Some tabs that have slid across my browser in recent days:
- The IRS is not making as much progress as it promised on its backlog of tax returns from past years and it abruptly abandoned plans to increase mandatory reporting of smaller transactions on platforms like Venmo and PayPal. This confirms to me that the agency is still struggling and is going to take a lot of time to turn its newly increased budget into competence and capacity.
- NWTRCC has a new newsletter out. It includes some news on new U.S. tax policies and official actions and their implications for war tax resisters, and some recaps of the recent 40th anniversary gathering of the organization.
- War tax resister Karl Meyer was interviewed on Northern Spirit Radio.
- John LaForge explains why he’s refusing to pay the fine imposed on him by a German court after he trespassed at nuclear weapons sites.
One reason is because my protest was not wrong or a mistake in any sense, whereas paying the fine implies I’m guilty of some sort of offense or misconduct. Further, agreeing to pay has the appearance of an apology or remorse on my part when none is warranted. I believe any nonviolent action against preparations to commit mass destruction with nuclear weapons is in the public interest. Further, my so-called “trespass” was an attempt at crime prevention, or interference with ongoing government criminality, and as such was a civic duty.
- The ragtag human rebel forces continue their global campaign against the relentless traffic ticket robot cameras. Someone smashed a camera van in New South Wales, motorcyclists taped bags over nearly every camera on the ring road in Tolouse and Caen, cameras were disabled in Walldorf, Hunfeld, Llandrindod Wells, and Telford, othes were burned, disorientated, and painted blind in various parts of Europe.
- When the IRS won a big one-time budget bonus recently, there was some speculation that Congress would claw some of it back by cutting the agency’s annual budget. Sure enough, the recently passed omnibus package cut the IRS allocation by about 2.2%. Expect more of this when the Republicans take over the House of Representatives .
