LH Forum rule changes

[Nikki]

Two things:

1 - Pete's legal troubles are just beginning. After he loses all of his appeals of the errneous refund suit, he will have to face (in no particular order):

- civil actions by the IRS with respect to his failure to pay taxes for the last umpteen years

- criminal charges for filing fraudulent returns

- injunction actions to shut down LoserHeads and stop the sale of CtC.

2 - In light of Pete's invocation of 1984ish ThinkSpeak restrictions, it's odd that people who are asking how to deal with CtC-related frivolous penalties and CPxx letters are still allowed to post.

[grixit]

At the risk of invoking a law, isn't the last stage of a bunker mentality the one where the subject begins blaming their most loyal followers for failing them and advocating their destruction?

[Famspear]

Cpt Banjo:

Famspear, you seem to be assuming that Pete sincerely believes in the crap he peddles. Isn't it equally likely (if not more so) that he's simply a con artist who knows better but who's been able to fleece a lot of ignorant TP's?

Which is not to say, btw, that he isn't a narcissist...

Yeah, with tax protesters in general there are two competing lines of thought, right? Version A: The protester is totally delusional, and really believes in what he says completely, or Version B: The protester is a totally cynical con artist. Maybe this or that protester is somewhere in between A and B.

Beats the heck out of me, though. I'm a total amateur at this psychology stuff.

[Famspear]

grixit wrote:

At the risk of invoking a law, isn't the last stage of a bunker mentality the one where the subject begins blaming their most loyal followers for failing them and advocating their destruction?

Absolutely. Hitler in his bunker, Berlin, April 1945.

[Dr. Caligari]

Pete's legal troubles are just beginning. After he loses all of his appeals of the errneous refund suit, he will have to face (in no particular order):

- civil actions by the IRS with respect to his failure to pay taxes for the last umpteen years

- criminal charges for filing fraudulent returns

- injunction actions to shut down LoserHeads and stop the sale of CtC.

I think the first thing he will face will be the contempt proceedings when he fails to file correct tax returns as ordered by the judge in this case.

[notorial dissent]

Followed by his immediate incarceration since he has already shown his unwillingness to voluntarily follow a court order, or even the liklihood of him following one let alone the possibility that he will do anything else other than continue on in his current direction doomwards.

Ultimately though, when you get a con man who has invested as much ego into something like this as Pete has-and let's face it, Pete is all about ego, coupled with as was pointed out, narcisistic personality disorder, they eventually start believing their own line of BS until they cross the line from being the one doing the conning to the one being conned. The more I see, the more I come to believe that he has done just that to himself, and the current meltdown will be nothing in comparison with what is to come. This tragi-comedy ain't over yet, but it is a question of how many more it will drag down with it.

[Joey Smith]

Maybe Pete will start sending out mail bombs again?

His odds of going to prison are 100%, but then he can hob-knob with Irwin Schiff, Eddie Kahn, et al., for the decade or so that he will be there.

[Imalawman]

Maybe Pete will start sending out mail bombs again?

His odds of going to prison are 100%, but then he can hob-knob with Irwin Schiff, Eddie Kahn, et al., for the decade or so that he will be there.

Not sure he'll be there for a decade. I'm guessing more like 5 years. Still not a good prospect and I think its starting to hit him that he's actually going to jail. That must be a terrifying thought.

[grammarian44]

Pete has posted a partial first draft of his response to the government brief:

http://www.losthorizons.com/Newsletter.htm

It begins,

There is an old and wise riddle that constantly comes to mind when reading every document filed by Plaintiff-Appellee throughout this affair:

Q. How many legs does a dog have, if you call his tail a leg?

A. Four. Calling a tail “a leg” doesn’t make it one.

[Disilloosianed]

Oh the irony.

[Imalawman]

How about this nugget;

A little fog-cutting is in order: The game Plaintiff-Appellee plays is as though there is a law laying a tax on all pay “for work as a widget-repairman”. Plaintiff-Appellee has introduced vague testimony that a Kim Halbrook has seen records claiming Peter Hendrickson was paid “for work as a widget-repairman” (and none regarding Doreen Hendrickson). Peter and Doreen Hendrickson have squarely testified that they were paid nothing “for work as a widget-repairman”. So Plaintiff-Appellee, having nothing else to do, has said, “That doesn’t matter anymore, because we’ve decided the law really says that ALL pay is pay “for work as a widget-repairman”!” (without having established that Peter or Doreen Hendrickson were paid ANYTHING of ANY character by ANYONE; and in support of which assertion as to the law Plaintiff-Appellee offers... nothing). Perhaps Plaintiff-Appellee hopes for confusion to reign due to the clever statutory language that “Gross pay for work as a widget-repairman includes ALL pay for work as a widget-repairman, from whatever source derived.”

To be continued...

[Famspear]

Yes, but being the sensitive, caring people that we are, we do not refer to Blowhard Hendrickson's behavior as being like "a chimp in an enclosed space" that would "freak out and shriek and scream and bash at the walls in a blind, inarticulate, whirling fury". We also would not emphasize the fact that he is, metaphorically, "shrieking, screaming and flailing wildly at the box in a very vain attempt to get out."

We would just say that Pete is having a decompensation episode in connection with his narcissistic personality disorder, and that he needs our care and understanding as he "works through" to get in touch with his own feelings, his inner self.

Oh, and pass the popcorn, please.

[Joey Smith]

Pete has posted a partial first draft of his response to the government brief:

http://www.losthorizons.com/Newsletter.htm

It begins,

There is an old and wise riddle that constantly comes to mind when reading every document filed by Plaintiff-Appellee throughout this affair:

Q. How many legs does a dog have, if you call his tail a leg?

A. Four. Calling a tail “a leg” doesn’t make it one.

Perhaps the court of appeals will write in their opinion that "Stupid is as stupid does."

Pete's example really brings out the totally frivolous nature of his position: That if he repeats over-and-over that he is not a taxpayer that maybe that will eventually come true.

[Dezcad]

Pete's example really brings out the totally frivolous nature of his position: That if he repeats over-and-over that he is not a taxpayer that maybe that will eventually come true.

He needs to "tap his heels together" too. I think that is what has been missing. Once he does that, he'll be fine, I'm sure.

[.]

Perhaps he's trying to set a record for sanctions.

[ASITStands]

He only has fifteen pages, does he not?

Trying to wax poetic or philosophical will fill several, making it less imperative to present substantive argument. You know, facts and law? It's hard to limit the brief to fifteen pages.

Of course, he only has to respond to the government's assertions, which makes his attempt at philosophy all the more entertaining.

Pass the popcorn!

[Quixote]

Pete's example really brings out the totally frivolous nature of his position: That if he repeats over-and-over that he is not a taxpayer that maybe that will eventually come true.

He needs to "tap his heels together" too. I think that is what has been missing. Once he does that, he'll be fine, I'm sure.

Don't forget the ruby slippers.

[LPC]

There is an old and wise riddle that constantly comes to mind when reading every document filed by Plaintiff-Appellee throughout this affair:

Q. How many legs does a dog have, if you call his tail a leg?

A. Four. Calling a tail “a leg” doesn’t make it one.

What is startling is the next sentence:

Similarly, asserting that an equity relationship exists between Defendant-Appellants and Plaintiff-Appellee does not make it so.

WHAT?? What the hell is an "equity relationship?" And when did anyone ever assert that one existed?

The "draft" (the inclusion of the "r" might be a typo) of his "brief" then goes on the claim that asserting that something is so doesn't make it so, thus:

Asserting that the property returned to Defendant-Appellants constituted a refund of tax does not make it so. In fact, that property was never a tax. Asserting that Defendant-Appellants’ earnings were “employee” and “non-employee” earnings (as “employee” and “non-employee” are defined in tax law), or “wages” or “taxable compensation” (as those terms are meant in the tax law) do not make them so, any more than calling a tail a leg (or a hind-leg, or a fore-leg) makes a dog have five legs.

I can never be sure whether this sort of thing is the result of an intellectual defect or an emotional defect (or a combination of both, of course). Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg, of course, but calling a leg a tail doesn't make it a tail.

I suspect that Hendrickson is not quite as crazy as he sounds, and that the reason he has never explained *WHY* the money he received was not "wages" is that he knows that his 3401(c) argument about "government employees" is a sure loser. So he's going the obfuscation route, arguing about burdens of proof and evidence and presumptions and all sorts of other crap, hoping to confuse the court enough not to notice that he has failed to make a single factual assertion or a single legal argument.

[Famspear]

Blowhard Hendrickson writes:

It is true, of course, that Plaintiff-Appellee [the United States] has a little virtual universe of its very own, populated by its own creations, and others who exist there because of (and only to the extent of) contractual relations with Plaintiff-Appellee. Within that little universe, in which Plaintiff-Appellee makes the rules, ALL receipts ARE “income”, and ALL earnings ARE “wages”, with only such exceptions as Plaintiff-Appellee has deigned to specify. But it is only within that little universe that these things are so, and, like the vast majority of persons, Defendant-Appellants do not exist or operate within that little universe.

http://www.losthorizons.com/Newsletter.htm

By contrast, the huge "alternative universe" -- the one that Blowhard Hendrickson seems to claim to believe exists -- encompasses only the finite space-time continuum wherein may be found the brains of Blowhard Hendrickson and those of his equally consistently clueless cohorts.

Unfortunately for Blowhard Hendrickson, the little bitty "virtual universe" to which he refers also includes the U.S. Constitution, the Internal Revenue Code, the Treasury regs, and the relevant case law interpreting all of the above. That "virtual" universe also includes the "virtual" accomodations at the "virtual" Graybar Hilton in which Blowhard just might someday find himself a "virtual" non-"existent", non-"operational", long-term guest.

[Cpt Banjo]

Calling all this bilge by Hendrickson a legal brief doesn't make it one.