Ok, I'm gettin' kinda jaded from all the election stuff. Well...for the moment, anyway...

The Amish Against the Feds

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

Answers

The Amish do not pay Social Security taxes, because it is a voluntary program. There is no law that requires anyone to sign up for Social Security. Call the SS office and they will tell you so.

Same with paying Federal income Tax. Strictly voluntary. The IRS calls it voluntary compliance. They could just as easily called it mandantory compliance, but they don't, because that would be unconstitutional.

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

Ok Betty, so lets not pay, but, um, you dont mind going 1st, do you?

lemme know what happens, ok?

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

It didn't say they don't pay income taxes, they don't pay Social Security.

Tell you what, lets drag them into Tax Court and see how much hardball they get to play.

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

I learned of the voluntary nature of the income tax in 1988. I'm self employed, so it was very easy for me to bow out of the tax system.

The IRS however tried to bully me with numerous letters, to which I simply responded to them that, since I no longer was a tax payer, they had no jurisdiction over me. Before I bowed out, I took certain precautions and put all my assets into several different trusts, in case the IRS was going to use their sticky fingers. I have a bank account in a trust name. The IRS has no clue that it is my account.

They even sicked the US tax court on me. I told them the same and the US tax court dismissed the case for lack of jurisdiction. Just think of it, isn't it strange that the US tax court is not in every state, but only in washington D.C.? That tells you right there that they have no jurisdiction in the 50 states. They only have jurisdiction over you if you pay their required $65 filing feee to argue your case. When you pay that fee, then they got you in their ball park. If you don't pay that fee, they dismiss the case.

Since I paid into social security for many years, now that I'm 64 years old, I'm now collecting social security.

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

In other words, "betty", you are a TAX CHEAT who is perfectly willing to let all the other citizens of this country pay for the services of Government from schools to the Department of Defense, the interstate Road System, the FAA, and all the other services you use without even beginning to understand that you use them and are CHEATING OTHERS.

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

It IS truly a REMARKABLE day.

CPR: I AGREE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now, if only *we* could figure out how to get away with the same? :-)

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

Lets see what the "bettys" of the world would willing give up if the taxes were abolished on EVERYTHING. Schools, hospitals, roads, POLICE, DoD, ??

J.C. advocated paying taxes as in 'Render unto Caesar........". Even the CHEATERS can't answer that because "they are "getting away" with it"...... BUT..........what's to get away with? Suppose you "Privatize" EVERYTHING. Put the roads on a toll basis and if they are not maintained, truckers and the public won't use them. If they are kept up, the money has to come from somewhere (and btw, the roads are a MESS everywhere after 40 years so that is a bill that is coming up for all of us to pay).

You can privatize the FAA, privatize the VA, HUD, Even the Dept. of State functions like a Pass Port. BUT......SOMEBODY will have to do it if the economic needs are there and those someones CHARGE.

In the end, GOV't exists to DO WHAT THE PRIVATE SECTOR CAN"T OR WON'T DO. Whether it "should" or "should not" be doing some of the things it does goes back before FDR.

When the People of the South East decide to sell TVA and make it a Corporation for pay and do the same with Bonneville they should. And while they are at it, sell off the Hoover/Boulder Dams so that Private Enterprise can run if better and cheaper. BUT guess what? Most of the time they can't. The USPS is classic.

COMSAT is an exception but then Comsat paid for itself MANY MANY TIME. And at the time that was considered "gov't invasion of the private sector" by the Hard corps Nut Fringers of the Right.

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

cpr:

You are right, the USPS is a classic. Here is a "semi-private" operation that is forbidden by law from creating a profitable price structure. To then turn around and say "See, the private sector can't deliver the mail profitably" is self-serving in the extreme.

And in general, the reason government is doing what the private sector can't do, is because the private sector can't do it BY LAW, not by inherent capability. The government is also taxing us to do one hell of a lot that very few people want or need, because of special interests or the strange machineries of pork.

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

In 1983 Pesident Reagan appointed the Grace Commission to find out where our income tax money goes. They determined that not one dime of your income tax money goes to run the country.

All of your tax money goes to the Federal Reserve Bank, which is not a Federal bank and which is owened mostly by wealthy foreign bankers. They call it Federal to deceive we the people, and they have done a good job of it. You can sure tell by the stupid responses to my posts.

If you're self employed it is very simple to find out where your tax money goes. Simply turn the check over and see how the IRS has endorsed your check. It all goes to the federal reserve bank. Even your social security poayments go to the federal reserve bank. Your SS payments are supposed to go to the SS Trust account!!!!

This is the biggest scam in US history and 90% of the people have no clue!

We need another Boston tea party!!!!

The IRS admits that over 30 million Americans do not file income tax. They are the true patriots!

-- Anonymous, December 06, 2000

Once the IRS gets on your case they never give up. Eventually you will be faced with jail time and/or a visit by Jack-Booted Government Thugs. You can then choose either to surrender or endure another WACO scenario. Of course if the government is able to take away all our guns first, then the WACO scenario becomes moot.

It's not really a question of right or wrong. Just who has the biggest and most guns. THE JBGT aren't afraid of you even if you are armed. But they ARE afraid if your neighbors are too and might rise to your aid one of these days.

-- Anonymous, December 07, 2000

The gun issue is DOA. I can't count how many times I have seen this or the equivalent lately. "All liberals or MOTR types need at least one rifle and a pistol. The right wingers have shown their hand in Florida, they can't win at the polls, so they are going to attempt to refuse us the right to make our votes count. Prepare to fight NOW!". Forget about it. Outside a few single issue types, you won't hear about it again, not for a long time.

As for taxes, I don't care how you push the money around, BB. Why not play similar games with your own bank accounts? Hmm - this check was drawn on a bank in Dothan, but Alabama was a Confederate state that never surrendered, so the check must be no good unless it is paid with Confederate money, right? Or checks can't be drawn accross state lines for at least a dozen reasons similar to the ones you give for taxes. And Supreme Court decisions don't apply anywhere outside DC, since they only meet in DC, right?

BB, with that kind of logic, I can prove anything whatsoever. And how did you think those interstates got built? Magic?

And, do you pay your state taxes? If not, who paid for the roads in your state? Or your city, if you live in one large enough to build its own roads?

Like I said the other day, Charles, we agree on a lot more than we disagree on. And that's a fact.

-- Anonymous, December 08, 2000

Am I the only one who has never resented paying taxes? I admit we notice the bite more when we're self-employed, but I just looked at my check and realized it wasn't all mine.

Speaking of cheating and scams, there's a girl in my Botany class who took the first exam and failed miserably on it. She missed the second exam, got a written excuse from her husband [who works for a hospital], got the exam and the answers from someone who took the exam, took the makeup and made an 82%. This worked so well that she missed the third exam, got another written excuse from her husband, and will substitute her third exam grade with the portion of the final that deals with the third exam's questions [a copy of which she has ALSO obtained.] I'm hard-pressed to see how the prof hasn't seen through this, but he hasn't. Actually, I'm a bit stunned that she doesn't see this as cheating. She and I sit in the front row [of about 100 students overall]. She said, "He's sitting right in front of us when we take the exams. Who knows what they're doing back THERE!"

-- Anonymous, December 08, 2000