Thank You New York Times

IRS Questioned About Our Questions

Thanks to The New York Times, we achieved a measure of success in DC last Tuesday in our attempt to get the media to include some of our side of the story in its coverage of the press conference held at the Treasury Department to announce a new agreement between state and federal tax officials to fight “abusive tax avoidance schemes”. More on that in a moment. 

Attending the event were officials from Treasury, IRS and nine of the 40 states that have signed the agreement. We believe about thirty print and broadcast reporters from the dominant media were in attendance.  

We do not believe any reporters from World Net Daily, News Max, Media Bypass, American Free Press, or any of the other “alternative” media outlets who have written about our efforts to get the government to answer our questions regarding the income tax, showed up to raise the issue or to directly question the government about its failure to answer our Petition.  

Bob Schulz had called the Treasury Department on Monday to ask if he would be allowed to attend the event. He was told by “Rowina” that only those with press credentials would be allowed in the building to attend the event.  

About two dozen friends and supporters of the We The People organization were gathered outside the main entrance to the main Treasury building before the start of the event. The day was sunny and warm. They held attention-getting, professionally printed banners that read, “IRS Agents: “No Answers, NO Taxes,” and “Obey The Constitution,” and “Government Is Limited By Written Constitutions, and “The Truth At www.GiveMeLiberty.org.” They also handed out copies of prepared statements by Schulz, Banister, Turner and Jackson along with the WTP “Banister card.” Click here to view some photos from the event.  

Click here for a copy of Schulz’s press statement. Please take the time to read this important summary of our legal position. WTP will soon make a version of it available, free of charge, to anyone who may be interested in telling the IRS what they think of filing tax returns, paying the tax or withholding in the absence of any answers to our questions. More on this in a day or two.  

On behalf of the entire roster of WTP friends and supporters, we want to thank those WTP members who, on one-day notice, traveled to DC in support of our effort to draw attention to “our side of the story.” Some drove all night from New York, North Carolina and Ohio. Many were State and County coordinators. They held banners and passed out literature. Thank you all.  

We also want to thank former IRS agents Joe Banister, John Turner and Sherry Jackson for agreeing, on such short notice, to travel from their homes in California and Georgia to be on hand for the event. 

Now, here is a brief report of the results of the government’s press conference and our efforts to get the media to include our side of the story and not to simply agree to quote “officialdom.” 

Prior to the start of the government’s press conference, only David Cay Johnston of the New York Times stopped to talk to any of us. None of the federal and state employees or the other members of the press stopped to talk. Many quickened their strides, looked the other way and stuck their noses in the air as we attempted to politely engage them in conversation and to hand them material which would better prepare them if they were at all interested in questioning the federal government about its new initiative. 

After the conclusion of the government’s press conference David Cay Johnston again stopped by to talk to us. So did a reporter from the Associated Press, one from Scripps Howard and two from PBS.  

We learned that Johnston broke from the pack of reporters who were on hand to cover the government’s press conference (almost all of whom appeared only interested in reporting what “officialdom” had to say). We learned that Johnston got to ask the first question and a follow-up question at the press conference. We learned that Johnston referred to our presence outside, that we had been challenging the legality of the income tax and its enforcement and that we were not getting any answers from the government. 

Johnston asked the IRS to respond. We learned from Johnston that the IRS gave a vague answer, saying it has answered our questions, referring to the IRS website and to “other publications.” According to Johnston, after he pressed for a more definitive response he was told by a senior IRS spokesman that “the recent spate of enforcement actions taken by the I.R.S. against promoters of abusive tax schemes, and the new agreement with the states, show other ways that government is answering the petition.”

Click here to read the New York Time's article on the day’s events. 

We believe this exchange and IRS’ answer will prove to be more important in the coming days.

In the meantime, we are asking everyone to:

a. Review the list of 537 questions we have formally asked the IRS and DOJ to answer,
b. Select between five and fifteen of those 537 questions, and then
c. Send (via postal mail) a letter to Dale Hart (the IRS executive who claims that our questions have been addressed at the IRS Web site and in print publications.)  

Ask Ms. Hart to please cite the exact location on the IRS web site or the publication where your questions have been asked and answered. Click here for a sample of the letter to send (includes mailing addresses and  representative questions, in .rtf format for any word processor).

Remember to select your favorite questions and to copy David Cay Johnston at the Times and the WTP office with a copy of your letter.

Click here for a copy of Schulz’s statement to the press.

Click here for a copy of the 537 questions that were submitted to the government and have gone unanswered to this day (160 KB, .pdf).

Click here to obtain a package of WTP/Banister index-size color cards from our online store.