PELOSI: Buy a $15,000 Policy or Go to Jail

Renegade — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 14:45:55 +0000

The original article can be found here.

The collectivist tyrants trying to push this totally unconstitutional bill upon our citizenry have really not been paying attention or are so arrogant as to think they will get away with this. It is quite the joke, they are going to tell a Three Percenter, like myself that I am going to bow at the statist feet. I wish them a lot of luck. They will need it. They got us surrounded, the poor bastards.

JCT Confirms Failure to Comply with Democrats’ Mandate Can Lead to 5 Years in Jail
Friday, November 06, 2009

Today, Ranking Member of the House Ways and Means Committee Dave Camp (R-MI) released a letter from the non-partisan Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) confirming that the failure to comply with the individual mandate to buy health insurance contained in the Pelosi health care bill (H.R. 3962, as amended) could land people in jail. The JCT letter makes clear that Americans who do not maintain “acceptable health insurance coverage” and who choose not to pay the bill’s new individual mandate tax (generally 2.5% of income), are subject to numerous civil and criminal penalties, including criminal fines of up to $250,000 and imprisonment of up to five years.

In response to the JCT letter, Camp said: “This is the ultimate example of the Democrats’ command-and-control style of governing – buy what we tell you or go to jail. It is outrageous and it should be stopped immediately.”

Key excerpts from the JCT letter appear below:

“H.R. 3962 provides that an individual (or a husband and wife in the case of a joint return) who does not, at any time during the taxable year, maintain acceptable health insurance coverage for himself or herself and each of his or her qualifying children is subject to an additional tax.” [page 1]

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“If the government determines that the taxpayer’s unpaid tax liability results from willful behavior, the following penalties could apply…” [page 2]

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Read the complete article here.

“They’re gonna need a bigger jail.” Yeah, and a whole crap-ton of deputies.

Renegade — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 15:15:43 +0000

The original article can be found here.

How much closer to the wall can we be pushed?

March on Washington, 12 September 2009,

Carrie Budoff Brown has been tracking this story at Politico.com.

September 24, 2009

Flout the mandate penalty? Face the IRS

Americans who fail to pay the penalty for not buying insurance would face legal action from the Internal Revenue Service, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.

The remarks Thursday from the committee’s chief of staff, Thomas Barthold, seems to further weaken President Barack Obama’s contention last week that the individual mandate penalty, which could go as high as $1,900, is not a tax increase.

Under questioning from Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.), Barthold said the IRS would “take you to court and undertake normal collection proceedings.”

Ensign pursued the line of questioning because he said a lot of Americans don’t believe the Constitution allows the government to mandate the purchase of insurance.

“We could be subjecting those very people who conscientiously, because they believe in the U.S. Constitution, we could be subjecting them to fines or the interpretation of a judge, all the way up to imprisonment,” Ensign said. “That seems to me to be a problem.”

Ensign’s argument, however, wasn’t persuasive to the committee — which rejected an amendment from Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) to eliminate the individual mandate.

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) was the only Republican to vote with Democrats to preserve the mandate.

Ensign pressed for an explanation of what would happen to someone who didn’t knuckle under to the mandate. This is what he received in reply.

Brown writes:

September 25, 2009

Ensign receives handwritten confirmation

This doesn’t happen often enough.

Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) received a handwritten note Thursday from Joint Committee on Taxation Chief of Staff Tom Barthold confirming the penalty for failing to pay the up to $1,900 fee for not buying health insurance.

Violators could be charged with a misdemeanor and could face up to a year in jail or a $25,000 penalty, Barthold wrote on JCT letterhead. He signed it “Sincerely, Thomas A. Barthold.”

The note was a follow-up to Ensign’s questioning at the markup.

To which “jd” commented at Politico:

“They’re gonna need a bigger jail.”

“Yeah, and a whole crap-ton of deputies” comments Mike V. at Sipsey Street Irregulars.(my emphasis)

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PELOSI: Buy a $15,000 Policy or Go to Jail

“They’re gonna need a bigger jail.” Yeah, and a whole crap-ton of deputies.