Media and Blog Articles – part 2 of 11 (Year 2015)

1,837 thoughts on “Media and Blog Articles – part 2 of 11 (Year 2015)”

1. …widely embraced as one would embrace a lover or one’s child?

2. Innovative fraud that might affect *US Persons Abroad* — do not open — send to IRS:

   Canada: IRS Tax Scam – Fake Form W-8BEN

3. Conversation dispersed between her music portions here is discussion with CBC’s Shad — a young musician who *hails from Illinois but now calls Toronto home as she fell in love with a Canadian*…

   http://www.cbc.ca/radio/q/schedule-for-friday-september-25-2015-1.3243288/u-s-girls-unleashes-half-free-in-studio-q-1.3243291

   (I haven’t listened to all of it, but here is another one of us — who may or may not know consequences that await her and her love.)

4. @calgary411

   And the comments are very interesting (and ironic):

   deepblue

   Wow. Whereas I might have given your music a listen before, after hearing Meg Remy spout about how she (apparently) is….kind of…alone… in saying something unique… (anyone sense any irony here?) …and how she doesn’t like generalizations…but then makes stacks of them in one conversation…
   Feel free to go back across the border (and close the door behind you on your way out).

   mrvogel56

   How rude this woman was, I don’t understand how she can say current music is too dumbed down for her, especially when she is putting out an album about the effects of war on the aggressors. Talk about american exceptionalism.

5. More on *OLD STOCK* (http://www.lfpress.com/2015/09/21/clash-between-old-new-citizens-age-old-struggle) in a letter to the Editor in Brockville, ON (http://www.recorder.ca/2015/09/25/letters-to-the-editor-september-2015) / reminiscent of Justin Trudeau’s statement, *A Canadian is A Canadian is A Canadian*, but we still have no Liberal letter showing he / they, too, are trying to stop the imminent turnover of *Canadian private financial information to the US IRS when there could be a year’s delay requested …

   About those ‘old stock’…

   To the editor:

   Let me tell you that I spent a whole sleepless night on pins and needles after last week’s party leaders debate in the current federal election campaign.

   Why? Simply because the Prime Minister made reference to something he called “old stock Canadians”, and by inference, how they had special status in this country when it came to values, rights and privileges, as opposed to those who were not fortunate enough to be so classified.

   All kinds of thoughts went through my head.

   Was he referring to those British and French descendants who could trace their roots all the way back to the time of Confederation, or even earlier? A coded play on words, perhaps, reminiscent of the musings of late Quebec Premier Jacques Parizeau, when he chose to blame the defeat of his 1990s separation referendum on the “ethnics” and others who were “not pure wool”, so to speak.

   No one had any difficulty in decoding those words.

   Far more ambiguous with the PM’s uttering, though: Was I in or was I out?

   Jubilation came the next day. Old stock, the PM said, included all descendants in the generations following those who had immigrated to the country and become citizens. Not being of British or French descent, but being a third generation Canadian meant I was in!

   But my jubilation was short lived. From my many shopping excursions, I have noticed that anything labelled ‘old stock’, or equivalent, meant its expiry date was approaching, and therefore its value was being discounted accordingly.

   I also feel devalued for having that label pinned on me. A label concocted arbitrarily, that has sown seeds of doubt, intentionally or otherwise, for vote getting purposes.

   I just want to be a Canadian, sharing equally with all, in this great country of ours.
   

   …

   Try inclusion, not division. It works better in the long run.

   To put it another way, Mr. Harper:

   Are all Canadians Canadian and subject to the same Canadian laws and with the same rights under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms?

6. National Post, “A full list of all the promises made so far in the Canadian election campaign”

   Comments through Facebook (and I don’t do) — if anyone wants to include what I would say, it would be something like:

   Here’s an important promise by the Green Party — important to one million Canadians, their Canadian spouses, their Canadian children, their Canadian business partners as the first round of their private financial information collected from their local Canadian *foreign financial institutions* is ready to be sent to the US IRS in a few days, one year earlier than the delay the Canadian government has been advised it could request – a delay to September 30, 2016.

   They are now second-class to all other Canadians because of their US place of birth or, for Canadian-born children who have never lived in or had any benefit from the US, the birthplace of their parents. This also includes Canadian children born in US hospitals, the nearest hospital when their parents gave birth, and children born in the US to Canadian parents but who returned to Canada with their Canadian parents as infants or young children. These *accidental Americans* have no meaningful connection to the US and acquired US citizenship without their consent, unjust consequence when the US has citizenship-based taxation law VS residence-based taxation for the rest of the world (save Eritrea) and the expatriation fee is now at an ever-increasing US$2,350, a financial barrier for many. Or there is the complexity of US tax and Foreign Bank Account Report yearly compliance costs and double taxation on many items not covered by the US-Canada Tax Treaty.

   The Green Party says in their Platform (http://www.greenparty.ca/sites/default/files/platform_english_web.pdf)

   “We will repeal as unconstitutional the Foreign Accounts Tax Compliance Act FATCA). It essentiallydeprives any Canadian with US connections (eventhose short of dual citizenship) of full rights to privacy and treats them as a lesser Canadian. We will alsorepeal Bill C-24 which allows the minister of citizenship to revoke citizenship. Other threats to Canadians willbe eliminated with the repeal of Bill C-51.”

7. @ calgary411
   I don’t do Facebook either but I want to say PLEASE someone post this comment for you and on behalf of all of us. Elizabeth May is so clear and committed when it comes to promises, isn’t she.

8. The Rollout of FATCA Is Being Delayed to Help Foreign Banks. Tax Attorney Rob Wood Explains
   September 25, 2015 Cecil Caulkins
   Featuring video interview with Robert Wood via “Legal Broadcasting Network”
   http://legalbroadcastnetwork.com/the-lbn-blog/2015/9/25/the-rollout-of-fatca-is-being-delayed-to-help-foreign-banks-tax-attorney-rob-wood-explains-1

   Usual Wood – “the law is the law” yet talks about FFI discrimination for those who renounced – supports notion of reciprocity will happen, says England will get it because it wants it yet others do not care about reciprocity, they just complied to avoid the penalties. True.
   No mention of US persons overseas double taxed and discriminated against.

   I’ll see if I may land a comment in there.

9. @Calgary and EmBee

   I will post it in the National Post.

10. Charl, thanks — and EmBee for the encouragement to Charl.

    Feel free to use something like that anywhere there is Facebook.

11. Second article on the tax haven book. Funny how FATCA hasn’t solved this problem. Lets face it. If FATCA stopped all hidden money they would have to invent some hidden money to go after.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/gabriel-zucman-tax-havens_560554ace4b0768126fd2584

12. @Foo says
    Yes, there is a fair amount of protectionist BS going on here, but which country is going to be fired up enough to take the issue before the WTO?

    I can’t see countries moving away entirely from PFIC regs. Some PFICs are rather unobjectionable boring little mass-market index/tracker funds, but others are more sophisticated. The problem is that U.S. law is a blunderbluss rather than a sniper rifle. Perhaps some kind of reciprocity is needed for accounts that are available to all tax residents and only fundable out of the income the resident has earned or a limited amount of savings and therefore don’t involve the offshoring of money. The $4,350 a person over 55 can put into an HSA is hardly going to motivate a high-net work individual to move from the U.K. to the U.S. for the tax savings, but if U.S. companies get panicky about people who work abroad for a few years and start restricting HSAs, it could cause big problems.

13. http://www.c-span.org/video/?328396-1/donald-trump-news-conference-tax-policy

14. If only a real, respectable newspaper would start publishing articles like this. Not only is the Washington Times a biased rag no one takes seriously, but its website crashes my computer. Yet they’re about the only ones writing such commentaries:

    http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/sep/28/richard-rahn-global-tax-bullies/

15. A comparison between FATCA and OECD CRS:

    http://www.mondaq.com/article.asp?articleid=427528&email_access=on

16. Trump supports the foreign tax credit, because “no company should face double taxation.”

    https://www.donaldjtrump.com/positions/tax-reform

17. JC: I salute you for your comment on the Cecil Caulkins article. Fabulous!

18. @ JC: I too salute you for your recent comment on the Cecil Caulkins article. Thorough and clear, not angry but certainly strongly covering the issues facing all “US Persons” living outside the “homeland”. Thank you for this thoughtful reply for others to consider

19. Not sure this has been posted before. Good review. Mentions FATCA.

    William H. Overholt: America’s Biggest Enemy Is Neither China nor Russia — It’s Us
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/william-h-overholt/america-enemy-china-russia_b_8170624.html

20. @Cheryl

    Thanks so much for that link. Unless someone beats me to it, I’ll make that a feature post later today. It expertly connects so many dots that are of interest and relevance to everyone here.

21. A bit of tongue in cheek from me (or self-fulfilling prophecy). From the article:

    “Despite concerted efforts to stem the flow, (the Obama Administration has) largely failed to stop Americans from traveling overseas to join jihadists.”

    Well, they already go after a small handful of tax evaders by treating all 8.7 million Americans overseas as criminal tax cheats. It isn’t much of a stretch to catch a few miscreants by treating all Americans overseas as jihadi terrorists unless proven otherwise. Next: IGAs to force governments around the world to detain without charges anyone with “US indicia”, with promises of reciprocity, of course.

    http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/09/29/congress-us-fails-to-stop-most-people-trying-to-join-isis/

22. I haven’t read the report, but a summary here says new TIGTA report calls for the IRS to get more serious about collecting taxes from accidental Americans, U.S. citizens, and green card holders living abroad:

    http://tax-expatriation.com/2015/09/30/part-i-new-tigta-report-to-congress-sept-30-has-international-emphasis-on-collecting-taxes-owed-by-international-taxpayers-treasury-inspector-general-for-tax-administration-tigta/

23. Federal tax crimes says the US lawsuit is futile:

    http://federaltaxcrimes.blogspot.com/2015/09/court-denies-preliminary-injunction-in.html#more

    Wish I had known this before I gave them some cash.

24. “Customs Hold: A notification to the Department of Homeland Security that, according to IRS records, a taxpayer owes Federal taxes. If the taxpayer should return to the United States or Commonwealth Territories without having paid the total amount due, he or she could be interviewed by a Customs and Border Protection Officer at the time of entry. The IRS will then be advised of the taxpayer’s arrival and will be provided with information enabling it to contact the taxpayer regarding payment of his or her outstanding tax liability.”

    http://tax-expatriation.com/2015/09/30/part-i-new-tigta-report-to-congress-sept-30-has-international-emphasis-on-collecting-taxes-owed-by-international-taxpayers-treasury-inspector-general-for-tax-administration-tigta/

25. @Neill

    Fuck Jack Townsend. he is nothing more than a parasite.

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