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View Full Version : LewRockwell.com abandon tax exempt status for the sake of Ron Paul!




inibo
08-06-2007, 06:07 PM
I don't about any one else, but I think this is HUGE. Burt Blumert, the publisher of LewRockwell.com, after discussions with a lawyer who advised him that the appearance of supporting Ron Paul while criticizing other candidates could conceivably threaten LRC's tax-exempt status, has announced that rather than shut up they will give up the their tax exempt status. :eek:


There was a certain surrealism in dealing with this tax attorney; profit vs. non-profit; tax-exempt vs. non-tax-exempt. These are state-created categories, and libertarians should never have to deal with such distinctions. Some libertarian purists refuse to use a state driver’s license. Others, on the fringe, don't want to travel a government built roadway. (And after Minneapolis, who can blame them?)

Still, Lew has sufficient challenge six days a week, every week of the year, without some bureaucrat peering over his shoulder determining whether an LRC article falls under regulation A (politically acceptable) or B (politically unacceptable).

So, on June 30, 2007, LRC seceded (an appropriate word for us!) from the Center for Libertarian Studies, which will carry on its scholarly work. LRC, now to become a 501(c)4, will continue as a popular educational endeavor, operating on a not-for-profit basis, but not tax-deductible.

That is, donations to LRC as of July 1, 2007 (Lew’s 63rd birthday), are NOT tax-deductible.


Our "Ron Paul Problem" has a price tag. It’s going to cost us at least $15K to set-up our new non-profit entity. In addition, since we started suffering with the lawyers, and stopped fundraising given the uncertainty, we have consumed about $30K of our reserves. Then we need about $25,000 to keep going for the rest of the year, and I’d like to restore our reserve so we are not perpetually on the knife-edge. So that is $70,000 in total.

Will you help? You have never failed us. And now LRC needs you more than ever (http://www.lewrockwell.com/donate-t.html).


I have had a great deal of respect for Lew and LRC since I stumbled up him and his tall-cold-glass-of-water-on-a-hot-day web site back in 2001. My estimation of him and all the folks at LRC just reached stratospheric levels.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/blumert/blumert122.html

Kuldebar
08-06-2007, 06:08 PM
Yay! They were in a tough place.

Amazing how intrusive government insinuates itself into almost every type of human interaction.

Distorting it, cursing it and often destroying it.

This outside force retards civil society and perverts the very idea of free association and growth of community.

LibertyEagle
08-06-2007, 06:13 PM
Tom Tancredo said it. The IRS uses the income tax to control our behavior.

shrugged0106
08-06-2007, 06:14 PM
Thats pure Ballsy! Think about the courage and loyalty to "The Glorious Cause" that it takes to go that far for Dr. Paul.

Syren123
08-06-2007, 06:20 PM
That shows integrity of a degree you rarely see. Doing the right thing because iit's the right thing to do rather than the easy thing to do. EVEN IF IT COSTS YOU MONEY.

THAT is what separates the men from the boys, right there.

Sending LRC $$ asap.

TexMac
08-06-2007, 06:26 PM
Sending LRC $$ asap.That's what I did after reading Burton's piece this morning.

UtahApocalypse
08-06-2007, 06:33 PM
Digg:

http://digg.com/2008_us_elections/Ron_Paul_Is_a_Big_Problem

mport1
08-06-2007, 07:36 PM
Lew Rockwell is awesome.

Chase
08-06-2007, 07:48 PM
I donated $25. RP is my main priority right now, but what LewRockwell.com did was pretty admirable.

Nefertiti
08-06-2007, 07:52 PM
I've read it is a lot harder to go from non-profit to profit than the other way around. It has to do with converting assets that were amassed with a non-profit purpose to a profit one. I wonder how they plan to pull it off?

Razmear
08-06-2007, 07:54 PM
If he's already got the lawyers in play, maybe he should become a 527.