SoylentNews

I was considering the opposition to Federal taxation and wondered what might happen if the requirements to pay Federal taxes were optional on a state-by-state basis.

The way this would work is that state legislatures could opt the residents and businesses of their state out of paying any Federal taxes, levies and fees.

In order to make this reasonably fair, if a state were to opt out, all those in the state would no longer receive any Federal monies, including highway funds, Medicaid block grants, Superfund grants, education funds, federal government contracts (including subcontracts), Medicare, Social Security, military bases, or any other appropriations from the Federal government.

There are a couple of ways this could go. Those states who are least dependent on federal funds might opt out.

Alternatively, states with populations that are most anti-Federal taxes might opt out.

What other scenarios might drive a state to opt out?

More details:
FY 2013 Federal taxation and spending by state
Federal Tax Revenue By State

Would you support such a law? If so (or not), why (or why not)?

There seems to be a major controversy in Maryland right now. The gun grabbers are attempting to - well - to grab guns. I stumbled over the story on this site: https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2019/03/daniel-zimmerman/maryland-gun-owners-will-not-comply-gun-grabbers-and-legislators-freak-out/

Admittedly, this is a biased site. I happen to agree with the aims of The Truth, but it is biased. So, I did a search for articles on the subject, "We will not comply". I found one "mainstream" media mention of it: https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/politics/ac-cn-wicomico-not-comply-20190226-story.html

I've scrolled three pages into my search results, and have not found another mainstream media story. I've found infowars, callmegav, conservativefiringline, rallyforourrights, a related story at investmentwatchblog, dcclothesline, unclesamsmisguidedchildren - in short, hit after hit after hit, page after page of hits. But, mainstream media isn't covering the story at all.

Let me change search terms, and see if MSM is even covering the vote on the bill - - -

Search term used, "Maryland HOUSE BILL 786" Results for MSM stories after scanning two pages of hits = ZERO Are they trying to pass this bill without any publicity at all? Keeping it hidden from voters? WTF?

Several small time news sources located inside of Maryland carry stories. I thought I found a hit at the Washington Post - but that was a false hit, on an entirely different subject.

Odd - if all the rest of MSM is refusing to cover a story, we might expect Fox to carry it. I don't even see a Foxnews hit.

Go ahead, do your own searches. If you can find liberal media stories on the house bill in general, let us know what search terms you used.

If you can find liberal media stories on the We Will Not Comply opposition to HOUSE BILL 786, please, PLEASE let us know how you found them.

It's this sort of apparent coverup that lends credence to the likes of infowars.

Folks, I'm making today a very special day. For the beautiful Boardroom Babes. For the Government Gals. The Housekeeping Honies. And the Family Females. The smart -- and the sexy.

By the way, women’s unemployment rate is down to 3.6%. It was 7.9% in January, 2011 before I took office. And we(me& House/Senate GOP) did Historic Tax Cut, you ladies have that extra money in your pockets, because of me. So go ahead and buy yourself something nice. You're welcome!!!

Lenovo Unveils ThinkStation P520 & P920 ‘AI Workstations’: Xeon Plus Quadro RTX 6000

Ubuntu Linux based systems shipping with 10 or 24 cores, 128 GB or 384 GB of RAM.

Maybe that will be the new minimum in 15 years.

R. Kelly

R. Kelly denies sexual abuse allegations in explosive interview

R. Kelly was "unhinged" in interview with Gayle King, columnist says (12m36s)

Gayle King talks about her explosive R. Kelly interview on CBSN (7m18s)

Full interview is apparently around 80 minutes and has not been released in its entirety yet. Even Oprah wants the full video.

Turmoil or manipulation?

Previously: R. Kelly Contracts Ligma
R. Kelly Exposes Himself

President Donald J. Trump participates in the first meeting of the American Workforce Policy Advisory Board! Watch the meeting here: 45.wh.gov/RtVRmD

VERY SPECIAL tweet from President Bolsonaro of Brazil. About what goes on at Carnival. I'll tell you, it's something no decent person should see -- especially not at work. But, I looked anyway. It's very sad. And we had a lot of those goings-on in New York City.

Especially in Times Square. When I was a boy, I would sneak out of the house. Hop on the Long Island Rail Road with my friend. And go to Times Square to watch movies. It was a tremendous place to be a kid in. But it turned into something horrible -- so filthy. If you've ever seen Midnight Cowboy or Taxi Driver, it was exactly like that. Until we cleaned it up, very successfully. Took a long time and Mayor Giuliani deserves a lot of the credit for that. And we have a Disney Store there now. Jair's working very hard, he's cleaning up Brazil. 🧼🚿 And I think we'll see Disney coming in Rio de Janeiro! pic.twitter.com/u0qbPu9sie

Mardi Gras

Mardi Gras: The most fun you'll have with a history lesson

Patricia Clarkson on leading the Mardi Gras group breaking with tradition

In New Orleans, The Fight Over Blackface Renews Scrutiny Of A Mardi Gras Tradition

Mobile mom says shoes thrown from Mardi Gras float sent her kid to the ER

Popeyes might be onto something with chicken-tender-cradlin’ Mardi Gras beads

Sounds like a great way to get grease all over your shirt on Fat Tuesday.

I just got this email:

"Your satnav has always been there to guide you, now it needs your help. There is an issue that may impact the functionality of your satnav and requires your attention before 6 April 2019.
Please take a moment to check its status and learn if it will be impacted."

It is TomTom.
Does anyone have an idea why this update is needed? I'm worried it may 'update' a forced retirement on my wife's TomTom (it is getting rather old).

Why April 6?

Opened my mail, and found "Dissenter is a Gamer Changer". Hmmm - from Gab. New member or something? Sorry, not much interested . . . scan on down through the list of emails. Slide the mouse toward the top of the page to select another tab, and I notice "Dissenter is a browser extension".

Alright, curiosity piqued.

GAB

Earlier this week we launched our new sister app, Dissenter. Dissenter is a browser extension and website that allows you to comment on any URL online and also see what others have commented. This includes Wikipedia articles, Amazon products, Tweets, YouTube videos, CNN articles, and more.

Many people are saying that Dissenter.com is a “game changer” for the internet. It empowers the voice of The People and makes surfing the web fun again. At a time when most websites have removed or heavily censored their comment sections, Dissenter brings back the wild west of internet comments.

We fundamentally believe that Dissenter is going to be revolutionary for free speech online, but don’t take our word for it:

Dave Cullen says Dissenter is “incredibly innovative and important.

Styx says “I believe Dissenter has the capability of becoming the next big thing in tech.”

The Financial Times says “There is a clear demand for this sort of freedom. Some argue the concept is therefore a billion dollar idea with the potential to completely disrupt conventional media's control of its comment real estate.”

Discover what the entire internet is talking about, literally. Visit Dissenter.com and download the Dissenter browser extension today.

Alright, didn't we do this once before? I very specifically remember an extension that permitted people to comment on a page, but those comments didn't show up on the page unless you had that extension installed and enabled. It was kinda cool, but, I dropped it for reasons - probably security related reasons.

Alright then - let's look at this reincarnated potential security disaster that will lead the NSA right straight to my front door . . . I think maybe I'll test it with Chrome, keep it away from my Fox family . . .

Youtube "tutorial" on the extension here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYsdpKfe0w4

Hmmm - to comment you have to create an account. That isn't looking really great. If I wanted to leave anonymous comments, I'm kinda screwed. I usually sign my name to stuff anyway, but, I may just feel like visiting the White House to tell Donald Duck how damned STUPID he is for - oh, I don't know - appointing Ajit Pai? I can tell him nicely, and sign my name, or I can tell him rudely, and remain anonymous, except I can't do so with this extension.

Hmmm again. Can't seem to sign up and/or log in with the fork of Chromium that I installed to. I can read comments, but can't make comments, sign up, or log in. It *appears* that a Gab login credential might work to sign in - which is not good. Signing in to use the extension should be separate from any site's log in credentials.

Let me try this on another browser . . .

Ahhhhhh - Browser extension installed on Iron browser, and it works much better. I attempt to log in, it rejects my first login attempt, so I sort through some of my logins. Naturally, since I'm already suspicious that my Gab credentials will work on the extension, I try one of those credentials first. And, I'm in.

I'm presented with a popup:

Dissenter | Comment On Any URL Online. is requesting permission to access your account.

This application will be able to:

Read access to your profile and feeds
Send new posts
You can revoke this app's access later under Settings / Authorized Apps.

Nahhhh - I'm mildly impressed with Gab, and I agree with their stated purpose in life - but I don't trust them with the ability to track me around the internet any more than I trust FaceFuck. Cancel. Errr, wait. Maybe I'm being hasty. I don't USE Iron for anything. In fact, it doesn't have a single login saved. This login to Gab is the first and only login it has.

Nuts. "Authorize". See what I see, I guess.

Hmmmmm - still broken. I have "signed in" repeatedly, but still can't make a comment. Does Dissenter rely on something that my forks of browsers have ripped out of the browsers?

Ehhh, time to uninstall, and purge the browser's cache history. I've devoted more than enough time to this thing already.