Orwell was wise in 1948. Here is some wisdom from another Orwell in 2015 – How to Educate Congress" http://t.co/Npl1Qno26K #yeswecan
— U.S. Citizen Abroad (@USCitizenAbroad) July 20, 2015
I am making this comment by Orwell into a separate post so that it doesn’t get lost. I think it’s important that Americans abroad do everything they can to make their voices/concerns heard.
This is on and off topic. The DemsAbroad recently posted on FB that they condemn the RO and Rand Paul law suit as irresponsible and driven by greed. They proposed their counter approach which is to tweak the FATCA so as to harm less – I suppose in much the same way that FEIE squelches the voices of dissent with targeted complacency. People responded that the real problem is CBT and DA further stated that this is not the issue at hand, but for the record they have been opposed to CBT since 1992. After 23 years of opposition with less than nothing to show for it (the Dems are the greater evil of the two parties against US Persons Abroad), the DA have just proved that they are irrelevant in their own party.
Their only purpose is to get-out-the-vote. The party will patronize them at its pleasure.
Meanwhile, the RO have seized an historic moment with the lawsuit by taking an unorthodox and bold approach to reach out to US Persons abroad to say to them “we support you”. This is not “we hear you”. It is much stronger. But even “we hear you” would be a first for us. Which brings me to my appeal:
There is a web site that tracks public opinion about pending legislation in the US called popvox. I was told that it gets the attention of members congress, especially when there is a large volume of activity around a piece of legislation.
There is a bill H.R. 3078 proposed by Caroline Maloney (D-NY) and Mike Honda (D-CA) for congress to study the impact of legislation on Americans Living Outside of the US. This was recommended to a friend on Facebook and when I went to the site, it had only 4 votes; 2 for and 2 against. I asked my friend to post an appeal on FB to get people to go to the site and vote for it. It is now 35 for and 3 against.
One of the myriad excuses that Congress, their controlled press and the US Govt use against US Persons Abroad is that the problem is isolated and small: e.g. 3,000 people renouncing each year out of 7.6 million is nothing; and 376 stories of pain and tragedy over “is no crisis”.
As we all know, we are not part of the US community and makes us fair game (“if you are not at the table, you are lunch” — Billy Tauzin). Even when we make our voices known, the very same people who admonish that the US is a democracy and its people have the right to change the laws, minimize and crush our voices.
If this simple legislation is approved, it will force the USG to do an evaluation of the pain inflicted on families all over the world with data that they, themselves commissioned and vetted. It would take away the convenient excuse to look the other way while continuing the infliction. Unless, of course, the legislation is used to prove that the disenfranchisement is indeed insignificant. But if the legislation is never passed, the American people can return to the hollow comforts of their willful ignorance.
A total of 38 voices seems nothing and can easily be swept aside by Congress and their allies in the US press. I note that at this point, the H.R: 3078 has the highest level of the participation and our appeal on FB is not even 24 hours old. On top of that, it has not yet seen the familiar faces of the IBS.
My dream is that the site will see 7.6 million votes (up or down – it does not matter). It will be the loudest voice that web site has ever seen. The message is clear – “we are here”.
Here is the link:
https://www.popvox.com/bills/us/114/hr3078
Unfortunately, you have use a US address to register – irony indeed… If you don’t have one, then use the address of your representative’s office and say that you’ve done this and why, so that they will not see it as a prank.Please, do your best – use e-mail, friends, social media, to appeal to the few in the homeland know that we exist, who care about us and know our suffering. After you make your appeal to your friends, thank them when the numbers go up and then give them periodic updates to let them know how we’re doing.
I know – this vote does not mean anything either. It will be so easily dismissed because there is no validation of identity or authenticity. However, just the fact that we blew the roof off the site will get attention.
@Barbara we might encourage Democrat action on injustices for the reason of politics. I am still waiting for Clinton to try and “grab” my vote.
@Embee. Mirroring. Just my term. Might get web support – Gwen to help.
Put up our own page and href all the pdf submissions (have to load all the pdfs onto the website) – we may have it look like the original. I believe the cause would benefit greatly if we may easily reference these submissions, as a page link.
Gone now, yet there is something call Freedom of Information Act, that one might request archived info.
For the Senate Finance submissions we could take a snap shot of the the original page and include it as perhaps the first item on the list. I would say try to make the rest look like the authentic original. Could have a different colour link for submissions related to individuals.
@ JC
I gave my colour-coded lists to Barbara which, I believe, she is using to download the roughly 290 CBT related pdf documents. I’m sure the SFC webpage will stay up for awhile so there will be time to get it archived somehow. I’m just not techie enough to know any easy way to do it. Admin can post pdf documents but 290 is a lot and I remember bogging down a comment just posting a long list of e-mail addresses for Canadian MPs.
I think I now agree with the RO that HR3078 is a smoke screen and this logic is insightful:
“1) it is a smoke screen to provide political cover for the FATCA Party because DA and House Democrats can’t honestly say that the U.S. Government does not know expats’ agony and needs a commission to study the negative effects and 2) it is a well known tactic In Washington DC – politicians create a commission to study a hot political hot potato in order to bury it. A good example is the National Commission of Fiscal Responsibility and Reform created in 2010 (http://v.gd/ggGROa) by Obama who increased our national debt from $10.6 trillion to $19.1 trillion over six years.”
If I could change my vote on PopVox (that may be possible – haven’t tried), I probably would based on the quote above. However, that’s not entirely the point.
The point is to register a 6 figure number on the site so as to take away the “no crisis” argument.
If we populate the Opposed columns with comments that say “let the Rand Paul suit sort this out”, “this is a smoke screen from the party that has inflicted the harm”, “the pain is well known and the time for study has passed – let the electorate inform congress in 2016”, etc., then this is OK too. The DA may very well choke on their own smoke.
SCE Is a really bad idea and the DA are hoping that it will do for FATCA what the FEIE does for CBT. It would take away the most sympathetic arguments about the real suffering and harm that the Democrats have inflicted on their countrymen under a moral banner to “stop the tax evaders”. Keeping the tax evasion myth alive as a way to solve the deficit crisis without having to reduce spending is just another “kick the can down the road” tactic. Meanwhile, the other pernicious elements of FATCA and CBT remain intact – e.g. try being a partner in small company abroad as a US person.
The Dems don’t want FATCA as an election issue because it will expose just how bad the law is and it will raise up the tax reform issues that the Dems have blocked for years. They want to keep the corrupt “isolate, shake-down and extort” system in place and they expect their DA poodles to rally the complacency.
Note: there are two Orwell profiles on IBS. Both are equal, but one is more equal than the other.
@Embee All the PDF would have to be uploaded to a folder on the website using ftp software and necessary password. Then a webpage would need to be created on the site with href to each PDF so that they would be clickable and viewable. I think. WordPress may allow something different.
@orwell – now that’s orwellian
@EmBee: If–and I mean if–I can find the time, after downloading the 290 PDF files, I might be able to throw together an HTML page and subdirectories that we can use to make the submissions permanently and publicly available. But this will entail someone knowing how to upload the entire thing into a separate directory on this creaking, dysfunctional IBS website (no offence to the owners/moderators of the site, but as we all know from trying to access the ‘latest’ comments, the code on this site is somewhat outdated).
I just got this letter from my Congressman that I can only attribute to my participation in the popvox survey:
Dear friend,
Thank you for contacting me to share your thoughts. I appreciate having the benefit of your views. While my office receives many emails each and every day, your input is valuable, and I will do my best to research and respond to your email in a timely manner.
In general, our Washington office handles policy and legislative issues. If your message pertains to an urgent casework issue, such a problem you are having with a federal agency (e.g. Social Security, Veterans Affairs, Passports), please contact my local office directly at 321-632-1776.
It’s the highest privilege to serve as your representative in Washington.
Sincerely,
Bill Posey
I think I’d like this committee formed just to tick off this PopVox person who is opposed to H.R. 3078 …
Me too.
Can any Congresscritter answer why such an emphasis on “tormenting” (term used by the Taxpayer Advocate for the IRS) those outside the US, when an ex-IRS counsel notes:
………”Misallocation of Effort
According to the IRS’s tax gap map for 2006, underreporting of individual business income was much larger in scale than was the underreporting, underpayment, or nonfiling of any other category for which data was included in the study, at $122 billion. That suggests that FATCA’s focus on offshore accounts is a “misallocation of effort,” Matthews said.
“If you look at tax compliance as a dike and there are little holes in it and you’re trying to patch those holes, the gusher is small business taxpayers,” Matthews said. But there’s never been a hearing on small business tax evasion, he said, adding that for political reasons, small business owners are unlikely to become a target. ”
from:
Worldwide Tax Daily Quotes Mark Matthews on FATCA: Swatting Flies With Atom Bombs
April 2, 2015, Worldwide Tax Daily
http://www.capdale.com/worldwide-tax-daily-quotes-mark-matthews-on-fatca-swatting-flies-with-atom-bombs
I have now downloaded all the SFC submissions which EmBee marked as CBT related. Going through them, I found a number of duplicates, including different people sending in the same clipping such as a Houston Law Review article, identical letters sent under organizational and individual names, and so on. Grand total of 280 unique submissions. I’m trying to figure out a way to make them available on an IBS-linked web directory. But in the meantime they will be winging their way to Washington and the two Democrat representatives who sponsored HR 3078, for their reading pleasure.
@ Barbara
Many thanks and I hope Rep. Maloney and Rep. Honda will take some time to read those submissions to get some sense of how vital it is for the diaspora to be given a place at the table to present their grievances and pursue resolutions. At least I hope, if this proposed committee is ever formed, that they will be open to receiving input from overseas Americans.
@Barbara. Thanks for sending.
I emailed Honda’s rep before sending ADCS’s submission and she said too early in the game and not to send now……………..
Thanks, Barbara and EmBee. I’m uploading to another site as well where we have the Ways and Means submissions. We’re not going to lose these and other important documentation we’ve now archived.
@Tricia Moon,
Too early in the game?
The only way to get a fire lit under their asses is to make them feel the urgency we feel. Hit them now, hit them later, hit them in between…
By the time the get around to discussing our issues, they should be entirely sick of hearing from us. Wear them down.
When the archive of SFC submissions is online here, I think I’ll send copies to “my” reps as well.
Excuse me foo, but there is no commission set up yet, if you send large files now you can be assured no one will read them and they will probably simply be deleted. The commission will be appointed with specific recommendations as to who and what. They are not necessarily members of Congress etc.
@Tricia Sending now might influence those who craft the study that would occur. Yet might need to send later also.
Carolyn Maloney introduces HR 3078: help for overseas Americans!
https://aaro.org/vote/525-carolyn-maloney-introduces-hr-3078-help-for-overseas-americans
I like this part of it: federal policies and requirements that affect the ability of a U.S. citizen living in a foreign country to access foreign and domestic financial institutions;
@ JC
That’s great. Maybe AARO will be the first organization to click on SUPPORT at PopVox.
NEW DEVELOPMENT:
I just got a phone message from my Congressman’s office (Posey) that HR 3078 has gone to the Committee on Financial Services of which he is a member.
Maybe not so new. Learning how this stuff works…
https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/3078/committees
@EmBee I sent that question to AARO by Twitter: https://twitter.com/search?q=%40aaro&src=typd
DA are slamming bopp and Paul again as irresponsible and distracting and jeopardizing SCE (which is a bad compromise) while promoting HR 3078.
It’s looking like a pre-election smoke screen.