House votes to decriminalize marijuana at federal level

[Thunder Good-Oil]

so again, the religious nature of the action doesn't matter to the IRS. glad we agree.

seems like its the CHARITABLE nature of the church that is the basis for its special exemption. what have I been arguing this whole time? That the taxes should be based on the level of charity, regardless of source.

and using the IRS tax laws to justify the IRS tax laws is weak and redundant. under that logic if my rules were in place I could sit here and argue for them simply because the IRS is doing it.

The difference is that those books have a selling price. Listening to the preaching doesn’t have a price tag. If the church gives away the books it’s charitable. If they charge an admission to the services it’s probably going to be interpreted as a taxable event. If they sell tickets once it’s going to be under the radar. If it becomes routine the IRS will come a knocking. Especially when the church is large and rich and the IRS will turn a profit by inserting themselves.

 

[DinkinFlicka]

The difference is that those books have a selling price. Listening to the preaching doesn’t have a price tag. If the church gives away the books it’s charitable. If they charge an admission to the services it’s probably going to be interpreted as a taxable event. If they sell tickets once it’s going to be under the radar. If it becomes routine the IRS will come a knocking. Especially when the church is large and rich and the IRS will turn a profit by inserting themselves.

So if the church charged cover at the door instead of getting the money mid service it'd be taxable.

Wow, what a big difference that is. Lol.

 

[Vol8188]

I think we should ban cigarettes because marijuana is banned.

That’s the same “logic” being used for why churches should be taxed right now.

“I’m taxed!”. Just because a negative is happening to you, doesn’t mean you should advocate the negative be done to more people.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

have you seen most of the places of worship being built? they are palaces with who knows how many accessory structures. I guess that 50ksqft air conditioned gym is really important to making sure people hear the good word. its one of my biggest beefs with how the Catholic Church spends its money. if the finishes are anything more than painted gyp and concrete floors, it is not necessary for religious worship, and is money that should be going to a better cause than the aesthetics.

and I am really interested to hear which religions REQUIRE a specific place of worship? I don't remember Christ requiring too many purpose built structures to preach in. Where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there.

The more extravagant, the more labor is expended. And the IRS gets most of their offerings from payroll taxes. Win win.

The government doesn’t get to dictate what’s too fancy. The cost of swimming pools in mansions and the deductibility of property taxes and mortgage interest gets the same tax treatment as the cost of the installing the $100 toilet.

The IRS also doesn’t limit the exempt status to Jesus. And they can also worship in tents, parking lots, and river banks. The religious organization gets to determine the use of funds and they’ve figured out how to make most expenditures compliant.

You figure Joel and his church are subjected to regular IRS audits?

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

So if the church charged cover at the door instead of getting the money mid service it'd be taxable.

Wow, what a big difference that is. Lol.

I didn’t mention anything about the timing of voluntary donations.

If they were charging admission the IRS would be coming around if the ticket sales are high enough. I can promise you if and when Joel sells tickets the IRS makes sure that they’re getting a cut.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

Pretty sure anyone with an IQ surpassing that of a great dane's average life expectancy can figure out which churches are duping the feds and which ones are are actually existing within the confines of being Christlike.

Hell, I'm not even religious and it's easy to see.

Smoke weed every day.

What’s your source for that weed that you smoke everyday? Do you grow your own? Smuggle it in from a legal state after remitting the fair share of taxes? Or do you chose to buy from the murderous, Mexican cartel dealers that source your local connection?

I hope that it’s the home grown option since shipping it across the country leaves a sizable carbon footprint and supporting the criminals below Texas funds a wretched element of society? Asking for a friend.

 

[DinkinFlicka]

My guy grows it in his basement.

I bet you wear tinfoil as a condom once every decade!

 

[rekinhavoc]

All this fighting would end if you just smoked a bowl together.

 

[LouderVol]

The difference is that those books have a selling price. Listening to the preaching doesn’t have a price tag. If the church gives away the books it’s charitable. If they charge an admission to the services it’s probably going to be interpreted as a taxable event. If they sell tickets once it’s going to be under the radar. If it becomes routine the IRS will come a knocking. Especially when the church is large and rich and the IRS will turn a profit by inserting themselves.

I thought the IRS didn't have the resources to monitor churches? and you just spent a paragraph talking about how they already are, so there is no fear of expanding the government.

you win the lottery, your winnings get taxed. even though lotteries typically go to fund some public function. it shouldn't be any different in a church getting donations even if some go to fund a beneficial public function. No service is provided by either. you are directly paying someone to do whatever it is that is being funded. there are administrative costs in both.

 

[LouderVol]

I think we should ban cigarettes because marijuana is banned.

That’s the same “logic” being used for why churches should be taxed right now.

“I’m taxed!”. Just because a negative is happening to you, doesn’t mean you should advocate the negative be done to more people.

no its not. you could have made a direct comparison. should have talked about MJ being taxed.

I do think marijuana should be taxed, but not because cigarettes specifically are taxed. but because every sale is taxed. its not a specific MJ sales tax, its the general sales tax that exists on everything in your state (assuming you have a sales tax). sales are sales, and income is income. existing tax structures are in place for both, and the government picking winners and losers should never be acceptable.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

My guy grows it in his basement.

I bet you wear tinfoil as a condom once every decade!

Have you asked him if he’s paid his fair share of taxes or do you knowingly participate in the underground economy?

 

[LouderVol]

The more extravagant, the more labor is expended. And the IRS gets most of their offerings from payroll taxes. Win win.

The government doesn’t get to dictate what’s too fancy. The cost of swimming pools in mansions and the deductibility of property taxes and mortgage interest gets the same tax treatment as the cost of the installing the $100 toilet.

The IRS also doesn’t limit the exempt status to Jesus. And they can also worship in tents, parking lots, and river banks. The religious organization gets to determine the use of funds and they’ve figured out how to make most expenditures compliant.

You figure Joel and his church are subjected to regular IRS audits?

I hope they are, but the last couple pages have been spent telling me there is no way the IRS could ever monitor churches. now you are implying they already are. under your logic Joel should be winning court case after court case against the IRS for even thinking about an IRS audit.

the point on the expenditures is that it is money going away from the charitable aspect of the church, where it should be going, and instead going to self aggrandizing aesthetics. something hypocritical to the teachings of most churches, although your prophet Joel would approve. which also illustrates why a church's income shouldn't be tax free, because they are able to spend on non-charitable areas. and I don't remember too many churches taking out loans to fund any of their charitable works.

now if you/churches wanted to set up an HSA equivalent for charitable funds, I would have no problem with that being tax free. but anything that goes towards general operations, capital improvements, outreach, advertising etc should be taxed like any other business.

and yeah I know its not limited to the followers of Jesus, that's why I included Joel Osteen in the first place. but yeah the satanists, Muslims, jews, hindu, budists, Fonziests "churches" would all be taxed too. which is why I keep pointing out that income tax is not a church specific anti 1A tax you want to pretend it is.

 

[LouderVol]

All this fighting would end if you just smoked a bowl together.

I tend to get paranoid, so its doubtful.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

I thought the IRS didn't have the resources to monitor churches? and you just spent a paragraph talking about how they already are, so there is no fear of expanding the government.

you win the lottery, your winnings get taxed. even though lotteries typically go to fund some public function. it shouldn't be any different in a church getting donations even if some go to fund a beneficial public function. No service is provided by either. you are directly paying someone to do whatever it is that is being funded. there are administrative costs in both.

The IRS depends on tax filers to calculate their own obligations and will devote more resources to those caught cheating or taking in huge amounts of revenue. They certainly aren’t going to do 400,000 full audits of religious organizations.

Another difference is that most of the church revenues come from their members. Country clubs don’t pay income taxes on their member’s contributions to their revenues. Labor unions and HOAs don’t either. But let’s tax church collections for what reason?

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

I hope they are, but the last couple pages have been spent telling me there is no way the IRS could ever monitor churches. now you are implying they already are. under your logic Joel should be winning court case after court case against the IRS for even thinking about an IRS audit.

the point on the expenditures is that it is money going away from the charitable aspect of the church, where it should be going, and instead going to self aggrandizing aesthetics. something hypocritical to the teachings of most churches, although your prophet Joel would approve. which also illustrates why a church's income shouldn't be tax free, because they are able to spend on non-charitable areas. and I don't remember too many churches taking out loans to fund any of their charitable works.

now if you/churches wanted to set up an HSA equivalent for charitable funds, I would have no problem with that being tax free. but anything that goes towards general operations, capital improvements, outreach, advertising etc should be taxed like any other business.

and yeah I know its not limited to the followers of Jesus, that's why I included Joel Osteen in the first place. but yeah the satanists, Muslims, jews, hindu, budists, Fonziests "churches" would all be taxed too. which is why I keep pointing out that income tax is not a church specific anti 1A tax you want to pretend it is.

When did I say the there’s “no way the IRS could ever monitor churches”? If I said that then I omitted something like the word “all”. Most of them file with the IRS every year. Those with employees submit documentation with the IRS even more frequently.

They aren’t going to devote a lot of resources examining those that they can’t collect more taxes than what they spend investigating. There’s no way that they will do full audits on 400,000 religious groups.

 

[LouderVol]

The IRS depends on tax filers to calculate their own obligations and will devote more resources to those caught cheating or taking in huge amounts of revenue. They certainly aren’t going to do 400,000 full audits of religious organizations.

Another difference is that most of the church revenues come from their members. Country clubs don’t pay income taxes on their member’s contributions to their revenues. Labor unions and HOAs don’t either. But let’s tax church collections for what reason?

you continue to be dishonest about what I have been saying. TAX THEM ALL EQUALLY. Only one I knew about were the unions. I was always fine with them getting taxed too. Same for the rest.

the government should not be picking winners and losers via taxes. tax everyone under the same rules. that way we can get EVERYONE to agree the taxes are too much in general instead of playing more government favoritism and carving out protections for politically convenient reasons.

right the churches, and everyone else, would be subject to the same reviews the rest of us are already under. There are 130 million personal income tax filers. you could increase the number of taxed churches 10x and not be a drop in the bucket of reviews that already go on.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

you continue to be dishonest about what I have been saying. TAX THEM ALL EQUALLY. Only one I knew about were the unions. I was always fine with them getting taxed too. Same for the rest.

the government should not be picking winners and losers via taxes. tax everyone under the same rules. that way we can get EVERYONE to agree the taxes are too much in general instead of playing more government favoritism and carving out protections for politically convenient reasons.

right the churches, and everyone else, would be subject to the same reviews the rest of us are already under. There are 130 million personal income tax filers. you could increase the number of taxed churches 10x and not be a drop in the bucket of reviews that already go on.

The IRS is already overextended. They aren’t going to be able to fund the additional scrutiny.

Also, churches aren’t going to contribute much at all in income taxes. They’ll be able to expense what comes in. Amazon did it for decades. The only reason to tax them is leftists hating their message and envious of their success. There is no economic net positive for the government to take a share out of the collection plates.

I’d be more agreeable to local governments taxing their real estate but I assume that that has 1A protection. However I’m opposed to additional taxes of any variety.

Taxing them all is a ridiculous suggestion. That would result in a far bigger government doing an inefficient job of replacing services given to communities by wonderful organizations such the Salvation Army, the Love Kitchen, Catholic Charities, Habitat for Humanity, Emerald Youth Foundation, and millions of others.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

FTR, NORML is exempt from paying income taxes as their mission is not to make a profit. But they aren’t a charity so contributions to them aren’t tax deductible to the donor. However, to counter that, they have an affiliated organization that qualifies as a 501(c)(3) with educating the public as their mission. Donate to the NORML Foundation and it’s deductible as a charitable gift.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

My guy grows it in his basement.

I bet you wear tinfoil as a condom once every decade!

Are you obsessed with male genitalia? Earlier you wanted information on whether some preacher’s balls smelled like Aqua Velva. Now you want to speculate about tinfoil on peckers.

 

[LouderVol]

The IRS is already overextended. They aren’t going to be able to fund the additional scrutiny.

Also, churches aren’t going to contribute much at all in income taxes. They’ll be able to expense what comes in. Amazon did it for decades. The only reason to tax them is leftists hating their message and envious of their success. There is no economic net positive for the government to take a share out of the collection plates.

I’d be more agreeable to local governments taxing their real estate but I assume that that has 1A protection. However I’m opposed to additional taxes of any variety.

Taxing them all is a ridiculous suggestion. That would result in a far bigger government doing an inefficient job of replacing services given to communities by wonderful organizations such the Salvation Army, the Love Kitchen, Catholic Charities, Habitat for Humanity, Emerald Youth Foundation, and millions of others.

adding all of the churches at once would be less than a years worth of population growth. stop acting like we are doubling the work load or that the system would collapse under the weight.

really your argument now seems to be about the efficiency of the IRS. thats completely separate on if churches, and other groups claiming 501c status should meet a threshold to actually claim 501c status.

if you want to have that completely separate discussion on the IRS and our tax code as a whole, I would largely be supportive. I would be supportive of the IRS decreasing in size.

what I am not supportive of is the IRS picking winners and losers with no type of justifiable reasoning.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

adding all of the churches at once would be less than a years worth of population growth. stop acting like we are doubling the work load or that the system would collapse under the weight.

really your argument now seems to be about the efficiency of the IRS. thats completely separate on if churches, and other groups claiming 501c status should meet a threshold to actually claim 501c status.

if you want to have that completely separate discussion on the IRS and our tax code as a whole, I would largely be supportive. I would be supportive of the IRS decreasing in size.

what I am not supportive of is the IRS picking winners and losers with no type of justifiable reasoning.

The IRS certainly is already too small to police the existing code.

There already are thresholds.

Taxing churches and charities would be a major disruption to the economy and what little marginal tax revenue that’s collected would pale in comparison to services that society loses.

BTW, there are already rules in place and churches and charities are subject to excise taxes if they don’t follow the existing code.

 

[DinkinFlicka]

Have you asked him if he’s paid his fair share of taxes or do you knowingly participate in the underground economy?

Considering he's in Colorado, he *is* paying his fair share for his grow allowance.

It feels like I'm playing teeball with you. It's not as much fun anymore.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

Considering he's in Colorado, he *is* paying his fair share for his grow allowance.

It feels like I'm playing teeball with you. It's not as much fun anymore.

So you’re supporting a smuggling operation?

You’d strike out playing tee ball.

 

[LouderVol]

The IRS certainly is already too small to police the existing code.

There already are thresholds.

Taxing churches and charities would be a major disruption to the economy and what little marginal tax revenue that’s collected would pale in comparison to services that society loses.

BTW, there are already rules in place and churches and charities are subject to excise taxes if they don’t follow the existing code.

Impossible. you have swore up and down for multiple pages that taxes on churches was un Constitutional, and that they would all shut down if it happened.

some services would be lost. not all of them. but it would also lead to churches being more efficient with their money, which is needed regardless of taxation. and if they met my threshold they wouldn't face a penny more of taxes which usually gets ignored by you.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

All this fighting would end if you just smoked a bowl together.

I demand some bahn mi for the munchies.