President-elect Donald J. Trump.
President Trump
The NYT title says it all:
Donald Trump Is Elected President in Stunning Repudiation of the Establishment
Donald John Trump was elected the 45th president of the United States on Tuesday in a stunning culmination of an explosive, populist and polarizing campaign that took relentless aim at the institutions and long-held ideals of American democracy.
The surprise outcome, defying late polls that showed Hillary Clinton with a modest but persistent edge, threatened convulsions throughout the country and the world, where skeptics had watched with alarm as Mr. Trump’s unvarnished overtures to disillusioned voters took hold.
I watched basically all day as I did other things. It seemed to start slowly enough but once it was clear he had won Ohio, it seemed to me, that the entire dynamic changed. You could hear the puzzlement of anchors as they spoke, realizing everything they expected to see, was not happening. It wasn’t disappointment or disapproval but more an absorption, a wonderment, as to how this could be happening. Questioning how the pollsters and pundits could have gotten it so wrong. Some had no problem allowing that to have a positive edge; you could see them mentally re-arranging their thoughts. John King was the first I heard say, long before it was a given, that things were not going well for Hillary. He seemed to have a feel for it, to see the pattern present itself and then play out, state by state. It was fascinating to watch him go through each one, accurately assessing which pockets had yet to be counted, which ones would go to Hillary but as things progressed, would still not be enough.
A long long wait to get the final counts for Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania (which earlier in the evening, had seemed clearly in the Democrat’s pocket). Trump had 244 electoral votes with 9 states to go. It was pretty obvious how it was going to work out in the end.
An ugly argument took place between Van Jones and Corey Lewandoski once John Podesta announced that there would be no announcement from Clinton’s end until all the votes were counted. In a very undignified and ungracious way, Lewandoski pounced on the fact that Trump had been roundly criticized for saying he might not accept the results of the election. He did not listen when it was suggested that if Trump were in Hillary’s shoes, he likely would have waited too, until every vote had been counted. I believe in that exchange also came the statement that Hillary would be investigated for all of her alleged issues.
That aside, the DOW fell 1000 points the last time I checked. The USD was worth $0.75 CDN. Just like that. The Senate remains Republican; thank God Chuck Schumer, will not be the Senate Majority leader. (What a nice taste of revenge for expats.) Let’s hope we see some of what was in the Republican platform, though I expect it may take some time to get to it. At least we can envision tax reform. This time, we will be speaking to a more receptive group.
So, the American people have chosen to strike down the establishment. It is not difficult to understand. In spite of some of Mr. Trump’s less-than-dignified ideas/statements about Muslims, women, Mexicans, et al, the American people said “Enough” to the useless bureaucracy of Washington. I don’t blame them.
FINALLY, IT’s OVER!
@Iota….thats very useful.
@Brockers……do we have a blueprint as to how the IGAs came into existence and what is their basis in “law?”
I can clearly see that IGAs that have not been signed can be stopped.
But……….could they be unpicked if a radical new IGA is generated for lets say Country X which has not signed yet that is super favorable to expats meaning residents are EXCLUDED. This would then ripple back in time through all prior IGA agreements. Clever?
Correct me if I’m wrong but surely the IGA “more favourable” clause refers to “more favourable to a country’s banks” not “more favourable to a country’s expats.”
New IRS regulations could do it – along the lines of the SCE proposal.
@George
Allison Christians
McGill University – Faculty of Law
February 11, 2013
Tax Notes International, Vol. 69, No. 6, 2013
Abstract:
When Congress enacted the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act in 2010, it made no mention of any internationally-agreed alternative to its enforcement, and Congress has made no authorization since then for the president to override FATCA’s statutory provisions by international agreement. Yet due to difficulties in implementing FATCA, Treasury has entered into several ‘‘intergovernmental’’ agreements (IGAs) to essentially bypass the hurdles, even going so far as to draft model IGAs with the intent of streamlining their enactment globally. This column examines the nature of these agreements and concludes that their legal pedigree is tenuous as a constitutional matter. It argues that this pedigree implicates the rule of law in two ways: first, if the IGAs are not “good” law in the U.S., then FATCA partners incur the risk of penalties should the statute they seek to override apply in default. Second, and more fundamentally, the IGAs violate the rule of law by ignoring established procedural requirements for binding the US internationally. This undermines the legal system in the US domestically as well as hurting U.S. credibility in the international community. The column concludes by arguing that there is no benefit to be had in skirting the normal legal process for concluding international agreements in the rush to implement FATCA. Instead of jeopardizing the important and complex project of global tax compliance with such a legally dubious procedure, the obvious and straightforward approach to making FATCA work internationally is to follow the normal treaty-making procedure, time-tested through 100 years of US tax treaty-making history.
Number of Pages in PDF File: 5
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2280508
http://www.bclocalnews.com/news/400702461.html?mobile=true
U.S. election results shock local ex-pats
from Victoria, BC, Canada