Am I dreaming? Could we open our internet browsers some morning soon and see this headline? Northernstar talks about the ripples of anti-FATCA sentiment spreading throughout the world. We are seeing it in increased media reports like this one that JustMe pointed out: http://www.freeenterprise.com/economy-taxes/fatca-trap-opposition-builds-can-intrusive-foreign-tax-compliance-law-be-stopped, and this one that describes Ruth Freeborn’s FATCA nightmare: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/11/27/209810/new-tax-law-driving-expats-to.html.
Maybe, just maybe….
Were you going to add a link to this? 🙂
http://www.freeenterprise.com/economy-taxes/fatca-trap-opposition-builds-can-intrusive-foreign-tax-compliance-law-be-stopped
@Just Me,
Perfect! I will add it in.
That article’s comments are a rat’s nest of homelanders. Too bad you have to have a Facebook account to comment.
@bubblebustin,
You can create a Facebook account to use just for purposes like that.
@bubblebustin,
It looks like comments can be made through Disquss as well as google. And I am not seeing any nasty comments from homelanders, but it would be nice to see more anti-FATCA support!
Are you accessing the article from a different source?
here, WhiteKat:
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/11/27/209810/new-tax-law-driving-expats-to.html
@WhiteKat
Me getting confuzed! I referenced Badger’s reads (also one of which was Just Me’s, hence the confusion)!
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/fatca/comment-page-60/#comment-719889
Ruth Freeborm is quoted in one (the McClatchy one that both Badger and Just Me linked to).
In the words of Jorge at the Aboriginal People’s Television Network this morning “This is huge” Let the information and Media put this on the front pages everywhere!!
@Mike,
Great what your doing and for sharing with us the response of Jorge at the Aboriginal People’s Television Network — yes, this SHOULD BE huge!
http://aptn.ca/shows/ — maybe we’ll soon see something re FATCA. Thanks, Mike.
Another connection between FATCA and other US overreach:
The Other Feds-Snooping-On-Foreigners Scandal
@Johnson, the strategy and rationale described on the link you cite http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/26/nsa-porn-muslims_n_4346128.html reminds me of the FBI and CIA crusade conducted against Martin Luther King and others in the civil rights and other social movements http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/08/j-edgar-hoover-war-martin-luther-king http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/07/the-fbi-and-martin-luther-king/302537/
One of their tactics was to plant bugs and then send MLK and others anonymous letters and copies of the tapes in order to discredit him in the eyes of himself, his family and his supporters. See NPR ‘
The History Of The FBI’s Secret ‘Enemies’ List
February 14, 2012’http://www.npr.org/2012/02/14/146862081/the-history-of-the-fbis-secret-enemies-list
…” Hoover had his intelligence chief bug King’s bedroom, and then sent the civil rights leader a copy of the sex recordings his intelligence chief had taken of King — along with an anonymous letter from the FBI.
“It was a poison pen letter, it was a hate letter; it wasn’t from anyone in particular, but Martin Luther King and his wife would certainly know the source of the tapes, that it had to be the FBI,” says Weiner. “And the poison pen letter read: ‘King, look into your heart. The American people would know you for what you are — an evil, abnormal beast. There is only one way out for you. You better take it before your filthy, abnormal fraudulent self is bared to the nation.’ ”
Weiner says King ignored the letter, even as the FBI tried diligently to defame him.
“They were trying to get King knocked off from his perch as the Nobel Peace Prize recipient,” he says. “They sent [the tapes] to colleges to keep him off campus, they sent it around Washington.”
It was Hoover, says Weiner, who decided that bugging King’s bedroom was necessary….”….
At the McClatchy article, William Olenick comments:
“After living in Switzerland over 20 years I am returning back home to Vermont due to FATCA.
My company has been importing high tech equipment and training, for various US firms, and selling them in Europe, North Africa and the Middle East.
I worked very hard, at great personal sacrifice, to open these nitch markets for US products, going head to head against European and Asian companies, to gain market share for US product, increasing the tax base back home, and doing my share to reduce the trade deficit.
The fools who wrote FATCA wiped out all 20 years work, along with the gains I made in market share for US made products, in one fell swoop, when my bank here in Europe informed me that they will no longer make wire transfers to the companies I work with in the states.
I said how will I pay my suppliers and they said that is your problem, due to your government.
On top of that it caused great tension in my marriage as my wife, who is European, refused to have her bank information turned over to the US Gov and FATCA, caused tears and fights, with I defending my country and she, justly, saying only Nazis acted like Washington was acting so FATCA has caught up many, who were not tax evaders, and only made a modest income, not to mention the extra costs and paperwork for filing overseas tax returns, average costs to do so here, where I live, is about 5 thousand dollars.
If any news agency is interested in my story, contact me at busy28@gmail.com, and I will be only happy to tell you my story and hope that with it now coming to light, what the Treasury Department has been up to overseas, that the public outcry will force them to rethink this, bull in a china shop, policy.
William Olenick “
I don’t know how I came across this link – probably published at IBS by someone else, but it is a remarkable explanation of the link/parallels between FATCA and the NSA issues:
http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/the-us-surveillance-dragnet-extends-to-foreign-bank-data-too
“This past summer, the NSA attempted to calm Americans’ paranoia by saying, “Oh, we’re only spying on foreigners,” as if to say that mass foreign surveillance was, on principle, okay if US citizens weren’t the targets. FATCA has a similar, if mirrored, argument at its core, with the US telling the banking world to live by its rules because it says it’s only gleaning data on US taxpayers.
“I don’t see any theory of legal jurisdiction here at all,” remarked Jatras. “Suppose that China or France forced American companies to comply to a similar law that would be very expensive, and punished non-compliance with economic sanctions—would that make it legal?” Indeed, there would be a collective “piss off” from US politicians if the tables were turned.”…..
“Jatras referenced the recently published International Principles on the Application of Human Rights to Communications Surveillance (crafted in response to the NSA leaks) when considering if FATCA is a proportionate law.
….“One of the things that Necessary & Proportionate lay down under proportionality is that there should be a high degree of probability that a serious crime has been committed,” said Jatras. “Evidence of such a crime would be obtained by accessing the protected information only after other available, less invasive investigative techniques had been exhausted. As it stands, FATCA is blatantly in violation of proportionality and other of those principles.””….
…”Jatras speculates that forcing FFIs to download their data onto a US-run website could potentially expose them to further electronic security risks. In other words, even more of their data could be surveilled by the NSA, FBI, and so on.
“If you have the resources of US intelligence agencies, then why wouldn’t you use that as an opportunity to see what else the FFIs are up to?” said Jatras. “It’s speculative, but I don’t think it can be ruled out.”
@Mike, at the protest in Ottawa I spoke with a couple of people from Idle No More who were there to protest another issue. We actually had a few things in common since they were there to raise awareness about problems with bees. Spouse and I used to keep bees and I was very aware of the problem so engaged them in a discussion. I told them about FATCA and gave them some hand outs.
Those I spoke with seemed very concerned about this at that time. I thank you for your efforts to engage further and hopefully more will want to work with us to raise further awareness of the damage FATCA will do to Canada.
Also, want to thank those who are publishing so many of these articles lately, those writing letters and publishing them and those who have this week stepped forward to submit “Myth” protest photos. All of you ARE making an impact.
This can be exhausting but, it’s certainly given a voice to those marooned on FATCA “island”
@WhiteKat
Here’s a little backgrounder on William Olenick.
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/?s=William+Olenick
No one’s picked up on this yet…
CBC radio correspondent spoke favourably of FATCA today:
http://www.cbc.ca/earlyedition/2013/11/27/tax-havens/
@bubblebustin, re “CBC radio correspondent spoke favourably of FATCA today” : http://www.cbc.ca/earlyedition/2013/11/27/tax-havens/
I wondered what he was referring to when he used the phrase ‘a couple of days ago’ in reference to the US requiring Canadian banks to report on the accounts belonging to US citizens. I need to listen to it again, but was puzzled by that specific date reference.
@badger
I wondered about that too. Maybe he’d just heard of it 2 days ago. He sort of garbled the word FATCA didn’t he?
I just sent an e-mail to Harvey Cashore at CBC with a copy of the Open Letter to Flaherty.
If others want to do the same, his e-mail address is harvey dot cashore at cbc dot ca
At least that is what I used and it didn’t bounce back.
Again, the only media I have heard from on the Open Letter was Aboriginal People’s Television Network and they are now in touch with Mike. Mike and I spoke on the phone this afternoon and discovered we live less than an hour’s drive from each other.
Maybe Mike can become our Elijah Harper!
Thanks, Blaze. He sounded like he could use some direction.
Thanks Blaze. I will send Harvey an email from the point of view of an ‘accidental US person’.
“Rand Paul Goes After Tax Law Aimed at Expatriates”
Read Latest Breaking News from Newsmax.com http://www.newsmax.com/US/expatriates-tax-paul-turner/2013/11/27/id/538992#ixzz2ltciHqyL
Check this out……http://news.co.cr/should-u-s-expats-in-costa-rica-give-up-their-citizenship/24831/ Seems we are not alone…..
Costa Rica just signed an MOU with the US it will comply with FATCA and enter into an IGA. Second country in South America after Mexico to agree.
That CBC article was just a bunch of unashamed Conservative bashing. There was really no more of a motive to it, and it really left out numerous examples of even non-Conservative misdemeanours. Throw that one in the dust bin. It’s not relevant to the IBS.