Did I get your attention? I hope so, because I'm really not kidding. This
week's posts WILL be found below, as always, but I'm really counting on your
support. I simply won't be able to continue without it.
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?
The Institute for Justice Thwarts An IRS Effort To Thwart
CtC-Educated Tax-Return Preparers
IN 2011, DOUBTLESS
CHAFING FROM THE SENSE THAT
things are
getting away from them in every direction at once, and frantically trying to
plug every hole in its crumbling dike of lies, the IRS launched an lawless
effort to stop anyone from serving as a tax return preparer unless that person
had been trained and approved by the agency. Obviously, the purpose of this
effort had nothing to do with ensuring good service to customers, and everything
to do with ensuring that only those thoroughly steeped in IRS Kool-Aid could
help other people do returns.
The agency invoked
an 1884 tax statute as its basis for authority. (This admission of the true
origin and continuing currency of pre-16th Amendment tax law-- and its
implications-- are brushed past with momentarily-glazed eyes by all parties
involved in this case.)
The agency's
reliance is mis-placed, to put it in the nicest possible way. The law invoked
(23 Stat., 236, 258-59, from an act of July 7, 1884) provides authority to the
Secretary of the Treasury simply to create rules governing the "recognition
of agents, attorneys or other persons representing claimants before his
Department" in order to ensure that such representatives are "of good
character and of good repute" and are "possessed of the necessary
qualifications to enable them to render such claimants valuable service, and
otherwise competent to advise and assist such claimants in the presentation of
their cases."
On its face, this
language (now codified as 31 USC § 330) doesn't give the IRS (or Secretary)
authority to do anything more than ensure that any representative is of normal
adult competence mind and (perhaps) has made some study of tax law, without any
regard to what that person may have concluded about the law. More, though, this
language also clearly doesn't concern itself with folks who simply assist others
in the preparation of tax returns.
HOWEVER, THE IRS
IS NOTHING if not creative and corrupt. Just as the agency creatively found
non-existent but very self-serving ambiguity in the language of the "telephone
tax" on the basis of which it corruptly extorted trillions from Americans over
several decades before recognition of this crime became so deep and broad that a
multitude of federal circuit courts finally refused to go along and shut the
scam down, and just as it has exploited the tendency of laymen and
poorly-educated (or lazy) legal professionals to
inaccurately perceive ambiguity in the definitions of things like "wages" and
"trade or business" for 70 years now, here the agency gratuitously "found"
that "representing claimants before [the Secretary's] Department" and
"advis[ing] and assist[ing] such claimants in the presentation of their cases"
embraced simple tax-return preparation, as well as the legal representation
during administrative "judicial" contests to which this authority is plainly
confined.
Any port in a
storm, eh?
HAPPILY, THIS
PARTICULAR ATTEMPT at abusing its power and exploiting the far-too-common
tendency of lawyers, judges and others to treat the agency as able to lawfully
operate outside all bounds of legitimacy ran into three upstanding Americans who
know and respect their rights, along with the good folks at the Institute for
Justice. These fine, grown-up-and-responsible Americans sued the IRS over this
effort at tyrannical usurpation of power never granted by Congress, nor even
within the scope of what could be Congressionally granted-- after all, offering
the service of helping a private citizen prepare a return involves no exercise
of any Congressionally-granted privilege and is none of the government's
business.
Happily again,
this case ended up before a generally-sensible-- and in any event not co-opted--
federal judge in the DC District Court. Even this mostly commendable judge
didn't quite get everything right; among other things, as noted previously he
doesn't quite recognize, or awkwardly stumbles past, the reality of the tax
law's continuity from pre-to-post 16th Amendment (even while simultaneously
having to acknowledge that continuity since the IRS had invoked it in its
usurpatious effort). He also stumbles a bit in an aside concerning §§ 7407 and
7408 of Title 26, due to being apparently unaware of the limits of the term
"person" as it relates to Title 26 §§ 6700, 6701, 6707 and 6708 (which limits
resolve what the judge describes on page 18 of his ruling as a conundrum of
statutory construction-- a gold star will be awarded next week to the reader who
explains what I mean...).
The upshot is that
on January 18, 2013 the IRS got properly slapped down in no uncertain terms, and
liberty and the rule of law not only hung on here, but regained a little ground,
due to several other virtuous aspects of the ruling issued, in which the proper
rules of statutory construction and judicial deference to the language of the
law were soundly and lucidly upheld. See the ruling
here.
"Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never
will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you
have the exact measure of the injustice and wrong which will be
imposed on them, and these will continue till they have been
resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of
tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they
suppress."
-Frederick Douglass
***
P. S. Speaking of the IRS, I hope everyone notes how much of a
charade is the token resignation of Steve T. Miller as commissioner
in response to the still-heating scandal over denial of 501(c)(3)
status to various groups (a status in which none of them would have
any interest in the first place if the truth about the tax were
widely-enough understood, by the way).
Miller just took the job last November. The vast bulk of these
offenses took place during the PRECEDING 18 months or so-- while
Bush-appointee Douglas Shulman held the post. THIS WAS NOT A
DEMOCRATIC PARTY ATTACK ON THESE ORGANIZATIONS! Rather, it was a
bi-partisan, Republican-machine and Democrat-machine attack on
libertarians. Let's all work to ensure that this is not spun by
those same Republicans away from recognition of their own
culpability, and from what was really going on here.
What I'd Put On A Non-FDA-Approved Medicine Package
WHILE DOREEN AND I PAID MOTHER'S DAY RESPECTS this past Sunday, my
mother-in-law happened to show us an Amish "home remedy" for leg
cramps she'd been using (and with which she was very pleased). My
eye was caught by the disclaimer at the bottom of the label, which
followed the manufacturer's description of the product and its
purposes. The disclaimer read:
"These statements
have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration.
The product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or
prevent any disease."
What struck me about this disclaimer was its inherent denigration of
the product (which certainly IS intended to treat a disease) and its
simultaneous elevation of the state. I was also struck by what was
left unsaid, and that I believe ought to accompany and dramatically
overshadow this protectionism-payoff disclaimer (which is added to
forestall an assault on the manufacturer by bureaucratic thugs on
the pretense that without it, the product must be falsely seeking to
present itself as being "FDA approved").
For instance, would it not be appropriate to add the following?
"We are obliged
to make this disclaimer because the state will pretend that
without it we would be trying to fool you into thinking our
fine product has been "tested" and verified as "safe" and
"effective' by its politically-driven charade of a vetting
process (at huge expense to you, by the way). The idea is
that you should assume that products not so "tested and
approved" are basically no good, despite the fact that the
vast majority of things that HAVE been through that testing
and approval process were made or packaged and marketed for
eons before the FDA was even dreamed up in 1906 (and that
its real purpose at that time and since has been to harass
and suppress producers disfavored by the state and to hinder
newcomers from competing with established,
campaign-contributing producers of the same or similar
goods).
We think that on
reflection you will agree that determination of
"effectiveness" is not something anyone in his or her right
mind wants left to the state. For one thing, this puts way
too much arbitrary power in the state's hands, because
"effectiveness" is a nuanced term. If "effectiveness" is
defined as "providing the full range of nutritional value
available in milk, undiminished by any pre-cooking", for
example, then raw milk is "effective". The FDA, however,
disagrees. It thinks its view of "safe" trumps YOUR view of
safe and effective, and authorizes the agency to interfere
with you being able to come home after a long day of
hang-gliding or bungee-jumping and enjoy a nice, refreshing
chock-full-of-nutrients glass of ice-cold raw milk.
For that matter,
what is "safe" also depends on one's interests and purposes
in using a product. The state has no business eclipsing or
usurping this kind of decision-making by adult consumers.
Further, state
usurpation of "effectiveness and safety determinations" acts
to dumb down too many of the American people. Americans at
one time made all such determinations for themselves. In so
doing, people cultivated a sophisticated, grown-up view of
the world, in which hucksterism, hype and hooey were
recognized and rejected.
Indeed, at one
time, we were capable of recognizing that even the scare
stories used back in the day to foist the FDA on us were
largely hype, hucksterism and hooey. "Snake oil" sometimes
found a market, of course-- products like "Dr. Pepper",
"Moxie" "Coca-Cola", "Fig Newtons", "Graham Crackers",
"7-Up" and many more were originally marketed as medicines,
some with ingredients the manufacturers would rather
everyone just forgot about. But the nonsense about
widespread grave dangers and massive frauds was just that--
nonsense. Any company that engaged in meaningful frauds was
quickly sued and stigmatized out of business, and anyone who
marketed poisons was lynched.
Because Americans
were more grown-up about these things back in 1906, the FDA
was stealth-marketed as merely the "Pure Food and Drug Act".
As indicated by that label, the measure was ostensibly
intended to do nothing more than ensure that foods and drugs
crossing state lines were not "adulterated" with undeclared
additives.
Unfortunately not
enough of us anticipated the "mission mutation" potential of
that bent-in-the-womb enactment. It is a classic irony that
marketing of the FDA was among the biggest MIS-labeling
scams of its time, with the bureaucracy it vomited forth
quickly becoming the expensive, heavy-handed
crony-capitalist, nanny-with-a-gun monster that it has
remained for many decades now.
As a consequence
of this effective false-marketing ploy, we have had the
state doing a lot of our discriminating for us over the
course of the last 100 years. It's no coincidence that the
state's campaigns of "engineered consent" became
increasingly successful during this same period, as
Americans lost the habit and skills of cynical skepticism
toward hyperbolic or seductive marketing.
Herbert Spencer
once dryly observed,
"The ultimate result of
shielding men from the effects of folly, is to fill the
world with fools."
Spencer was right, but there's nothing the state likes
better than a constituency of fools, which it will take
great pleasure in savagely exploiting.
Letting an appendage of the state take control of deciding
for us what is safe and effective in regard to a huge range
of products has proven to be very foolish indeed, in our
opinion. We think letting it go on would be
even more foolish...
But we're out of space on
this little label, so these remarks must end. WE think
you'll find this product safe and effective, and we stake
our personal liability, our survival in the market, and our
reputation on this being true (as does our insurance
provider, which is also confident in our product). But we
think that ultimately such conclusions are, and should be,
up to you and the market. Thank you for your business.
"I would rather
be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than those attending
too small a degree of it."
"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)
I WAS PLEASED TO POST IN THE APRIL 26 NEWSLETTER an excellent
letter by CtC Warrior
Barry Sullivan apprising the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt textbook
company of a gross legal and historical error in one of its
American History texts. HMH's tepid "Thanks, we'll look into
it..." response was also posted. See both
here.
Wisely anticipating that HMH would simply ask the IRS or their
own "tax attorney" or CPA to reassure them-- without a moment's
actual research-- that what Barry explained to them couldn't
possibly be true and then ignore his first communique (or have
its error confirmed but calculate that the cost of correction is
greater than it wished to bear), Barry has followed-up with
another letter, making clear to the very influential publisher
that correction is expected and performance will be monitored:
05/08/2013
Barry Sullivan
XXXXX XXXXXX
XXXXX, XXXXX XXXXX
Ursula Szwast
Executive Editor
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
909
Davis Street
4th
Floor
Evanston, IL 60201
RE:
The
Americans
Reconstruction to the 21st Century
ISBN
978-0-547-49117-2
Dear
Ms. Swast:
Thank
you for your response to my letter advising you
of substantive historical and legal errors in
the above referenced text. (Copies of both my
letter and yours are enclosed for your
convenience.)
Of
course I understand that your research into the
errors I brought to your attention may take some
time. Please note, however, that in my letter I
also requested the identity of the contributor
who provided the content to which my letter
referred. I should hope that that information is
readily available to you.
Please provide me with that information as soon
as possible. It is critically important that we
determine the cause of this misrepresentation of
our Fundamental Law.
I
would also appreciate a list of all the schools
that have used these texts, so they may be
notified to provide their students with the
corrected information.
Thank
you for your help in this matter.
Sincerely,
Barry
Sullivan
This is exactly the kind of sustained activism on the
"correcting disinformation" front that will ultimately
restore the rule of law. As I observe in 'The
Shield',
we've gotten where we are today by many small,
individual poor choices of apathy, self-indulgence and
timidity. All that is needed to get back where we belong
is many small individual GOOD choices, of activism,
self-interested civic-mindedness and courage-- like
Barry's.
Many thousands will read this page in the coming two
weeks that it is posted. If each such person strives to
emulate Barry and takes steps to fight back against the
disinformation, it won't be long before the fog clears
and sunlight can
do its
disinfecting thing against the corruption that has
thriven in the darkness.
(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.
A Great Summary Of Blackstone's Description Of The Duty We Know
As The "Income Tax"
CtC WARRIOR GREG SUTTON
shares some cogent and illuminating observations about the historical
context of the "income tax", first posted as comments on two history forums
at Tom Woods Jr's
Liberty Classroom site. Like Barry Sullivan's corrections of Houghton
Mifflin Harcourt's textbook discussed elsewhere on this page, Greg's posts
are excellent examples of the kind of campaign to which we must all devote
ourselves in order to overcome the disinformation on which rests most
Americans' misunderstanding of the "income tax".
Here's a
little sample of the first of Greg's posts:
"Blackstone lists various
excises or duties as representative of the system in 1760′s
Britain. The ninth and last duty was the office duty upon the privilege
of receiving gain, profit or income whose ultimate source was from
government. It was as Blackstone put it: “highly popular taxation.” This
particular duty was unmistakably a tax upon the privileged political
class and reflective of the classical liberal thinking that government
service was for altruist ends not personal gain. In fact the whole
question of graduation was born out of this thinking. The more one gains
from a political privilege the more he is obligated (duty) to return."
"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.
