I recently received a couple e-mail messages suggesting that our government has crossed a mighty threshold and that it was time for us, as concerned citizens, to take action to express our displeasure with policies architected to bury current and future taxpayers in unprecedented amounts of debt. These e-mail messages suggested the solution was getting a large group of people to simply refuse to pay their federal income taxes.

The logic here is that without tax revenue, the federal government would be unable to fund programs like those in the recent "Stimulus Package." Plus, what better way to let elected leaders know you're not happy with the direction they're taking the country than by pulling the plug on the very means they have to do those things?

I'm not sure I agree with this suggestion. It's an intriguing suggestion, but it's a risky move for obvious reasons. If you don't get enough people to go along with it, then you're asking to be fined and penalized by the IRS. On the other hand, if you do get enough people to go along with it, it would be virtually impossible for the government to go after all those who refuse to pay.

I did a quick Google search to see what kind of "chatter" there is online about such a tax revolt. There's a little background talk about it, but mostly people are organizing protests against tax hikes and the Obama "stimulus."

If the Obama "Stimulus" is just the beginning of similar policy shifts to come, we may very well begin seeing items in the news like this and it will be interesting to see how the administration responds. Will they step back and find peaceful solutions or will we be looking at incidents reminiscent of Ruby Ridge, ID and the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, TX?

In slightly unrelated news, it is interesting to see how quickly terms like "flat tax" and "fair tax" have all but disappeared from the public radar since President Obama took office.