Welcome to My Stand-up Comedy Theater.

I never like to burden the jury with more information than they need. 

So if I were society’s defense attorney, this is how I would proceed:

“Your Honor, I should like to call Mister IRS Director or whatever his title is. …Mister Director, thank you for coming.”

“You’re quite welcome, Mister King. Thanks for having me.”

“And before I begin, Mister Director, I would like to say how smartly you are dressed. That is one nice tie. Fiddle with it much?”

“Wh, what do you mean?”

“Never mind. It’s a bit of an inside joke. If you would be so kind as to tell the court, from what legal instrument does the IRS derive taxing authority for the federal income tax that most Americans today pay?”

“The Sixteenth Amendment.”

“So prior to the Sixteenth Amendment, the IRS possessed no such taxing authority, is that correct?”

“That’s right.”

“So had this fine nation not successfully had the wisdom in seeking and thus obtaining the taxing authority conferred by the Sixteenth Amendment, you would not now possess that taxing authority, is that correct?”

“That’s correct.”

“Thank you. That will be all. Your Honor, I’d like to call our neighborhood judge who considers it to be within his professional bailiwick to remain familiarized at all times with the federal jurisdiction’s legal canon. …Judge, thank you for coming. Did the Sixteenth Amendment confer new taxing authority?”

“No. The Sixteenth Amendment conferred no new taxing authority. It placed the income tax into the class of indirect taxes to which it inherently belongs.”

“Thank you. That will be all. Your Honor, I trust that you are now well tired of having your court converted into a sewer?”

“Yes, Mister King, I am. Please leave. I don’t want you to see the deliverymen install the new Foosball table that I’m putting over there next to the bouncy house.”

And that will be that. And that is the state of law in America. It’s a fraud a minute around here. Every last lawyer in my audience ought to be looking at their shoes right now. It is a sad commentary on your “profession” that a high school grad with a library card had to bring this to your attention.

The United States legal system is a joke.