The Picket Line — 3 January 2010

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3 January 2010

Here’s a classy and well-made video short promoting war tax resistance and the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee that was put together by Christopher Dimitrov, Jared Ingster, and Antonella Lentini of New York University’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study:

You can find registration information and more details about The 13^th International Conference on War Tax Resistance and Peace Tax Campaigns at its website. The conference is scheduled to take place this July 2–4 at Skiringssal College in Norway.

Remember the Chascomús/Lezama municipal secessionist fooferaw that I covered last August? Back then, residents of Lezama, Argentina announced a tax strike to protest the legislature’s unwillingness to consider granting them independence from Chascomús. Apparently their campaign worked and they finally succeeded in convincing the government to see things their way.

So now the unionist Chascomunenses are fighting back with a tax resistance campaign of their own (translation mine):

After governor Daniel Scioli announced yesterday that he would not veto the law to create the new city of Lezama, passed by the provincial deputies on Tuesday, the citizens of Chascomús reacted with a series of propsals to reject the independence of the nearby town.
In a neighborhood assembly it was decided next Sunday to hold the Opening of the Summer Season of Chascomús on Highway 2. The event will include the election of the queen, shows, and other attractions. The intention is to obstruct traffic during the signing of the law, a recourse that was frequently used by the residents of Lezama in order to gain their independence.
Furthermore, they proposed to carry out tax resistance, not paying taxes, cutting the railroad tracks, and declaring persona non grata the 58 provincial deputies who sanctioned with their votes the law for the creation of Lezama as well as governor Scioli.…

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How you can resist funding the government → the tax resistance movement → conferences & gatherings → 13^th International Conference on War Tax Resistance & Peace Tax Campaigns: ▶; ♦ ♦ ♦; Mary Theroux cuts off the government for breach of contract. Also: Charles Madigan throws down the gauntlet to the Tea Party protesters. And: news about the next international war tax resistance conference, eating sustainably and ethically on a food-stamp budget, and how thinking you’re a good person can be a substitute for being one.; A new issue of NWTRCC’s newsletter is out. Also: an update on the I.R.S.’s software modernization efforts — after years of missing deadlines and blowing budgets, it looks like they’re throwing in the towel.; A new issue of NWTRCC’s newsletter is on-line. Also: Bomb-throwing anarchists, mutinies, and revolutionary agitators on the march, in the wake of the Viborg Manifesto, which called on Russians to refuse to pay taxes to the Czar.
How you can resist funding the government → the tax resistance movement → media → video: ▶; ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦; NWTRCC’s video contest begins. Also: Albert Jay Nock on anarchist ethics. And: war tax resisters find a receptive audience at the School of the Americas Watch protest in Georgia earlier this month.; Choose your favorite among the finalists in NWTRCC’s video contest. Also: Dave Keniston writes about his tax resistance, and Ticia at T.P.M. Cafe thinks about getting her toes wet. And: the American public begins to suspect that they’re overspending on the military.; The Agape Community, a group of radically nonviolent, tax resisting Catholics in Massachusetts that was founded in 1982. Also: Eric Volpe explains why he became a war tax resister. And: will tax resisters get hassled when they try to cross the border?.; Two war tax resistance films — “Paying for Peace” and “An Act of Conscience” — are released on-line. Also: the story of The Bezuidenoudt Affair, an act of tax resistance that triggered the first Boer War.; Two war tax resistance films — “Paying for Peace” and “An Act of Conscience” — are released on-line. Also: the story of The Bezuidenoudt Affair, an act of tax resistance that triggered the first Boer War.; A new video from Conscience Canada promotes conscientious objection to military taxation. Also: as I walk down the path of tax resistance, I notice I’ve been bothered by the same stone in my shoe as those in whose footsteps I’m walking.; On “The Ridley Report” Dave Ridley files a Peace Tax Return instead of a 1040. Also: a new G.A.O. report on the I.R.S. collection process contains a few bits of interest.; If you tap on the core of central authority it sounds hollow, brittle, and rotten, like the stalk of a cattail just before the seeds are ready to disperse. Also: a video of David Schenck giving a talk about war tax resistance last month. And: Gerald DePyper tries to light a tax-resistance fire under the American anti-abortion movement.; Some notes and photos from the first full day of the NWTRCC National Gathering in Cleveland, Ohio. Also: Aristotle continues to try to understand self-control and its absence, and contrasts his view with that of Socrates. Does this have anything to do with hypocrisy?; A new edition of NWTRCC’s newsletter includes items on relationships where one person is a tax resister and the other one is not, news on a new war tax resistance film, upcoming and recent war tax resistance actions, and more. Also: Mexican vendors sell tax evasion paraphernalia, making the income tax there nearly a joke.; War tax resister Patrick Keaney takes his case to the top, Billy Bragg says he’ll refuse to pay taxes that pay for outrageous bonuses of executives of taxpayer-bailed-out banks, the U.S. changes policies on tax-delinquent federal contractors and charitable donations to Haiti relief, and one frustrated taxpayer starts a tax resistance campaign against the corrupt government of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. Also: the trailer to the new war tax resistance promotional film “Death and Taxes.”; A new video about government spending priorities and war tax resistance, put out by the Mennonite Central Committee. Also: seven million American children went missing in 1986, thanks to a change in the tax laws. And: Nepalese doctors stage a tax strike.; A review of the new war tax resistance video, a look at how the war tax resistance testimony fares in modern Quaker Meetings, the Alliance of the Libertarian Left registers as a subversive organization and refuses to pay its filing fee, Steuern zu zahlen ist keine Bürgertugend, Wendy McElroy on the philosophy of William Wollaston, and American prison slave labor’s link to war materiel.; George Ought to Help, but when people call on governments to mandate contributions to otherwise charitable causes, they are using disreputable violent means to feel-good ends.
Some historical and global examples of tax resistance → Argentina in 2009–10: ▶; ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦; Juanita Nelson shrugs off the inaugural hoopla and says she doesn’t go in for elections. “I vote with what I do or don’t do,” she says. Also: Did you pay enough in taxes last year to pay for the $46,790 portrait of Donald Rumsfeld the Pentagon commissioned? The nation thanks you for your sacrifice. And: farmers in Argentina organize and plan a tax strike for next month.; The Argentine government is feeling the heat from the tax resistance threat of drought-stricken farmers. Also: ostentatious individual action as a form of activism, a rent strike in government housing, and how to qualify to head up the Oakland police department’s Internal Affairs division (get caught beating a suspect to death and then ordering your subordinates to lie about it).; A review of “Standing Up to the Madness” by Amy Goodman and David Goodman. Also: states issuing I.O.U.s instead of tax refunds (and making taxpayers angry), a prisoner serving a life sentence successfully files for millions of dollars in federal tax refunds (and the feds decline to prosecute!), a taxpayer pays his whole bill in coins, the agrarian tax revolt buzz in Argentina, a 35-year-old service gift economy, a water tax strike in Northern Ireland, and a way to make a buck or two from unused storage space in your home.; A former member of the Weather Underground reassesses the role of that violent insurgency. Also: tax revolt in Argentina moves from the countryside to the city.; Yet another organized tax resistance campaign in Argentina. Also: Martin Kelly wonders whether Quaker war tax resisters ought to start getting more confrontational with their own congregations. And: a new magazine dedicated to alternative & local currencies.; Strikes and highway blockades spring up as drought-stricken Argentine farmers protest high export taxes. Also: Matt Taibbi lays down some high dudgeon about the brazen robbery that is U.S. economic policy.; Tax resistance emerges as a tactic in a municipal secessionist campaign in Lezama, Argentina.; Taxpatriate satyagrahi Jeff Knaebel has a new quest and a new website. Also: Washington wants you to invest your 401(k)s and IRAs in government bonds and has begun floating ideas on how to force you to do so. And: An obituary for long-time war tax resister George Willoughby. Also: another tax resistance campaign in Argentina.; A new issue of NWTRCC’s newsletter, “More Than a Paycheck” with news about last month’s Southeast War Tax Resistance gathering and the criminal case against war tax resister Frank Donnelly. Also: more tax resistance talk in Argentina, and Greek tax collectors go on strike.; You’re invited to the May NWTRCC national gathering in Tucson. Also: Rebecca and Her Daughters reemerge in Arizona. And: a neighborhood in Argentina opts out of the municipal tax system. Also: inmates in Florida swipe $100,000 from the I.R.S. while still behind bars.; War tax resisters Frank Donnelly, Larry Dansinger, and Dan Jenkins on the radio (here’s a podcast). Also: Villa Nueva, Argentina is blanketed with tax resistance pamphlets, and everyone is dodging blame. And: the I.R.S. begs Congress for more money so it can answer its tax assistance phone line 71% of the time after an average 698-second hold (seriously, those are the agency’s goals for this year if it gets more funding).; An Argentinian legislator proposes a broad guarantee of the right of conscientious objection… except, of course, any objection to paying your taxes. Also: Alasdair MacIntyre gives a virtue ethics perspective on money, economy, and business.; Tax resistance movements have often coordinated with labor strikes, business shut-downs, or consumer strikes as a way of further restricting government resources, demonstrating solidarity, and freeing up the time of resisters to engage in more campaign-oriented activities. Here are several examples.; Today I’m going to cover a specific variety of consumer strike undertaken in coordination with some tax resistance campaigns: a strike against goods sold by the government or by a government-protected monopoly, or goods that are subject to a particular tax.; Some tax resistance campaigns have encouraged people to pay their taxes into escrow accounts that they will surrender to the government only if the government meets their demands.; One way a tax resistance campaign can claim victory is by convincing the government to either formally rescind the tax, or to recognize the legal validity of tax resistance. Here are some examples.

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