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Hightower Lowdown
"You can spend your time agonizing or organizing." -- Dorothy Day
December's Lowdown
Corporate elites and their small-minded political servants are creating the Incredibly Shrinking America
"We the people of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." What a paragraph! This sparse, 52-word opening of our Constitution did not merely launch a fledgling nation--but a bold experiment in democratic idealism.
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In This Issue
The Bush push for an imperial presidency part 2
Who's spying on us? Rumsfeld's Pentagon takes the lead
Also in this issue:
- WHO IS TO BE "DETAINED"?
- SPORTS "BRANDALISM"
- DON'T LOOK DOWN ON IMMIGRANTS, LOOK UP
- THE MANNING MEMO
- A NEW HORROR FROM THE IRS
- BUSH ANNULS A LAW
Do Something!
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A NEW HORROR FROM THE IRS
It's time to call 9-1-1 about an IRS proposal to change Section 7216 of the Internal Revenue Code. This regulation would authorize giants like H & R Block or any other tax preparer to sell the contents of your private tax return to any corporation wanting to buy it! All of your personal contact information—including your Social Security number— could be sold, as well as information about your income, employer, medical expenses, children, charitable donations, etcetera.
Who's pushing this crass sell-off of our privacy? A powerful lobby of data brokers, including Choicepoint, credit companies like MasterCard, and marketers who want to use your 1040 filing to target you for sales.
The IRS says your data will not be sold unless you sign a form authorizing your tax preparer to do it. But it's all too easy for this socalled "consent" to be shuffled in with the stack of forms you have to sign to complete your filing, or to reduce it to fine-print, boiler-plate language that no one reads.
Our tax-return information should not be sold. Period. To learn more, call the Public Interest Research Group at 202-546-9707.