Your first time: Was it -- well, was it good for you?

[grixit]

Perhaps ENM was the victim of an attack based on Advanced Resonance Plasma Physics and got sent to another universe.

[Demosthenes]

ENM's website:

http://www.elfninosmom.com

[Imalawman]

ENM's website:

http://www.elfninosmom.com

Ah, yes, I forgot about that. Thanks.

[Demosthenes]

ENM also seems to be a regular visitor to Webhick's ever-entertaining blog,

http://illuminatigonewild.com/

[jg]

Some years ago (but not sure just when - as I am mentally deficient as to how many years ago anything has happened) my first encounters were on MSN Money income tax boards where I was answering tax questions on the public forum.

On occasion a post with tax denier nonsense would be made and several of us would be sure and quick to point out the fallacies. For a period, there was allowed much nonsense to be posted. During this period Kenneth Evans and Christopher M. Hansen were among those encountered.

Quatloos was found during searches while debunking tax denier nonsense. From my first encounter it has been my intention to not leave tax denier nonsense unchallenged lest anyone think that it may have any merit.

[jcolvin2]

In 1991, I left the law school for the real world. At the time, the law firm which I went to work for (and with which I remain employed today) was defending a (former) tax protestor on failure to file charges. The client was convicted, but his wife was acquitted. I learned a lot about jury instructions, including the promise and practical limitations of Cheek, in a very short period of time.

[webhick]

Webhick's ever-entertaining blog

Odd. My records don't indicate that you've had any recent brain surgery. But then again, I'm missing a chop saw.

[LaVidaRoja]

My first time -- In 1979, I was a grade 5 Tax Auditor in Santa Ana, CA. On April 15th, a group called "Your Heritage Protection Association" held a rather noisy protest in front of the Federal Building. The IRS employees in the building used a back exit that day, avoiding the confrontation. YHPA (as they were called) were anti-FRN types. I never personally dealt with any of them. I was too junior to be exposed to them. Eventually, (as I recall) the Service issued 90-day letters to a considerable number of them. They petitioned the Tax Court, and as all of the issues were identical, the cases were consolidated. On the day of the Calendar call, the Service moved to have the cases dismissed -- probably for failure to state a claim. YHPA, one of whose founders was a petitioner and allegedly an attorney, AGREED WITH THE GOVERNMENTS MOTION!!! They failed to recognize that THEY were the petitioners and what dismissal would mean!! They actually thought that they had won!! A year or two later, when the paychecks of those who were employed were garnished, some of them came to realize just how badly they had been had.

I remember in the late 70's or early 80's, the first time I read a tax case involving Schiff. It started; "Mr. Schiff is no stranger to this Court." I wondered at the time why he was not in jail.

It seems to me that most tax protestors (and I remember when we began calling them 'compliance challenged') who are willing to present their position beyond the most basic level know quite well that it is a pile of hogwash. They hope to either fall through the cracks (look how long it took to put Schiff in jail) or that some change in law will wipe out their non-compliance.

The IRS took altogether too long to recognize that these people were and would continue to be a problem in the system. That failure gave the movement a sufficiently solid base that it may not be wiped out any time soon. The basic appeal is to greed, and in the 80's we were all taught "Greed is good"

[LOBO]

Other than coming across a Shiff-style return or a "reparation credit", my first protester experiece was driving by Togodude when he was "fasting" across from the Austin Service Center. I saw an article about him on Fark.com, which led to a site or two that led me here for the first time.

[ErsatzAnatchist]

My first internet dealing with a tax protester was on a lawyer listserv of some sort (it may have been the ABA Solosez list). I was mildly intrigued and looked into the issues raised (the normal crap about how their is now law actually requiring a return to be filed, etc...). I think I found Dan's FAQ and forwarded that to the TP attorney. I never heard back from her.

My first live TP was Ed Brown. My dealings with him had nothing to do with taxes, but he did give me an earful about the gold fringe on the flag and admiralty jurisdiction. I gave him a pocket copy of the Constitution and showed him the jurisdiction of the Courts language in Article III. He was unimpressed and we agreed to disagree.

[Evil Squirrel Overlord]

Ah, now that I have your attention, the question is: The first time you became aware of this thing called a "tax protester," was it a good experience? And who was your first tax protester?

Mine was a guy in the 1980's who had never paid any income taxes. (Veit Nam era tax protest.) He regretted it because he could not get loans and nor ever file a return because he believed it it would put him on the radar. He wanted to repent but was too afraid of the consequences.

Next was a man in St. Cloud who was self-employed. Same deal. He could never get any loans to grow his business because the banks wouldn't consider him without any previous records to establish income. (He blamed the Federal government and Coborn's grocery stores.

There was also a bicycle courier who thought pot was better than taxes. The IRS had already caught up with him and he was paying massive amounts of back taxes.

[Evil Squirrel Overlord]

Oh and I found Quatloos on two separate occasions. The first was after one of our finance guys tried to interrupt my pouring coffee to get me to buy into a gas card scheme. As he was explaining it to me I said, "Sounds like a pyramid scheme". He quickly remembered that he left a bagel on the copier and had to run. I asked my boss about it and he was already on the site looking up the scam. The second time my boss was laughing out loud. It was the Brad Christianson exhibit. Quatloos stuck in my mind.

The came the 9-11 Truthers... followed by TPers on several discussion boards. I kept coming here and linking for arguments and the real results of the court cases... finally thought I'd stick around.

[Duke2Earl]

It has been quite a while. In 1987 I was working as a technical advisor to the IRS Chief Counsel. One of my jobs was to answer letters. We got a letter like I had never seen before... it was printed by hand in a rainbow of various colored pencils with a lot of pictures of eagles and the like pasted on. To the extent it was understandable at all it was a rant about how nobody was required to pay taxes and how we were breaking the law by insisting people pay up. I wrote a nice response citing book and verse about why people were indeed required to pay taxes. Obviously that was the wrong thing to do because he reponded quickly getting shriller and more difficult to understand. I again responded with the law as I knew it and sent the appropriate IRS pubs to boot. This must have really caused his head to explode because I then got back a letter that I couldn't follow at all. So I didn't respond further and the letters from that guy stopped.

[TheSaint]

I'm a layperson. I first discovered Quatloos while attempting to debunk a conspiracy-minded web poster who was spewing the Irwin Schiff nonsense. Needless to say, this site (along with the "Tax Protestor FAQ") was incredibly valuable in that regard.

[Brandybuck]

My first time was the early 80s. I can't even remember the name of the book, but basically said the income tax was illegal. For several years I would not sign my 1040 (but still sent in a check, because I ain't *that* stupid). The reason I half-heartedly believed it was because there was no ready access to the countering information.

The internet changed that, and in later years I did have the means to check stuff out for myself. Tax denial had dropped off my radar for decades until someone gave me a copy of America:Freedom to Fascism. I watched it all the way through and I must admit I fell for it. But before diving into the movement and handing out DVDs of my own, I decided to do a simple Google search for that law that Russo said did not exist.

I found in in five minutes.

That was a HUGE lesson for me, and a swift hard kick in the butt. From "sheeple" to tax denier to eyes wide open in the space of one week. The next week I found not only Dan's Tax Protestor FAQ (and from there the Quatloosian Illuminatus), but also Sheldon Richmond's pounding of the TP movement from an anarcho-libertarian perspective.

Tax deniers who say they have "researched tax law for decades" are lying. They are in an echo chamber of tax denier webrings. They are not researching they are self-indoctrinating.

[Pottapaug1938]

If I recall correctly, Jerome Schneider can be credited with starting me on the Quatloosian trail. Over 10 years ago, I was working for my present company; and I either got a junk fax or saw a magazine ad for Schneider's offshoring strategies (the illustration for which showed a blonde in a bikini, sipping some sort of tropical cocktail while she relaxed with her male companion on a beach somewhere, with his yacht anchored nearby). I was still fairly new at the Internet then; but eventually I found the "old" Quatloos site. It wasn't until probably some time in 2008 that I came across this side of Quatloos; and a couple of years ago I decided that it was time to sign on (or stow away, judging from my initial rank).

[Parvati]

Ah, now that I have your attention, the question is: The first time you became aware of this thing called a "tax protester," was it a good experience? And who was your first tax protester?

It shouldn't surprise anyone who follows the current Ronald Ottaviano thread, but he was the first TP I'd ever met. I was quite young at the time, and my instantaneous dislike of the man was not because I knew he was a con artist (which I didn't), but simply because he struck me as the scummiest salesmanlike life form imaginable. Greasy, slimy, weaselly, generally insincere and nauseatingly self-important.

While he was reasonably well spoken (and I must admit that the man *does* have the gift of gab--he just doesn't know when to STFU), he was astonishingly illiterate in his written communications. When I pointed this out, the adults around me became very angry and defensive, pointing out that understanding grammar and spelling correctly is overrated, and declaring that Ron was, in fact, a genius.

Given my age at the time, I was really, really pissed off by this offhand dismissal of what seemed to me to be an obvious indicator of stupidity--particularly when Ron not only claimed to be studying law and the tax code, but was telling his followers that he was learning all the "hidden" meanings in the tax code as well as arriving at new interpretations. I didn't think that someone who couldn't string together two sentences without a 50% error rate could possibly be a legal genius. Or, indeed, a genius of any kind.

While Ron was around, the family got even deeper into the whole TP thing, which sucked. I'll leave it at that.

My attempts to prevent the family from getting involved in the crap Ottaviano was pushing (BIC, Sovereignty schemes, offshore debit cards, etc.) frequently led me to Quatloos. When I finally joined, it was with the intention of chronicling the little turd's final spin around the Bowl of !Fail!.

I still have TPs in my life--just not in close proximity, which helps keep the frustration factor down. This is one of the reasons I don't generally engage the free-range variety when they pop up on here. I deal with it enough in my daily life--interacting with them is not a novelty.

[JamesVincent]

My first experience with a tax protester was, as I have said before, growing up with an uncle who, after serving in WWII, refused to pay taxes. I never quite understood what the problem he had with taxes was, he never really explained it. As I have also said, he never had anything but a vehicle, lived in a shed behind my grandmothers for years, and with his girlfriend for a long time. He did carpentry work for cash and when he had enough cash he would just disappear for awhile and show up when he was broke again. When he did finally die of old age his long time girlfriend called one of my other uncles and told him which hospital his body was in and told him to take care of it. Probably one of the nicest people you would ever meet and at one point was a very big guitar player in Nashville back in the day, playing at the Grand Old Opry and played for Patsy Cline at one point.

My second run in was actually a history teacher in high school who taught as part of his class that income tax was illegal in that the constitution had never been amended to include income. I paid about half attention since it was high school and chicks were more important then taxes anyway. Along the way Ive run into several others here and there with different degrees of idiocy, including a person I worked for for a few years who insisted that since he still held joint citizenship in an another country that he shouldnt be required to pay income tax here. The IRS caught up with him eventually and hes still paying his back taxes as far as I know.

I actually found Quatloos while doing research on MLMs and stuck around since Im a very common sense kind of person and appreciate the wit and education provided here. Dont know if I fit in all that great since I am not specialized in tax code or law but I have fun.