Aren't You Really, Really Glad YOU'VE Taken Control Of How Much Of YOUR Money Washington Gets To Spend, Just As The Founders Intended?
It's Pop Quiz Time Again!
Take this NEW little test to see just how tuned-up you are with the
realities of the federal tax structure as laid out by the framers and
amenders of the United States Constitution, interpreted by the Supreme
Court, and implemented in current law.
The Quiz:
SCORING
0 - 24% correct: I'm afraid you've gotten your "education" exclusively from the
IRS.
25 - 49% correct: Your heart's in the right place, but you haven't yet started down
the path to knowledge.
50 - 74% correct: You're well on the path, but still have some studying to do.
75 - 99% correct: You're on the very verge of self-empowerment...
Question 2: If I
grant you the privilege of using my lawnmower commercially, I can charge you a
percentage of your gain (that is, I can claim a piece of the action) no matter
whose grass you cut.
True
False
What kind of lawnmower do you have?
I thought this quiz was about the income tax...
Correct response: "True".
I trust no commentary is needed here...
Question 3: I
can't claim a "piece of the action" for you cutting grass with YOUR lawnmower
except where I have a lawful authority to prohibit you from cutting, and you act
only with my permission.
True
False
Maybe
Lawnmowers again!?
Correct response: "True".
Again, I trust this need not be supported by argument or evidence...
Question 4: The
16th Amendment is designed to make all lawn-mowing "federal-permission-only", or
assign ownership of all lawnmowers to the feds, or both.
True
False
That's the grass-tax amendment?
I live in a condo, and don't cut grass at all...
Correct response: "False".
Click
here for some relevant observations.
Question 5: A
"piece of the action" tax is what is known as an "excise" (privilege tax), and
isn't subject to apportionment requirements, but must be uniformly applied (as
in, the same rates of tax being applied to the same specified volume or type of
taxable activities, regardless of by whom the taxable activities are conducted).
True
False
Cutting grass is good excise!
My tax attorney
told me again to STAY AWAY from this site!
Correct response: "True".
Click
here
for some relevant observations.
Question 6: The
income tax isn't apportioned, conforms to the uniformity rule, and has been
declared many times by the United States Supreme Court to have always been an
excise and to have remained entirely unchanged in its legal character by the
16th Amendment.
True
False
Huh?
That can't be true! Think of the implications!
Correct response: "True".
Click here for some
relevant observations.
Question 7: An
excise can be claimed on the taxable activities of:
a. Non-resident aliens
b. American citizens
c. Artificial persons (like corporations and partnerships)
d. All of the
above.
Correct response: "d".
Click
here and
here for some relevant observations.
Question 8: An
excise on taxable economic activities measured by the dollars produced in the
conduct of the activities can:
a. Apply simply because the "dollars" by which an activity is measured are really "Federal Reserve Notes", whether the activity itself is taxable or not;
b. Be mistaken for a "profits" tax because "a piece of [that kind of] action" can only be taken from the gains; the mere recovery of expenses is not part of the "action";
c. Be confined to apply only to activities of corporations;
d. All of the above.
Correct response: "b".
Click here,
here and
here for some relevant
observations.
Question 9: The
"income" excise on taxable economic activities can:
a. Amount to any part of what a federal worker earns as such, because all such earnings are realized only by the permission of the government;
b. Be mistaken for a tax on the receipt of gains of any kind because being measured in, and typically paid out of, the dollar-value produced by the activity, the tax appears superficially to be on the dollars themselves (or on simply receiving dollars-- in turn this supports the mistake of thinking that "income" in the tax law has the common meaning of that expression: "all that comes in");
c. Apply to no earnings not realized by permission of the state-- that is, the excise can apply to no earnings realized solely through the exercise of one's right to trade goods and services with others, to receive gifts, to create wealth and do anything else within one's own powers and authority;
d. All of the above.
Correct response: "d".
Click
here for
some relevant observations.
Question 10: The
"income" excise can apply:
a. To activity of the same sort as could be done without being subject to the tax (fixing someone's plumbing, for instance), if that activity is done on behalf of the federal government;
b. To activity performed on behalf,
or by permission, of the government, no matter where performed or by whom,
even when the liable recipient of the gain only performs the activity by
proxy, through investment;
c. Both (a) and
(b);
d. None of the
above.
Correct response: "c".
Click here
and
here for some relevant observations.
Question 11: The
Founders laid down the apportionment rules prohibiting unilateral federal taxes
directly on Americans in order to:
a. Impose fiscal restraint on the feds, by confining their unilateral option to a level of burden no greater than could be borne by the poorest state;
b. Ensure fiscal restraint on the feds by making all other revenue-raising options directly dependent on the voluntary participation of individual citizens, who would regulate the size of the federal purse in accordance with the general prosperity by each simply looking after his own affairs (and with the additional benefit of thereby helping to ensure capital formulation at the pace and in the volume most suited to the national circumstances, a balance guaranteed to go wildly askew when the state is not so restrained);
c. Ensure fiscal restraint on the feds by making non-individual-citizen-regulated revenue measures one-time-each affairs, subject to high political accountability and narrowly scrutinized and only reluctantly endorsed by the several states which must bear the pain of raising the tax, and will therefore be active counterweights to the federal state's size, power and ambition (with the predictable and historically-proven effect of keeping both small).
d. All of the
above.
Correct response: "d".
Click
here for
some relevant observations.
Question 12: If
enough Americans regain the not-so-long-lost accurate understanding of the limited nature of the income tax:
a. The individual prosperity of productive Americans resumes a robust upward climb;
b. The state resumes its intended role of austere night-watchman, adjudicator of disputes, and a few other key, citizen-prioritized activities, having to confine itself to no more than it has the wherewithal to undertake (with the people being always able to infuse revenue into its treasury in the event of crisis or calamity);
c. All the distortions attendant upon substantial political influence over the general economy end, and the astonishing productivity of a free people operating under a real rule of law is unleashed to the benefit of everyone;
d. All of
the above.
Correct response: "d".
Click here and
here for
some relevant observations.
There's No Such Thing As An "Innocent American Civilian"
THROUGHOUT
MOST OF THE PAST 12 YEARS of US military aggression in the Middle East I
have let myself harbor a false notion about who has moral responsibility
for the death and destruction visited so many by this aggression. My
false notion held that because the aggression is conducted by the state,
and the state is so often contemptuous or disrespectful of the popular
will, the responsibility for the bad behavior is "theirs", not "ours".
By
virtue of the distinction I was drawing, I would wince whenever
I saw or heard someone refer to "American bombs" or "American
sanctions" or "American drones". "These are "United States"
bombs, sanctions and drones," I would say, "not "American"".
Those who felt aggrieved by these things, I thought, had a beef
with the state, not with the American people.
But this week I read
a commentary by Thomas DiLorenzo making just this argument, and I
had to recognize how wrong it is.
DiLorenzo writes to denounce a mindless screed by Rush
Limbaugh against ex-CIA "bin Laden" case officer Michael Scheuer's perfectly sensible explanation of terrorism against
American targets as "blowback" from US violence against
indigenous populations in the Middle East. Uncharacteristically
(due no doubt to writing in haste and with a head of steam),
DiLorenzo responds to Limbaugh's oversimplification of Scheuer's
real argument with an oversimplification of his own in which he spells-out the underlying
premise of this "it's the state's fault, not ours" notion-- that
grown-up, mentally-competent American are helpless victims of
their government, innocent of blame for its acts because their
participation in those acts is outside their power to effect:
"Limbaugh was
even more misleading when he screeched and whined over and
over that Scheuer supposedly said that "It’s the United
States’ fault!" "It’s America’s fault!" No, Rush, it’s not
"America’s" fault. It is the fault of the several dozen or
so political connivers, liars, manipulators and empire
builders who call themselves "statesmen." The average
American never has anything whatsoever to do with the
"diplomacy" that gets us into never-ending, perpetual wars
for perpetual peace."
and:
"It is not
"America" that is responsible for the killing of
hundreds or thousands of Muslim civilians with
drone strikes or other weapons of mass destruction. War
always originates, wrote Bourne, when "the government,
with no mandate from the people, without consultation of
the people, conducts all the negotiations, the backing
and filling, the menaces and explanations, which slowly
bring it into collision with some other government, and
gently and irresistibly slides the country into war"
(emphasis added). Contrary to what Limbaugh insinuates
and what Barack Obama has similarly declared, the
government is not us. The government is the
government; it is the largest instrument of organized
plunder ever known to man. We are the plundered,
duped, and misled into catastrophic, bankrupting war
after war that has nothing to do with "national
defense.""
ACTUALLY SEEING THIS "IT'S NOT US" THING laid out in black and
white makes clear how ridiculous an argument it is. The fact is,
EVERYTHING done by the United States is done at the pleasure of
the American people, enough of whom could stop bad state
behavior on a dime simply by deciding they'd had enough and
proceeding to withhold cooperation and participation (just as is
expected of disfavored foreigners made victims of US
sanctions).
Seeing this notion of helplessness laid out in black and white also
makes obvious how comforting it must be
to those who cloak themselves in its fuzzy delusion. After all,
if you can tell yourself that you have no
choice, then you can clear your conscience. You can even stop
bothering to pay real attention to evil that is done-- even when
it is ostensibly done in your name.
In
the course of my little epiphany I also realized that this
helplessness delusion is the
corrupt cousin of a dynamic about which I have
written much over the years. This is the dynamic by which
those weak in moral fiber strive to remain ignorant of
the truth
about the income tax because knowing that truth obliges the
honest knower to act.
Those weak in moral fiber fear acting in
ways disfavored by the hungry state. Thus folks of this sort
carefully nurture a pretense of skepticism concerning the truth
about the tax even in the face of
overwhelming evidence. This allows them to pretend to
themselves they are not obliged to act, since, as the
self-deception has it, they're still not
sure of this demanding truth.
The same thing goes on in regard to the fiction of helpless
participation in the state's evil: By rationalizing one's
helplessness, one is spared the guilt-- or, at least, the pain
of acknowledging guilt-- for the evil.
More, by rationalizing one's helplessness, one conceals from oneself the
imperative of acting to withdraw from participation in the evil. "What can I
do?!" whine those who snuggle up to this pretense. "Sure,
starving a half-million children to death in Iraq was a
reprehensible evil (as was helping Saddam Hussein murder
Iranians in an aggressive war for ten years before that,
installing the Shah in Iran after engineering the overthrow of
the elected government there in 1953, wiping out huge numbers of
men, women and children in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and
elsewhere with drones and by other means, supporting the
barbaric oppression and dispossession of the Palestinians, and
on and on).
But I'm just a kid!"
THE FACT IS, EVEN AMONG THOSE WHO refuse to support the statist agenda
and its aggressions by not voting for those who implement them, too
many Americans nonetheless remain responsible for those
aggressions by pretending that they have no choice but to pay
for them. "I despise and refuse to endorse your actions," they
say, "but here's a check to cover your expenses..."
This convenient self-deception would be immoral even if the
"paying" were legally compelled. But here in America
this isn't so. Other than by apportioned taxes laid on the several constituent
states of the union, the aggressive central state has merely been
given permission to lay fees on the beneficial use of its own stuff,
on privileges it extends, and on imports, with
no citizen being obliged to use
any of that and make him or herself liable for the fees. Here,
therefore, this
self-deception of helplessness in enabling and supporting the
state's acts is grossly immoral.
Of course, the state does its best to excuse its bad behavior,
and seduce the American people into imagining that behavior to
be necessary and proper. This relieves some from the need to
resort to self-deception about their helplessness, supplanting
that self-deception with the self-deception that the evil action of the state is
not evil at all. Such folks then support those actions
willingly, and deliberately foot the bill (and the luxurious
salaries and perks of the state officials and the profits of the
arms merchants and financing banksters) without complaint,
proving the wisdom of Tom Paine's observation that,
"Taxes are not raised to carry on wars, wars are
raised to carry on taxes."
THE BOTTOM LINE IS STRAIGHT AND UNCOMFORTABLY SHARP.
We ARE responsible for the behavior of the United States.
This doesn't mean that any one of us can, by ourselves,
discipline that behavior. But it DOES mean that we each have the
responsibility to do so to the degree that we can, and none of
us enjoy the luxury of being able to honestly declare ourselves
as "innocent" unless we have stopped actively enabling and
supporting behavior in which we would be ashamed to engage
personally.
"I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but
I can do something. What I can do, I should do and, with the
help of God, I will do."
I hate to criticize anything by Thomas DiLorenzo, because I am a great fan of his work, and
include several of his excellent and very important books on my
Reading Recommendations page. Nonetheless, everyone who
resists
the liberating truth about the income tax is rightly
vulnerable to the overall points I offer in this commentary, and
DiLorenzo is among this crowd, even going so far as to assume
the US Constitution to be flawed rather than consider the
possibility that he misunderstands certain of its provisions or
the manner in which they have come to be successfully undermined
and evaded by craft and corruption over the last 70 years (and
while overlooking the contradictory fact that the same
constitution bound the state down to
a
pale shadow of its current size and threat for the preceding
150+ with only a few short-lived interruptions in that record of
success). So, I must let those points penetrate where they may.
"At the outset, we reject the
Government's breathtakingly expansive claim of congressional power under the
Sixteenth Amendment -- upon which it founds the more far-reaching arguments
it advances here. The Sixteenth Amendment simply does not authorize the
Congress to tax as "incomes" every sort of revenue a taxpayer may receive.
As the Supreme Court noted long ago, the "Congress cannot make a thing
income which is not so in fact." Burk-Waggoner Oil Ass'n v. Hopkins,
269 U.S. 110, 114 (1925). Indeed, because the "the power to tax involves the
power to destroy," McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. (4 Wheat.) 316, 431
(1819), it would not be consistent with our constitutional government, and
the sanctity of property in our system, merely to rely upon the legislature
to decide what constitutes income.
Fortunately, we need not rely
solely upon the wisdom and beneficence of the Congress for, when the
Sixteenth Amendment was drafted, the word “incomes” had well understood
limits."
MURPHY v. INTERNAL REVENUE
SERVICE, DC Cir. No. 05-5139 (2006)
(Deceitful efforts to discourage Americans from learning the
truth about the "income tax")
FOR
ALL THE YEARS SINCE 2003 when
CtC was first
published, the government has engaged in a concerted effort to
frighten people away from its truths. This effort involves
official government websites and press releases touting an
occasional court ruling that appears to be at odds with some
CtC-revelation
(but without details sufficient to expose the real substance of the
ruling)--
and
sometimes even more mendacious behavior.
The
effort also involves online
activity by purportedly disinterested folks who we are supposed to imagine spend huge amounts of time posting "Stay away from this crazy stuff!" out of the goodness of their hearts and
a selfless concern for
the well-being of others. In other words, this is online activity by
obvious government-connected or supervised "agents-provocateur" and
the occasional "useful idiot" shill
Some of these folks imagine themselves to
be beneficiaries of the status quo, or want to be on some official's
cocktail-party A-list. Some are doubtless
just shameless hacks attempting to defend a professional career of
thoughtlessly buying into the "income tax" scam as commonly
misunderstood, and see their best bet at avoiding embarrassment in
helping the government bury the truth.
These
"non-official"
posts (which can be found in newsgroups, blogs, and occupying entire
websites) are generally of a consistent character. All either make
fallacious "resort to authority" arguments based on a careful
selection of misleading, irrelevant or demonstrably flawed material
from certain judicial rulings, present outright lies about events
such as tax-agency reactions to educated filings, present lies about
the content or arguments in
CtC, or do all
of these. All rely on the targets of their mendacities not
investigating matters for themselves, knowing that such investigations are often
time-consuming and sometimes outright difficult.
Here's
the simple, impossible-to-misunderstand short answer to these efforts: The
IRS has admitted under oath that tens of thousands of
CtC-educated filings have been
made since 2003. Now consider how many allegedly adverse
court rulings are claimed in these official and non-official
scare-you-away-from-CtC efforts...
Furthermore, pretty-much everything alleged in these official
and non-official scare-you-away-from-CtC
efforts is grossly misrepresented. Let's examine
a few of these falsehoods.
Misrepresentation: CtC-educated Americans
have been prosecuted for their filings
We each have our reasons, and our story. It's time, and it's needed, for
you to share yours with the world.
Everyone's failure to step up and fulfill
this simple request is really getting to me, now...
"The day we see truth and do not speak is the
day we begin to die."
-Martin Luther King, Jr.
What does it
for you?
Is it simply
because no moral and upstanding person has any choice when it comes to
telling the truth over his or her signature, whether on tax forms or
anywhere else?
Is it recognition of the critical importance of the rule of law,
and the knowledge that if everybody leaves its caretaking to someone else,
it will soon be lost to us completely?
Is it the money?
Maybe it's
just simple respect for your own rights as a human being, who is not and
cannot be not involuntarily subordinated to others?
Maybe it's just
simple respect for your general civic responsibility to be the grown-up and
enforce frugality and restraint on a big, powerful creature of our own devising
which otherwise is like a badly-raised teenage boy given whiskey and car keys
and let loose on the road to wreak havoc?
Or is it, perhaps,
a more acute anxiety that if our bonfire of a state isn't damped, and quickly,
it'll soon burn down the house around us all?
What IS it that
firms up your jaw and stiffens your resolve?
It's time to
take off the bushel and share your light!
I would like
you to think about what it is that motivates you for a few moments (or all
day, if you like), and then send me your thoughts. I want to put YOUR reasons to work inspiring folks who
don't yet understand what this is all about.
In this day
and age, the most effective way
for you to share your thinking
for the benefit of others is to video-record yourself talking about how you
feel, and explaining what inspires and motivates YOU.
All you need is a
webcam or cell-phone equipped with a camera. If you don't have, or know how to
use, one of these, have a friend help.
If needed, write a little script for yourself. Better, though, to just speak
extemporaneously, after spending a little time sorting out your thoughts and
getting down into your heart.
Keep yourself to
no more than 2 or 3 minutes,
and keep in mind that the purpose is not to educate, but to
INSPIRE, ENCOURAGE and ENERGIZE. Your video will be one of many to be shared.
You needn't
feel any obligation to be profound, and you shouldn't try to explain
anything about the law, other than to say that you have read it and you know
it's on your side. You just need to be sincere, and uplifting. Your object
is to make your audience want to have what you have, and to be where you are
in your heart.
Keep in mind that you're speaking to an
audience that doesn't yet know ANYTHING about the subject, and whose first
reaction is, "This must be illegal; this must be dangerous; this is too good to
be true." You want to pull that audience right past such things, and
straight to a focus on truth, morality, and our American heritage of liberty
and the rule of law.
Remember:
INSPIRE, ENCOURAGE, ENERGIZE.
Speak about rights. Speak about morality, and the obligation of a grown-up
and responsible person to speak the truth and to enforce the Constitution. Speak
about everyone's duty
to give to God what is God's, always, and to Caesar only
what is really Caesar's. Speak of your obligation to respect yourself, and to
look out for the current and future well-being of your children and your fellow
citizens.
If you have had victories, describe them.
Better still, show them, if possible.
Be clear about
just what you accomplished: EVERYTHING
back-- Social Security, Medicare and all; a "notice of deficiency" closing
notice; an on-paper agreement or acknowledgment that your earnings weren't
subject to the tax and everything withheld or paid-in was an "overpayment";
a transcript showing all $0s; or whatever happened.
When you speak of state victories, name the state. If you had to
overcome balkiness from a tax agency before winning any victory, describe that,
too!
Remember, your
purpose is to INSPIRE, ENCOURAGE and
ENERGIZE.
If you're dealing with ongoing balkiness, describe that,
too, if you wish-- but be sure to explain why you're not discouraged, and why you are not
standing down, not slinking back into the barn, and not choosing to endorse the lies.
Mention what you do for a living, whether you're a doctor, homemaker, lawyer,
trucker, IT guy or gal, or a retiree or student. Help people understand that the
company of grown-up activist Americans they are being invited to join cuts
across all demographics and all interests-- with the common denominator being
respect for the law and love of the principles on which this great country was
founded.
This is
your chance to get a LOT accomplished.
We've all had
frustrating occasions of trying to explain all this to a friend, neighbor,
family member or co-worker, only to pile up against the wall of a mind not
yet ready to listen and learn. Here is your chance to address a
self-selected audience of folks who have themselves decided that it's time
for them to begin paying attention, and have clicked on your testimonial for
exactly that reason.
So, please
make and send those videos right away! The restoration of institutional
respect for individual rights and the rule of law depends on enough
individuals insisting upon it. Do your part to let those starting to rub the
sleep from their eyes know that there is a community already waiting for their
fellowship with open arms and open hearts and shining spirits.
The
early May editions of the
losthorizons.com newsletter have always noted the
anniversary of the May 7, 1915 sinking of the British ship
Lusitania with the loss of 128 American lives, and the use of
this tragedy as a propaganda tool in overcoming American
resistance to participation in the then-ongoing World War I.
That anniversary follows closely on this one, as well:
"April 25, 1898- The United States declares war on Spain,
using the pretext of the mysterious sinking of the USS Maine in
a Cuban harbor. The war resulted in U.S. claims of ownership of
the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico, and a more limited
sovereignty over Cuba."
In fact, over the course of each year we have occasion to note
the "Gulf of Tonkin Incident", the contrivance used to justify
the Mexican-American war, the Nazi regime's attack on Germany's
Gliewitz Radio Station staged in
order to serve as the pretext for its invasion of Poland, and
several other famous "false-flag" operations as well, the most
significant of which (in terms of immediacy, anyway) is that of
"9/11",
of course.
All of these scams share common
characteristics. Among these are that each was deployed in
order to engineer the consent (or passive acceptance) of the
citizenry to some ambition of the state which was inherently
adverse to the citizens' interests; and each was effectuated and
sustained by a massive, systematic cacophony of disinformation
from all government organs, and all others who perceived their
interests as aligned with, or dependent upon, the government.
That is, each of these scams, by which a state ambition adverse
to the people was accomplished, relied upon a relentless
drumbeat of lies by agents of the state and their fellow
travelers.
The lying about each subterfuge
committed by the state against the people is typically
perpetual, of course. Those directly responsible for any one of
these crimes hardly want their culpability revealed during their
own lifetimes-- crimes of the sort involved here typically
result in the needless deaths of thousands, if not millions.
Furthermore, even when those responsible for any given offense
hand over the reins of the state to their successors and pass
from the scene, the inheritors of the state apparatus have an
abiding interest in sustaining the lies, so as to allow them to
successfully pull off the same sort of scam, at the expense of
an unschooled, and thus unsuspecting citizenry, whenever it
might suit their own ambitions.
Usually this program works like a
charm: A loud, relentless drumbeat of lies surrounding the
immediate "incident", all off the same "sound bite" memo; the
mobilization of resources and commitment of policy on a rush
basis, before any sober and independent evaluation or
investigation of the pretext can be conducted; the maintenance
of the campaign of lies and denigration of dissenting or
suspicious voices long enough for the purpose of the subterfuge
to become a fait accompli, and the public to be distracted by
ongoing, new issues and concerns; and then a more desultory (but
still careful and deliberate) incorporation of the lie-- often
customized at this point to account for the more egregious and
inescapable evidence to the contrary unearthed by voices of
opposition over the intervening years-- into the official
historical record and government school curricula.
In most cases, the nature of the
original subterfuge and its effects are such that the passage of
time serves the purposes of this program, making the truth more
obscure, or at least, harder to prove and less likely to excite
interest. Witnesses passing on; physical evidence being
destroyed or scattered; dialogue on the matter coming to be
increasingly cluttered with speculations and disinformation; and
the state's endless, ubiquitous and generic
"I-am-the-people's-friendly-servant" propaganda campaign, along
with reluctance of second-stage victims (those of the
mobilization in "response" to the false-flag "incident") to face
the fact that their personal tragedies were due to their own
unquestioning embrace of a lie and the contrary interests of
those invested in, or benefiting from, the new status quo all
conspire to bury the truth beyond conclusive disinterment.
Sometimes, however, we are
blessed with a glitch in the program...
Over the holiday season at the
end of 2008, such a glitch manifested, concerning the Lusitania affair
with which this discussion began. To round out the story of
that ill-fated ship and its use by the Wilson administration to
drag a previously opposed America into war in Europe, let me
explain that German intelligence had determined that the
Lusitania would be carrying munitions from America to Great
Britain-- one of the belligerents that had declared war on
Germany in the then-ongoing World War I. As
EyewitnessToHistory.com recounts:
"The British Admiralty had secretly subsidized her
construction and she was built to Admiralty specifications
with the understanding that at the outbreak of war the ship
would be consigned to government service. As war clouds
gathered in 1913, the Lusitania quietly entered dry dock in
Liverpool and was fitted for war service. This included the
installation of ammunition magazines and gun mounts on her
decks. The mounts, concealed under the teak deck, were ready
for the addition of the guns when needed.
"On May 1, 1915, the ship departed New York City bound
for Liverpool. Unknown to her passengers but probably no
secret to the Germans, almost all her hidden cargo
consisted of munitions and contraband destined for the
British war effort."
It was for this reason that
Germany considered the ship a legitimate target of attack (as
was an accepted principle under the rules of war), and had taken
pains to warn Americans to stay off the ship:
This notice was placed in
newspapers prior to the May 1, 1915 sailing of the Lusitania, in
some cases appearing alongside ads for that very voyage. The
British and the Wilson administration, however, publicly
discounted the warnings as merely intended to discourage
peaceful trade, withheld from public knowledge the fact that the
Lusitania was, in fact carrying munitions bound for the British
military, and thus acted to ensure that Americans WOULD be on
the ship when it set sail.
After the sinking of the ship on
May 7, both the Wilson administration and the British government
denied that the Lusitania had been outfitted as a British naval
auxiliary and was carrying munitions (the admission of which
would have undermined the affair's utility as a tool in
fomenting enthusiasm for American entry into the war in
Europe). Wilson actually wrote a note of protest to Germany
following the sinking, expressing these denials (and prompting
his own Secretary of State, William Jennings Bryant, to resign
in protest):
"Your Excellency's note, in discussing the loss of
American lives resulting from the sinking of the steamship
Lusitania, adverts at some length to certain information
which the Imperial German Government has received with
regard to the character and outfit of that vessel, and your
Excellency expresses the fear that this information may not
have been brought to the attention of the Government of the
United States.
It is stated in the note that the Lusitania was
undoubtedly equipped with masked guns, supplied with trained
gunners and special ammunition, transporting troops from
Canada, carrying a cargo not permitted under the laws of the
United States to a vessel also carrying passengers, and
serving, in virtual effect, as an auxiliary to the naval
forces of Great Britain.
Fortunately these are matters concerning which the
Government of the United States is in a position to give the
Imperial German Government official information. Of the
facts alleged in your Excellency's note, if true, the
Government of the United States would have been bound to
take official cognizance in performing its recognized duty
as a neutral power and in enforcing its national laws.
It was its duty to see to it that the Lusitania was
not armed for offensive action, that she was not serving as
a transport, that she did not carry a cargo prohibited by
the statutes of the United States, and that, if in fact she
was a naval vessel of Great Britain, she should not receive
clearance as a merchantman; and it performed that duty and
enforced its statutes with scrupulous vigilance through its
regularly constituted officials.
It is able, therefore, to assure the Imperial German
Government that it has been misinformed. If the Imperial
German Government should deem itself to be in possession of
convincing evidence that the officials of the Government of
the United States did not perform these duties with
thoroughness, the Government of the United States sincerely
hopes that it will submit that evidence for consideration."
In concert with official denials of this sort, the sinking of
the Lusitania and related loss of American lives was
subsequently treated as an illegitimate provocation by the
Wilson administration in order to sway American public opinion
toward entry into the war against Germany.
These efforts DID ultimately help persuade Congress to declare
war on Germany-- resulting in direct American casualties
totaling more than 320,000, and many other adverse consequences
that reverberated throughout the rest of the twentieth century
and into the present.
Take this serendipitous reminder, and the lesson it teaches, to
heart: When the federal state ventures beyond guarding the
borders against invasion and seeing that you have judicial
remedy for physical aggressions against your person or property,
it is no longer your servant or your friend. On the contrary,
at that point, the state is your competitor and your enemy. At
that point its words, and those of its sycophants, agents and
beneficiaries, should be taken as a matter of course to be lies,
as any fair reading of the historical record proves them always
to have been.
“There is no safety for honest
men but by believing all possible evil of evil men.” – Edmund Burke
"There are two distinct classes of men...those who pay taxes and those who receive and live upon taxes." - Thomas Paine
CtC Warrior Ike Hall has been engaged in a very virtuous project-- creating a study guide for new students of CtC. This remains a work in progress at this point, but I think what Ike's done so far is already worth sharing with the rest of the community. Click here to download the guide-- now complete through chapter twelve!
For more clarifying resources click here; and click here for more tools for spreading the truth.
Getting Free Of The "Income" Tax Scheme Is As Easy As Falling
Off A Bike
To get an
idea of how today's "income" tax scheme works, try this little
exercise:
Think
of the federal government as a guy named Bob, who lives down the
street from you in a town that is really big on bicycles. Bikes
get used for commuting, deliveries, shopping, etc.. In fact,
other than walking, bicycles are the exclusive form of
transportation in your town.
Your neighbor
Bob has a by-the-mile bicycle-renting business-- "Bob's
Bicycles". Bob's Bicycles is far and away the biggest business
in town.
Part of Bob’s
success is because he does a lot of contract business. However,
Bob doesn't just get paid by riders who have signed an agreement
with him, or even just those using Bob's bikes. Bob gets
something every time anybody in town does any riding at all,
through an odd combination of circumstances that took many years
to come together.
Here's how it
happened...
Bob's
Bicycles was launched long ago by the great grandfather of the
present Bob (Bob IV). Great Grandpa Bob started out not only
with a main location for his contract business-- he also had the
bright idea of setting up spots around town where he parked some
of his bikes for use by the more occasional rider, on an "honor
system". Anyone could take and use one of these bikes, but they
were expected to keep track of their mileage, and send Bob a
"1040 Mileage Ridden/Rent Due Form" (and the appropriate rent),
periodically. The initial design of the form was like this:
I, ______________, rode a
Bob's Bicycle a total of _____ miles this year.
At Bob's rental rate of
$.15 per mile, I owe Bob $______
I said that
Great Grandpa Bob planned to deal with these occasional riders
on the "honor system", and that's true. But he liked his money,
too, and didn't want to miss anything that was due him. So,
after setting up the "self-serve" locations, Great Grandpa Bob
went around handing out "W-2, 1099 or K-1 Rider Reporting Forms"
to every other business in town. The forms-- accompanied by
notices that if Bob didn't get his rent from someone riding a
bicycle in connection with any business, he would sue the
company involved-- said:
You Can’t Fight Well When You Don’t Know What You’re Fighting About.
If you are having an argument with the IRS or any other tax agency,
You are NOT being presumed to have made “corporate profit”.
You are NOT being alleged to have received “foreign income”.
You are NOT entangled in an invisible “adhesion contract”.
You are NOT being obligated by a law whose subject is never identified.
You are being targeted because REAL EVIDENCE exists that YOU PERSONALLY HAD “INCOME” to which the revenue laws apply-- even though that evidence is almost certainly incorrect, and CAN be corrected.
Seriously. Do you want to win? SPREAD THIS FILE AROUND!
Doing so will accomplish more than anything that happens in a courtroom, more than any argument you make with any bureaucrat, more than ANYTHING else that you can do.
Are You Not Bothering?
Then You're Just Talking The Talk.
You've GOT To Walk The Walk If You Want To Win.
"Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated."
CtC Warrior SanDiegoScott has put together a great little 20-question quiz to test your knowledge of the law regarding the United States "income" tax. Test yourself, test your friends and family! Test your accountant and tax attorney, and help them learn the liberating truth!!
A "Pragmatic" Perspective On The Tax And The Rule Of Law
Hey, don't bother me with that "morality" argument, and all that stuff about "upholding the rule of law". I'm a pragmatist. I'm just interested in looking out for "numero uno", and living my life without any hassles from the IRS!
So I'm okay with submissively letting the government:
take 45% of my earnings;
habituate itself to the conveniences of "creativity" in the writing of laws and the behavior of its officers in courtrooms in order to take that wealth from me with an appearance of legitimacy;
use my money to mess with foreigners on behalf of special interests, engendering hatred and contempt of all Americans-- including me;
use my money to finance an army of bureaucrats who rule my life for the benefit of themselves and their special-interest clients;
use my money to pay for an army of lawyers who will sue me or prosecute me if I try to make my own choices about who works for me and on what terms; about what I say-- and when, and how; about what I do with my own property; about whether I'm equipped to defend myself and those I love; and about how I raise and educate my children;
-- just as long as I'm left alone, dude!
To suffer abuse without complaint or struggle is to suffer it
nonetheless-- but to suffer it without the amelioration of dignity and
self-respect.
If each person receiving this newsletter each week distributed as few as 100 of any of the great outreach tools featured here to co-workers, friends, neighbors and family members (or just strangers on the street, in the mall, etc...), we could have SEVERAL MILLION new Americans suddenly introduced to the liberating truth about the tax!
When directed to a page by topic or link, read everything.
I know that this can mean the investment of a lot of time, attention and effort, but although some may imagine otherwise, I don't write as much as I do because I can't think of any other way to spend my time...
Furthermore, when you encounter a hyperlink within, or associated with, the text you are reading, follow it!
It is pretty common these days for web-based material to be littered with hyperlinks. Sometimes the purpose is to provide definitions or examples, in order to ensure that folks reading the original material aren't presented with a word or reference which they don't understand. Sometimes the links lead to illustrations pertinent to the original text.
It is common-- and perfectly understandable-- for folks who are confident that they are familiar with language or references within the main text they are reading to get in the habit of skipping over included links. I do it all the time, myself!
However, I very rarely include links for definitional or explanatory purposes; and when I DO make a link out of text in one page it is generally to another self-contained page, rather than merely illustrative material. These other pages contain material the clear understanding of which I deem highly important for the proper and complete understanding of the original page. (Links to CtC, the Victories pages, CtC Warriors and so on are obvious exceptions to this general rule. On the other hand, a link to the victory Highlights or 'Every Which Way But Loose' pages, which might seem like such exceptions, are not. The special selection of victories on those pages, and the filed docs and tax-agency correspondences included therewith, themselves constitute highly instructive material which merits careful attention. Thus care needs to be taken in all cases.)
Please make a habit of clicking on all provided links and at least looking briefly to ensure that the linked page is one with which you are completely familiar from another study session.
Finally, please keep in mind that, annoying though it may seem at first blush (but not, I trust, upon reflection), I constantly tweak material already posted. Obviously this doesn't mean that every page is in flux at all times, but it does mean that if you are directed to a page that IS familiar, it's worthwhile to read it through again if it's been a month or two since your last having done so.
