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Patents on Tax Reduction Strategies a Problem
EsonLinji writes "The International Herald Tribune has an article about how some lawyers are realising that patents on tax reduction strategies (a business method) might be a problem. The article states that there are already 50 such patents with more on the way, and at least one lawsuit. Particularly worrying is the idea of needing a license to follow the law. Fortunately, some of the laws get that this is a problem. Tax patents, the lawyers wrote, amount to 'government-issued barbed wire' to keep some taxpayers from getting equal treatment under the tax code."
No patents on tax increases?
Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
( and, yes, it does say 'state', but the US Supreme Court has ruled that this usually applies to federal law also. )
One can only hope that tax and patent lawyers turn on each other and simply self destruct. Maybe then we can make up for the past few decades of apparent non accelerating advancement.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
Finally, someone was dumb enough to rock the patent boat silly.
/read common man/ to take notice that something is just a bit wrong. Unfortunately, I don't forsee any great changes to come until wealthy men start losing out to those less fortunate. A good ol' fashioned robin hood approach to the matter could very well upset things just enough to make some real changes.
Granted, these will probably be killed due to certain issues... like aformentioned blurb mention.
However, it might just be enough to get more people
I will make it quite simple. Rich people don't care if poor get poorer. Rich people don't care if they lose wealth to other rich people. Rich people do care if they lose wealth to poor people. You just can go around upsetting the natural balance of things.
Yes, over the top a bit and a bit absurb, but I think I can get a few people behind my new campaign slogan.
Vote Cylix 2008!
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
Okay, so let me get this straight...
The gaming industry doesn't want me to make backups of my game to keep the disk from being scratched by overuse. It's infringement after all.
The recording industry won't let me put my tunes on a mix CD because that's a type of infringement too.
Now the government is going to ensure that I'm going to have to go to certain places to file my taxes this year because otherwise that's a different kind of infringement, patent infringement - and it doesn't matter if I read the law myself and saw that this is possible, because some tax firm in the middle of Texas came up with it as soon as the law was passed?
Enough is enough, already!
I'm filing my patent on looking both ways before crossing the street. Oh yeah, and a patent on not getting a traffic citation by not speeding.
How can you patent a business method on following the law? Let's forget for a moment how ridiculous a patent on business methods are in the first place.
I love when lawyers try to make money by blowing smoke up some suits (pick a hole). 1. Taxes are going to go back to reality when Shrub leaves office in 2008. 2. Corperate taxes are going to be one of the first targets ....the days of taxing only personal income and not corp profits are numbered. 3. We have a branch of government that makes laws and sets budgets (taxes).....they are not bound by any silly patents floating around. 4. Some time in the next 400 years laws will be in place to prevent lawyers from trying this kinda crap.....and I would think instant qauntum removale from this universe would be the punishment (as allowing governments to murder it's own citizens will finally be a thing of the past).
If, however, a tax dodge only comes into use several years after the tax law, then I would agree that the dodge was not obvious.
Having said that I still don't think that there should be patents on things like this, but that is another matter.
"The first thing we do," said the character in Shakespeare's Henry VI, is "kill all the lawyers."
I'm flabbergasted. Honestly, I fucking am. This is just not fucking acceptable. Just... no. What the fucking... I mean, how the fuck.... FUCK.
I have a request for you, world. Please end. Immediately. I really mean it. No more. It's not worth it to keep existing, y'know? We are an embarrasment to the concept of existence.
I mean seriously, holy shit.
How can you patent 'business methods'. This is just abusurd, and could never happen in a democracy.
I feel sorry for Americans, living under that horrific regime.
Oh, wow, so NOW someone patents something that pinches lawyers, and it's "ZOMG! WE GOTTA DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT!!!" from the lawyers, and all this business method patenting bullshit that has been going on for decades gets nary a finger wave all this time?
I'm shocked. Truly.
Even beyond the fact that patenting something has to do with obeying the laws of the land, the whole notion of patenting business methods (and many forms of software patents as well) was and has always been absurd and self-destructive.
-SS "Teach the ignorant, care for the dumb, and punish the stupid."
But what if one gets tax advice from overseas where they don't accept silly patent laws?
Table-ized A.I.
So, if I patent a method af applying for and receiving a patent, will the patent system self destruct?
I can't stop laughing from lawyers fscking other lawyers. Time to taste your own sh*t. I hope someone gets sued, soon.
"nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
Good point. But until this is 'noticed' by the courts, there are some further worrying questions. One is that there is nothing specific about patenting 'business methods' related to tax law, as opposed to other branches of law, as far as I can see. So, why not patent a type of defense in criminal law? Not that this topic is funny, but imagine for humor's sake "Plan B" from The Practice or "the Chewbacca Defense" from South Park being patented.
"Ain't democracy great?"
Right there is the prime reason why people are getting more and more cynical about this entire democracy thing: here, democracy has degenerated into a simple oligarchy, where the group in power is the group with money. Quite frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if in 50 years, the US would have the same political system that China has now: a central party that is in name democratic, but in practice completely static, and where ascension to posts comes strictly through internal power struggles.
I'm really not one for doomsday scenarios, but I have to say that this kind of crap is how people get disenfranchised and the idea that they have nothing to lose anymore. And what do people do who feel they have nothing to lose? They revolt. Feh.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
1. Patent "Methods for Not Committing Murder, Rapine, Robbery, Soccage-in-feif, and Barratry-on-the-high-seas."
2. Hire a grasping, unethical lawyer.
3. Profit!
...is that the patents are based on something that may not remain the same for the life of the patent.
If I patent a tax avoidance scheme that involves, say, investing in a rainforest planting scheme to get a tax break (grossly simplified example) and that tax break is removed in the next budget then the patent is no longer valid.
One of the principles of patent law is that a patent is a disclosure: in exchange for protection on your invention you provide instructions on how to implement the invention. If it's not implementable the patent is invalid - this is where those perpetual motion machines that slip through from time to time get knobbled.
As a patent examiner cannot be certain that the "model" of the patent will work for the term of the patent they shouldn't grant it.
Or, of course, the next US administration could implement an intellectual property regime that doesn't look like an unseemly land grab, and then spend all its time in the WTO trying to persuade the rest of us to follow suit.
We waste incredible amounts of time and money working around our Byzantine internal revenue code. There's a better way to handle this.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
The criterium of a high "degree of inventive ingenuity" is meant to prevent an obvious patent to be passed; however since this criterium cannot be measured (except if you kept the invention secret), the patent examiner has a hard time applying it and it has been replaced by the concept of "first to uspto".
Hey don't blame me, IANAB
I think the USPTO should start rubber stamping patents on legal strategy, what better way to bring the entire house of cards crashing down?
This is one of many signs that the patent system is decadent, and will soon collapse under its own weight.
Or at any rate, I hope it will, because it clearly doesn't fulfill its stated goal any more.
Can't see why the poster is upset that someone has patentet something that is according to the law. A patent on something that is against the law would be pretty pointless wouldn't it? Patents should be inovative, how to fill in a tax form for your own greatest benefit isn't obvious to most people...not like making a website where you can buy stuff by clicking one time on them.
Software shouldn't be patentable for the same reason that legal argument shouldn't be patentable. (Although I would like to see someone patent "a method and system for avoiding culpabiulity for murder by claiming diminished responsibility on the grounds of experiencing a sugar-rush at the time, said rush to have been brought on by the consumption of a sweet comestible" - aka, The Twinkie Defence.)
*note: Toudai = Tokyo University (basically the #1 university in Japan)
HD Trailers
Tax shelters, and other creative interpretations of the tax code, are the bane of the IRS's existence. In the late '90s and early '00s, a few accountants went overboard with their tax planning strategies and started selling them as if they were "products", not unlike the what the law firms appear to be doing today. As a result of their marketing of products called BLIPS, FLIP, OPIS, and SOS, KPMG ended up paying the IRS $456 million dollars in penalties. Since 2003, the IRS appears to have focused on cleaning up the accounting industry and the rules around "reportable transactions" (transactions with attributes common to tax shelters) and seems to have the accountants in check. It looks like it's time to turn their attention to the lawyers.
Just like the "confidential transactions" of the accounting industry, where the taxpayer isn't allowed to disclose the details of a transaction to others (presumably for intellectual property protections for the accountant), a lawyer holding a patent on a tax strategy will only serve to draw attention to the strategy and get the whole thing shut down.
Boring but informative:
From the IRS Publication 550 on reportable transations:
See also: Inside the KPMG mess
nor are they designed to be. Someone usually spends a lot of money lobbying to get a tax loophole put in for their benefit. For someone else to just take advantage of those loopholes without any investment on their part probably strikes the original lobbying parties as unfair which is irony for you considering tax loopholes are unfair by definition. Not all loopholes can be taken advantage of. So patents make perfect sense as a mechanism for protecting one's lobbying investment. It is funny that lawyers who think patents are perfectly ok as long as as they affect other people, change their minds when the patents affect them.
This just points out that the income tax laws in this country are overly complicated and need to be cleaned up. Right now the income tax laws are just a job program for tax lawyers and accountants and the IRS. Unfortunately the only way to fix it is to totally replace the tax laws and not just amend them.
"Particularly worrying is the idea of needing a license to follow the law."
Ah, but how can you follow the law if you can't afford to pay the law's copyright holders for the right to read it?
I have already patented a business method for abusing the patent system in this fashion. It's time to pay up, boys!
Fortune Magazine has 2 good writeups about this. They say "For tax-shelter touts, the patents are a potentially deceptive marketing tool: Just because a process is "patented" doesn't mean it's legal. "A patent carries with it no assurance whatsoever that the process will pass IRS muster," IRS commissioner Mark Everson told a congressional hearing in July. Giving patent protection to even legit tax strategies alarms many experts. "If you can patent an interpretation of the tax law, why not patent anyone's legal advice?" asks Carol Harrington, a lawyer with the firm McDermott Will & Emery in Chicago."
and
"'A patent carries with it no assurance whatsoever that the patented process, transaction or structure will pass IRS muster,' IRS Commissioner Mark Everson told a Congressional hearing in July. 'We are concerned, however, that taxpayers may be confused about this.'"
You can find the links to the articles here and here.
The sequence should have gone like this...
1. Patent ingenious tax strategy
2. Sell licenses for ingenious tax strategy
3. Patent genius idea of patenting tax strategies
4. Sell licenses to others so that they can patent their own ingenious tax strategies
5. PROFIT ON YOUR OWN AND OTHERS' INGENIOUS TAX STRATEGIES!!!
That is done every day..
Watch the constant attack on the 1st and 2nd amendments by the states ( and feds )
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I plan to invent creative and ingenious ways to pimp, and once I get a patent on hookers, I know I'll be rolling in dough. Yeah, scoff if you will. I'll have the last laugh, and the bling-bling. Now y'all come here Cindy and Lashawna, I'm feeling tense. You know what Daddy needs. Bring the penguin-fur gloves.
I made a completely accurate comment that gets modded down to -1 Troll, but the parent which made a completely false and defamatory comment about Bush is modded +5.
It's simply moderation abuse here. I challenge anybody to provide any credible evidence that Bush made the comment the parent posted. If you can't, please mod him Troll because that is the very definition of trolling. It's wrong that false statements are so easily modded up here.
Balance the f'ing budget
Try to be deft enough at foreign policy that you do not get most of the rest of the world pissed off at you.
When striking at your enemy, prefer a swift lance in the right place versus an avalanche in the general area.
Read Sun Tzu.
Remember that the "goddamn piece of paper" written about 230 years ago helped make us the most respected country in the world at one time, and was specifically intended to protect us from the worst of leaders, not those that we trust.
Constrict the ability of lobbies to buy our government policies, criticize your elected officials with reasoned arguments, accept the inevitable fact that your views are not absolutely "right", don't use all caps in your Slashdot subject line, limit your government to doing the things that only government can do well, think for yourself (at length).
Question why you believe what you believe, as if it was a scientific question -- which of course it never will be.
Put your neocortex in control of your verbal/written output, as opposed to your limbic system.
Failing all of the above, stew in your own juices and try to avoid ad hominem attacks. If you find a perfect way of doing this, let me know or patent it.
BTW, if I had to label myself it would be as a centrist-conservative, but any label now carries so much stupid baggage that I try to avoid any one of them. "More power to the Party of Thinking People" -- Oh Shit, there isn't one.
I don't trust atoms -- they make up stuff.
We, the human race, are disposed towards creating abominations of ourselves. Abominations that mimic our values enough to complete a purpose, but lack safeguards that we humans rely upon (such as pain, emotion, flexibility, etc). In the Terminator, it's robots. In real life, it's corporations, bureaucracies, and a rigid legal system. They are heartless, they feel no pain, and they have very few weaknesses. But, most frightening of all, they can adapt terrifyingly quickly.
This the reasons why democracy doesn't work for the people. It's not that we don't get what we want, it's that our society is based around powers that have the capacity to dictate what we want.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
I think I should patent the process of suing someone who patents an idea that has prior art.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
if it was never ratified legally.
But that never stopped a taxman yet.
If the Democrats somehow manage to take control of the presidency and both houses of Congress, they'll take advantage of the shady techniques pioneered by the Republicans, possibly even extending them. Historically, our country always does best when the party in the White House is a different party than the one controlling Congress.
I was going to continue my rant, but it got too depressing. Anyways, make sure you vote in November - regardless of who you support.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
then why isn't He enforcing them?
If he can't, then they aren't rights.
Disclaimer - I am a tax lawyer
We've been discussing this internally for a few months now. Looking at the patent applications involving tax, we saw three categories of items:
(1) claims on how to implement data tracking systems in order to pay taxes (think programs for calculating sales taxes depending on where the product is shipped).
(2) claims on automating how to think through the tax consequences of a business deal (wow, if you do it with a database rather than pencil and paper, that should be patentable, right?) Side note: The hard part is not the algorithm, the hard part is getting the data and keeping it up to date.
(3) claims on a certain sequence of transactions that are claimed to be non-obvious and achieve lower taxes than a different sequences of transactions.
These have all the same problems that the software industry is dealing with: Some of this stuff has been done for decades, but is not "obvious" to a patent examiner.
A lot of these seem to be filed for patent troll purposes - if the patent office grants the application, then the patent holder will show up at the big accounting firms and demand a payoff.
There are a couple of interesting additional twists when this stuff starts getting applied to things like tax law. The first relates to type 1 claims (e.g. data tracking implementations). Here is where we argue that the patent system should not be allowed to put roadblocks on people's attempts to follow the law (and we are not even talking about gaming the system, just trying to be legal).
The second tax law specific twist relates to telling the government about your new tax planning idea. A competent government would look at the idea, decide if it should be allowed, and if it doesn't like the idea, change the tax law even before the patent is granted. [Yes, you can argue whether the US has competent government, but hey, we can talk hypothetically.]
I generally agree that the patent system is broken, we've just found additional ways to demonstrate that fact.
If you think deeply enough, you will have no single direction for your outrage.
This is a good thing :-)
Wenn Fliegen hinter Fliegen fliegen, fliegen Fliegen Fliegen nach.
No, you're 100% incorrect.
I honestly don't know why that meme is still floating around the interwebs. The guy at capitolhillblue was the only person to push this story and he did it with anonymous sources.
If you read here it has the followup article CHB wrote 3 days later, titled "Where there's smoke, there's ire" which CHB pulled from his own site
"This article has been removed from our database because the source could not be verified."
It surprises me that he repeats the same claim just a week ago
Not to mention that he first claims he heard it from 3 sources, then later changed it to two sources. The man reported shiat either he or someone else made up.
I honestly don't care about getting modded up, but please mod down the AC.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
I say we start a fund and finance this patent on lobbying efforts! Except that prior art might kill the whole thing... arrgh..
http://www.fairtax.org/
I saw it on Slashdot, it must be true!
Check out http://www.uspto.gov/patft/class705_sub36t.html
Alot of these seem to be computerized systems to generate tax advantages for businesses or computer programs to determine a tax benifit. I wonder if anyone can find any 'outrageous' examples in here?
Obviously patent law is broken. The Federal Circuit doesn't believe so, but they really are not the brightest bulbs on the tree. So let it happen. Let companies continue to duke it out over ridiculous patents, and, in fact, try and get blocking patents on everything you can until the stench of bad law reaches so high up, the Supreme Court finally recognizes that the FC are a bunch of wanks who need to be shut down, redefines obvious to be obvious, and fixes patent law.
I say let them drown!
I wonder if a court would allow "laws" to be expansive enough to mean the physical laws of nature. That is, if (part of) a patent's claim is simply an optimization dictated by, say, mathematics or physics, why should any party be given the power to exclude others from using those principles?
When we treat a discovery or a process as an invention, we run into such problems.
I think this instance of abuse could be used a to get the legal industry thinking more critically about patents, and how an invention differs from a discovery or a process. Can they be helped to recognize the similarities between this tax patent and thousands of expansive scientific patents which are considered legitimate but are actually a restatement of a discovered principle or dictated entirely by external physical laws?
you are screwed, get out while you still can.
It's what you get when you annihilate them ;)
Sticks and rocks will no longer protect you. You're going to need to get some kind of gun that fires dogs.
How exactly would these patents be enforced? If I get a patent on, say, an audio amplifier, I can purchase competitors amplifiers, disassemble them, and see if they're using my patented design. Tax returns are private. How will the patent holders be able to prove infringement?
"...but any label now carries so much stupid baggage that I try to avoid any one of them."
I feel exactly the same way.
"Constrict the ability of lobbies to buy our government policies, criticize your elected officials with reasoned arguments,"...
But, then the corporations, shield/crest/dagger/sword-carrying old-boy network of family and old money would lose their grip around our necks
"Balance the f'ing budget"
IF the budget ever is and remains balanced, all sorts of public services might go away, or worse, officials might micromanage the poor to death to their ultimate "soylent green-like" extermination (I'm reaching a bit on that one...)
"Try to be deft enough at foreign policy that you do not get most of the rest of the world pissed off at you."
But then the US military, like many, and like football teams, are not content to train; they have the primal urge to kick ass, break some bones, and make up their own missions or prohibit instant replay, so to speak. Actually, worse, the governments are like team owners, rigging whom they'll line up with, and which they crush then the troops/players get restless. Except, football tends to be played by seasons, and militaries as governmental swords tend to act at the whims of the governments, I think.
Worse, those with imperialistic, manifest-destinist agenda do not really give a damn about pissing off people. Look how bush and company (including blair and cohorts) perpetually pretend as if terrorists have no legitimate grievances. Hell, when you invade lands (let's just look at the Middle East of the 1910's thru 1950's), divvy them up as spoils of war, prop up brutal regimes, give them promisies of massive oil-buying customer bases, and then kill off any sects or secular threats and expect their parentless kids to not complain, then there sure will be problems. By comparison, suppose the bad guys in US cities began wiretapping, exposing, and causing indictments of thousands of police chiefs, tens of thousands of bad and otherwise "good" cops, and undermining "relative order", then the police would feel oppressed and demand exemption from exposure. Not a good analogy, but...
"When striking at your enemy, prefer a swift lance in the right place versus an avalanche in the general area."
But, the lockheeds, boeings, and such would have less shot up or shot down hardware to replace via tax payers' money; ammo makers would have less bombs and rockets and bullets to assemble, meaning layoffs, and a general "demasculinization" of the US ass-kicking regime. Just look at how (militarily) the US plays China off against Taiwan, Korea and Japan. An Asian superpower in the form of a non-warring, non-first-strike China does NOT fit in the privileged/anglo mentality of the US and its western allies. Of course, South Korea, Japan and Taiwan (and, throw in Israel) love the billions of dollars and high-tech gizmos and the R&D access, so they are not comfy seeking to hang up their armor and gauntlets when there remains a sense of right to wage war, plan for it, research and practice and seek it out. The money and power behind war-planning and war-making are just too tempting, despite being "god-fearing". (Just a note: South Korea is not yet yielding to rice in her attempts to push SK to apply full sanctions against the North. In a nutshell, NK/SK are a huge split, dysfunctional family, and they BOTH resent the US meddling in an internal affair, but the US leadership won't fucking learn that they are playing with fire but as yet haven't been burned. But, the implication and much evidence points to the South paying off the North to NOT start a war. SK wants to be a major economic powerhouse, and if the North lobbed 500,000 shells an hour for 3 or 4 hours into the South, the whole region would be ruined, and SK would never realize the dream of surpassing Japan, which Japan doesn't want, which means the US is in cat-mating-dance like trance, injecting western/anglo interests into a wholly Asian quagmire that can work itself o
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
In TJ, Mexicali, Windsor, Vancouver, Niagra Falls.
This fair tax is only fair if you think rich people would give up and not try to find ways around it.
There wouldn't be a single car sold in Detroit, Port Huron, Seattle, Buffalo, San Diego (probably LA), or any city near Canada or Mexico.
And that'd just be the start. Rich people would find ways to lease stuff so they never actually buy stuff (it IS a sales tax).
We have an income tax, which made rich people find ways to never realize income, thus we had to modify our tax code to fix that.
There's no reason to think the rich wouldn't find a way to avoid a sales tax just like they avoid income tax.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Let's forget for a moment how ridiculous a patent on business methods are in the first place.
Why? We should never forget the root of the problem.
What is the benefit to society at large to patent tax-holes?
Patents were made for a purpose, to be a benefit to society at large, not put up arbitrary monopolies and limitations on everybody to enrich the few.
MP3
Related Links:
Americans for Campaign Reform
A group in support of public-funding for all federal elections
Public Campaign: A group supporting 'clean elections'
Clean Elections in your State
Arizona-Specific
Arizona - Citizens Clean Elections Commission
List of 2006 Candidates
Clean Elections Institute
Goldwater Institute
"Campaign Promises: A six-year review of Arizona's experiment with taxpayer-financed campaigns"
California-Specific
Californians for Clean Elections - Yes on 89
This group supports so-called clean elections. They believe "prop 89 is the antidote to negative ads paid for by rich special interests." It limits the amount corporations can spend on initiatives. It limits the amount everybody can give to candidates.
Californians to Stop 89
This group is against the clean elections movement and believe that the initiative "works to shut certain groups like small businesses, non-profits and some unions, out of the political process" therby creating an "unlevel playing field."
Maine-Specific
Maine Citizens for Clean Elections
Maine Commission of Government Actions and Election Practices
List of 2006 Candidates
This is some of what Jesus had to say about greed, greedy ways and treating others the right way:
Matthew 7:2
For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.
Luke 6:38
Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.
1 Timothy 6:10
For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
Matthew 19:21
21Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me.
Matthew 19:23
23Then said Jesus unto his disciples, Verily I say unto you, That a rich man shall hardly enter into the kingdom of heaven. 24And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.
Here's what Jesus said about lawsuits, and resisting evil: (Matthew 5:40) And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. (Luke 6:29) And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also. 30Give to every man that asketh of thee; and of him that taketh away thy goods ask them not again.
Now let's say, hypothetically, that they DID allow the crooked tax scheme patents: BOTH the taxees, and the patent holders: are required to forgive, and to stop being abusive.
Matthew 18
21Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?
22Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.
23Therefore is the kingdom of heaven likened unto a certain king, which would take account of his servants. 24And when he had begun to reckon, one was brought unto him, which owed him ten thousand talents. 25But forasmuch as he had not to pay, his lord commanded him to be sold, and his wife, and children, and all that he had, and payment to be made.
26The servant therefore fell down, and worshipped him, saying, Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all. 27Then the lord of that servant was moved with compassion, and loosed him, and forgave him the debt.
28But the same servant went out, and found one of his fellowservants, which owed him an hundred pence: and he laid hands on him, and took him by the throat, saying, Pay me that thou owest.
29And his fellowservant fell down at his feet, and besought him, saying, Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all. 30And he would not: but went and cast him into prison, till he should pay the debt.
31So when his fellowservants saw what was done, they were very sorry, and came and told unto their lord all that was done.
32Then his lord, after that he had called him, said unto him, O thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all that debt, because thou desiredst me: 33Shouldest not thou also have had compassion on thy fellowservant, even as I had pity on thee? 34And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due unto him.
35So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses.
"Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us." -Jesus Christ The Lord's Prayer
I can wrap my brain around the idea that "generally accepted accounting principles" is cynical and contrived as a methodology; but having said that, how can criminal application of bits and snippets of U.S. Tax Code to create criminal tax fraud be sanctioned by patent? What am I missing?
Goddamned kids! Get off my lawn!
Wait until I file my breathing technique patents. Just wait.
jeezzz, taking the flamebait... again.. ;)
but seriously, we're talking about patents here right? the value of the US constitution might be related, but I think you're overdoing it on the patriotism here.
Show a man some news, distract him for an hour. Show a man some mod points, distract him for the rest of his life.