PM's Self Reliance Tools: Backyard Chef, Free Tech Support, Give the Taxman Hell

Bruce’s Poor Man Survival Bulletin

A Digest of Urban Survival Resources

http://www.PoorManSurvival.com

ISSN 2161-5543

A Free Press is the Guardian of a Free People

In This Issue:

1. Giving the Taxman Hell

2. The Backpacking Chef

3. Ducks and Geese Report

4. Homemade root beer recipe

5. Bank Privacy, Cheap or free tech support

“But politicians who talk about failed policies are just blowing smoke.
Government policies succeed in doing exactly what they are supposed to do:
channeling resources bilked from the general public to politically organized
and influential interests groups."
-- Robert Higgs
(1944- ) American economic historian

Vivien Kellems: Giving the Taxman Hell!

If principles are expressed through people, then Vivien Kellems’s life (1896-1975) shouts out that business is not the handmaiden of government.

For over 25 years the Westport, Connecticut industrialist battled the federal withholding tax, which she refused to collect from employees’ wages. If the government wanted her “to be their agent,” Kellems declared, they “have to pay me, and I want a badge.”

In For a New Liberty, economist Murray Rothbard discussed Kellems’s stance: “What moral principle justifies the government’s forcing employers to act as its unpaid tax collectors? The withholding principle, of course, is the linchpin of the whole federal income tax system. Without the steady and relatively painless process of deducting the tax from the worker’s paycheck, the government could never hope to raise the high levels of tax from the workers in one lump sum.”

“Temporary” Measure

The withholding tax on income had been introduced in 1943 as a temporary measure to finance World War II. Called “the Victory Tax,” it required businesses to use their own resources to withhold taxes, to maintain records, and to remit money; mistakes or noncompliance could result in severe penalties. Thus businesses became unpaid accountants and tax collectors for the federal government.

After the war there was no sign of withholding’s repeal and so Kellems, who had master’s degree in economics and a nearly completed Ph.D, ceased to comply. Her rebellion was based on far more than the lack of a badge

In her 1952 book, Toil, Taxes and Trouble, Kellems explained that her rebellion was based on constitutional grounds. Article I Section 2, Clause 3 of the U.S. Constitution declares, “Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several States . . . according to their respective Numbers. . . .” Section 9, Clause 4 states, “No capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in proportion to the Census or Enumeration. . . .”

Kellems concluded, “[O]ur forefathers bound fast the hands of Congress and secured the liberty and freedom of the American people. How? By making it impossible to levy an income tax. An income tax is certainly a direct tax [which] must be paid by the person receiving the income.

Asked for Prosecution

In February 1948 Kellems publicly invited the government to prosecute her. Instead, four IRS agents arrived and demanded $1,685.40 even though her employees had been paying the correct amount. The rebuffed agents intimidated her bank into surrending that amount from her account.

The conflict became famous nationally when television shows such as “Meet the Press” interviewed Kellems. On Eleanor Roosevelt’s 1950s talk show, “Today With Mrs. Roosevelt,” Kellems explained, “As you know, Congress can pass all of the laws it wishes to. The President may sign all of the laws that he wishes to. But no law is a valid law in our country until it has been declared constitutional by the Supreme Court. Any citizen doubting the constitutionality of a law has the right, and in my opinion the duty, to break the law in order to provide a test case. That is all I did.”

Kellems also organized a nationwide group called the Liberty Belles and Boys to seek the repeal of the withholding tax.

Sues the Government

In 1949 tax agents demanded $6,100. Despite proof that her employees had paid their own withholding, the agents once again forced her bank to turn over the money. In January 1950 Kellems sued for its return in the federal district court in New Haven. She was not permitted to argue constitutional grounds, but she secured a full refund nonetheless.

Eventually Kellems abandoned her legal pursuit of the IRS because of its expense, but she never abandoned the fight. In 1969 she disobeyed a court order to produce financial records on the grounds that it violated her Fifth Amendment rights. According to some reports, she also refused to file tax returns; other reports claim she filed blank forms. In a 1975 interview with the Los Angeles Times -- the same year as her death -- Kellums declared, “Our tax law is a 1,598-page hydra-headed monster and I’m going to attack and attack and attack until I have ironed out every fault in it.”

Make your mattress last longer by vacuuming is monthly and flip it over every six months.

PM’s Compendium of Useful Resources

The Backpacking Chef

Navigation is easy – just use the left side menu to navigate between categories. The list starts with the recipes, so you can dive right. The categories are Breakfast Recipes, Supper Recipes, Dessert Recipes, Your Recipes, Menu Planning, Dehydrating Food, Bark Recipes, Packing & Storage, and Cooking.

Learn to dehydrate foods and get recipes for meals that you can use while backpacking. You’ll find all the information you need in the Dehydrating Food section of the site.

The Your Recipes section provides a form to submit your backpacking recipes to the site and see the recipes that other users have submitted.

The other nice thing about this site is that not only do you get cooking instructions, but you also get reviews of different products that you can use for the process of dehydrating, cooking, and eating your foods. This is great for anyone who is just getting started because you can learn everything you need to know before you waste a lot of time.

Get your food dehydrator and make some of these breakfast recipes. It would make eating breakfast a lot easier if you have everything prepackaged and ready to go.

http://www.backpackingchef.com/index.html

Cash in by trading in…

If you plan to upgrade your camera, laptop, cellphone, etc, you can save by trading in your old one for a Costco gift card or one from Sam’s Club.

Recycling.EconewOnline.com/samsclub

Costco.Gazelle.com

Home Made Root Beer - Old Time Recipe

1-gal water, 1-½ cups molasses, 1 tsp. dry yeast, ½ ounce each of:

Hops, dried burdock, yellow dock, sarsaparilla, dandelion, sassafras, spikenard root.

Wash herbs and bruise them thoroughly with a potato masher. Cover with water and bring to a boil. Lower heat to simmer for 20-minutes, then strain into large crock. Add the molasses and cool to lukewarm.

When lukewarm, add 1 tsp. of dry yeast and stir. Cover the crock with a cloth and place in a warm, dry area (room temp should be about 70-80 degrees). After two hours, pour into clean bottles to about ½ inch of the top.

Cap with capper and place bottles on their side in warm, draft-free area for about five days; then set upright in a cool place. Ready to drink in 10 days and will stay for three or four months.

Bank Privacy Part I
US law limits your freedom of contract. Banking services are strictly controlled and are the future of individual tracking. Learn how this affects you.

http://www.howtovanish.com/2010/01/bank-privacy-a-fundamental-right/?awt_l=9mqfI&awt_m=1l3cDvWinCxNxm

How to Get Free or Cheap Tech Support When one of your tech devices goes awry, you can get expert answers at low cost or even for free, if you know where to look

http://www.pcworld.com/article/247222/how_to_get_free_or_cheap_tech_support.html

Take a Gander
From GRIT magazine, by Jennifer Kendall

For many folks, ducks and geese are merely ornamental entertainment. We see them on ponds and lakes, and we enjoy their beauty and grace from a distance; however, we often forget their role in our agricultural past. Throughout our history, ducks and geese have been staples on farms across North America.

For centuries, families and small farmers valued these animals for their many products and services including meat, eggs, fat, down and feathers, weed control, alarms and more. Today, most folks have forgotten the role that ducks and geese can play in sustainable farm practices. Unfortunately, that’s led to a fowl loss, including many historic breeds that helped our founding fathers and mothers make a go of it in the New World. Take a gander at some of the remaining rare-breed geese and ducks and see waddle you think!

Read the full story at:

http://poormansurvival.com/UrbanLivestock.aspx

Keep your mobile electronics inside. It’s just not heat which can destroy them, but cold weather can make their components brittle.

The Nanny State Updates…

35 terror training camps now operating inside U.S.

Government does nothing to impede expansion of 'Soldiers of Allah' network

Dozens of jihadist training camps are operating inside the United States right now and the federal government could not care less. The following is from a recent WorldNetDaily article about a jihadist organization that is operating 35 training camps on U.S. soil right now....

http://www.wnd.com/2012/01/381953/

VA Police Relieve Church of their money

The Washington Post recently ran an editorial denouncing the treatment of Victor Ramos Guzman and the process by which Mr Guzman and the parishioners of his church, Nuevo Renacer, were relieved of their money by the Virginia State Police. Read the shocking story here:

http://forfeiturereform.com/2012/01/05/piracy-in-virginia/

Save money at restaurants and salons with gift cards purchased at warehouse clubs - save as much as 20%

The Parting Thought – What college students want

Economics Professor Jack Chambless of Valencia College in Florida had his sophomore students write a short essay on what the American dream means to them and what, specifically, they wanted the federal government to do to help them achieve that dream.

The results demonstrate the sheer magnitude of the idiocy of a public education system dead set on indoctrination rather than education:

I took the essays from three classes – about 180 students…

About 10% of the students said they wanted the government to leave them alone and not tax them too much and let them regulate their own lives.

But over 80% of the students said that the American dream to them meant a job, a house, and plenty of money for retirement and vacations and things like this.

When it came to the part about the federal government, eight out of ten students said they wanted free health care, they wanted the government to pay for their tuition, they wanted the government to pay for the down payment on their house, they expected the government to, quote, “give them a job.” Many of them said they wanted the government to tax wealthier individuals so that they would have an opportunity to have a better life.

The following is an excerpt from one of the non-sensical essays written by a student of Professor Chambless:

“As human beings, we are not really responsible for our own acts, and so we need government to control those who don’t care about others.”

Source:

http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/plundering-the-american-dream-college-students-demonstrate-the-idiocy-of-our-education-system_01052012

Watch the interview here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Lsi2MFapwNw

“Until the next revolution”, the Poor Man

Follow us on Facebook

www.facebook.com/PoorManSurvival

Twitter

http://twitter.com/poormansurvivor

Keep our services free, visit our sites…