My son is visiting this afternoon and I was telling him about a book I am (finally) reading “The Sovereign Individual” by James Dale Davidson & William Rees-Mogg. Some of you may recognize the title as US Citizen Abroad has mentioned it often. Written in 1997, it is eery in the accuracy with which it predicts what direction the world is headed.
My son responded with this video of George Orwell’s last interview. I don’t know if this has been posted here before but given what is going on in the world right now, I find it spot on. It brought to mind PMSH’s comments about how he will change Canada.
Perhaps Harper was a big Orwell fan as he grew up.
Be sure to look straight at Orwell as he makes his last statement.
Absolutely chilling.
I no longer recognize the US!!! Anyways, that makes it easier to uphold what seems to be becoming a personal pledge of never stepping foot back there.
One other thing in my mind. Would we have all minded FATCA and IGAs if US citizenship remained subject to “involuntary destruction” in the pre-supreme court era?
I have to say that most of our concerns would have been gone.
Trying to think of the arguments from decades ago. How could the court with a straight face say that someone swearing an oath to another country did not imply they were ready to get of rid of US citizenship?
I think the court and legislature really screwed adopting this idea that you need to notify if you are giving it up. Rather, I think the burden should have been that you needed to notify if you wanted to keep it like what is required in South Africa and Germany.
I would then say that if somehow you did not notify then you would have needed to fill out a DS 4079 look alike document as to how you had intended to keep it. Then you would have been given a CRN or Certificate of Retention of Nationality. One of the questions is Do you file tax returns? If you said YES that would have been indicative of retention so you could get a backdated CRN.
The analogy is if I see and buy a new house before selling or listing my existing home. Once you buy a new house its very likely you are moving.
“Don’t let it happen. It depends on you”. What a timely post. As the House of Commons Finance Committee conducts its hearings again this coming week we have an opportunity, at this moment, to help push this country, if not the world, off its current collision course with Mr. Orwell’s vision of the future. Thanks, Tricia, for posting this powerful and stark reminder of the awesome responsibility that has been placed on our shoulders. Let’s all get our briefs written and sent.
Harper and his government have indeed been damaging Canada greatly. He seems stuck in the past, basing his policies on a discredited neo-conservative.philosophy of small government and trickle-down economics, coupled with apparent nostalgia for British empire days. It all seems very 1890s to 1930ish.
His current economic policy seems to depend mainly on environmentally-damaging exploitation of western bitumen deposits — building an economy literally based on sand, and dirty sand at that — rather than developing a new economy based on sustainability of energy, agriculture, manufacturing, and information technology. In doing so, he yields to US exploitation of Canada, and dependence on their political and economic policies, rather than defending a strong, independent Canada.
Rather than seeing our cultural diversity, including French speakers, as strengths, and rather than protecting the CBC as a real national cultural institution, he clings to an obsolescent (for Canada) English monarchy as his symbol of Canadian unity. Rather than making decisions based on independently-verified facts, he seems to go mainly by his personal nostalgic intuitions. The sooner we can get him out of government, the sooner we can resume building a Canada for the 21st century.
@AnonAnon
That’s a great concise assessment of what’s wrong with the Harper regime. Will copy to my MP, who’s a Liberal.
Concerned that the Liberal’s seem to be waging a light-weight social-media style campaign based on platitudes borrowed from the Obama campaigns. I told my MP that I don’t especially want a Justine Trudeau tee-shirt; I want clear and strong policy statements on issues that count.
More and more I value the news links and insight I get on this site; especially since the mainstream media seems fixated on the Rob Ford drug addiction circus. If only economic and sovereignty issues could get as much coverage as the clown show at Toronto’s city hall…
A thought…
Suggest that EVERYONE make a concerted effort to get Conrad Black at National Post to cover FATCA and its discontents. While I disagree with his take on on certain issues, Black is one of the few commentators who have a consistent sense of international historic perspective.
Contact for Conrad Black, National Post columnist: cbletters@gmail.com
Our PM is puppet of the global elites. The puppet masters will be attending this meeting.
http://www.infowars.com/danish-police-confirm-marriott-hotel-site-of-bilderberg-2014/
I hope we don’t recognize SH when WE’RE done with HIM. Like a view his backside with his tail between his legs.
Carol Goar in today’s Toronto Star has a good column about how the Harper government has been making decisions based on ignorance or distortion of facts:
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2014/05/13/how_the_myth_of_a_canadian_skill_shortage_was_shattered_goar.html
Near the end of the column she says
If Harper’s government saw the long-form census as a violation of privacy, how can they deny that the FATCA IGA is also a violation of privacy?
Let us be clear about FATCA: For the US it is not just about finding major tax evaders. Its purpose is to find US citizens and green-card holders world-wide who are not compliant with US extra-territorial tax policies, in order to extract money from them and from the countries in which they reside. The Harper government seems to be so ignorant of that US agenda that it is actually cooperating with it, to the detriment of Canada, by assisting it through the IGA.
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