Another Nail in the “Écotaxe” Coffin

Some bits and pieces from here and there:

• Erica Weiland shares some Practical Reminders for War Tax Resistance at the End of the Tax Year at the War Tax Talk blog.
• Although the French government gave up on its plans to impose a new highway shipping tax some time ago, in the face of sustained protests and the destruction of tax portals by the bonnets rouges movement, only now has the quasi-private government contractor Ecomouv laid off the workers who were to have administered the tax. Predictably, I suppose, the economically-challenged French left is up in arms about this and is accusing the bonnets rouges of contributing to French unemployment!
• We’re coming up on the 100^th anniversary of “The Christmas Truce” — an informal truce and mutual hobnobbing organized by those in the trenches on both sides during World War Ⅰ. Adam Hochschild wonders why we mostly neglect to commemmorate peacemakers.

A few more dispatches from the Russian Revolution of 1905, from the Taunton Courier and Western Advertiser on this date in 1905:

Drain the Savings Banks.

Advice to the Workmen.

The Executive Committee of the Council of the Workmen’s Delegates has issued a notice counseling the workmen to withdraw their deposits from the savings banks. The effect of the proposal, if it should be generally carried out, may be gathered when it is stated that according to the last returns, the depositors numbered 5,261,660, and the cash deposits amounted to 943,000,000 roubles, with an additional 215,000,000 in securities.

Rushing to Bankruptcy.

Payment of Taxes Refused.

The Russian Government is rapidly moving towards bankruptcy. The revolutionaries command all the workers, a large proportion of the peasantry, and an increasing proportion of the Army and Navy. The peasants everywhere refuse to pay any taxes, the workers refuse to allow the sale of Government vodka in the towns, thus depriving the administration of one of the greatest sources of revenue, which amounts to £40,000,000 annually.

Sugar merchants refuse to pay excise; Socialists refuse to pay their passport fees and their house taxes. The revolutionaries are aiming to prevent the flow of money into the Treasury, thus rendering inevitable the insolvency of the Government.