Author: Greg Snyder

The IRS and Cryptocurrency, which, btw, is NOT a currency.

by Greg Snyder

Have you ever asked yourself any questions about the IRS? I have. I know that governmental agencies usually have specifically defined purposes and functions and that they often do not include functions that may be provided by other agencies such as law enforcement and/or security and protection so that they are left to provide for such for themselves on their own if they do so at all. And then I wonder if government agencies, even those tasked with the functions of regulation and law enforcement, always fulfill such obligations? The exact role and nature of the functions of the IRS are a little unclear to me. As an agency of the United States federal government, does it have any functions that protect the public? How exactly does the IRS function to safeguard the economy so that ordinary Americans are guarded from loss or damage caused to the economy as a whole which negatively impact them? Is protection of the economy very broadly, and of citizens more specifically, a function of the IRS? If not, should it be?  

With just a tiny bit of online research I found the following:

The mission of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is to provide taxpayers with high-quality service to help them understand and meet their tax responsibilities, and to enforce the law with integrity and fairness. 

Purpose of the IRS

As a bureau of the Department of the Treasury, the IRS administers and enforces federal tax laws. Established in 1862 during the Civil War to collect the nation’s first income tax, the IRS’s purpose now includes tax collection, taxpayer services, and tax law enforcement. The IRS collected nearly $4.7 trillion in revenue in fiscal year 2023. They assist taxpayers through various resources like forms, publications, and helplines. The agency also enforces tax laws by auditing returns and investigating financial crimes through its Criminal Investigation division. 

IRS core mission statement

The IRS’s core mission statement focuses on taxpayer service and law enforcement. They aim to help taxpayers understand their obligations through accessible information and assistance, while also enforcing the tax code fairly to ensure compliance. 

Core values

The IRS operates with core values such as integrity, respect, accountability, continuous improvement, and collaboration to guide its mission. 

Prior to Trump’s second term, Congress had already taken steps to put cryptocurrency under the umbrella of the treasury department for better or for worse and without, I believe, a full understanding of cryptocurrency or thorough planning, oversight, or protections for its adoption and use within the treasury department. The IRS, under Trump, is incorporating cryptocurrency into its jurisdiction and purview. Since January, while in the office as president of the United States, Trump has invested heavily in cryptocurrency. It has been reported that he and his family have profited by billions of dollars in only a few months. Trump has a vested interest in making sure that cryptocurrency serves his long-term financial goals. Trump does not have direct control of cryptocurrency policy. But he does have control of the agency policy directors who have stepped into the role of serving him unquestioningly and as is true of all of Trump’s administrative personnel, if or when they do not serve him unquestioningly, they will usually find themselves fired from the job immediately. The incorporation of cryptocurrency by the treasury department into its system inherently involves a high degree of potential for conflict of interest and corruption.  

So, what is cryptocurrency? Is it money? Is it a component of the market and economy that generates revenue, value, or that supports the economy?  

I am not a coder or programmer and I do not understand how this technology is devised and created, or what its original intended purpose was. I don’t know what ideas or concept designs bring forth new computer technology. But computer technology is created and becomes part of our lives even when we know little or nothing about it or how it affects our lives now or how it will or could impact our lives in the future. I say this about cryptocurrency and AI and all technological innovations that instantly enter into our lives and become a part of the free market and present themselves on Wall Street trading floors as entities that are traded and have definite impacts on the economy and thus on all of us.

Not really knowing what cryptocurrency is, after a little researching I have found that:

Cryptocurrency is digital currency that doesn’t require a central bank or financial institution to verify transactions. Instead, this virtual currency is verified and recorded with blockchain technology, creating an unchangeable ledger that tracks trades and the purchase of digital assets.

Cryptocurrency is not a currency in the same way that a “real” or “fiat” currencies like the U.S. dollar because it’s decentralized, not issued by a government or central bank, and generally lacks government backing, insurance, or an established legal tender status. While some people use crypto for payments, many treat it as an investment, and the IRS taxes it as property, not as a currency. 

So, what, exactly is a “digital” currency? Is it a real thing? Is it real money that comes from a real bank account and that goes to another real bank account? Or is it a debit that is created on a non-verified, non-centralized bank account by a publicly facing and supposedly transparent and permanent leger through a blockchain? Again, is it real? Are cryptocurrency transactions in fact legitimate, traceable, and verifiable transactions that take place between two real bank accounts using real money? How are two sets of accounts, one regular banking, the other cryptocurrency, balanced, reconciled, and coordinated? Does having two sets of accounts pose any risk for the economy in general? Does having two sets of two different types of accounts create a potential for economic problems? Does a cryptocurrency transaction represent real money that is coming from a real bank account and is going into a real bank account? If that is the case, why use cryptocurrency and why not just use real bank accounts in real banks that use real legal tender and are insured instead? Isn’t the whole idea behind a “digital currency” redundant when the necessary traditional banking services and financial tools that we have always used are already in use in the transactions that we make every day? Why use a system that is redundant and is not needed and is not guaranteed or secure or insured? Is swapping out the protections that we have using a secure and insured banking system for a peer-to-peer closed autonomous system with no such protections a smart thing to do?  

The most serious caveat that has been made about the use of cryptocurrency in general is that it is often not used to benignly transfer money, which normally is usually done using traditional banking services and methods, but is used to carry out illicit, nefarious, and criminal activities and as a devise to launder money. Money laundering then leads to increased crime and can confound and compound many law enforcement and judicial activities and issues.

I believe Congress and the treasury department are in the process of determining how to embed and interlink cryptocurrency fully into the IRS. The federal government of the United States seems to be determined to change the status of cryptocurrency and to fully validate it as part of the whole economic system and seems to seek to allow it to remain a sort of autonomous and not adequately regulated or secured part of the banking system.

If it is true that one of the stated purposes of the IRS is “to investigate financial crimes through its Criminal Investigation division” I would think, hope, and expect that any codification of cryptocurrency in the IRS by Congress would ensure protections against potential crimes that could be committed with cryptocurrency and to prevent those from occurring. But that would require that Congress enforce laws, rules and regulations that prevent such crime from occurring.

A General Strike in the United States Would Require Massive Organizing

by Greg Snyder

This could be facilitated by Labor Unions, NGOs, Social Service organizations, schools and educational institutions, state and local political offices, various other types of collectives or agencies or non-profits, the independent press, social media, and hundreds of thousands of volunteers to name a few. Education of the public as to what a general strike is would be an absolute necessity in planning for and initiating one.

For Americans, the two most difficult aspects of a general strike are:

1. It requires not working and not participating as much as possible in the economy. Limiting buying to pay mostly for necessities. And,

2. a general strike could take a long time to achieve the stated goals and objectives of the strike. It requires a siege mentality to stick it out and survive. So, people need be prepared to do that. It would require planning and setting up a plan.

A general strike in the United States would not be like other great general strikes in history because it would not involve being confined or defending against violence. It would simply be stopping work, not paying federal taxes, and not buying most things except for necessities. The point is to make it be felt in the economy.

Another thing about a  general strike in the United States is that one of its key objectives would be to demand, and not relent in our demands, until Congress does what we are demanding and gives us a fair tax code that does not favor the rich by giving them a set of benefits in regards to deductions for luxury items like yachts/private jets/show horses, etc, which the rest of us do not have, loopholes, waivers, exemptions, tax cuts, tax havens that allow them to hoard cash in offshore accounts etc., etc. that the rest of us do not have.

A new tax code, one that I am calling a fair tax code, would be a tax code that no longer has benefits that go only to the wealthy that the rest of us do not have. A new tax code that is fair does not reduce taxes on those who do not need tax breaks; it raises them. The rich can certainly pay more taxes without it causing them any real harm in terms of financial or monetary security. After tax increases on them, they will still remain very rich. A fair tax code does not impose high taxes on people who are hurt by them and cannot afford higher taxes. The only taxation that is fair is taxation that taxes according to the ability to pay them. The only justification for tax waivers, tax breaks, and exemptions to paying taxes is to give them to the poor or marginally poor who barely make ends meet because they are the only genuinely needy and deserving people when it comes to tax “relief.”  

The simple rule of thumb for Congress to adhere to when writing a fair tax code is that it has to be uniform and not give one class of people, the rich, benefits that the rest of us do not have or get, and to eliminate benefits that the rich get that the rest of the population do not get. It’s a very simple and unambiguous concept.  

Getting back to the difficulties of Americans living during a general strike:

We would have to accept that a general strike means shutting work down. A strike is always temporary. But it could last for a long time. Employers would know that workers are striking to achieve specific economic and political goals and objectives and that it is not personal. It is a cultural goal and aspiration and need. During the Covid shutdown/slowdown, many businesses had to shut their doors, many permanently. That is a risk. In the undertaking of any major social movement there are always shifts and changes and shocks. But, as it is true with nature when it is no longer being assaulted by damaging activities done to it by people, it can and does re-equilibrate and begin to stabilize and heal itself over time after the event has concluded. That happened with the Covid epidemic. Eventually many businesses reestablished a strong footing post Covid.

Small and medium-sized businesses might be better positioned during a general strike to stay open on a limited basis if the business is one of proving essential needs. But as people will have to reserve and stretch the funds they have for the duration of the strike they will probably not be consuming as much during a strike as they normally do other than on essentials.

An important consideration for the success of a general strike is for it to be a whole community inclusive event. Every individual would have to be involved and I would hope that every business would also consider itself part of the community. As part of a whole community, businesses could do what they can to help people sustain the strike.

Small and medium-sized and possibly even corporate businesses might, in reality, become an ally to a general strike if they can dialog with their employees about a possible return to work at the conclusion of the strike if the businesses can sustain a prolonged stoppage without going out of business altogether. It would save them from having to reestablish business from scratch after the strike. And it could be a bond between employer and employees.

 We know that Americans often have from 3 to 7 career changes in a lifetime. And we saw that after the Covid lockdown and epidemic people returned to work. Sometimes in the same jobs they had before the epidemic. Sometimes in a different career altogether. So, we know that we can do this. Americans already do it anyway as part of the way they live. It’s not preferable to have to start all over in a new career. But it is doable.

Americans must consider coming together in their communities to help and look after one another and to help those who need it. I believe this is what has occurred in past general strikes that have been successful. Come together. Pool resources. Help your neighbors. Be part of a community. Be together in this.

There are plenty of reasons to engage in a general strike at this time in our history of the United States, when there is so much at risk because of the dangerous government we have.

We risk losing our democracy to a kleptocratic autocrat and his entourage of opportunistic, nihilistic enablers and administration, a very slim sliver of the American population, and the United States could possibly end up as a society of the tiny few “haves” and the vast bulk of the population of “have nots.” Any intelligent and thinking rich person would know that a poor population does not sustain prosperity for the rich or bode well with the continuation of a flourishing economy.

A general strike has to have goals and objectives. There are many causes of alarm and concern that engulf us at this time:

We have a unitary executive president and a Supreme Court that made it possible and put him above the law.

We have a unitary executive president whose immediate goal seems to be to create an army to harass and disappear immigrants without due process and to quell protest and the petitioning of grievances and opposition by citizens, a right guaranteed by the first amendment.

We have a DoJ that has become the personal property of the unitary executive president.

We have a non-ethical, religiously-biased, corporate-owned, partisan and political Supreme Court majority that has made it a habit of degrading the Constitution, the document that they all swore to uphold, protect, and defend who are using their role “to interpret” the Constitution to destroy it.

We have a conservative Supreme Court that is rolling back, eroding, and eliminating voting rights and full voting participation by all eligible voters by allowing states to use many tactics to disenfranchise voters on specious grounds, dismantling human rights, including the right for women to make their own reproductive decisions, allowing gerrymandering, and allowing for the continued degradation and destruction of the Earth’s environment. All in service to corporate and special interests.

We have a tax code that is going to add trillions of dollars to the federal budget to make the rich even richer at the expense of the rest of the population and a president who is illegally imposing tariffs to help pay for the ballooning deficit caused by the engorged enriching of billionaires via the enormous tax cuts to the rich and shifting the cost of tariffs to regular consumers to do so.

We have gross economic inequality that threatens us with real damage economically and culturally.

We have an unjust Justice system.

We have a corporate mainstream legacy media that has dismissed its obligation to be a free and independent press and no longer serves to truthfully inform the population and that serves an increasingly fascist government and moneyed special interests, most especially including their own interests.

This is my own partial individual personal list of concerns that I believe really need to be addressed and dealt with politically and thus my belief that at some point a general strike may become necessary to achieve a list of political goals and objectives.

Given the many areas of grave concern and problems that we as a nation are facing, I believe the list should be an officially endorsed document outlining political goals and objectives that have been arrived at through a consensus of the largest possible number of strike participants. That seems to me the only way to democratically go about carrying out a general strike.

If you are still reading, thank you. I know it’s a lot. Probably too much. But it’s also why so many people are feeling so stressed out and hopeless. But I write this with the hope that something good can come out of it. Possibly many good things can come out of it.

I’ll end with my own short list of goals and objectives that I would like to see the American people be able to achieve to move on to a better future. Most, if not all of these things would require Congress to do them:

  1. Eliminate the unitary executive president with common sense laws that limit the president’s power.
  2. Restore an independent DoJ and make it free of the president’s control. Proscribe the use of National Guard reservists and the US military for illegal or unconstitutional law enforcement activities and for policing American cities when there is no emergency and only if it has been approved by Congress. Require that law enforcement officers not be allowed to wear masks and are required to identify themselves as legitimate law enforcement officers when asked to do so.   Abolish ICE .
  3. Reform the Supreme Court with term limits. Create a Supreme Court code of ethics that is enforced by laws of Congress, not by the court’s own relaxed self-protective half measures. Eliminate life-long terms of employment for justices and institute term limits. (A life-long term of employment was never a good idea and is a guarantee that almost all people do NOT have in almost all work. It’s an outdated convention of privilege that belongs in the trash.) Establish an IA for the judiciary, including the Supreme Court, that can investigate allegations, indict, and prosecute possible violations and has a mechanism to remove judges found guilty of gross misconduct from the bench.  
  4. Make taking gifts and bribes by any judge or elected official an illegal activity like it used to be. Ensure and enforce that elected officials taking bribes and gifts results in termination.
  5. End all stock trading by members of Congress while they are serving as members of Congress.
  6.  End Citizen’s United and get money out of politics.
  7. Limit campaign spending and implement public funding of campaigns. Shorten the duration of political campaigns.
  8. Scrap the current tax code. Congress start fresh and write a new fair tax code. See above.
  9. End gerrymandering. Abolish all currently gerrymandered districts nationwide and require that voting district maps be redrawn by independent map makers who do not use racial or other prejudicial criteria to draw maps.

That is my short wishlist of the political goals and objectives that I would propose be included in any officially endorsed declaration for a general strike. But that document could be anything and have as many or as few demands as agreed upon by a consensus of participants.

I have hope for the future. If things get bad enough then possibly the country might need to consider the need to have a general strike. General strikes have been used in the past to make difficult political change possible and have helped their countries move on to a more positive future. So, it’s something to have in mind.

Social Security Applauds Passage of Legislation Providing Historic Tax Relief for Seniors

by Greg Snyder

Trump/Republican “Good News” following Republican passage of The Republican Big Ugly Bill 

Got a cheery (yes, it’s sarcasm) bit of propaganda from the new Social Security Administration under Trump this morning. The day after the Republicans passed the Big Ugly Bill. 

The propaganda told me the good news that Social Security benefits are no longer going to be taxed. If that is true, great. However, the propaganda does NOT mention several very important points:

1. This is the first step in the Republican/Trump plan to eliminate Social Security altogether. 

2. It is appeasement for those already receiving Social Security benefits to help them “look the other way” in the future actions the republicans may take to further decimate the program. 

3. Republicans think they are doing a good service by eliminating this crucially important safety net for their own ludicrous and unknown reasons. They don’t talk about them except to call Social Security socialism or some other such bullshit smear. What Social Security is can be thought of as a retirement bank account that Americans pay into every hour that they work from the time they begin working until they retire. It is an earned investment, not socialism, not fraud. 

4. The truth is that Social Security is not broken and never has been broken. In fact, it has performed spectacularly since its inception. But Republicans and Trump, right now, are trying very hard to destroy and eliminate it permanently. 

5. The truth about Social Security is that it can be easily improved, strengthened, expanded, and made permanently solvent very easily by removing the artificial cap on the upper limit of income that is taxed to pay into the Social Security Trust Fund. That’s it. 

That single easy step would fix the problem of Social Security solvency and give the Social Security Administration the ability to expand benefits and make it a permanent program of retirement for hard working Americans. 

So, the good, cheery bit of propaganda I got from the Social Security Administration this morning, the day after the Republicans passed Trump’s Big Ugly Bill, may be good news if indeed it is true that Social Security benefits will no longer be taxed. But that shouldn’t have happened in the first place anyway because it is double taxation for no good cause or reason. So, stopping double taxation for Social Security for working Americans is only the bare minimum thing that Republicans could have done to help rather than hurt working Americans. And it should be permanent. 

But far better news yet will be when Congress finally fixes the problem of Social Security solvency by taking the very easy, very do-able step of removing the artificial cap on the upper limit of income taxed for it. 

Oh, and it wouldn’t hurt if Congress returned the trillions of dollars that Congress has “borrowed” and promised to pay back from the Social Security Trust Fund to pay for disastrous and unsanctioned wars that didn’t do any good for anything or anyone.

The Public Needs to be Protected

by Greg Snyder

The Fairness Doctrine was defective because it did not protect the public from the propaganda, lies, non-verified/non-fact checked, speculation, opinions, and distortions of truth, smears campaigns, fear-mongering, xenophobia and racism, that is being produced every day by mainstream news media and cable channel “news” shows like Fox News.

The defect of the Fairness Doctrine that was exploited was that its guidelines did not protect the public, but rather mandated that “both sides” of an issue be covered in the news and given equal time before the public. This was abused to create reasonable doubt in the public mind and then used to advance a deleterious libertarian free market ideology and policy agenda by a small group of scientists working for the administrations of republican presidents to obscure the truth of settled science on a number of consequential issues.

“The Merchants of Doubt”, a book by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway provides a detailed exposé of how these scientists working for republican administrations attacked settled scientific truths that were not even in question as there was general consensus in the scientific community based on the scientific method, peer reviewed validation, that had already definitively scientifically settled these matters. We are still very much living with this type of media manipulation of facts and reality by a mass corporate media and cable news outlets that today continue to spread propaganda, lies, conspiracy theories, delusional speculations, radically extreme conservative and opinions, hate-mongering and race-baiting xenophobia even though the Fairness Doctrine was stopped by Ronald Reagan’s FCC in 1987.

The United States needs a law that protects the public from mass manipulation by the unscrupulous, self-serving corporate and cable media empires that control the airwaves and much of the press. We need a law that requires fact-checking and proscribes the dissemination of non-factual, non-verified, non-vetted information that is speculative or deceptive or manipulative and ideologically or politically based. This new law would require that it is the news source’s responsibility to prove the veracity of the content it disseminates. Speculative and opinion editorial content should all be required to provide disclaimers to alert the public that that is what is being reported, speculations or opinions that are not necessarily factual in nature. So, viewer be warned.

The law that is needed is not the Fairness Doctrine. But rather it would have to be a law to protect the public, not demand equal time on settled matters which, as we now know, can be used to muddy the waters, confuse or scare the public, and create reasonable doubt when there really is no actual reasonable doubt.

The Big Ugly Senate Bill

by Greg Snyder

Trump wants to put more than 250 million acres of public lands up for sale to anyone. And senate republicans have put that into their big ugly bill. They want to make it law.

That is a proposal to make the biggest transfer of national resources in the history of the United States, resources that belong to the people, away from the people and into private pockets and bank accounts. Tax cuts for the rich are bad enough. But senate republicans also want to put this vast chunk of publicly-owned land up for sale to anyone for pennies on the dollar. This would take land that is in trust that belongs to all of us and which is under the stewardship of all Americans and to future generations of Americans and release it for sale. Damn the rest of the population whose land it is and to all future generations of Americans. Senate republicans say that they care about our future. But they are actively seeking to put the future, our future and the future of future generations, up for sale.

If the big ugly senate bill becomes law, not only will the massive tax cuts for the rich increase the deficit by trillions of dollars and slash the social safety net that we depend on, but our public lands will also be put up for sale and could disappear forever. The vast publicly-owned lands that belong to all of us could become private property and be exploited any way new owners would wish and the people would be left with nothing in return. That is a double hit of impoverishment that would certainly make the country that much more destitute.

Most Americans do not approve of what the republicans are trying to do. If the republicans persist and push this bill through, there will be a backlash, not just about this theft of public lands and the deficit-ballooning tax breaks for the rich, but for all of the other malicious and destructive items in the bill as well.

There are things that concerned citizens can do if public lands are put on the auction block:

Monthly reports of sales of public lands identifying the individuals and/or businesses who made purchases can be collected and publicly disseminated.

Talented hackers might be able to find creative ways to reach out and respond to these individuals and businesses and find novel ways to interact with them.

Concerned citizens can reach out to these individuals and businesses with their concerns and questions in emails, texts, social media posts, phone calls and in person in protests like Tesla Protests at Tesla dealerships.

Boycotts of business, as in the Tesla Protests and the backlash to Target’s ridiculous DEI ban, can be initiated.

Boycotting the payment of federal taxes starting in 2026 and lasting however long it takes for Congress to give us what we want. gregleesnyderpdx.com/2025/03/15/w…

gregleesnyderpdx.com/2025/06/16/p… can be an option for protest, our own Project 2026 so to speak.

Mass peaceful protests like the ‘Hands Off’ and ‘No Kings’ protests, and actions of civil disobedience can be a method to demonstrate the mood, opposition, and disapproval of the American people and a way to make our demands known to our elected representatives and the mainstream media that really doesn’t serve the public interest but does well serving special interests.

Americans can always band together in numbers to peacefully protest and petition grievances to our government. Rural protests can be attended by friends and family members from urban centers in states to show support for rural matter as well.

The midterm elections could make all of this moot if enough democrats are elected to take control of Congress away from the republicans. So, it is very important to vote and to vote for democrats.

The rights, freedom, liberty, privacy, safety, security of all Americans are all at risk and being aggressively threatened by Congressional republicans. But American citizens are not powerless or without recourse and remedy to the reckless endangerment and abuses being heaped on them by the republicans in Congress. The list of activities above are just some of the ways that Americans can actively engage themselves in stopping the destructive impulses and activities of the republican party and make the United States a better place. But that will require the participation of a critical mass of concerned American citizens. That means you. Democracy requires participation. If you don’t exercise your civic obligation muscles they atrophy. No one can’t just sit this out. We are all needed on board.

Project 2026 Tax Boycott

by Greg Snyder

In April of 2026, we might all consider not paying our federal taxes and continue to do so until Congress gives the United States a fair and progressive tax code that does not increase taxes on anyone making $150k/year or less and exempts taxation of income on all income of individuals and families at or below the poverty line.

Instead of paying federal taxes as is normal in April of 2026 and beyond, due to the current unjust political taxation as it is currently established and implemented, we could instead have our taxes prepared and filed as usual and all penalties for non-payment of taxes during the boycott are waived until Congress produces a new progressive and fair tax code, and pay only state taxes but not pay federal taxes until the following demands are met:

A new tax code that ends tax breaks for the rich and adds additional tax brackets to tax ALL upper levels of income.

Restores IRS funding, staffing, and functioning to Biden administration levels.

Fair and progressive taxation on all corporate income and the elimination of exemptions, waivers, exceptions with enforcement penalties for non-payment of taxes.

Automatic auditing and taxation of all overseas tax haven accounts and closing all loopholes and preferential treatment of expatriated wealth.

A one time inheritance tax as proposed by Elizabeth Warren.

A tax on all securities and stock transactions.

A review of all federal subsidies and the elimination of all subsidies to profitable corporations.

Convert federal subsidies in the Farm Bill that pay for monoculture crops and use it to pay for Restorative Agricultural farming/ranching which would also greatly mitigate climate change and greatly improve a carbon sink back into our soil.

Give it some thought. A tax boycott might be able to help us get Congress to do what it has needed to do for a long time: Give us a fair and progressive tax code.

A Democratic Post Midterm Election Tax Platform

by Greg Snyder

Democrats in Congress should immediately start writing a new tax code that among other things restores funding to the IRS to Biden administration levels, taxes ALL upper levels of income, institutes a one time wealth tax as proposed by Elizabeth Warren, taxes offshore accounts, eliminates corporate subsidies, restores a corporate alternative minimum, and adds a transaction tax on securities sales. Democrats running for election in the midterm election should campaign on this tax agenda. This should be done now, immediately, in preparation for the midterm elections. It should be a democratic party platform priority for the midterm elections and the democratic party should have a tax bill ready to go directly to a vote immediately after the midterm elections are over.

Is it Time to Rethink Work?

by Greg Snyder

Working is a difficult concept. Individuals have to figure out what they want to do for work. Ideally, it is something they enjoy doing. But, just that first step, figuring out what kind of work to do is a difficult process for most people.

For most people, work is a reality in which they have no say or power. It doesn’t have to be that way. But finding an alternative to it requires creative thinking and problem-solving and/or a commitment to more active participation, communication and team playing. It also requires a desire to be more empowered and autonomous. For many people these requirements are too much to accept so they are at the mercy of seeking private sector employment in already established businesses.

Employee-owned companies and collectives, stores, and businesses that produce goods and services are a way out of the slavery that working for a hierarchical, management-heavy, for-profit business can be and often is.

Even when people who work in such companies enjoy the work that they do, it can often be in a hostile environment that is degrading, demeaning, and that does not value the contribution of the worker, especially in terms of compensation, labor rights, and benefits.

Employee-owned businesses can be the solution and a way out of the slavery and drudgery of working for a company that does not value the work and contribution of its workers and whose sole interest is the profit margin of the owners, shareholders, executives, and corporate boards. The sad fact of capitalism is that the working side of business, the workers who actually do the work and are the productive members within the business itself, usually have no say or power in this type of business model and do not share equally in the profit generated by the goods and services they produce. It’s the owners and shareholders who most benefit from this type of business model. And they don’t do any of the work. The workers do the work.  

Employee-owned businesses can develop and adopt any form of business model that they want to follow and structure themselves any way they want. They can be egalitarian and equitable. That is the beauty of employee-based business: it can provide a good living for workers, create a good work environment that allows for the workers to enjoy doing what they like to do while providing them with better compensation and benefits without having to struggle and fight for them and face opposition (owners and CEOs) that has deeper pockets for ligation and lobbying and which will do anything it can to protect and maintain its bottom line which usually means keeping costs and overhead as low as possible which translates to paying low wages and strictly limiting or eliminating paying benefits or giving cost of living increases.

The establishment of employee-owned or collective businesses is a process that relies almost entirely on the expertise and experience of core people who know how to start a business from scrap with very little or no outside financial assistance which is a formidable task. Depending on outside financial assistance can be a minefield and expose the new business to predatory, indebted servitude to banks or private equity that most often take a company that often starts with the goal of being a self-sustaining company and breaking it. A lot of thought, planning, and a solid business plan are required to avoid that pitfall and demise. It requires enough people coming together to bring it to fruition who are willing to be part of it and commit to making it work so that being dependent on outside financial assistance is not and does not become necessary.  

So, if it is time to rethink work, there are alternatives to the traditional business model that are egalitarian and give the workers their fair due. It’s not the easy way to go and there are costs and risks. But, in the end, if workers are treated fairly and everyone is compensated well and is able to thrive in a work environment, wouldn’t it be worth it? Americans have always been entrepreneurs. But they haven’t scaled it up to the point where small businesses and employee-owned and collective businesses are the dominant business model. That may never happen. But it doesn’t mean that the potential for that happening does not exist.

3,000 Against 263,000,000

by Greg Snyder

There are around 2,500 billionaires now. They own the 273 Republicans in both houses of Congress and 6 of the Supreme Court Justices.

But we are 340 million people. There are more of us than there are of them.

Our constitutional democracy was created for “We, the people.” Not for a delusional, sociopathic, mentally sick wannabeking or dictator and his aristocracy (oligarchy) and their political lackeys.

77 million people voted for what we are all experiencing currently. Hopefully, some of them are beginning to understand that they willingly fell for being conned and voted accordingly and now, as a result, they are being injured by a thousand little cuts to their income, their standard of living, their retirement, their rights, their constitution, their laws, their justice system, their currency, their safety, security and well-being. All of those things are now being assaulted head on by the Trump administration.

It’s not just the people who voted for him and the chaos that he has brought with him who are suffering and will be made to suffer much more in ways that they never could have conceived as even possible as time advances. Their vote for Trump is forcing ALL OF US to go through this horrible nightmare. We are all suffering as a result.

People, good people, do not do that to themselves, their friends, their family, their community, and their nation. They need to understand that for themselves and figure out the reasons and causes that led them on a path that took them so far away from our values as a nation. No one of us can do that for them. It will have to be a personal moment of reflection that brings them to their own understanding if it’s going to happen at all.

I suspect that somehow the 2024 vote that brought Trump to office for a second term could have been manipulated to give Trump those “11.7 votes” that he needed to push a win across the finish line. I believe some interesting information is beginning to surface now about how the vote in some states may have possibly been manipulated to limit the vote of democrats in those states. I am not proposing a conspiracy theory, but a strong suspicion based on data that needs to be either verified or found to be false. However, if states themselves do not do the forensic investigations that would be needed to fully understand this, it will not be done and the truth will remain hidden.

Getting back to my original point at the beginning of this essay:

There are about 2,500 billionaires now and they own the 273 Republicans in both houses of Congress and 6 of the Supreme Court justices.

But, We, the people, number 340 million people, minus the 77 million people who fell for the con and cannot be relied upon to do the right thing and stand up to save the country until they themselves have come to that on their own. I wish that they would and hope that they do join with the rest of us.

So, until they do that, that leaves 263 million Americans who can reliably, if they want to do so, fight back. Fight Trump. That is millions more people than the fewer than 3,000 billionaires and their republican sycophants and tools thatapparently want everything all to themselves and nothing for everyone else. That is millions of people to fight Trump’s inner circle and cabinet. Fight the oligarchs. And fight the sick insanity that has occupied the entire executive branch of our federal government. That is enough people to shake up these offenders who have all lost their minds and deeply offended and injured the American people.

So, the time for standing up and making our voices and demands be heard and implemented is not over yet. Not with the first of the mass national protests that occurred on May 5, 2025. Actions will undoubtedly still be necessary for some time to come.

But I have confidence and hope that the people will prevail. They can if that is what they want. It takes consent to be governed. It takes good governance to merit consent. That’s what we need to stand up for.

Come together. Join hands. It’s going to be a long march.

General Boycott of paying your Taxes

by Greg Snyder

If you do not like what the government is doing under Trump/Musk and the republican party, next year, in April of 2026, for the 2025 tax year, if you can, please consider not paying your taxes.

If enough people do not pay taxes and it truly gets the attention of Congress, it could serve as incentive for Congress to rewrite the tax code; a tax code that is fair and does not increase the tax on people making less than 400k a year but taxes all upper levels of income, imposes a responsible corporate tax burden, cuts wasteful and fraudulent subsidies, waivers, exclusions, limits, creates more tax brackets for the upper levels of income that have not been adequately taxed since the 1970s, closes tax shelter loopholes and offshore tax-free havens by making them taxable accounts, we would finally have the tax code that is fair that we need.

There are penalties for not filing your taxes at tax time. Filing your taxes prevents having to pay penalties for not filing them. The two options are filing, or not filing your taxes.

There are late fee penalties if you don’t pay your taxes.

If enough people do not pay their taxes that it gets the attention of Congress and makes Congress realize that it has to do something and fix the tax code, penalties for not filing taxes and for not paying them during a boycott should be rescinded. But this needs to be a condition that is understood by Congress by the people not paying taxes until there is a new fair tax code in place. We, the people, we, the tax payers, can resume paying our taxes as we have always done, after we have a fair tax code and when we have a guarantee from Congress that there will be no penalties for having not filed or paid taxes until then, however many years that may take.

Not paying taxes for as long as it takes to get Congress to rewrite a new fair tax code could take a long time. It may take years. However, not paying taxes for one, or two, or more years until we have a fair tax code, if we end up with a fair tax code, would be worthwhile.