{"id":47590,"date":"2026-04-09T22:10:06","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T05:10:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=47590"},"modified":"2026-04-09T22:10:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T05:10:07","slug":"my-decision-no-more-tax-money-for-trumps-madness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2026\/04\/09\/my-decision-no-more-tax-money-for-trumps-madness\/","title":{"rendered":"My Decision: No More Tax Money for Trump\u2019s Madness"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

US Politics<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The US Treasury at night. Photo credit: Illustration by WhoWhatWhy from\u00a0APK \/ Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)<\/a>,\u00a0IRS (PD)<\/a>, and\u00a0Constitutional Convention \/ Wikimedia (PD)<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jonathan D. Simon<\/a>\u00a004\/08\/26 (whowhatwhy.org)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What if millions just said No and opened escrow accounts?<\/em><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve been wending my way toward the exit of the TurboTax fun house, as I do every year in preparation to send the US Treasury and the California Franchise Tax Board what my partner and I wind up owing as law-abiding taxpayers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It turns out I owe a fair amount this year, as none of my income comes from W-2s or has otherwise been subject to withholding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have decided not to pay it, and I am writing this column to explain why.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let me begin by stating that this has been a very difficult decision. I\u2019ll be 70 next year and I have always paid my taxes, in full, on time \u2014 even in years when I passionately objected to what the government was doing with my check. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like when George W. Bush invaded Iraq and rammed through the Patriot Act<\/a> along with massive tax cuts<\/a> for corporations and the rich. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I grumbled, I even yelled, but I sent. Because taxation \u2014 however determined and apportioned, and however spent \u2014 is fundamental to the compact that binds us into a nation. It is, in a sense, the price of representation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In our form of democracy, both our voice and our funding are mediated, indirect. We vote for the leaders we believe represent our values and priorities and we fund the project as they devise it, holistically, as one big package. Anything else \u2014 picking and choosing, consenting and refusing \u2014 would spell chaos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Line Has Been Crossed<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

So what has changed? Why am I now moved to violate this well-understood commitment by which I have abided my whole working life?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Put very simply, the federal government, under President Donald Trump, has made itself my enemy \u2014 the mortal enemy of everything I hold dear, everything I value. It\u2019s that serious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Every day I wake to some fresh hell spawned from his evil madness. And every day \u2014 literally every day \u2014 I rage anew. With the helpless impotence of a spectator at a slaughter. Yes, I march every now and then; yes, when decorum permits, I talk to others; yes, I write \u2014 but I talk and write mainly to those as outraged as I am. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And I warn, and warn, and warn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But isn\u2019t the time for warning over? All that I\u2019ve warned about<\/a>, throughout and long before<\/a> this abomination of a presidency \u2014 is here<\/em>. And its breadth and depth are damn near unfathomable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes, it will get worse. There\u2019s your warning. But, if someone doesn\u2019t get it by now, I doubt anything I can say or write will do the trick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So I feel, much if not all of the time, as if I am doing nothing<\/em>. Nothing public enough to matter. I am taking little or no risk. Like Rick, in Casablanca<\/em>, I have been sticking my neck out for nobody.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m Done<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m done with that. Done with being a Good American. And done with financing an evil regime led by a madman, as it destroys all the things I love. As it blackens my hope for the future. While bringing untold suffering to those helpless to fend it off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have seen online chatter about a tax revolt this year. And I\u2019ve tracked down a few organizations<\/a> devoted to this tactic. Former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) made news<\/a> as 2025 drew to a tumultuous close by calling for a tax revolt among disillusioned Trump supporters. The New York Times<\/em> deemed the matter worthy of a full-length news article<\/a> last month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve also repeatedly advocated<\/a> for mass economic action<\/a> against the Trump regime, as being far more effective, and for the most part less risky, than physical demonstrations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mass protests have been remarkably peaceful thus far \u2014 but the potential for violence, provoked by either side, always exists, along with the potential for that violence to spread and lead to the kinds of crackdowns that authoritarians like Trump relish. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nor, for all the show of goodness, decency, caring, empathy, and community that the No Kings and other rallies have manifest, have they succeeded in stopping the madness. God bless the people of Minneapolis and their courage, but ICE, while executing a tactical retreat there, still lurks and terrifies. And elsewhere, the construction of the \u201cdetention camps,\u201d which may as well be concentration camps, continues apace<\/a> \u2014 along with a \u201cmassive\u201d presidential bunker<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Please don\u2019t misconstrue me. The mass protests, along with the millions of daily acts of kindness, reflect the best of us and are a reason to hope for our country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But stopping our deranged president will take more than protests, even involving millions; and it will take more than letters to our officeholders, or even personal lobbying of such, unless you happen to have a corporate check for half a million or so for their PAC in your pocket. And even then. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It will take, at minimum, a free and fair election, and there is hardly a guarantee of that<\/a>. And it will take practical rather than symbolic impact \u2014 and that translates to mass economic <\/em>action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That comes in essentially three forms: boycotts, strikes, and tax revolts. Of these, the withholding of tax payment is, at scale, the most directly impactful. But it is also the most difficult to organize at scale and make publicly visible and contagious. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pay for This?<\/em><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I am not so naive as to assume that anyone, let alone masses, will follow suit. Or that a critical mass of others, of their own accord, will act on their own rage and defiance in this particular manner \u2014 though I am always up for a pleasant surprise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No, the driver of this decision is conscience, personal and solitary. I am well aware of the personal risk, the price likely to be paid. The question posed is whether I can, in good conscience, fund this regime and its unconscionable \u2014 and often illegal \u2014 actions, at home and abroad. Can I add my money to the stream that irrigates these poison fields?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How can I lend material support to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n