Well, its done, it’s over and a big step toward being free!

The first thing is that Toronto now has a system for keeping keys, cell phones and so on. Not big items, no purses and so on. You give it to the security guard – there is a storage cubby against the wall. You get a number, present it when you leave and get your belongings back. I do want to stress though, only small items. The non-citizen service area was packed and it felt so odd to feel that energy of  so many people wanting to get visas, to get in to the US and I was so wanting to get out.

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IRS going after Canadian-American citizens

Some of the readers of Barrie McKenna’s new article, Watchdog slams IRS for alienating expats, are still unhappy.  But I thanked Mr. McKenna for telling this very important side of the story:

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nobledreamer posted a very nice link to another site that showed the results of a recent poll. Over 56% of U.S. citizens, when asked what they were going to do in response to the 2012 Diaspora Tax Wars, replied, “Nothing, how will they find me?” That is pretty consistent with my informal queries to my friends and family in my host country. My answer to this is, “Oh, my fellow Americans, let me count the ways.”

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This is almost becoming a joke. I doubt the US taxpayer is even aware of this. Today the site owner of Megaupload.com was arrested in New Zealand and will be extradited to America. The charges: facilitating copyright violations.

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Check this out.  U.S. citizens living in Canada are required to disclose their RRSPs on an FBAR. I assume that a U.S. citizen living in the United States would have to file an FBAR disclosing any “offshore IRA”. This is a rather interesting article. Assuming you believe that Mr. Romney should disclose his tax returns, shouldn’t he have an obligation to disclose any  FBARs?

https://twitter.com/#!/renounceus/status/160082767982493696

A friend of mine runs a wonderful mailing list called “Citation du jour” (Quotation of the day). He gathers good quotations from French and English-speaking sources, translates them and sends them out once a day to anyone who is interested. Today’s quotation was:

“Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus.”

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