Every year on May 15, International Conscientious Objection Day, War Resisters’ International (WRI) organizes solidarity with conscientious objectors (COs) and draws attention to their resistance to war. This year, with the ongoing war in Ukraine, they turned their focus on the resistance of conscientious objectors from Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, and published statements from the… Continue reading
In these discouraging times for antiwar activists and humanity at large, it was good to be out marching around with like-minded folks and getting encouraging support from passers-by, including tourists from near and far. War tax resistance is a quarterly, paycheck-to-paycheck or even daily act of resistance to war, depending on your method, but it… Continue reading
The bright red slices of pie on War Resisters League’s new “Where Your Income Tax Money Really Goes” flyer have shrunk well below 50% this year. For years we’ve been demanding a budget that prioritizes humanitarian and social needs over military spending. It almost makes us want to celebrate…almost. Biden’s budget proposal for FY 2023… Continue reading
I was going to write about something else, but here the world is today facing a dangerous time with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. I am beyond being able to know how it feels for the people in the region, but I know I share a feeling with millions of others of just being sick of… Continue reading
Some months ago I wrote a blog about how the IRS had improperly applied my estimated tax payments for 2020 to the earliest tax years for which I had an open balance. In that way they wiped out the balance from 2011 and part of it from 2012, thus circumventing the 10 year statute of… Continue reading
Refusing to pay taxes to avoid complicity in state preparations to commit genocide with nuclear weapons, long time British war tax resister Roger Franklin was sentenced to 28 days in Gloucester Prison (and a further 21 days in 1996). His run-ins with the tax collectors also led to bankruptcy proceedings against him. (From NWTRCC’s History… Continue reading
“What we say to a society of murder and racism is a very simple no. What we say to our brothers across this country and around the world is a very simple word. That word is RESIST!” — David Harris, at a 1960s antiwar protest David Harris is one of the featured draft resisters and… Continue reading
Three letters arrived from the IRS within a week of each other. On the one hand this is rather exciting since the IRS has been quiet for the last few years, and I haven’t had much to report as far as consequences of refusal to pay. At the same time, it could take months of correspondence to sort out what they’ve done.
“You don’t know if it’s going to last two days or two weeks or two months. It certainly isn’t going to last two years.” That was Secretary of War Donald Rumsfeld in September of 2002, almost a year after the invasion of Afghanistan and at the time the Bush Administration was building support for their… Continue reading
The IRS has been so quiet lately that it’s been hard to find topics to write about — except for interesting historical notes or the horrors resulting from the massive U.S. military budget. But three people got in touch recently with three different issues. At a time when war tax resistance seems pretty quiet too,… Continue reading
The Pentagon Papers at 50 is getting a lot of attention and giving Daniel Ellsberg another chance to tell his story as well as talk about more recent releases of secret documents including his own. Ellsberg says he’s ready to go to jail again for his use of classified information in his 2017 book The… Continue reading
Watch your taxes Don’t kill the kids Don’t participate in this So said a Palestinian lawyer in Gaza City as he gently shook his finger at the group of Americans on a human rights witness tour of the West Bank, Gaza and Israel. That was back in 1988, on a trip I took with the… Continue reading
