From Bunkerville (citing the New York Times):
For almost 40 years, Carole Hinders has dished out Mexican specialties at her modest cash-only restaurant. For just as long, she deposited the earnings at a small bank branch a block away — until last year, when two tax agents knocked on her door and informed her that they had seized her checking account, almost $33,000.I almost always make deposits of less than $10,000. Furthermore, because of the nature of my small business, I make frequent deposits (mostly checks). I'm probably safe on this one. So far.
The Internal Revenue Service agents did not accuse Ms. Hinders of money laundering or cheating on her taxes — in fact, she has not been charged with any crime. Instead, the money was seized solely because she had deposited less than $10,000 at a time, which they viewed as an attempt to avoid triggering a required government report....
Still our government keeps stepping outside the bounds of our Constitution.
How long are WE THE PEOPLE going to submit to creeping tyranny?
Vendetta Sanguini said
ReplyDeleteInvite the Gubmint Thugs in for a Free Meal, and serve them a piping hot dish of EBOLA.
Sweetheart, you're a laugh riot, but don't be surprised if the FBI-Gestapo comes knocking one night very soon. They don't take kindly to thoughts like that, even when they're said in jest. The Cephalopod Squad is particularly MERCILESS and abslutely HUMORLESS, dear. So do watch your step. And no I am NOT kidding.
DeleteWith the standard paradigm of asset forfeiture without conviction of a crime, tyranny isn't creeping...it's entrenched. The question now becomes, when are We The People going to elect representatives that reverse it?
ReplyDeleteElections won't do it anymore The process is totally corrupt. It's time for a genuine, old-fashioned bloody REVOLUTION. If not, we will continue to be tyrannized exponentially.
DeleteWhen the IRS comes knocking, "the suspect" is guilty until he proves himself innocent.
ReplyDeleteHow does the owner of a modest cash-only restaurant prove her innocence?
You don't You just have to STAND and DELIVER. After all the IRS is nothing but a bunch of THIVES anyway. Our system of taxation is LEGALIZED THEFT by MAIN FORCE.
DeleteThe IRS is totally out of control. Sadly, probably not much more than most of the rest of this regime's agencies. Thanks for the shout out.
ReplyDeleteIRS agents have a long history of being intimidating tyrants. Under the Obama administration, they have to be stupid to boot.
ReplyDeleteThe IRS is the very worst TERRORIST organization on the planet.
DeleteNO ONE and NO THING should have THAT much power -- EVER.
It's completely unconstitutional, yet we've had to suffer with its ever increasing tyranny for over a hundred years.
WHY?
Because "We the People" have been seduced by too much comfort and convenience into allowing our liberties to slip away. As a result we've been turned into a mealy mouthed mob of SLUGS and EUNUCHS.
SECOND ATTEMPT
DeleteIt's way past time that we abolish the IRS, as we know it and institute a flat tax or consumption tax that everyone participates in. However, FT is quite correct in his last paragraph above.
Jon,
DeleteBlogger is burping.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteObama now completely owns the ebola issue
ReplyDeleteThersites,
DeleteDoes Obama think that he can control a pathogen?
Yep, Obama completely owns ebola.
ReplyDeleteIf you're a volunteer to serve on Obama;s ebola front, no quarantine. If you're conscripted, you must be quarantined.
Joe and Thersites,
DeletePlease post about Ebola in this thread.
No need to delete what you posted to this thread. But I'd appreciate it if you would put those links in the today's Ebola thread.
Thank you.
I don't know why Bunkerville didn't link to the article which may supply some context.
ReplyDeleteBut there must be a great many businesses in this mode and you have to ask why this one was picked.
Troubling but the whole story would help.
Duck,
DeleteAfter a certain point of number of times accessing the New York Times online, one has to have a subscription to view the entire article.
I have no problem with the IRS or other agency investigating suspicious financial activity; doing this without judicial oversight/review is the problem...particularly since the government is untrustworthy.
ReplyDeleteHear, hear!
Delete... the article is pretty informative.
ReplyDeleteLook at this as a gift from the War on Drugs.
One of those gifts that keeps on giving.
The very existence of the IRS is unconstitutional. It should never have been implemented in the first place. Another atrocity for which we ms thank the "progressives."
ReplyDeleteAnother one? Yes, this is a consistent practice. Nearly put a small family grocer in Detroit out of business. No reason on earth there could not have been an inquiry and request for information when these deposits were picked up. Except those greedy b'crats wanted the money - it was taken under the rubric of 'civil forfeiture' or legal robbery under secret warrant.
ReplyDeleteThe gov't nabbed them for making small deposits in an alleged attempt to 'restructure' larger ones that trigger bank notification to the gov't. The grocer said they never keep receipts overnight and get deposits to the bank before they reach $10,000 because that's the loss limit on their insurance policy.
Ducky's right, it's an abusive legacy of the war on drugs.
Baysider,
DeleteI'd forgotten about that small family grocer in Detroit!
As many small deposits as I make, I'm going to have a meltdown if my account gets seized! I have several monthly automatic debits coming out of that account -- not to mention paying the other bills from that account. How would I pay the real estate taxes if these assets were seized?
Baysider,
DeleteAbout the outcome for that Detroit grocer:
Arlington, Va.—Just hours after the Institute for Justice announced it was joining another civil forfeiture lawsuit in Michigan against the federal government, the IRS filed motions to voluntarily dismiss two forfeiture actions against innocent Detroit-area small-business owners. Terry Dehko of Fraser, Mich., and Mark Zaniewski of Sterling Heights, Mich., will each get back all of the money seized without warning from their business’s bank accounts (over $100,000 in total) by the federal government.
While today’s victories vindicate the property rights of Dehko and Zaniewski, they do not solve the nationwide forfeiture problem. As recently demonstrated in the New Yorker and The Economist, civil forfeiture is now one of the greatest threats to property rights in America today. A separate federal lawsuit filed in September by the Institute for Justice on behalf of Terry Dehko and his daughter, Sandra Thomas, seeks to reform civil forfeiture law to protect the constitutional rights of property owners. That lawsuit will continue.
[...]
“Last year alone, the government took in more than four billion dollars in forfeiture money,” said IJ Attorney Larry Salzman. “Taking money from innocent people like Terry Dehko and Mark Zaniewski is wrong, and it needs to end immediately.”...
This is why Mr. B and I support the IJ. Notice, THAT'S what it took to get the gorilla off their back. Not a reasonable conversation.
DeleteHERE is the article in the New York Times.
ReplyDeleteA few snippets from the article:
DeleteThe Justice Department does not track the total number of cases pursued, the amount of money seized or how many of the cases were related to other crimes, said Peter Carr, a spokesman....
[...]
The practice has swept up dairy farmers in Maryland, an Army sergeant in Virginia saving for his children’s college education and Ms. Hinders, 67, who has borrowed money, strained her credit cards and taken out a second mortgage to keep her restaurant going....
Much more at the link.
So whats the cigarette vendor supposed to do? Take his deposits to the Knights Templar? This is disgusting. Outright theft.
DeleteAye carumba. Putting aside the illegal nature of the IRS in the FIRST place, not to mention the blatant 4th amendment violations, the entire idea is so laughably inept it isn't funny.
ReplyDeleteAccording to the left, the whole point of the IRS is to keep the upper class/rich from cheating the system, and thus protect the lower classes. HAH. HAHAHAHAH no.
I have seen first-hand how this does not work. On contrere, the OPPOSITE is true.
The IRS is so massive, and has so many regulations, that an ordinary person cannot follow it. You need an accountant. You really need a team, that includes accountants and lawyers of various fields. The team can be at minimum 2, but frankly, if you are rich, it will be bigger than that. All those people pull 6 figure salaries. Take a quick caculation, and you will see the issue.
In order to avoid the IRS, you need to be a millionare, or at LEAST upper class.
The tax code has loophole after loophole after loophole. Those 6-figure guys? They know them all. They exploit them to. So the rich guys who can afford the team keep all their monies- by loophole abuse.
The average joe? He doesn't have that advantage. One accountant keeps you out of trouble if the IRS ignores you. That's it. No loopholes. No sneaky ways. No immunity from the IRS (something a team provides. The IRS ain't going to pointlessly challenge someone with 1+ lawyers on their side).
The system basically becomes the oppoisite of it's supposed intention: it keeps the rich from paying money and the poor paying all of the too-many taxes. Or, the rich get richer and the poor poorer, thanks to the IRS.
Know what would FIX this? I dunno, a flax, no-loophole, tax. Try 10% of all money earned. No exemptions.
But noooooo. We don't want THAT. Maybe because the inheritance-tax loophole disappears, or the overseas loophole, or the property loophole, or the gift loophole, or more that I don't even know about.
The IRS is not trying to stop the upper classes, or tax evaders for that matter. They would make the code SIMPLER if they were. They're trying to steal the most money they can from the most amount of people they can. Thus, they let the rich (who have lawyers that can uncover IRS persecution and corruption) do whatever they want and go after those who cannot afford to challenge them.
They know full damn well that a small business cannot even plead it's case, much less WIN. So, they pick on them.
When will we the people move to stop this? No clue. Maybe when they understand how the IRS really works instead of going "the rich need more taxes!!!"
-Wildstar
Wildstar,
DeleteMy mother worked for the IRS. She hated the job. She believed that the power of the IRS was something that every American should fear.
It costs a bundle to contest an audit!
As for simplifying the tax code, just imagine how many IRS employees would not be needed if the tax code were decipherable -- not to mention CPA's.
The IRS is so massive, and has so many regulations, that an ordinary person cannot follow it.
Even authorized IRS representatives cannot always figure out the finer points of the tax code.
I've personally had the experience of getting two entirely different answers when calling the IRS about a thorny issue regarding how to file a bit of income that didn't fit the categories in Publication 17.