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Vol. 4-5, October 2006 Nelson Waller, Editor PN Sec., Assistant Editor Dr. Clarkson, Publisher
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This is your copy of the September 2006 issue of The e-Patriot Cannon newsletter, one of your Patriot Network membership benefits. To view all past issues and much other exciting, useful information, go to our website www.patriotnetwork.info and click on Patriot Cannon Archives. The pictures may not come through in the e-group. Go to said website to view this entire issue. Your newsletter is below as an in-line text, and attached. The attached copy is generally easier to read.
IN THIS EXCITING ISSUE: |
Our trip to the torture chamber, Torture Canceled
by the ePC editor
The other day the call came up for patriots to back up one of our own in a hearing in Greenville, SC. Patriot "B" was being rudely harassed by the Department of Revenue (DOR) -- South Carolina's equivalent of the IRS -- for "income tax" payments they had failed to justify. They wanted to see him and on the big day found he had three friends on his side: Patriot "M," Dr. Clarkson, and yours truly. Here's how it happened, the best I can remember it.
The first and only time I'd been to the DOR's Orwellian-looking headquarters I was admittedly stunned with the Orwellian behavior of the tax mavens. They were cold and hard in barring witnesses from the meeting and only took about thirty seconds to get the police on the scene. (You must understand that our friend the "American Gandhi", Gene Chapman, was present!) The Supervisor, David Mays, acted like he was auditioning for a Nazi role in a World War II picture. This time he was present again, as was the admittedly lovely and mellow agent on the case, Susie Scheidel, plus a touchy SLED agent named Lollis. But things went quite differently this time.
"I'm a citizen -- you're a public servant. I'm your boss, not the other way around," he thundered... |
We walked through the door and a secretary asked us to have a seat. We did so -- just walked right into the meeting room. Presently another functionary stuck her head in the door and said "we need you to wait in the waiting area out front." One of us quickly and politely said "We prefer to wait in here, thanks" -- and the lady walked on.
Audacity, audacity audacity, always audacity -- this was the motto of General George Patton. When will we learn that it really brings results? The three DORites came on in after awhile and casually got the meeting rolling. They asked us what each of Patriot B's seconds were doing there. I truthfully said I was there to stand in for the wife of Patriot B.
Agent Lollis' first order of business was to attempt to order Dr. Clarkson off the scene. Our hero took charge and shouted right back that he had a right to stay and was going to. "I'm a citizen -- you're a public servant. I'm your boss, not the other way around," he thundered, leaving the uniformed one looking like somebody had licked the red off his candy.
The agents had one wish, and that was (officially) further documentation as to why "B" didn't owe them "taxes" on his earnings for 1991. They had some information on how much money he had made and who had paid it, but the sketchiness of this became "B"'s defense -- successfully, in my view.
The dialog basically seesawed between the agents' insistence that "B" either pay or refute their claims, and his insistence that they substantiate the latter. In order to cooperate, "B" said, he first needed to see copies of the statements his alleged employers had provided the DOR. They maintained that this was all accounted for by a bunch of numbers on the bottom of some form they had issued to "B". When it became apparent DOR wasn't going to come across, "B" informed them that he wouldn't owe any money anyway because of major deductions he had on account of family and business expenses. Almost desperate to win it, they allowed him to give examples, which he did.
They said up front -- inconsiderately and wrongfully, in my view -- that there wouldn't be deductions for any children without having their "Social Security" numbers. Can you imagine? What do they think our precious children are, anyway -- cattle? Yet again cleaving to the first rule of any kind of legal defense -- stick to the main point -- "B" again reminded them that he felt entitled to the further documentation he'd asked for before offering any himself.
This happened so many times in the course of the meeting, in fact, that I had to chime in and ask the agents whether they thought they weren't operating by egregious double standards, constantly demanding that others give more than they do themselves. They had no answer -- how could they? Any rules and regulations that may exist speciously allowing them to walk all over people are void ab initio.
Through all of this, Dr. Clarkson was the master strategist and parliamentarian that chaotic messes like "income tax" conferences sorely need. They don't want him practicing law, per se, but it was he who obviously and by far had the superior knowledge of law and DOR policy. I don't even know whether he was bluffing some of the time -- but what he said worked! It was so patently fair and even-handed the agents probably felt at a loss to challenge it. He radiated confidence and authority -- slouching there merrily in his most casual throw-on clothes!
The discussion lurched on for what must have been about 90 minutes. Finally one side -- unfortunately ours -- made a positive statement that offered the other an escape hatch. "B" said he wasn't going to give them any info. Director Mays snapped that the meeting was therefore over, but I seriously doubt he's going to find it any easier to rein in "B" and his nonexistent wealth as a result.
The agents seemed variously baffled and uptight in the presence of informed citizens who don't act like doormats. Lollis, supposedly the real bruiser in the group, shrank back behind the other two when I aimed my camera at them. It was reminiscent of the time in tax court in Columbia when prosecuting/persecuting lawyer J. Craig Young cried to the judge that the camera should be banned because "our pictures are going to appear on Clarkson's website tonight!" After the conference Lollis told us to clear out, and when we weren't quite fast enough for him he barked that we'd have to hurry or be arrested for trespassing.
The way government treats "our troops" (they're actually the troops of the "new world order", the anti-American scheme first noised up by President George H.W. Bush) is shocking.
One government body starts a useless war; another strikes a Faustian bargain over their wages; and then come the tax collectors to make a crazy situation impossible.
Can your editor be forgiven for thinking sometimes that one reason the fedgov throws these wars is to get everybody at each other's throats in this country,
and to make fools of as many of us as they possibly can? – Editor
When they were called up for military service in the wake of 9/11, hundreds of uniformed city workers in the Reserves faced the suspension of their city health and pension benefits. The city offered them an option: it would keep paying their salaries and continue their benefits, but when they returned
they would have to repay the city their city salary or their military pay, whichever was less.
On its face, the offer made sense. And many reservists had only a few days to get their affairs together before shipping out — hardly enough time to consult accountants. Nearly all took the deal. As the war dragged on, more than 1,600 city employees, mostly police officers, signed up for the benefits program.
Now the bills from the city are coming due, for far more than many veterans imagined they would have to pay — as much as $200,000 — and often for more money than they ever received.
The city is demanding that the veterans repay their gross salaries, even though they never saw about a third of the money, which went for taxes and other deductions. The commissioner of administrative services, Martha K. Hirst, said veterans should be able to get back the difference between gross and take-home pay by amending their tax returns. But several tax accountants said the city had created an accounting quagmire.
David Gitel, a tax accountant in Manhattan, said that if the employees paid the money back over several years — which many will have to do — rather than in a lump sum, they could lose thousands of dollars in income-tax and social security payments.
"It’s an interesting experience," Mr. Gitel said.
For now, the Police Department, which waited as much as four years to begin asking for the money back in the spring, is stepping up its collection efforts. On Thursday, hundreds of officers received letters in their pay envelopes threatening legal action if they did not make repayment arrangements within 15 days.
A city official, who was unwilling to be identified lest he incur his colleagues’ anger, gave an explanation for the delay. "People have been talking about it here for some time, about getting around to doing it," he said. "It’s probably the hero thing. Why make a top priority of telling somebody to give back money when they just went off to war?"
Under the terms of the deal, nontaxable military housing and food allowances also count as military pay. Those allowances can nearly double military pay, in some cases making it more than city pay. Many veterans who did not read the fine print said they thought they would have to repay only their modest military take-home base salary.
On Monday, the City Council will consider a resolution to ask Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg to stop counting military allowances as income.
Assistant Police Chief Michael Collins said that after the letters went out on Thursday, many officers contacted the department to begin repayment. The department hopes to recover more than $15 million, he said.
Other officers said the system needed to be overhauled. "We have to change it," Detective David Goodman, treasurer of the Police Department post of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, said at a gathering on Tuesday of about 50 officers at the Army base at Fort Hamilton in Brooklyn, "so that when you come back you’re not paying money for having gone to war for your country."
Detective Goodman added that since the war effort relies increasingly on reservists, it behooved the city to make enlistment attractive.
Ms. Hirst said the city was "looking at" the possibility of not counting military stipends as income, but she thought that in any case the benefits program was an excellent one.
"The city works out very, very friendly repayment agreements," she said.
Many officers said the four-year delay had reinforced their impression that the city did not intend to come after them for the money at all.
Officer Jake Marino, a five-year police veteran who was in the Military Police in Iraq in 2004, recalled that while he was preparing to go, his contact in the department’s military-leave office told him, "As far as paying back the money, I don’t think you have anything to worry about."
Many officers put one of their two salaries right in the bank, and some used it to make up for the loss of overtime pay. Others who started out saving the excess began to spend it when they did not hear from the city as time went by.
"Like most middle-class Americans," said Michael Donohue, a police sergeant, "you get a windfall; you fix the roof and the sidewalk and pay off credit-card debt." Sergeant Donohue, a command sergeant major in the Army Reserves who spent much of last year at Abu Ghraib, estimated that he owed the city $100,000.
The benefits plan was intended to let employees keep the larger of the two salaries. An officer paid $80,000 by the city and $60,000 by the military would owe the city $60,000 upon his return. And an employee paid $80,000 by the military and $60,000 by the city would also owe the city $60,000.
Administrative Services officials said that employees who pay the money back in a lump sum get an amended federal W2 tax form for the year they drew two salaries and would be able to get a full refund of the excess taxes they paid.
Employees who pay the money back by payroll deduction, though, could deduct the money from their income only in the year in which they pay it back, officials said.
This causes two problems, said Mr. Gitel, the tax accountant. One is that an employee would probably be in a higher tax bracket during the year she drew two salaries than when she paid the money back. The other problem, Mr. Gitel said, was that there was no way for the employee to get back the extra Medicare and Social Security contributions she made while drawing two salaries. These shortfalls could easily total $10,000, he said.
An Administrative Services official said last night that the city had just obtained commitments from accounting firms to provide free advice to veterans.
The city could have set its plan up differently. The state has a similar plan for its employees, but it pays them the difference, if any, between their military and state salaries, so they do not have to pay anything back. The state employees’ contributions to their pension accounts are not made while they are on leave, but the much larger state contribution is still made.
Laurence A. Levy, deputy counsel to Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani in 2001, said the city’s method seemed a better way to protect the employees’ benefits. "In Operation Desert Storm, many of the families didn’t get health benefits, and it caused tremendous financial hardship," he said. "We wanted to keep them whole."
Sergeant Donohue said he appreciated the city’s good intentions. "We’re not asking for a pity party or a handout," he said. "But maybe there’s a little more reasonable way for them to be approaching this."
(Source: New York Times)
The Honorable Paul S. Sarbanes
309 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington DC, 20510
Dear Senator Sarbanes,
As a native Marylander and excellent customer of the Internal Revenue Service, I am writing to ask for your assistance. I have contacted the Department of Homeland Security in an effort to determine the process for becoming an illegal alien and they referred me to you. My primary reasons for wishing to change my status from U.S. Citizen to illegal alien stem from the bill which was recently passed by the Senate and for which you voted.
If my understanding of this bill's provisions is accurate, as an illegal alien who has been in the United States for five years, all I need to do to become a citizen is to pay a $2,000 fine and income taxes for three of the last five years. I know a good deal when I see one and I am anxious to get the process started before everyone figures it out.
Simply put, those of us who have been here legally have had to pay taxes every year so I'm excited about the prospect of avoiding two years of taxes in return for paying a $2,000 fine. Is there any way that I can apply to be illegal retroactively? This would yield an excellent result for me and my family because we paid heavy taxes in 2004 and 2005.
Additionally, as an illegal alien I could begin using the local emergency room as my primary health care provider. Once I have stopped paying premiums for medical insurance, my accountant figures I could save almost $10,000 a year.
Another benefit in gaining illegal status would be that my daughter would receive preferential treatment relative to her law school applications, as well as "in-state" tuition rates for many colleges throughout the United States for my son.
Lastly, I understand that illegal status would relieve me of the burden of renewing my driver's license and making those burdensome car insurance premiums. This is very important to me given that I still have college age children driving my car.
If you would provide me with an outline of the process to become illegal (retroactively if possible) and copies of the necessary forms, I would be most appreciative. Thank you for your assistance.
Your Loyal Constituent,
Pete McGlaughlin
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Property Rights and Protection Seminar Date: Saturday, October 28, 2006 Time: 9am-5pm Cost: $60 includes breakfast and lunch. Location: PN Headquarters Anderson, SC Subjects include:
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4. Patriot of the month interview with Mark MosleyPN Secretary, Kris: Tell us what your connection is with Dr. Clarkson and the Patriot Network and how did you become acquainted with Robert Clarkson?
Mark: I met Robert Clarkson in fall of 2000 at a Patriot meeting in Atlanta. I've attended numerous PN meetings in Atlanta and have attended the Clarkson Law Course twice.
PN Secretary, Kris: Among all the freedom organizations out there, what in particular do you like about the Patriot Network?
Mark: The Patriot Network is a group focused on action and especially action that an individual person can take to seize their freedom today.
PN Secretary, Kris: When did you first become active in the freedom movement?
Mark: Ideologically, I've been aware of and learning about freedom all of my adult life since the early eighties, but that was mostly reading, study and engaging my naive friends in political discussions.
Learning how to manifest my need for freedom in action has been a struggle.
PN Secretary, Kris: Tell me where you are from?
Mark: I was born and grew up in Forest Park, GA, a suburb of Atlanta on the south side near the airport.
PN Secretary, Kris: If you are married and/or have children, tell me how your wife and your children feel about your activities.
Mark: Single, no kids.
I used to have a cat but he died of old age. He always agreed with me about everything, especially government. And he never filed a single income tax return!
PN Secretary, Kris: Tell us your story from the beginning.
Mark: My first baby step into political action was in the early 1990's in Houston where I was a minor participant in the hugely successful effort of the Houston Property Rights Association to defeat an underhanded conspiracy to implement zoning in Houston, the only major metropolitan city in America that to this day does not have zoning ordinances. The significance of this experience is that for the first time in my life I actually witnessed voters overwhelmingly reject socialist ideas.
In 1995 I concluded that no accomplishment would ever matter to me if I weren't free and made the decision that I would find a way to work full time in the freedom movement. In 1996 I began my journey as a volunteer with the Libertarian Party of Georgia and by the end of 1998 I was hired as the first Executive Director of the LPGa. I held that job for four years until 2002.
The most exasperating part of being a serious activist for a third party is the ballot access barriers. These are laws passed by state legislatures to suppress political dissent by controlling whose name is placed on the ballot. My tenure in the LPGa made me an expert on this problem in Georgia. In 2002 that experience paid off and I became one of four local LP candidates to make the ballot in a single county in Georgia (Clayton county). That team effort required the door to door collection of over 10,000 signatures and has yet to be equaled in the LP of Georgia. The momentum of that effort led to my election as Chair of the LP of Georgia in 2004, a position that I held until April 2006.
In the mid 1990's I began to find and study material about the fraud of the Federal Reserve and the Income tax. Filing income tax returns was never a moral issue for me; I simply did not understand how to make the change in a sensible, prudent way. Fear and ignorance got the better of me for several years until I simply ceased filing income tax returns in 2001.
PN Secretary, Kris: Where does your situation stand today?
Mark: To date, I've been fortunate to not have contact with the government and am prepared to make 'em work if they ever do.
PN Secretary, Kris: What does this tell you about the way the government works in regards to the taxpayers it serves?
Mark: Governments at all levels in America, and especially at the Federal level, are out of touch and out of control.
PN Secretary, Kris: Did you have any illusions about what the government was up to before you became involved in the freedom movement?
Mark: I've always had a natural distrust of large institutions of any kind. When I was younger I naively believed that the core problem with government was simply inefficiency and sloppiness. The reality I see as an adult is that governments at all levels have, as implied in their actions, a belief that they own the rest of us. The Federal government has become nothing short of treasonous to the original intent of American government. This is a frightening and serious situation that will only be remedied by reducing the size of government at all levels. Step one for every one of us is to stop providing support for government in whatever way that you can.
PN Secretary, Kris: How specifically do Robert and the Patriot Network help people with ideals like this?
Mark: Very simple; by providing inspiration, setting an example for the rest of us and offering educational seminars.
PN Secretary, Kris: Do you have any comments on Robert’s approach? (Robert’s perspective is not to file as opposed to some people who believe in filing a zero tax return. Or comments on his technique of stalling and postponing)
Mark: By and large, the government uses information against us that we willingly gave them. When you reach the decision that you are free to live your life as you see fit, it seems self-defeating to continue to provide the government with details of your life by filing needless forms. If the people in government really want details about your life so badly, they ought to work for what they want just like the rest of us.
PN Secretary, Kris: Do you have any last comments about Robert Clarkson or how he has helped you?
Mark: No one exemplifies The Right Stuff better than Robert Clarkson.
Working with Robert Clarkson has taught me an immense amount about the details of how to be free and I am continually astonished at his simple, cost effective solutions to solving problems, especially with our "buddies" at the IRS.
Having attended his law course on two occasions has given me a real world knowledge of the legal system that I do not believe that I would have ever accomplished on my own.
The single most important lesson that I learn from Robert Clarkson is his daily example of the kind of patriot that all of us must be if America is to be a free nation again.
Thanks so much, Mark, for being so active in the Patriot Movement and for your time today.
by Johnny gringo/ringo
Those who need to be converted are the self-serving lords of the Chamber/Rotary/United Way/etc who line up to do the bidding of David Rockefeller
and like metaCollectivist patricians.
Too many common slobs have become just that -- dumbed down couch taters.
The mass of us having voluntarily neutered ourselves, there's not enough real Americans left to take on America Inc.
Many, realizing this, have retired to particular foreign countries. Costa Rica alone has 500K expats, leaving the 'entitlement" junkies, peons, and "upscalers" to feed on each other.
If it comes to that, I've already got my spot. I'll leave a light on for ya.
Knob note: David "Shorty" Rockefeller, born 1915, is the youngest chip off the old rock, and rocks on as patriarch of the clan that can.
Long a proponent of international networking between a-list bizfolk and the govt heads of countries that matter, Dinky Davey became a director in 1949 of the CFR, which he then chaired from 1970 to 1985.
He's attended the annual Bilderberg meetings since their inception (1954), and was a founder in 1973 of the Trilateral Commission (No.America/W.Europe/Japan). Etc, etc.
After Rockefeller Center went bust (5/1995), he and a few pals bought it (3/1996), later flipping it (12/2K) for $1.85Billion. (Lucky timing, with "9-11" just a pregnancy away.)
One of the most amazing things about the Patriot Network's Executive Director, Dr. Robert Clarkson, is how
freely he gives of himself, his talents and time....... and how seldom, if ever, you hear anyone thank or commend him for it.
Here is one of those all-too-rare cases -- a humorous but heartwarming tribute.
It's not that Dr. Clarkson doesn't have happy customers. He does -- thousands and thousands,
and I can't remember the last one that wasn't satisfied with his ministrations.
But human nature being what it is (especially in this cold mechanical age) RBC gets taken for granted,
I would say, at least 99.9 percent of the time, having personally observed the situation for 14 years.
Have you thanked your income tax liberator lately? -- Ed.
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DISTRICT OF SOUTH CAROLINA, GREENVILLE
Harry C. Baxter } CIVIL# 10:48-mi-01-HCB
Petitioner }
}
V. } MOTION OF APPRECIATION
}
Robert B. Clarkson }
Respondent }
Petitioner Harry C. Baxter hereby files this Motion, dated July 29, 2006 pertaining to any and all other Advice, whether verbal or written of Respondent. 1. That Petitioner was invited to attend Respondent’s seminar entitled Church Law and Procedure on July 21, 2006 at 515 Concord Avenue, Anderson, South Carolina and to make video of same. 2. That Respondent opened his home to receive Petitioner and approximately twenty other men and women with a hearty welcome. 3. That Petitioner suffered from meeting so many people of extremely high character, independent spirit, and having extreme attacks of good taste. 4. That Petitioner suffered from eating so much good food that was forced upon Petitioner by Respondent. 5. That Petitioner learned valuable information from Respondent that Petitioner would never learn anywhere else, packaged in an effective format that made the learning process easy. 6. That Petitioner’s association with Respondent and other people of like mind has revitalized his confidence of winning over a common Enemy in any circumstances. 7. Petitioner Baxter accuses Respondent Clarkson of subjecting Petitioner to a weekend of fun, fellowship and education that Petitioner will never forget and will always appreciate. 8. The remedy that Petitioner seeks from Respondent is for Respondent to have many more Seminars, Workshops and Gatherings of the same nature. Petitioner prays the Court will grant request with a smile. CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE: I hereby certify that on or about this date, I emailed properly a copy of this pleading to the Respondent at his proper email addresses.
Date: July 29, 2006 Harry Baxter Petitioner, pro se |
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Disclaimer: "Robert B. Clarkson is not a lawyer. He is not licensed to practice law in South Carolina or in any other state or jurisdiction."
______________________________________________________________________________________
CONTACT INFORMATION
New email address: robert@patriotnetwork.info . Phone number: 864-225-3061.
Address: POB 2368, AndersonSC 29621.
New website: www.PatriotNetwork.info
FREEDOM is not Free!