Category: Government

This week and last have been difficult weeks, starting with the storms and then the situation with the IRS.

Thanks to the Taxpayer Advocate’s office, we have established that a) I have done nothing wrong, and b) the revenue officer has gone way beyond standard operating procedure in her behavior. All forms that need filed, have been filed. As for the taxes I’m making payments on, I have fulfilled all my obligations to the IRS on this, as was confirmed by both the Advocate’s office and another member of the IRS yesterday. Both of whom, I want to add, were reassuring and helpful, as well as friendly.

Yet today I received a nasty letter that left me shaking by the time I was finished with it, especially after making sure everything was resolved yesterday. The Advocate says that I need to now file a complaint with the area supervisor, as these actions are inappropriate to take considering that the only problem was that they couldn’t find a copy of one of my forms.

When I talked with the Advocate, I told her that the letters and conversations have been both confusing and very intimidating. I liked what she had to say: The IRS is a servant of the people; I have done nothing wrong; I have a right to be free from intimidation; the IRS officer forgot this right.

But this has exhausted me, in addition to cutting into my work time, which is putting me badly behind schedule. What I need, desperately need, is a couple of quiet days in a cabin somewhere–to catch my breath as well as get caught up in my work. Unfortunately, I don’t know of anyone with a nice waterside place nearby; even if I did, it would probably be under water with the current flooding.

But once I recover from today’s IRS incident–a walk, and Ted Drewes frozen custard comes to mind–I have to focus completely on work. If I have energy, I’ll post another LAMP essay later— just for you folks who say you don’t “do” code. Once it’s online, it will be the last post for me for a time.

Not me

I thought about following Feministe’s approach of having ‘guest bloggers’ while I’m earning money to give to the IRS. After all, I liked what she had to say about the latest “where are the good women bloggers” fooflah:

Whether or not certain female bloggers are good is up to the reader and the reader’s worldview. You certainly don’t have to think that I’m good, but I’m here, I’m writing, and I will continue to do so whether you think I suck or not.

If you want to know where the women who blog about politics are, well, here we are. You don’t have to like us, read us, or respect us, but don’t deny our existence altogether.

I am writing, and will continue to do so whether you think I suck or not. We should all tattoo this on our fingers.

Anyway, I thought that I could invite Jeneane to pretend to be me, and have a lot of fun twisting your minds; but you might like her too much, and not want me back. My ego can’t deal with the risk.

Instead what I’m going to do is pull up some old, favorite posts from past glory days. I thought that it’s almost like having a guest blogger, because my writing has changed between then and now.

But then, so have all of you.

TTFN

Busted!

When I started reading references to the FBI and its new spying tactics, I assumed it had to do with the FBI spying on protestors against the Iraq war. I didn’t realize there was a second story, this one about the FBI’s expanion of powers through NSLs, or national security letters.

Seems the government not only wants to know about us when we protest, it also wants to know about us when we breath.

Here’s a solution to the St. Louis crime problem – if we can get half the city residents to attend an anti-Bush rally, we’d generate enough interest to probably result in a whole lot of FBI people being assigned here. Since we assume that they would actually act on a real crime, rather than just imagined ones, they should help cut the crime rate here. If nothing else, all those suits hanging around wearing dark glasses and peering into windows should make for an interesting time, and it can get kinda dull sometimes in the winter here.

See, my mama always told me to make the bad stuff work for you.

I have been sending emails to groups that have and still are organizing marches for peace, basically posing to them the question: what’s next. Specifically, I sent emails to MoveOn and a more local organization Instead of War. The only email I’ve gotten in return from both is group emails for new actions.

Instead of War sent an email listing several new peace marches, some focused around the anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. According to the note, one of the marches is sponsored by the Martin Luther King Jr Holiday Committee. I’ll be honest that even if I were still marching to protest the war in Iraq, I would not march in a protest sponsored by a committee that considers the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr a ‘holiday’. I’m sorry, but I only commemorate Dr. King’s life. This march has a very confused message.

I’m not surprised that I haven’t received any response from Instead of War in regards to “What’s Next?” From my previous experience with protests against the Vietnam war and transporting nuclear waste across Washington state as well as several other environmentally and politically related issues, I have found that protest organizations are very conservative.

The MoveOn organization, though, sent an email that started with the following:

The war with Iraq continues. No one knows if it will last weeks, months, or years. Even after the fighting stops in Iraq, the fallout from this war could span decades. We can only hope that it ends quickly, with an absolute minimum loss of life.

The email addresses the question of What next? by starting a letter to the editor campaign focusing specifically on the issues that I find myself focused on — working against a US controlled occupation of Iraq:

Even as the troops march towards Baghdad, a big controversy is brewing over what will happen when the war does end. The neoconservatives like Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and Richard Perle envision a longer U.S. occupation of Iraq, directed entirely by the Pentagon and with only minimal participation by other countries and the U.N. Their scheme calls for setting up a provisional government in which Americans head each of the 23 ministries. In essence, they want to win the peace the way the U.S. has pushed for war: alone.

The U.S. State Department, the C.I.A., Prime Minister Tony Blair, the major humanitarian relief organizations, France, Germany, and most of the rest of the countries in the world disagree with this plan. They’d like to see the reconstruction of Iraq as a collaborative, international effort lead by the U.N. And many of them believe the Pentagon plan is a recipe for disaster.

The decision on how post-war Iraq is to be managed will be made in the next several days, and the Administration is split. The consequences will play out in Iraq and around the world for generations. By writing a letter to the editor of your local newspaper, you can help to sway the balance away from the unilateralism that has done so much damage and toward a collective rebuilding process.

I’m not sure that a letter to the editor campaign will help sway the balance away from the unilateralism but it will start the conversation in that direction, and this is not a bad thing. In fact, the same letter should be sent to congressional members and local politicians, in addition to those who are campaigning for political positions in upcoming elections. Start the letters with, “I am a registered voter…”.