Posted on 04/03/2007 7:45:54 AM PDT by SmithL
Dorothy Hansen used to pay her taxes faithfully every year -- until the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Since then, the 87-year-old Sebastopol resident has stopped filing her income tax returns to show her disapproval of the war.
"I am very sure that I don't want to have any part in killing people and I certainly don't want a part in any wars that do just that," Hansen said.
With the tax-filing deadline just two weeks away, some Bay Area residents are using it as an opportunity to protest the war by withholding their tax dollars to fund it.
Known as war tax resisters, they consider it an act of civil disobedience. Some withhold only a symbolic portion of what they owe -- $10.40, for example, to represent the 1040 tax form -- while others, like Hansen, refuse to pay anything at all. Many will redirect their tax dollars to a charity of their choice.
The risks can be costly if a resister is caught. The Internal Revenue Service recently increased the penalty for people who fail to pay their taxes to $5,000 from $500. Some resisters have had their wages garnisheed or property seized.
"There is no law that permits taxpayers to refuse to file a tax return or refuse to pay their taxes based on an estimate of what the government spends on programs or policies with which they disagree on moral, ethical, religious or other grounds," the IRS said in a statement. "These frivolous positions are variations of arguments taxpayers have made in the past about religion and taxation, and that courts have repeatedly rejected."
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
Since I have had to pay my taxes during the Clinton administration and all the years of rat congresses I demand of the IRS to THROW THE OLD BAT IN JAIL
You don’t understand that she is doing the right thing for the wrong reason.
When people finally rise up to protest that they have had enough, it matters not what made them stand up (antiwar), it matters only that the protest is just (abolish the personal income tax).
Movements succeed where people everywhere unite for diverse reasons around a focused issue.
That said, pay the 1040 taxes for now, but educate yourself to who the real enemy is. Watch the following:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4312730277175242198
Unity is more important than personal side issues.
That would be her Earned Income Tax Credit she received last year.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Get enough people to do it and then you have something.
Read what you wrote.
And exactly what % of the babyboomers would unite against federal income taxes. Without them their social security checks medicare benefits will be paid how?
Social Security and Medicare have their own taxes.
Please watch the film (if you can, you will need a high-speed connection) because it will answer all your questions. No one in that film is against you; you will be surprised.
I watched this film and it changed my life.
Don't these liberals realize they are harming the poor by their actions? Don't they realize that women and children will be hardest hit?
There is no legal excuse for not paying one's taxes. Sorry but we don't get to choose that our tax money not be spent on the military. Just arrest, take to trial, convict and send them all to jail.
Throw the old bat in jail.
This old biddy’s about to learn — the hard way — that the IRS long ago disproved the old addage “you can’t get blood from a turnip”. At the IRS, they can squeeze it out of thin air, if necessary.
They WILL get the legally payable “pound of flesh” — and THEN some.
I’m no booster of the tax code, but, so long as it’s in force, you’d best pay up, or you will come to understand a whole new universe of pain and anxiety.
I am as much in favor of abolishing the IRS as anyone. Government should tax consumption instead of productive behavior. However, we live in a nation of laws. The rule of law is a big part of what keeps our nation strong. Protesting against the IRS or income tax is great, but breaking the law is wrong. Is it possible for the law to become so oppressive that government destroys our freedom, making it necessary to throw off the yoke of oppression. Yes, but we are not there yet.
Our government will always need a revenue collector.
We the People will always need to pay taxes.
It is the form of taxation that is killing us meaning our ideals of freedom. Many today do not see it because it has come slowly and smoothly.
Watch the film. It will be distributed in independent theatres this year. It is free on the internet now. You will need a high-speed connection.
Watch every minute of it.
Study it.
Do not be distracted because some have different views. Our differences are used to divide us, to set us against each other. Just look at the comments on this thread.
The strategy being used by those that are slowly taking away our freedoms is perfect.
“Throw the old bat in jail.” (post #30, and many others).
Their strategy is perfect. Use us against ourselves.
“I watched this film and it changed my life.”
Ditto, and thanks for the link!
Good luck to you.
Security without freedom is a prison.
Freedom without security is temporary.
No freedom and no security lead to death.
Freedom and security are the ideal and reality of life.
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