Have you seen this story? Ed Brown, "just a regular guy" and certainly not a nutcase in the eyes of his supporters, is a tax protester who has been holed up in his New Hampshire "compound" (his own term) for three months, defending the American people against the tyranny of our government and the illegal federal income tax. Ed and his wife Elaine were convicted in January of conspiracy to defraud the federal government and conspiracy to disguise large financial transactions to avoid income tax reporting requirements, 20 counts in all. They have now filed an "order" requiring that their case be dismissed because, well, they say so. And they filed this order under the new names they're recently adopted: "Edward, a Living Soul in the Body of the Lord, of the House of Israel," and "Elaine, a Living Soul ..." likewise.
So.
Here's a recent interview with Mr. Brown, conducted by another pair of creative thinkers, John Stoddard Klar and his wife Jackie. Klar's website, which is all about "George W. Bush and the Desecration of Christianity in Modern America," is here. Just to put his views in perspective, Mr. Klar is of the opinion that "the mainstream media have been very uncomfortable criticising this president for the last year and a half."* So he, as a "conservative Christian lawyer" and a patriot, has to step up and do it for them.
Tax protesters, by and large, are a sorry lot of misguided, disturbed individuals. Once in a while you find one who's just a plain vanilla criminal using the tax protester dodge as a way to avoid paying taxes and fleece a bunch of the misguided, disturbed types in the process. This group, which is currently embroiled in its own legal problems and whose founders are currently serving hard time, has jumped with both feet onto the virulently anti-Israel bandwagon, as you can see here, e.g.,
Our hypothesis is as follows:
1) U.S. tax money is being used to oppress and destroy the Palestinian society;
2) in response, the Palestinians and their sympathizers are attacking the United States;
3) in reply, the United States has instituted a domestic War on Terror;
4) the War on Terror has given rise to a growing Police State in the U.S.;
5), the Police State has resulted in an across the board erosion of individual Freedoms, Rights and Liberties; and 6), therefore, U.S. financial aid to Israel is violative of the General Welfare Clause of the Constitution (Article I, Section 8, Clause 1).
If anyone can show that the hostilities being directed toward the United States and the War on Terror has nothing to do with our funding of Israelעs occupation and oppression of the Palestinian people, we beg them to do so.
"We the People" provides, of course, appropriate credit for this garbage to their spiritual guides Jimmy Carter and Professors Walt and Mearsheimer.
As I've pointed out elsewhere, no one pays attention to these kooks, but still. They're out there, dripping their own little bit of poison into the pot. And "We The People" naturally supports Ed Brown, though not his "stated intent to employ violence in defense of his Rights."
My question is: why are Ed and Elaine Brown still living "peacefully" in their "compound?" Well, the aforementioned stated intent to employ violence no doubt has something to do with it. He's not calling it a "compound" for nothing, and he's apparently been able to collect some supporters in there with him. His sentencing hearing is Tuesday. He's not expected to make an appearance.
*Update: More 'wisdom' from John Stoddard Klar:
The only effective counterforce for terrorism is to undermine the conditions which feed its existence. Instead, this administration consistently feeds the infection of Islamic extremism, dishing out the exact recipe to strengthen and enrage these people: unilateral support for Israel as it employs excessive force in Lebanon and Gaza "defending itself"Â; an attack on Iraq, which had nothing to do with 9/11; the use of torture, which has included the inflammatory practices of using women as interrogators, and of desecrating the Koran.
