The Infernal Revenue Service

This sort of thing is inevitable when government is allowed to directly tap your records and your bank accounts. And just think: no warrant, no messy process of prosecution (which would have allowed the citizens to remind these idiots of their innocence) -- no, the faceless mafiosi of the IRS simply go in and take the money. You want it back? Well, now, you'll have to work to clear that name of yours...

We are not a free nation under a benevolent government. The Founders would be appalled.

The IRS has acknowledged that Jamey and Lora Costner are victims of identity theft and aren't liable for 2005 income taxes on wages earned by impostors.

Congress called on Lora Costner to testify in Washington, D.C., on July 24 about their ordeal.

But the federal tax agency has sent the couple a bill for $2,748 in back income taxes from 2006 that actually are owed by identity thieves, and documents she provided show the IRS already has deducted $467 from Lora Costner's 401(k) retirement account.

"I have no words. I spoke before Congress. How could this happen?" Lora Costner said. When the letter came Saturday, her husband was afraid to tell her.

"I cried all night. I can't do this again," she said, after spending much of the past year untangling the snarl of red tape tied to their names.

And isn't it nice to know the identity thieves--illegal aliens, according to this account--were freed by a cooperative court on the grounds there is no law against using someone else's Social Security Number to obtain employment? ((Dear judge: look up the word "fraud."))

Abolish the IRS, abolish the tax code, abolish social security and get rid of these cattle-branding numbers. The entire machinery has done nothing but turn us into cogs in Leviathan's machine, while leaving us more open to abuse than if we simply fended for ourselves.

I'm no anarchist, but there ARE days...