Working people like those in these duplexes on Jeb Lane off of Middle Valley Road in Chattanooga are those most harmed by abusive administration by department of revenue and all law enforcement of TFRA, the state’s financial responsibility law applicable only to people who have had a qualifying accident or whom are under suspension. (Photo David Tulis)
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn., Wednesday, Sept. 23, 2024 — Our duty as Christians is to protect the weak and the poor to be a part of restoring public justice, especially when injustice is fixed by public authority as a mass phenomenon.
Right now Gov. Bill Lee and the two political parties are running a shakedown through the department of revenue and Cmsr. David Gerregano. The “Eye of Sauron” program afflicts everybody in the state who has a car registered with the department for “operation” on the public road (meaning, in commerce, for private profit and gain). But the wealthy and middle class buy their way out of the oppression by becoming insurance industry customers, and reasoning such purchases as prudent living.
That bribe is one the “working poor” cannot afford.
Only the poor are hounded in consequence of department of revenue’s so-called “Atwood” program, with police oppression and courtroom action against them so routine no one appears concerned. It never makes news anywhere. Mr. Gerregano’s department says about 1.026 million people are under his designation “unconfirmed,” a euphemism for “insurance noncustomer.”
Unconfirmed, which means that the department of revenue’s “Eye of Sauron” has determined that in a given sampling, their VINs and their insurance policies don’t connect meaning that they have a VIN, a vehicle identification number, but they don’t have a corresponding Insurance policy for that car being used under coverage nor a person under coverage.
And so they are out of compliance with what revenue calls the law.
An op entirely against the law
Which is no law at all. The program is entirely against the law and abrogates clear at least 28 provisions in chapter 12 of Tenn. code ann. § Title 55.
Until Christians in Tennessee understand that all their prayer, all their Bible studies, all their Sunday and Wednesday sermons, all their worship services are of less value than more if they ignore these innocent victims of Gov. Bill Lee, revenue commissioner Gerregano in the state of Tennessee. Now I’m not suggesting anybody attempt to replicate the case that I’m pursuing in court right now. I don’t need legal assistance. What I call for is broad, deep concern that this corruption exists without comment by anybody in spiritual, legal or political authority.
What I’m talking about is our state of mind and heart. We don’t talk about the state of our minds and hearts as pertains to oppressions such as this one. If one man rises up in court and fights, are others rising up in prayer and mutual aid?
Most Christians have been trained by their church pastors and church governments to ignore these issues as worldly and not of our concern.
I heard a sermon recently about Daniel under authority of Babylon in the captivity, and hear it is a story “of brokenness.” Every passage of Bible is seen solely in terms of what we can suck out of it for our own benefit, with preachers continually telling us we are hurting, broken, troubled in our lives and circs., etc. and that we need to get right with God. This intensive privatization of biblical content afflicts not just the Sunday morning TV sermons of Charles Stanley, but Presbyterian and reformed sermonizing, as well.
Each and every sermon, whether on the pre-eminence of Christ in Colossians 1 or on Israelites in captivity, seems to direct the listener inward toward improving and building out his private piety, and avoid any rhetoric of combat, construction, victory and expanding the kingdom of God.
1.025 million people “unconfirmed” are one in every six who have vehicle tags. Not all of them who are missing insurance are flagged by DOR, just a random sampling of the industry’s book of business and DOR’s record of VINs. Twelve thousand inquiry and revocation letters go out every week, with letter No. 4 the revocation letter.
If nothing else, this adventure of stopping this abuse should be used in sermonizing to describe a people under judgment. It is a judgment from God, and until God’s people wisen up to see these harms (there are many), and to stop them in the name of the Lord Jesus, we will continue under oppression, with little prospect of relief.
The state makes war against the people. We citizens, we parts of “the population,” are under occupation. We exist to be exploited by corporations, with insurance companies one group among many profiting from harms imposed upon people by law or by deception.
