I stand wholly behind my comment referring to this as a comically absurd kafka-esque look at our nations tax code, which is ostensibly the nations funding model, however given the level of downvotes, I would like to clarify the position a bit more formally:

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First, I appreciate you finding these links for me, I can actually use google quite well, however, I deign to point out that having a key piece of tax law intermittently down with such regularity that it is mirrored at an offsite location, in slightly poor form. Especially given the backlash Linux Mint faced just yesterday for not protecting itself and its' users. Linux Mint of course being an open source software project that, according to Wikipedia[1], is subsidized by partners and donations on a much smaller scale than the U.S. Gov't.

I will cut them some slack but I think holding the US government to a standard of one 9 of up time (on the left side of the decimal) isn't unreasonable. Now, obviously I could gave made a more cohesive argument to relay that point, which I hope is what the downbotes relay, and not disagreement.

The fact that some of the core Financial frameworks for a government that controls trillions of dollars of capital via tax revenue, and this very framework is how it raises that revenue, I suspect it would not be unreasonable to think a bit about structuring the system that makes it available.

In that it is served via non-secure HTTP and is so frequently down that the actual site links to a third party is somewhat troubling. More so, that the responses in fact seem to excuse this behavior which is, in fact, quite a dangerous precedent.

This isn't exactly, Show HN my weekend hack, right? Given that we expect an open source operating system to do many things surrounding security, do we not also find this a pretty immense lapse in judgement?

Consider:

* What if a student, or hacker gained access to the server by obtaining a password and making several edits to the document. It would not be unreasonable to assume that sysadmins have access to this, much like any internal infrastructure.

It is not a far fetched scenario. A large multi-corp could certainly do it, and given that the governments own site suggests it as a viable alternative. So, in the edge-case where they could not have congress insert a law directly into the tax code, they could of course cut out the middle man(joke).

So while I informally made a bit of a jest, I find this downright unprofessional especially in confluence with the statement they made about:

https://www.irs.gov/Tax-Professionals/The-Truth-About-Frivol...

Now, in fact the first income tax was actually started to fund the civil war[2] and went from 3% to 10% during that time. So, there were of course taxes but not a formal income tax. It wasn't formalized until 1919, by congress and people who make under 68K wouldn't need to file. So it isn't, in fact, unreasonable for a country formed out of a seccession from taxation rejected this notion, HOWEVER, irrespective of that argument, they make this statement:

[please see link for qoutes]

The rebuttal of a 1960 court case using the word "voluntary".

A 1986 court case stating they a are correct

And this statement, which is NOT a link:

The requirement to file an income tax return is not voluntary and is clearly set forth in sections 6011(a), 6012(a), et seq., and 6072(a) of the Internal Revenue Code. See also Treas. Reg. § 1.6011-1(a).

Which returns some shady book which is an entire rebuttal of what they said, but more importantly, a downed website, Cornell, and the insistence to go to Cornell to get the nations bloody tax code.

So to conclude, i don't know what you guys/girls are indicating, but if your contention is I should be able to use google better, and it isn't a big deal that the online version of our nations tax code is a cached 5 year old copy on a private university server, then frankly I don't know how to respond.

Consider, it would be entirely possible to retroactively change laws and court opinions if these things were not stored in a public place, in their most current form so that, other universities like Cornell, could host them as well and we would have 2 verifiable copies to make sure they hadn't been edited?

So a nations laws must be officially codified, however ridiculous, in a way that is irreversibly editable given it's state in time. So that, unless a new law is passed, Someone could not edit them at all, and that the public is made aware of them, and can verifiable look at them and read them, if not understand them due to their depth and complexity.

Original Comment

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edited for punctuation.

This is so Kafka it is legitimately unclear if this is trolling.

Contention: There is no law requiring taxes.

I actually wanted to see what the response to this was as I wondered if it was arbitrary. It is so FUCKING more absurd than that.

It is a tax form[0] which is the top answer when you google "irs tax code section 1", the relavent piece of law cited by the IRS demonstrating it's authority.

Now, leaving aside the link is pretty much a table that outlines what you pay in IRS legalese, it is hosted on Cornel Universities server and the IRS says it is provided to us, by Cornell. They also casually mention it isn't current, but is mostly the same as the original as this is the 2011 version.

Tl:dr, this law(and our power) is legitimate because of some case law and a 5 yearold invoice hosted on a private parties server. Unclear why they dont understand why the "myth" keeps circulating

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1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_Mint#Development

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_Revenue_Service

0. https://www.irs.gov/Tax-Professionals/Tax-Code,-Regulations-...

No I don't want to debate whether the IRS is legal, but whether or not anyone can credibly make the argument that this default behaviour is not, absurd.