employers, bankers and brokers need to make income information available to download.

Senior American officials and diplomats say crew of American spy plane spent 15 furious minutes destroying secret materials before opening hatch and surrendering to Chinese troops that had surrounded their plane, waving guns and shouting at them; it is not clear how much material was destroyed; Defense Sec Donald H Rumsfeld says crew did major portion of their 'checklist,' indication that loss of American intelligence data and technology may not have been as great as feared; two senior diplomats who played central roles in negotiations to win crew's release reassert United States' position that mid-air collision was caused by reckless flying by pilot of Chinese fighter jet tailing spy plane; Beijing rejects that assertion; American officials have become eager to get out their side of story since crew's release on Apr 12 (M)