- Michael Moore at Wisconsin uprising
Tax Day is coming on Monday. And Michael Moore has a message about why you should join with other MoveOn members and fellow progressive groups in Detroit to call out the big corporations who aren’t paying their taxes while programs to create jobs and help the needy get cut. Dear Maureen,
Do you wonder (like I do) what the tax accountants and executives are doing over at GE this weekend? Frantically rushing to fill out their IRS returns like the rest of us? Hardly. They’re taking the weekend off to throw themselves a big party and have a hearty laugh at all of us. It must really crack them up to see us like suckers scurrying around to make sure we report everything to Uncle Sam—and even send him a check, if necessary.
The joke’s on us, folks. GE and tons of other corporations will have a tax bill for 2010 of ZERO. GE had $14.2 billion in profits in 2010. Yet they will contribute NOTHING to the federal government while every last dime is soaked from us.1
In the latest budget deal, our politicians could have tackled the deficit by stopping the flow of these ill-gotten billions to corporations. Instead they cut billions from “wasteful” programs that do “wasteful” things, like create new jobs, drive economic growth, and help the needy and our nation’s children. It’s Democracy in reverse and it sickens me.
GE spends $20 million a year to lobby Congress to throw themselves this party.2 But do you know what speaks louder than $20 million? 20 million votes! 20 million people, and more, standing together and taking to the streets. That starts now, with you.
This coming Monday, April 18 is Tax Day—and that’s the day when “we the people” will demand our country back from these corporations in events all across the country. The folks at MoveOn tell me that the nearest event to you is in Detroit. I hope you’ll be there:
Host: Wednesday T—fellow MoveOn member
Where: U.S. Post Office-Detroit (in Detroit)
When: Monday, Apr. 18, 2011, at 11:00 AM
Bail out the people, not the banks
This Monday, MoveOn members—along with union, community, and environmental allies—will gather outside the headquarters and local offices of the biggest corporate tax dodgers to deliver tax bills from the American people. And we’ll demand that our leaders make these corporate deadbeats pay.
We’re doing this because we don’t buy into the Big Lie: that greedy teachers caused the crash on Wall Street! That the selfish firefighters sent millions of jobs overseas! That pregnant woman, infants, and children are sending us into deficit!
Exxon, Mobil and other oil companies profit from war on Africa
No, it was the big corporations that did this. It was the CEOs and the top 1% of the country. THEY brought on the mortgage crisis. THEY made off with trillions of dollars from our economy. THEY are systematically destroying the middle class. And THEY have bought and sold the very people elected to represent us!
This Monday we will call them out—can you join in?
On Monday, we will have something to say to Exxon, Chevron, and the big banks that crashed our economy and got billions in bailouts, like Citigroup and Bank of America, who pay little or no federal income tax. In fact, the IRS will likely give them a tax REBATE.3 If that doesn’t boggle your mind then nothing will.
The Tax Day events are about sending this message: We are coming after you, we are stopping you and we are going to return the money, jobs, and homes you stole from the people. This is your tipping point, Corporate America. And I, for one, am glad it’s going to happen this Monday.
And don’t go alone, because none of us can win this fight by ourselves. Plus, it’s more fun and exciting to go along with friends and family to be part of real democracy in action—not the store-bought kind Big Business gets on Capitol Hill.
Unions protest outside Chase Bank on Wall Street
If you’ve never been to an event like this before, this is the time.
I really hope you can make it. Click here to RSVP:
http://pol.moveon.org/event/events/event.html?event_id=114364&id=26978-6828678-YaeujGx&t=5
This is our chance, my friends. Take the time on Monday to make your voice heard. I can guarantee you I will. Please join me.
Sincerely,
Michael Moore
P.S. Can’t make this event? Click here to find another event near you.
Sources:
1. “G.E.’s Strategies Let It Avoid Taxes All Together,” The New York Times, March 24, 2011
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=207848&id=26978-6828678-YaeujGx&t=8
2. Ibid.
3. “Tax Time? Not for Giant Corporations,” release from Senator Bernie Sanders, March 27, 2011
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=207847&id=26978-6828678-YaeujGx&t=9
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