In other news:
- War tax resisters in Maine are holding a gathering and concert.
- Gloria Steinem continues to advocate tax redirection as a way of overturning Republican attempts to defund Planned Parenthood and other services. Excerpts:
- Amy Goodman
- How are you going to take him on? It’s not only Donald Trump. There is a majority-Republican House and Senate. They’re vowing to take down Planned Parenthood, to defund it, to repeal the Affordable Care Act. How are you going to do this?
- Gloria Steinem
- Well, one day at a time. For instance, if they defund Planned Parenthood and defund NPR, we can take that money out of our income tax, put a note with our return saying, “Sorry, I’ve sent it where it should go. Come and get me.” If enough people do that, it’s very difficult to do anything about it. We did it in the Vietnam era. And then, we just — it was more difficult, in a way, because we were just keeping the money. This is more positive, because we’re actually giving the money where it should go.
- Gloria Steinem
- You know, Planned Parenthood is, of course, necessary to women’s health in this country. A very—what? One percent of it goes toward abortion. It does everything, we know—breast exams and everything else. So it would be incredibly expensive to every emergency room in the nation, if they were not able to serve women and men in the way that they do. Therefore, if they defund it, we’ll take money out of our income tax and send it direct.
- At the NWTRCC blog, Erica Weiland tells the stories of war tax resisters who have successfully used the Fifth Amendment to refuse to provide information to the IRS.
- It’s rare in the United States for people who engage in civil disobedience for reasons of moral necessity to be able to make such an argument in court, and it’s even rarer for such an argument to succeed. But four anti-drone protesters were found innocent by a jury of charges of obstruction of government administration, disorderly conduct, and trespass earlier this month.
