Elsewhere on this forum, several of us have been having a fine old time debating the Congress' infamous 90-year-old IRS check-skimming scam.

On behalf of the estimated 67 million law-abiding Nontaxpayers and other non-filers who no longer pay the DC al Qaeda their pound of flesh, I assert that the Congress is busted. I assert that they have no game; that there is no section of the Internal Revenue Code establishing a duty for the average American living and working in the 50 States to keep records for al Qaeda, or file forms with them, or pay their demands for money.

We -- the new generation of Nontaxpayers -- are no longer a fringe group as the old "tax protestors" of the 1940s, 50s, and 60s were. Not only are there tens of millions of us, but we are professionals including CPAs and attorneys; including former IRS employees and attorneys. We are doctors, engineers, architects, entrepreneurs, and business owners.

We do not follow or even support any of the countless, loopy 'theories of law' that you can find on the IRS's "frivolous arguments" website. We only rely on what we can actually read in the Internal Revenue Code, and in the Code of Federal Regulations, and in well-settled US Supreme Court and federal appellate court rulings.

“realizing and receiving income on earnings is not a privilege that can be taxed. . . Since the right to receive income or earnings is a right belonging to every person, this right cannot be taxed as a privilege” Redfield v. Fisher, 292 P 819 [Oreg. 1930]; Cole v. MacFarland, 337 S.W. 2d 456 [Tenn. 1960]

So, the government can tax the use of a privilege. For example, it can tax a corporation for the privilege of even existing; a corporation is “an artificial entity which owes its existence and charter powers to the state.” It can declare an excise on “the particular privilege of doing business in a corporate capacity.” It can tax “special rights, belonging to the individual or class, and not to the mass . . . an exemption from some general burden, obligation or duty” Redfield, 819; Flint, 151; Cole, 456

In the case of an income tax, the tax is “laid upon the happening of an event [the use of a privilege], as distinguished from its tangible fruits [the income].” In such a case, “the tax is imposed upon the doing of business of the character described, and the measure of the tax is to be the income” Eisner v. Macomber, 252 U.S. 206-7 [1920]; Tyler v. United States, 281; Flint, 146

“The sixteenth [16th Amendment] does not justify the taxation of persons or things previously immune...it does not extend taxing power to new or excepted citizens... it is intended only to remove all occasions from any apportionment of income taxes among the states. It does not authorize a tax on a salary.” Evans v. Gore, 253 US 245 (1920)

The corrupt Congress must do something to stem the exodus out of their IRS 'fair share' line or the fat cats will begin to have to cut back on their lifestyles. Since all of them are multi-millionaires -- some of them worth hundreds of millions, with their families as beneficiaries in offshore trusts -- they do not want more Taxpayers becoming law-abiding Nontaxpayers. Something must be done.

As I posit on my American Glasnost blog, I believe the corrupt US Congress has had its disastrous 'Fairy Tax' waiting in the wings for that time when the IRS terrorists are simply not able to hold enough Taxpayers in terror any longer. Then, the politicians will propose their 'Fair Tax" as the dawn of a new era...no more IRS! You are free! No more April 15th!!!

Of course, if you're still in the Taxpayer line right now, you'll jump right from the frying pan into the fire. Seeing the Fairy Tax as your savior, you will support its passage...and usher in a virutally limitless sales tax such as many European nations struggle under today.

We must avoid a national sales tax at all costs!! But I'm jumping ahead. Back to the present town hall discussion here:

I am David Zuniga, P.E., an architectural engineer in a one-man private building design practice in the San Antonio, TX area. I have read the Tax Code and cases in tax law since 1998 but I am not an attorney nor do I attempt to offer tax or legal advice. However, I reserve my God-given right to speak in public, and my right as a free Texan and party to the Constitution for the united States of America, to hold my public employees accountable for obeying all laws and federal regulations, and for adhering to their oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution, rather than violating it while pretending to defend it.

In other words, I am NOT anti-tax; I am anti-corruption. I like the Tax Code just fine as it is, and I believe it would be DISASTROUS to get rid of it for anything else. I maintain that We the People, in order to resist and overcome government corruption, dare not resort to corruption or lawlessness ourselves. Two wrongs do not make a right, and because we still have an excellent Constitution and a perfectly fine Tax Code, it would be pure folly -- disaster -- to resort to civil disobedience or armed rebellion to beat back the usurpations of the Leviathan State.

I believe I can make the case that it is more proven effective in the course of history to defeat a much larger force by starving them out. If it is not illegal (of course), this Tax Honesty financial embargo is a lawful, peaceful, patriotic way to turn the tide of American self-government. And as I said, an estimated 67 million Americans are already part of that principled, peaceful embargo of the DC al Qaeda.

Thus far, my debate opponents have been Dan Chapman, C.P.A., a practicing tax accountant (from where, I do not know) and Kelvin McCabe, Esq., a practicing criminal defense attorney from Chicago who says, "I represent your average criminals - you know...drugs, guns, hookers...". [His words, not mine.]

I would characterise the upshot of both my opponents' debate positions thus far (read their posts and judge for yourself) as pragmatic as opposed to idealistic. This is not to suggest either man is unprincipled, but I must point out the obvious: whereas my design clients never require me to skirt the law or get "off the hook", the clients of tax accountants and criminal defense attorneys expect it as a matter of course.

I am not attempting to besmirch either of my past debate opponents, or dissuade any potential new ones from this ongoing BTM town hall forum. I am only pointing out the rather obvious ethical landscape of each of our professions. I'm sure if I was charged with murder or rape, I would want Mr. McCabe to be the very best he can be at criminal defense. If I thought I owed a million bucks to IRS but that Mr. Chapman could find a "work around", I would want to avoid giving them what I owed. It would be wrong, but I know that CPAs clients demand this all the time.

Ideals and ethics and morals are all intertwined in the subject of corruption in the federal government, you see. Ethics and morals cannot be teased from the discussion of this republic's future, without the entire fabric unraveling. And this leads me to several other active members of the discussion thus far:

Tom Mullen needs no introduction. Strange to say it as a devout Christian, but Tom is a proud agnostic (claims he is not atheist; I don't know the nuances) yet has been perhaps the most enjoyable, fruitful discussion partner here for me. I've enjoyed Tom's honesty, humor, and zeal for truth and justice. In this "IRS scam" debate, Tom has just begun to ask what I consider the key questions to understanding where in congressional history one must search, to find where the bodies are buried in the IRS debacle.

Two other active participants in the discussion thus far -- both avowed atheists -- have been Claire and Scott ('blue outhouse Scott' from Oregon). These two forum members, when they drop their barrage against God, have actually been very cogent, insightful, and honest in their discussion of the Tax Honesty issue, which knows no religious camps.

I also note other people young and old who have chimed in so far: "ObamabinLaden", "liberty-4-ever", "livefreeurdie", "libertariun", "Dolly Llama 77", "AdamAdamR", and I'm sure I'm missing others. I appreciate the fact that people here CARE about getting to the end of the money trail, and turning the republic around.

It's no small thing that Nontaxpayers also turn their own businesses and personal lives around once they are free of superstition, terrorist conditioning, and generations of family tradition that "everyone knows you have to file!" but no one has ever seen a copy of the Tax Code!

I will lay out some evidence for the Tax Honesty position presntly. But let me say that, contrary to the protestations of my worthy opponents in debate, Tax Honesty is not "my" grup, or "my" movement. I am no leader in the movement, nor do I have any following. I am just one of tens of millions of Nontaxpayers, who has done a decade of research and produced an educational blog to present the results of that research.

Though in my profession I am an analytical pragmatist, in my citizen duties and passion I am very much a lover of liberty and the Constitution -- and an idealist. When it comes to the seminal issues of modern self-government, I don't adhere to a thesis or adopt a way of life because I stand to gain more wealth, power, or ease. By the best lights I have from my own research, I adhere to a thesis and/or a way of life because it is right...because it advances the cause of truth and of liberty for my generation and the ones to come, including my grandchildren.

Most often, my online debates about Tax Honesty over the past five years have been against CPAs and tax attorneys, against an investment banker, against a few pastors and elders of Christian churches, and against my own siblings (both brothers and sisters). The debates often -- almost unfailingly -- become acrimonious to the point of serious emotional trauma; I am reminded of letters from family members in the period preceding the War for Independence and Lincoln's War To Enslave the States -- where even family bonds were not sufficient to quell the passions of these weighty matters of life in America!

To you who live in foreign lands: take notes. Think on these principles not in terms of the minutiae of Tax Code sections and turns of lawyerly phrase; think on the ethics and morality undergirding the principles in contest. The journalists' dictum is "follow the money", and in every age of man, in every country and culture, that dictum holds: follow the money.

Please understand then, that this debate is not at root about taxes. It is about the corruption of three branches of a federal government, which three originally stood as designed in magnificent, unique counterpoise against one another and against the fallen nature of man.

This corruption can in great part be traced to that fateful year 1913: in one disastrous Congress, this republic fell to the 16th Amendment, the (more disastrous!) 17th Amendment, and the Federal Reserve Banking Act. No Congress was ever more corrupt, giving birth to three such monsters from that same nefarious womb!

So. It began in the time of my grandparents, before the world wars. Much has happened since then, including this present Information Revolution, that now opens all of history, law, economics, and geopolitics for inspection by anyone with a sound mind and a computer terminal. Thus 67 million Americans -- with one motive or another and with more or less legal support for their stand -- no longer file IRS returns. Whether you think this is good or bad, it is the way things are. And several million new non-filers join the Tax Honesty exodus each year.

Obviously, business as usual will not continue in D.C.; something is going to change, drastically, within the coming generation. The direction of that change -- whether armed revolt and chaos with police-state crackdown, or whether a time of unsurpassed individual liberty and shrinking federal power -- will be largely determined on what WE THE PEOPLE do, not by what Leviathan does.

We The People are 300 million strong, and among these are us 67 million Nontaxpayers. No police state or military force on earth can beat back such a force -- if that force is of one mind.

The only way to bring a critical mass of Americans behind Tax Honesty is to make the case both from a moral/ethical standpoint, and from a pragmatic one.

I hope we will now do that, together. You are welcome to comment.

DM Zuniga