Liberty and justice for all United States persons abroad

The Isaac Brock Society

Monthly Archives: August 2012

RTS Radio Interview (in French) with Swiss Respect: “Who still defends Swiss banks?””

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RTS Radio Interview dated 8 August 2012:   http://www.rts.ch/audio/la-1ere/programmes/forum/4170924-qui-defend-encore-les-banques-suisses-08-08-2012.html

Interviewed were Antoine Spilmann, Member of the Committee of Swiss Respect (http://www.swissrespect.ch/index.php?id=21) as well as Charles Adams (Corporate Lawyer).

The header for the interview on the RTS website contained the following (quick human translation by me from the French in italics below):

Qui défend encore les banques suisses?   

Who still defends Swiss banks?

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Analysis of 2010 Foreign Earned Income Exclusion and Foreign Housing Deduction usage

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The IRS’ Statistics of Income division has released the latest data on individual income tax returns (hat tip: TaxProf Blog). You can download the full PDF, or go to the list of tables. This report is mostly a dry list of figures slicing tax returns every which way. I’ve extracted some numbers which may be of interest to U.S. Persons abroad, and tried to come up with some theories to explain them. If you have any better theories, feel free to suggest them in the comments.
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“Blind spots” are more than a topic for a driving lesson

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Know the “emotional blind spots” too!

The Blind Spot

This weekend I have been teaching a young person to drive. Like all new drivers she was focused on what she was doing and not how others perceive what she was doing or might do. Why? Well, for her, driving is a new experience and her priority is her own personal safety. After a bit of practice, we pulled over to get a drink (“non alcoholic” of course). After commending her on her progress, I introduced another aspect of safe driving. First, I reinforced that her navigation and control of the car was getting better and better and safer and safer. But, I also introduced the idea that she would be a much safer driver if she communicated better with other drivers. For example, she needed to work on “signalling so that others would know what she intended to do. She needed to communicate her intentions so that she and others would be interact better and be safer on the road. By increasing safety for all, she would increase the safety of herself. We then discussed one of the most hazardous aspects of driving – specifically “The Blind Spot”. The “Blind Spot” is a place where a driver can be seen by other cars, but cannot see those cars. A driver in relation to his “Blind Spot” is in a situation where: Continue reading →

When a government becomes criminal

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Greg Miller – American Expat Chiang Mai

Many Americans look at the federal government as behaving like a criminal. The government seems  to easily break laws, the foremost law of the United States being the US Constitution, which is often completely disregarded by the Executive Branch (and it’s many agencies) and the US Congress. For instance, can the President start a war with another nation? Not according to the supreme law of the United States, the same document the President swore to God and the World he would protect and defend. And every politician in Congress made the same solemn oath.

But “governments becoming criminal” is not just a recent development. It may seem that way as America currently bullies the world into submission, and conduct shakedowns of the American public without warrant or any just cause. We can look back to the era of the Second World War in Europe and see plenty of criminal activities from governments on all sides of that conflict. But it goes back much further than that — it goes back to the very establishment of Western governments a millennium ago. (But it is not just a “Western” thing, it is universal). Perhaps even earlier. It is the nature of the beast. Governments, unless stopped, morph into criminal enterprises.

 

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Global Sheriff – Should American Law Rule the World? (BBC News)

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Interesting article from the BBC today:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/19172065

Apparently the US claims jurisdiction over almost all banking transactions worldwide, because if a transaction is translated into US dollars, even for just a second (which apparently many unfortunately are), a US court has ruled that that is sufficient for the transaction to fall under US jurisdiction.

Other issues covered include Dodd-Frank, Standard Chartered bank, US anti-corruption laws claiming global jurisdiction, agressive US extradition requests (especially in the UK with its one-way extradition treaty with the US) and so on. The article doesn’t directly mention FATCA unfortunately, though it does mention the one-sided and completely unreciprocal US approach to regulating financial services.

Paternalism and how it works

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Bayaka pygmies in Central African Republic, photo by Peter W. Dunn

I have been reflecting over the last few days on the question of paternalism as a type of leadership.  I talked this over with my next door neighbor from Burkina Faso with a PhD from Laval University (Quebec), as he has some experience in Africa with paternalistic leadership styles.  His own country is a former colony of France and continues within a neocolonial, paternalistic relationship with France, and he also experiences paternalism in his church-missionary relationships. Here are the main points that he and I discussed (though I am entirely responsible for this write-up):

  1. A relationship of protection:  In a paternal relationship, the superior party is more powerful than the inferior and is therefore able to provide protection, benefits or honors to the inferior party in exchange for obedience. However, in paternalism, the superior forces the inferior to accept this protection. The Canadian government forced the children of aboriginal people into residential schools. The inferior must accept this protection and usually has no choice in the matter, because with disobedience comes the withdrawal of protection, loss of privileges, or even violent punishment. Continue reading →

NPR’s, “All Things Considered”, Finally Does a Story on Offshore Tax Evasion Crack Down

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Well, not a perfect story.  But, any story at this stage, is better than nothing. It provides opportunity.

Tax Evaders Beware! Money’s Getting Harder To Hide

The narrative is fairly predictable, and while not wrong, the emphasis is NOT where I would like it. However, it is the conventional wisdom (CW) version, and arises out of all the partisan focus on Romney’s tax situation, Swiss Bank Accounts and the battle over his lack of tax return disclosure. (see preceding story)

FATCA gets a passing mention which is significant as  it is the first time since it was passed in 2010 that it has been uttered on NPR. Also, since this is only a 4 minute story,  I understand that they would not get into the peripheral issues that impact you and I.

Have a listen, and see what you think.  I am still pondering a 1200 character response on their web site. That is their limit. Now, the question is, how to use this opportunity to expand their understanding of a BIGGER story of unintended consequences on immigrants and expats.

GOP Passes US Tax Reform Bill For 2013 – H.R. 6169

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One of the last acts of the House before they went on summer recess was to pass HR 6169. It has a snowball’s chance in Hell of passing the Senate as currently configured.  It was seen as a partisan political document to campaign on, rather than a realistic attempt at tax reform.  That is how the game is viewed in DC by the political wonks, and in fact it is how it plays out in reality.  However, since it is “game on” time, I like that this gauntlet was thrown down. The title appeals.

It was called “Pathway to Job Creation through a Simpler, Fairer Tax Code Act of 2012”

Here is the text version. It got NO votes from the Dems in the House.  So why do I bring it up?

Take a look at  Section 2, (B) (5) (F) of the legislative language, and you will see the following language that should be of interest to all here:

It says..

(5) makes American workers and businesses more competitive by–

(F) transitioning to a globally competitive territorial tax system;

Here is how the non partisan global publication, Tax News reported it, if you wish to read further.  You can Google search for many partisan opinions if you are interested.

 

741 tax returns filed from single Florida address, IRS sent back over $1 million in refunds

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That is the sensational headline from this Huffington Post story last night   Here is how the more sedate Accounting Today reports it..

Billions in ID Theft–Related Tax Fraud Undetected by IRS

The report, by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration , noted that the IRS reported that it detected 938,664 tax returns totaling $6.5 billion in fraud for processing year 2011 tax returns. Using the characteristics of confirmed identity theft, TIGTA identified approximately 1.5 million additional undetected tax returns with potentially fraudulent tax refunds totaling in excess of $5.2 billion. TIGTA estimates that the IRS could issue $21 billion in fraudulent tax refunds over the next five years

So, instead of solving these serious issues of fraud and tax collection shortfalls in the homeland, let’s launch offshore and spend all our limited resources chasing an estimated $800 million a year instead on world wide FATCA effort, shall we?  That makes sense.  Let’s deploy a distraction strategy to get people to look far away, rather than up close, at home, where the real problems lie.  Don’t look behind the curtain, Dorothy! Continue reading →

President Obama closes DIALOGUE with U.S. citizens abroad – comes full circle

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The risk of opening a dialogue: Better be careful what you wish for you might just get it!

Democracy and U.S. Citizens Abroad

The following message was sent to Just Me from Patric Hale and was posted as a comment on this site with the permission of Patric Hale.

Friends,

I’ve just signed up on their website (referring to americansabroadforobama.org) and sent the following message. I suggest everybody does the same – maybe they’ll get the message:

I’ve been a director of American Citizens Abroad for over 35 years. I lived in Europe for 28 of those years.

Here is the question that ALL overseas Americans want to know:

What has President Obama done for them that he deserves our support? We know that he has unleashed Doug Shulman of the IRS, and Senators Levin, Schumer, Casey, and Reid in writing legislation that makes the lives of ALL overseas Americans absolutely miserable so that more and more Americans are giving up their citizenship rather than live under the tyrannical tax regimes and policies of the USA while President Obama – and Hillary Clinton, too – has stood by and done nothing!

This goes diametrically against everything that Pres. Obama pledged to overseas Americans in 2008.

All politicians ever care about from overseas Americans is MONEY when elections come around but do absolutely NOTHING about the concerns overseas Americans have the rest of the time.

There are 5 million overseas Americans and in a tight election as this one will be we are looking not just for smiling faces and broken promises but ACTION!

The first thing Pres. Obama can do is tell the members of the Democratic Party in Congress to kill the amendment to the Transportation Bill that forces the IRS to determine whether a US citizen gets his/her passport renewed because of tax issues.

How successful do you think the Democrats would be if they proposed that everyone in America had to pay his/her taxes before getting their drivers licenses renewed??

Overseas Americans are SICK of being ignored and then dumped on by Congress while Pres. Obama does NOTHING to stop it! The IRS is even ignoring Executive Orders requiring cost-benefit analyses on their actions.

So the question is simple: What is the President going to do to HELP overseas Americans instead of permitting his administration and party dump all over them?

On June 4, 2012 I created a post called: President Obama opens dialogue with U.S. citizens abroad. The above message from Patric Hale was posted as a comment to that post. Those who are interested in this issue may want to reread that post. The gist of the post was that the Obama campaign, in an attempt to create the illusion of support for Obama, had created three sites: Continue reading →