*Please help, James Traficant's campaign website and Facebook page*

[knarfxii]

I just got off the phone with Rick Berger, Jim's campaign manager and it is balls to the wall! The Campaign is in full swing and they need much help from us Ron Paulers!
To contact Rick directly, email is torts3@Aol.com
To contact the general campaign, email Contactus@votetraficant.com

Here is the Official Facebook page for James Traficant, please join: http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/profile.php?id=100001476105345&ref=search or type traficantforcongress@yahoo.com in the top bar.

This is James Traficant's official website, they just started on it, so it looks a little cheesy: http://www.votetraficant.com/

What they really need is donations and your word of mouth, tell everyone to help and if you are reading this please post on C4L website.


CAMPAIGN DONATIONS !


This website and Jim’s OFFICIAL Facebook site (traficantforcongress@yahoo.com) will at any moment have pay pal capabilities. Until then, those wishing to send a check for a campaign contribution may do the following: make checks payable to: TRAFICANT FOR CONGRESS….and mail to:
Traficant
429 N. Main St.,
Poland, Ohio 44514
Thank you! Let the chaos continue! Semper Fi ! Support the U.S. Constitution! ” VOTE AMERICA…..VOTE TRAFICANT !”

Just in case you have no idea of who James Trafficant is
Read this: The Bankruptcy of The United States http://www.apfn.net/Doc-100_bankruptcy.htm

And watch this: James Traficant on the IRS YouTube - James Traficant on the IRS (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CXYw82RH0E)

[sofia]

Trafficante has the balls to defy the Israeli War Lobby...and the ability to unite the regular Joe "union left" with the libertarian paleo right...

We have got to get behind this guy. If he wins in November....he could be our third party hope in 2012....

I will be dropping $100

[WaltM]

I think the website looks fine,

just add some more colors.

worst case, hire netboots/terra eclipse.

but generally I think good wordpress themes will do the job (for free).

[WaltM]

here's an important tip.

he needs to make a video or voice recording saying "I am Jim Trafficant and my website is this"

or else people have no way of knowing whether it's legit.

[knarfxii]

here's an important tip.

he needs to make a video or voice recording saying "I am Jim Trafficant and my website is this"

or else people have no way of knowing whether it's legit.

calling right now!

[GigiBowman]

you should have him apply for Liberty Candidate Status

the application is on the website www.liberty-candidates.org

[knarfxii]

you should have him apply for Liberty Candidate Status

the application is on the website www.liberty-candidates.org

thanks

[torchbearer]

i thought they said he didn't qualify for the congressional campaign?

[WaltM]

i thought they said he didn't qualify for the congressional campaign?

good question

[knarfxii]

i thought they said he didn't qualify for the congressional campaign?


read this! James Traficant, Ex-Con and Former Congressman, on Ballot in Ohio http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/09/02/james-traficant-ex-con-and-former-congressman-on-ballot-in-ohi/

Traficant wows Portage crowd: Congressional candidate pushes 25 percent sales tax in speech to TEA Party http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/4890910

he barely had enough signatures!

[WaltM]

read this! James Traficant, Ex-Con and Former Congressman, on Ballot in Ohio http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/09/02/james-traficant-ex-con-and-former-congressman-on-ballot-in-ohi/

Traficant wows Portage crowd: Congressional candidate pushes 25 percent sales tax in speech to TEA Party http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/4890910

he barely had enough signatures!

Like I said, he needs to make some videos of him answering FAQ, and announcing this

videos is what will get the youtube crowding to spread the info around.

webpages are essential, but not sufficient.

making videos doesn't cost very much money and it costs nothing to spread it around,

[brandon]

25% sales tax to replace income tax? gtfo

That would be absolutely devastating. That would be a significant net tax increase on all people earning (roughly) under $100,000/year

[knarfxii]

http://blogs.dailymail.com/donsurber/archives/20442
Convicted Democratic ex-congressman James Traficant will be on the ballot in November as a congressional candidate, the Youngstown Vindicator reported.

Hallelujah.

The man who cannot be bought.

Or rented.

Or bribed.

Especially bribed.

He’s been to The Big House





Here is the Official Facebook page for James Traficant, please join: http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/profile.php?id=100001476105345&ref=search or type traficantforcongress@yahoo.com in the top bar.

This is James Traficant's official website, they just started on it, so it looks a little cheesy: http://www.votetraficant.com/

[knarfxii]

25% sales tax to replace income tax? gtfo

That would be absolutely devastating. That would be a significant net tax increase on all people earning (roughly) under $100,000/year

I am sure! Or main stream wants to hurt him.

[brandon]

Someone who earns $34000/year currently pays about $3900/year in income taxes.

People who earn this little generally spend all of their money each year,so under traficant's plan they would pay $8500/year in taxes.

[knarfxii]

Someone who earns $34000/year currently pays about $3900/year in income taxes.

People who earn this little generally spend all of their money each year,so under traficant's plan they would pay $8500/year in taxes.

typo

[knarfxii]

bump

[BuddyRey]

//

[Old Ducker]

25% sales tax to replace income tax? gtfo

That would be absolutely devastating. That would be a significant net tax increase on all people earning (roughly) under $100,000/year

Excises, including sales taxes, are constitutional. The income tax is not. I dont care if you define it as an excise or a direct tax it neither conforms to the rules of uniformity or apportionment.

[WaltM]

Excises, including sales taxes, are constitutional. The income tax is not. I dont care if you define it as an excise or a direct tax it neither conforms to the rules of uniformity or apportionment.

what's the 16th Amendment?

[libertybrewcity]

what's the 16th Amendment?

Here ya go WALT:
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=sixteenth+amendment

[WaltM]

Here ya go WALT:
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=sixteenth+amendment

no, I knew what it was, I wanted to see why income tax is unconstitutional, if 16th amendment was ratified.

[knarfxii]

Bump for today!

[knarfxii]

Friday Bump

[torchbearer]

no, I knew what it was, I wanted to see why income tax is unconstitutional, if 16th amendment was ratified.

Tax protester Sixteenth Amendment arguments are assertions that the imposition of the U.S. federal income tax is illegal because the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was never properly ratified,[1] or that the amendment provides no power to tax income. Proper ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment is disputed by tax protesters who argue that the quoted text of the Amendment differed from the text proposed by Congress, or that Ohio was not a State during ratification.[2] Sixteenth Amendment ratification arguments have been rejected in every court case where they have been raised and have been identified as legally frivolous.

Some protesters have argued that because the Sixteenth Amendment does not contain the words "repeal" or "repealed", the Amendment is ineffective to change the law. Others argue that due to language in Stanton v. Baltic Mining Co., the income tax is an unconstitutional direct tax that should be apportioned (divided equally amongst the population of the various states). Several tax protesters assert that the Congress has no constitutional power to tax labor or income from labor,[3] citing a variety of court cases. These arguments include claims that the word "income" as used in the Sixteenth Amendment cannot be interpreted as applying to wages; that wages are not income because labor is exchanged for them; that taxing wages violates individuals' right to property,[4] and several others. Another argument raised is that because the federal income tax is progressive, the discriminations and inequalities created by the tax should render the tax unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment, which guarantees equal protection under the law. Such arguments have been ruled without merit under contemporary jurisprudence; evading taxes is a serious criminal offense.

Many tax protesters contend that the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was never properly ratified (see, e.g., Devvy Kidd).[5][6] A Sixteenth Amendment argument was mentioned in passing in Ex parte Tammen, a federal court case in May of 1977, some sixty-four years after the ratification.[7] In Tammen, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas noted testimony in the case to the effect that taxpayer Bob Tammen had become involved with a group called "United Tax Action Patriots," a group that took the position "that the Sixteenth Amendment was improperly passed and therefore invalid...."[8] The specific issue of the validity of the ratification of the Amendment was neither presented to nor decided by the court in the Tammen case.

After the Tammen case, two lines of court cases eventually developed. The first group of cases deals with the claims of William J. Benson, co-author of the book The Law That Never Was (1985). The second line of cases involves the contention that Ohio was not a state in 1913 at the time of the ratification.

The William J. Benson contention is essentially that the legislatures of various states passed ratifying resolutions in which the quoted text of the Amendment differed from the text proposed by Congress in terms of capitalization, spelling of words, or punctuation marks (e.g. semi-colons instead of commas), and that these differences made the ratification invalid. Benson makes other assertions including claims that one or more states rejected the Amendment and that the state or states were falsely reported as having ratified the Amendment. As explained below, the Benson arguments have been rejected in every court case where they have been raised, and were explicitly ruled to be fraudulent in 2007.

The earliest reported court case where Benson's arguments were actually raised appears to be United States v. House,[9]. Benson testified in the House case to no avail. The Benson contention was comprehensively addressed by the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v. Thomas:[10]

Thomas is a tax protester, and one of his arguments is that he did not need to file tax returns because the sixteenth amendment is not part of the constitution. It was not properly ratified, Thomas insists, repeating the argument of W. Benson & M. Beckman, The Law That Never Was (1985). Benson and Beckman review the documents concerning the states' ratification of the sixteenth amendment and conclude that only four states ratified the sixteenth amendment; they insist that the official promulgation of that amendment by Secretary of State Knox in 1913 is therefore void.
Benson and Beckman did not discover anything; they rediscovered something that Secretary Knox considered in 1913. Thirty-eight states ratified the sixteenth amendment, and thirty-seven sent formal instruments of ratification to the Secretary of State. (Minnesota notified the Secretary orally, and additional states ratified later; we consider only those Secretary Knox considered.[11]) Only four instruments repeat the language of the sixteenth amendment exactly as Congress approved it. The others contain errors of diction, capitalization, punctuation, and spelling. The text Congress transmitted to the states was: "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." Many of the instruments neglected to capitalize "States," and some capitalized other words instead. The instrument from Illinois had "remuneration" in place of "enumeration"; the instrument from Missouri substituted "levy" for "lay"; the instrument from Washington had "income" not "incomes"; others made similar blunders.

Thomas insists that because the states did not approve exactly the same text, the amendment did not go into effect. Secretary Knox considered this argument. The Solicitor of the Department of State drew up a list of the errors in the instruments and — taking into account both the triviality of the deviations and the treatment of earlier amendments that had experienced more substantial problems — advised the Secretary that he was authorized to declare the amendment adopted. The Secretary did so.

Although Thomas urges us to take the view of several state courts that only agreement on the literal text may make a legal document effective, the Supreme Court follows the "enrolled bill rule." If a legislative document is authenticated in regular form by the appropriate officials, the court treats that document as properly adopted. Field v. Clark, 143 U.S. 649, 36 L.Ed. 294, 12 S.Ct. 495 (1892). The principle is equally applicable to constitutional amendments. See Leser v. Garnett, 258 U.S. 130, 66 L.Ed. 505, 42 S.Ct. 217 (1922), which treats as conclusive the declaration of the Secretary of State that the nineteenth amendment had been adopted. In United States v. Foster, 789 F.2d. 457, 462-463, n.6 (7th Cir. 1986), we relied on Leser, as well as the inconsequential nature of the objections in the face of the 73-year acceptance of the effectiveness of the sixteenth amendment, to reject a claim similar to Thomas's. See also Coleman v. Miller, 307 U.S. 433, 83 L. Ed. 1385, 59 S. Ct. 972 (1939) (questions about ratification of amendments may be nonjusticiable). Secretary Knox declared that enough states had ratified the sixteenth amendment. The Secretary's decision is not transparently defective. We need not decide when, if ever, such a decision may be reviewed in order to know that Secretary Knox's decision is now beyond review.

—United States v. Thomas
Benson was unsuccessful with his Sixteenth Amendment argument when he had his own legal problems. He was prosecuted for tax evasion and willful failure to file tax returns. The court rejected his Sixteenth Amendment "non-ratification" argument in United States v. Benson.[12] William J. Benson was convicted of tax evasion and willful failure to file tax returns in connection with over $100,000 of unreported income, and his conviction was upheld on appeal. He was sentenced to four years in prison and five years of probation.[13]

On December 17, 2007, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois ruled that Benson's non-ratification argument constituted a "fraud perpetrated by Benson" that had "caused needless confusion and a waste of the customers' and the IRS' time and resources."[14] The court stated: "Benson has failed to point to evidence that would create a genuinely disputed fact regarding whether the Sixteenth Amendment was properly ratified or whether United States Citizens are legally obligated to pay federal taxes."[15] The court ruled that "Benson's position has no merit and he has used his fraudulent tax advice to deceive other citizens and profit from it" in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 6700.[16] The court granted an injunction under 26 U.S.C. § 7408 prohibiting Benson from promoting the theories in Benson's "Reliance Defense Package" (containing the non-ratification argument), which the court referred to as "false and fraudulent advice concerning the payment of federal taxes."[17][18]

Benson appealed that decision, and the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit also ruled against Benson. The Court of Appeals stated:

Benson knew or had reason to know that his statements were false or fraudulent. 26 U.S.C. [section] 6700(a)(2)(A). Benson's claim to have discovered that the Sixteenth Amendment was not ratified has been rejected by this Court in Benson's own criminal appeal.... Benson knows that his claim that he can rely on his book to prevent federal prosecution is equally false because his attempt to rely on his book in his own criminal case was ineffective.[19]
The Court of Appeals also ruled that the government could obtain a ruling ordering Benson to turn his customer list over to the government.[20] Benson petitioned the United States Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court rejected his petition on November 30, 2009.[21]

Similar Sixteenth Amendment arguments have been uniformly rejected by other United States Circuit courts in other cases including Sisk v. Commissioner;[22] United States v. Sitka;[23] and United States v. Stahl.[24] The non-ratification argument has been specifically deemed legally frivolous in Brown v. Commissioner;[25] Lysiak v. Commissioner;[26] and Miller v. United States.[27]

Another argument made by some tax protesters is that because the United States Congress did not pass an official proclamation (Pub. L. 204) recognizing the date of Ohio's 1803 admission to statehood until 1953 (see Ohio and the Constitution), Ohio was not a state until 1953 and therefore the Sixteenth Amendment was not properly ratified.[6] The earliest reported court case where this argument was raised appears to be Ivey v. United States,[28] some sixty-three years after the ratification and 173 years after Ohio's admission as a state. This argument was rejected in the Ivey case, and has been uniformly rejected by the courts. See also McMullen v. United States,[29] McCoy v. Alexander,[30] Lorre v. Alexander,[31] McKenney v. Blumenthal[32] and Knoblauch v. Commissioner.[33]

In Baker v. Commissioner, the court stated:

Petitioner's theory [that Ohio was not a state until 1953 and that the Sixteenth Amendment was not properly ratified] is based on the enactment of Pub. L. 204, ch. 337, 67 Stat. 407 (1953) relating to Ohio's Admission into the Union. As the legislative history of this Act makes clear, its purpose was to settle a burning debate as to the precise date upon which Ohio became one of the United States. S. Rept. No. 720 to accompany H.J. Res. 121 (Pub. L. 204), 82d Cong. 2d Sess. (1953). We have been cited to no authorities which indicate that Ohio became a state later than March 1, 1803, irrespective of Pub. L. 204.[34]
The argument that the Sixteenth Amendment was not ratified and variations of this argument have been officially identified as legally frivolous federal tax return positions for purposes of the $5,000 frivolous tax return penalty imposed under Internal Revenue Code section 6702(a).[35]

Repeal clause
Some protesters have argued that because the Sixteenth Amendment does not contain the words "repeal" or "repealed", the Amendment is ineffective to change the law.[36] According to legal commentator Daniel B. Evans:

There is nothing in the Constitution that says that an amendment must specifically repeal another provision of the Constitution. In fact, there are 27 amendments to the Constitution, and only one of them specifically repeals an earlier provision. (The 21st Amendment, which ended Prohibition, specifically repeals the 18th Amendment, which started Prohibition.)
If this argument were correct, then the losing presidential candidate would be the vice-president of the United States, because the 12th Amendment did not expressly repeal Article II, Section 1, clause 3 of the Constitution. And Senators would still be selected by state legislatures, because the 17th Amendment did not expressly repeal any part of Article I, section 3, of the Constitution.[37]

—Daniel B. Evans
In Buchbinder v. Commissioner, the taxpayers cited the case of Eisner v. Macomber and argued that "the Sixteenth Amendment must be interpreted so as not to 'repeal or modify' the original Articles of the Constitution."[38] The United States Tax Court rejected that and all other arguments by Bruce and Elaine Buchbinder (the taxpayer-petitioners), stating: "We will not dress petitioners' frivolous tax-protester ramblings with a cloak of respectability.... We find that petitioners in this case have pursued a frivolous cause of action. We find that they are liable for a penalty in the amount of $250.00 under the provisions of [Internal Revenue Code] section 6673."[39] The actual statement by the United States Supreme Court in Eisner v. Macomber is that the Sixteenth Amendment "shall not be extended by loose construction, so as to repeal or modify, except as applied to income, those provisions of the Constitution that require an apportionment according to population for direct taxes upon property, real and personal ... In order, therefore, that the clauses cited from Article I of the Constitution may have proper force and effect, save only as modified by the Amendment ... it becomes essential to distinguish between what is and what is not 'income'...."[40]

[edit] Stanton v. Baltic Mining Co.
In Parker v. Commissioner, tax protester Alton M. Parker, Sr.,[41] challenged the levying of tax upon individual income, based on language in the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Stanton v. Baltic Mining Co.,[42] to the effect that the Sixteenth Amendment "conferred no new power of taxation, but simply prohibited the previous complete and plenary power of income taxation possessed by Congress from the beginning from being taken out of the category of indirect taxation to which it inherently belonged [. . . .]"[43] The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit rejected Parker's argument, and stated that Parker's proposition is "only partially correct, and in its critical aspect, is incorrect.[44] The Court of Appeals re-affirmed that the Congress has the power to impose the income tax, and stated that the Sixteenth Amendment "merely eliminates the requirement that the direct income tax be apportioned among the states."[45] The court ruled that Parker had raised a "frivolous" appeal.[46]

Tax protesters argue that in light of this language, the income tax is unconstitutional in that it is a direct tax and that the tax should be apportioned (divided equally amongst the population of the various states).[6][47]

The above quoted language in Stanton v. Baltic Mining Co. is not a holding of law in the case. (Compare Ratio decidendi, Precedent, Stare decisis and Obiter dictum for a fuller explanation.)

The quoted language regarding the "complete and plenary power of income taxation possessed by Congress from the beginning" is a reference to the power granted to Congress by the original text of Article I of the U.S. Constitution. The reference to "being taken out of the category of indirect taxation to which it [the income tax] belonged" is a reference to the effect of the 1895 Court decision in Pollock v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co.,[48] where taxes on income from property (such as interest income and dividend income) — which, like taxes on income from labor, had always been considered indirect taxes (and therefore not subject to the apportionment rule) — were, beginning in 1895, treated as direct taxes. The Sixteenth Amendment overruled the effect of Pollock,[49] making the source of the income irrelevant with respect to the apportionment rule, and thereby placing taxes on income from property back into the category of indirect taxes such as income from labor (the Sixteenth Amendment expressly stating that Congress has power to impose income taxes regardless of the source of the income, without apportionment among the states, and without regard to any census or enumeration).

The Court noted that the case "was commenced by the appellant [John R. Stanton] as a stockholder of the Baltic Mining Company, the appellee, to enjoin [i.e., prevent] the voluntary payment by the corporation and its officers of the tax assessed against it under the income tax section of the tariff act of October 3, 1913." On a direct appeal from the trial court, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the lower court's decision, which had dismissed Stanton's motion (i.e., had rejected Stanton's request) for a court order to prevent Baltic Mining Company from paying the income tax.

Stanton argued that the tax law was unconstitutional and void under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution in that the law denied "to mining companies and their stockholders equal protection of the laws and deprive[d] them of their property without due process of law." The Court rejected that argument. Stanton also argued that the Sixteenth Amendment "authorizes only an exceptional direct income tax without apportionment, to which the tax in question does not conform" and that therefore the income tax was "not within the authority of that Amendment." The Court also rejected this argument. Thus, the U.S. Supreme Court, in upholding the constitutionality of the income tax under the 1913 Act, contradicts those tax protesters arguments that the income tax is unconstitutional under either the Fifth Amendment or the Sixteenth Amendment.

[knarfxii]

"I will hit the ground running, Come out swinging, and end up winning!"

[BlackTerrel]

"I will hit the ground running, Come out swinging, and end up winning!"

I see he currently has 233 friends. I have 657.

It's on like Donkey Kong.