Yet Another CtC Success Story!

[Joey Smith]

Charles X


574 Posts
Posted - 05/07/2007 : 3:24:17 PM
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I have gotten nowhere with the IRS.

They ignore the law, my letters, FOIA'S, and Affidavits.

After the Heart Attach Sunday before last, April 29th, looking forward to more tests on the May 10th, and another operation to insert 2 more stents June 1st.

The IRS'S lack of cooperation, and the Social Security Hearing coming up, and the Social Security giving the IRS $742 of my Social Security leaving me with only $704 per month makes me tired.

Even after I contacted my congressman and ask for intervention they still have taken 3 more payments with no end in site.

So, I am tired, retired, desperate, elderly, confused, and you might say wounded or slightly disabled.

So, I decided to turn to Legal Aid to see if they could or would help.

Anyone with any ideas that I should give to legal aid, I am open to suggestions, and opinions.

There are probably a lot of elderly people in my position, and a lot of younger people, too.

Maybe what we need is a petition to abolish the IRS, do you think we could get enough signatures?

God help'em if I ever learn how to sue them.

[Disilloosianed]

Poor legal aid! There they are, trying to stave off evictions by slum lords and collect child support for single parents and this guy is showing up with "ideas."

[jkeeb]

After the Heart Attach Sunday before last, April 29th

It was attached to Pete before, necessitating the operation.

[Imalawman]

Its stories like this that piss me off. The fact that these guru's lead the ederly into this scam is just reprehensible.

Maybe Demo can answer this question: Why do a lot of older people become tax protestors?

Many of my TP cases that are litigated are against people over 55. I have no answer for this, but I find it strange. To date, I haven't had a TP case across my desk with anyone under 40 yrs old.

[Demosthenes]

I wonder who is paying for his tests and stents.

[The Observer]

Maybe Demo can answer this question: Why do a lot of older people become tax protestors?

Many of my TP cases that are litigated are against people over 55. I have no answer for this, but I find it strange. To date, I haven't had a TP case across my desk with anyone under 40 yrs old.

I would venture that these are people who have marginal financial security and are anxiously looking at their nearing "golden years." If they haven't arrived at the number of dollars that they believe they need to get by or are experiencing financial difficulties now, they may become vulnerable and willing to listen to any number of "get-rich-quick" schemes out there. And mind you, it doesn't necessarily have to be a tax-scam based scheme - police blotters are full of crime reports where the elderly are fleeced out of their savings by all sorts of con artists.

It may be that the over-50 crowd that falls for the tax-protest nonsense may already be harboring grudges against the government from experiences or perceptions in their past dealings and this only makes it easier in their minds to justify the non-payment of tax.

[Quixote]

I wonder who is paying for his tests and stents.

Medicare? Nah, couldn't be.

[webhick]

Its stories like this that piss me off. The fact that these guru's lead the ederly into this scam is just reprehensible.

Maybe Demo can answer this question: Why do a lot of older people become tax protestors?

Many of my TP cases that are litigated are against people over 55. I have no answer for this, but I find it strange. To date, I haven't had a TP case across my desk with anyone under 40 yrs old.

Failing faculties may attribute to it. I pay the bills for a mobile home park. The President is approaching 90. He sent me a form from the State to renew their trade name "[Blank] Mobile Terrace" registered to the previous owner of the park. I wrote him a letter stating that their name is not [Blank] Mobile Terrace, it's [Blank] Cooperative, Inc." and that I didn't cut the check because it isn't their name and that it's the previous owner's problem. I also noted that if they really wanted to renew the trade name, they'd have to follow the process in the directions (which involves having the previous owner dissolve the old name and the new park re-register it). I get a phone call at 7:10 AM yesterday from the President: "Why do we have to change our name?!"

Don't even ask about the two month fiasco to get their high balance accounts into Money Markets.

[Demosthenes]

Maybe Demo can answer this question: Why do a lot of older people become tax protestors?

Short Answer

Midlife crisis. Some people dump their wives and buy expensive sports cars and hair plugs. Others buckle down and start seriously saving and planning for the future. Many simply ignore the future and continue plodding along. Tax protesters decide to take on the roll of David against the Goliath of the US Government. It makes them feel important, and it helps them blame someone else for their personal financial and emotional failures.

Long Answer

Part I: Financial reasons for becoming a tax protester "This isn't where I expected to be financially at age 50"

When you reach a certain age (50 or so) you start thinking more seriously about retirement and other major future financial goals. Some people hit that point and are cautiously optimistic. Others reach that age, and start to panic because they realize that they may not make it financially in the future.
50 is also an age where financial crises tend to occur. An unexpected health care issue, for example, can easily wipe out a savings account. As part of my research for the book, I've been randomly choosing tax protester names over the past two years and checking the bankruptcy records. After looking up more than 200 names, I've found that more than 80% of these TPs have declared bankruptcy in the past.

When this recognition of financial failure occurs during a period of prolonged economic downturn, having a bleak future means that you're in the same boat as a whole lot of people. You can blame the economy. But when recognition of future financial failure occurs during an extended period of economic stability and growth, the failure is personal. Blaming yourself is far less attractive than blaming an abstract entity that you watch take a percentage of your paycheck. And so, they turn their anger and resentment towards the government and since the IRS is the only government entity with frequent and regular contact with the TP (withholding, quarterlies, and annual returns), the IRS bears the brunt of that anger.

Part II: Ego reasons for becoming a tax protester - "This isn't who I expected to be at age 50"

Talk to a lot of foreign visitors or exchange students and ask what they think about Americans and you'll hear a lot of statements along the same theme: Americans have this boundless (some would say irrational) confidence that we can move mountains and save the world. When you're young, with your whole future ahead of you, it's easy to believe in a beautiful future.

Yet 50 is a magical age. You start to examine both your past and your future. Tax protesters are narcissistic, and they just know that they are more important and special than the rest of us. And yet, somehow, that specialness hasn't translated into a successful business, best selling book, or famous patent. Taking on the US government feeds that feeling of self-importance. They have special knowledge (the magic meanings of those special words in the Code) that the rest of us sheeple are just too stupid to see. And taking on the government in the form of tax protesting means that they have more money at the end of the day which alleviates some of the financial stress they were feeling above.

Part III: Miscellaneous reasons for becoming a tax protester -"I hate the government, and the special knowledge I purchased from a learned teacher, or read about online, enables me to see all the secrets the government is trying to hide from me"

A number of other factors are involved:

1) political beliefs - has anyone ever seen or heard about a Democrat/liberal tax protester?

2) paranoia - believing that you are personally being persecuted and/or that there is a vast government conspiracy to hide the Truthtm is a necessary ingredient to your "special knowledge"

3) gullibility - to become a tax protester, you have to be willing to believe some really stupid arguments, no matter how absurd. This is the same willful blindness you see in cult followers.

[Demosthenes]

And two other interesting things I've found while I'm in long winded mode:

1) We're seeing a sudden rush of really young tax protesters. It's my theory that young adults today are far less optimistic about their future than prior generations have been.

2) I see tax protesters, for all their warts and silliness, to be a kind of canary in a coal mine. They're just experiencing anger and resentment and paranoia a little ahead of the curve.

[Duke2Earl]

2) I see tax protesters, for all their warts and silliness, to be a kind of canary in a coal mine. They're just experiencing anger and resentment and paranoia a little ahead of the curve.

I think I disagree with your analogy. A canary in a coal mine serves as a warning of a real danger. Many of the "dangers" allegedly foreseen by the tax protesters are totally imaginary. I see them more as "Chicken Littles." There have always been and always will be Chicken Littles crying the sky is falling... but that doesn't necessarily mean the sky will fall. And like Chicken Little their continual crying vastly dilutes any "real" issue that really exists. Yes, paranoids have real enemies but it's damn hard to see them among the hallucinations.

[Imalawman]

Thanks, that makes sense and I can see that from the cases I have. Also, I've often said that so far anyone that has drunk deeply from the kool-aid has had an underlying mental or emotional problem/disorder. Maybe the late T. Sussey was the only one that I've heard of that was actually talented, smart and didn't have a tremendous emotional or mental problem. I suppose with age these underlying problems begin to manifest themselves more prominately.

1) political beliefs - has anyone ever seen or heard about a Democrat/liberal tax protester?

Yes. Increasingly actually. I will admit, it used to be a by product of radical conservative, christian thinking. However, lately, I've seen this starting to change. Expecially with the increased dislike for Bush. The war protestors (mostly liberal) are starting to blend in with the TPs.

[Demosthenes]

One of my kind of "far out" predictions is that the hard core right wing TPs will eventually join with the hard cord left wing (such as eco-terrorists) contingency under the theory that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend."

[Disilloosianed]

I've always believed that there isn't a political spectrum, but more of a circle....the closer you get to the radicals, the more they all seem to blend into each other.

[Demosthenes]

Are there any salaryman type "tax protestors?" You know, the folks who work in a cube farm, or for a big corporation.

My guess is that the majority of the newer recruits are salaried.

[The Observer]

Are there any salaryman type "tax protestors?" You know, the folks who work in a cube farm, or for a big corporation.

My guess is that the majority of the newer recruits are salaried.

But it is much easier to get salaried people off the kook-ade. Several weeks of being under levy by the IRS tends to change one's outlook towards tax laws.

[The Observer]

Are there any salaryman type "tax protestors?" You know, the folks who work in a cube farm, or for a big corporation.

My guess is that the majority of the newer recruits are salaried.

But it is much easier to get salaried people off the kook-ade. Several weeks of being under levy by the IRS tends to change one's outlook towards tax laws.

Hmmm, Freudian slip there. I meant to say "kool-ade."

[LPC]

As part of my research for the book, I've been randomly choosing tax protester names over the past two years and checking the bankruptcy records. After looking up more than 200 names, I've found that more than 80% of these TPs have declared bankruptcy in the past.

I seem to see a recurring pattern in which tax deniers have had an emotionally traumatic financial or legal experience, which seems to trigger the start of their tax denial "research."

For example, my understanding is that Irwin Schiff was financially ruined when he got (unwittingly) involved with a Ponzi scheme that also ruined several friends along with his clients. It was only after that they he started believing that he no longer had to pay income taxes.

Similarly, Bill Benson started looking at the ratification of the 16th amendment only after he was indicted for tax and Social Security fraud.

When this recognition of financial failure occurs during a period of prolonged economic downturn, having a bleak future means that you're in the same boat as a whole lot of people. You can blame the economy. But when recognition of future financial failure occurs during an extended period of economic stability and growth, the failure is personal. Blaming yourself is far less attractive than blaming an abstract entity that you watch take a percentage of your paycheck.

What puzzles me is that the tax denial activists only became noticeable when tax rates began going *down.*

In the 1950s and 60s, the top income tax bracket was 70%. When I was in law school in the 70s, Congress had lowered the top tax rate on earned income (wages and salaries) to 50%, and lowered the top tax rate on capital gains from 35% (50% deduction for long-term capital gains) to 28% (60% deduction). Then came the Reagan years and the top income tax bracket was lowered to 50% and the top capital gains tax rate was 20%.

And I think of the 80s as the "golden age" of tax denial, because that's when almost all of the main arguments got raised (and destroyed) in court.

Now we've got a top income tax rate of 35% and a top capital gains (and dividend) rate of 15%.

But meanwhile, income inequality has been growing, as the rich get richer and the working class gain nothing (or lose purchasing power).

And that's a good prescription for social (and political) discontent. A perception that things should be getting better economically, and lots of very visible wealth in the news and in popular culture, clashing with the reality that the after-tax wages of most workers has actually been declining.

I see tax protesters, for all their warts and silliness, to be a kind of canary in a coal mine. They're just experiencing anger and resentment and paranoia a little ahead of the curve.

Which is consistent with what I've said above. They may be the parts of society that are especially sensitive to the rising cognitive dissonance between (a) lower tax rates on the wealthy and increasing wealth and (b) a larger tax burden on the working class and rising income inequality.

1) political beliefs - has anyone ever seen or heard about a Democrat/liberal tax protester?

Obviously, most tax deniers are right-wing/libertarian, so there's a correlation, but is there cause and effect? And if there is, which is cause and which is effect?

I am very skeptical of rational philosophies, because I believe that people adopt the philosophy that justifies the attitude they already have. So, when a tax denier decides that he wants to keep more of his money and pay less in taxes, he adopts whatever political philosophy will make that decision seem patriotic instead of selfish. (Lest anyone think that I'm slamming the right, I should add that I believe that the same can be said of the political left. Someone who wants other people to spend more of their money in ways that he thinks are important will develop a philosophy that justifies taking other people's money in taxes to pay for social welfare programs.)

[Cobalt Shiva]

I have never been under a levy. I have been on a levee.

Did you drive your Chevy to the levee?

(Evil cackle as I plant the earwig)

[LPC]

Okay, it gets better.

In a later message in the same thread that Joey quoted from the same guy ("Charles X") writes:

OK, I called the Taxpayer advocate.

She said before she could help me that I had to fill out the paper work, 1040, finacial statement, bank statement, ect, ect.

I told here that I had a problem with all this because there didn't seem to be a law that required me to do these things.

She said that if I didn't do it that the secretary was authorized under 26 USC 6020 (b) to assess me.

While we were talking I looked it up, and I said to her did you know that 6020 (b) gets it's authority from Alcohol, tobacco, and Fire Arms. She said it didn't matter that was the law.

I ask her, well in order for the law to apply to me do I need to go out and get a license for alcohol tobacco, and fire Arms.

Sir, I know that this is hurting you financially but thats what I have to have before I can help you.

Also, the 15% limit doesn't apply if they want to take more.

I told her I was going to have to give this some more thought.

At the rate he's going, that's going to take a loooooonnnng time.