Militia groups creating their own currency -- again

[Generic Other]

Counterfeiting money is crazy enough; creating your own form of currency and trying to pay your bills with it seems like downright insanity. Yet, that's exactly what dozens of members of the militia movement are doing, according to a leading civil rights group.

These paramilitary groups, whose adherents believe the government doesn't have any power over them, are waging a war of "paper terrorism" by creating their own form of currency and using it to pay everything from debts to their taxes, the Southern Poverty Law Center in Birmingham, Ala. says.

In St. Louis, bankers have received phony documents called "bond promissory notes" or "private offset" notes as payment for car loans, mortgages and credit card debt, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. As the paper points out, such actions defy common sense. After all, the notes are completely worthless and, not surprisingly, these payments were not honored by the banks.

"A man from O'Fallon, Ill., tried it 60 or 70 times before making a big mistake - filing a bond promissory note in U.S. District Court in St. Louis to pay someone else's $14,100 federal tax lien," the newspaper said,

Even more brazen people have tried to pass these types of documents to the Internal Revenue Service.

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2009/12/12/militia-groups-creating-their-own-currency-again/?icid=main|main|dl5|link5|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dailyfinance.com%2F2009%2F12%2F12%2Fmilitia-groups-creating-their-own-currency-again%2F

[ck4829]

1. Let me get my Monopoly money out and pay for everything

I would also be a rich man.

I'd go up to the clubs and flash my Monopoly money to everyone.

Seriously, do these Militia nuts even think about what they do before they do it?

[Ozymanithrax]

2. Seems they are trying to start a modern version of the Whiskey Rebellion.

The U.S. fought them because they used Whiskey as currency, and thus undermined the U.S. Government at the time. The militias may be attempting to get the U.S. government to actually crack down on them with violence.

[petronius]

4. They should try using whiskey, then. Heck, I'd even sell them something

in that case. :9

What's sad is that I'll bet most of the people getting busted for these things are followers, and the people coming up with the 'legal justifications' are sitting back. I also bet that the legal theorists don't take play money for their own books and pamphlets and whatnot...

[MineralMan]

3. Dumb as rocks, these militia/freemen types are.

Stupid, lazy, arrogant and, eventually in prison.