Monthly Archives: April 2010

About 47 percent will pay no federal income taxes at all for 2009

Tax Day is a dreaded deadline for millions, but for nearly half of U.S. households it’s simply somebody else’s problem.

About 47 percent will pay no federal income taxes at all for 2009. Either their incomes were too low, or they qualified for enough credits, deductions and exemptions to eliminate their liability. That’s according to projections by the Tax Policy Center, a Washington research organization.

Most people still are required to file returns by the April 15 deadline. The penalty for skipping it is limited to the amount of taxes owed, but it’s still almost always better to file: That’s the only way to get a refund of all the income taxes withheld by employers. (Read more from finance.yahoo.com)

See also:

US is only 3% of the population away from officially being a nation of looters

Dear Rich People, The IRS Chief Announced A New, Globalized Effort To Go After You

Christian news organization CNSNews.com has the skinny on a speech from Douglas Shulman at the National Press Club on a new globalized effort to go after the networks of the rich.

“Through our new global high wealth operating unit we are taking a unified look at the entire web of business and economic entities controlled by high wealth individuals so we can better assess the risk such arrangements pose to tax compliance,” Shulman said at the National Press Club on Monday.

Shulman said the IRS is using “our robust and evolving enforcement program that ensures that everyone pays what they owe.”

This is the part that will really raise people’s hackles, perhaps even among the non-rich:

“This brings me to another important development–a game-changing trend–the globalization of tax administration,” said Shulman.

The black helicopters go global!

(Read more from businessinsider.com)

Wealth is not evil. In a free economy, the wealthy are the people who provide the things everybody else wants. Typical of government is to make war on the providers of society. I am reminded of the stories my family in Ukraine told me. They were persecuted because they had the knowledge, ability and work ethic to build and run a flaxseed oil mill.

Fluoride to stay in Iowa City water

Iowa City residents will continue to drink fluoride along with their tap water.

After considering concerns raised by some residents, City Council members said at this evening’s work session they’ve found no reason to drop the practice.

“Not seeing in my mind enough significant statistical data to imply harm, I’m not prepared” to end the practice, Councilmember Sue Mims said. (Read more from infowars.com)

Yet Another Congressman Questions 9/11

Congressman Jason Chafetz just said that we need to be vigilant and continue to investigate 9/11.

A nutjob, right?

Maybe.

But he joins quite a few other Congressmen:

* According to the Co-Chair of the Congressional Inquiry into 9/11 and former Head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Bob Graham, an FBI informant had hosted and rented a room to two hijackers in 2000 and that, when the Inquiry sought to interview the informant, the FBI refused outright, and then hid him in an unknown location, and that a high-level FBI official stated these blocking maneuvers were undertaken under orders from the White House (confirmed here)

* Current Democratic U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy said “The two questions that the congress will not ask . . . is why did 9/11 happen on George Bush’s watch when he had clear warnings that it was going to happen? Why did they allow it to happen?”

* Current Republican Congressman Ron Paul calls for a new 9/11 investigation and states that “we see the [9/11] investigations that have been done so far as more or less cover-up and no real explanation of what went on”

* Current Democratic Congressman Dennis Kucinich hints that we aren’t being told the truth about 9/11

* Former Democratic Senator Mike Gravel states that he supports a new 9/11 investigation and that we don’t know the truth about 9/11

* Former Republican Senator Lincoln Chaffee endorses a new 9/11 investigation

* Former U.S. Democratic Congressman Dan Hamburg says that the U.S. government “assisted” in the 9/11 attacks, stating that “I think there was a lot of help from the inside”

* Former U.S. Republican Congressman and senior member of the House Armed Services Committee, and who served six years as the Chairman of the Military Research and Development Subcommittee Curt Weldon has shown that the U.S. tracked hijackers before 9/11, is open to hearing information about explosives in the Twin Towers, and is open to the possibility that 9/11 was an inside job

And 9/11 Commissioners:

* The Commission’s co-chairs said that the 9/11 Commissioners knew that military officials misrepresented the facts to the Commission, and the Commission considered recommending criminal charges for such false statements (free subscription required)

* 9/11 Commission co-chair Lee Hamilton says “I don’t believe for a minute we got everything right”, that the Commission was set up to fail, that people should keep asking questions about 9/11, and that the 9/11 debate should continue

* 9/11 Commissioner Timothy Roemer said “We were extremely frustrated with the false statements we were getting”

* 9/11 Commissioner Max Cleland resigned from the Commission, stating: “It is a national scandal”; “This investigation is now compromised”; and “One of these days we will have to get the full story because the 9-11 issue is so important to America. But this White House wants to cover it up”

* 9/11 Commissioner Bob Kerrey said that “There are ample reasons to suspect that there may be some alternative to what we outlined in our version . . . We didn’t have access . . . .”

* And the Senior Counsel to the 9/11 Commission (John Farmer) – who led the 9/11 staff’s inquiry – recently said “At some level of the government, at some point in time…there was an agreement not to tell the truth about what happened”. He also said “I was shocked at how different the truth was from the way it was described …. The tapes told a radically different story from what had been told to us and the public for two years…. This is not spin. This is not true.”

And senior intelligence officers:

* A number of intelligence officials, including a CIA Operations Officer who co-chaired a CIA multi-agency task force coordinating intelligence efforts among many intelligence and law enforcement agencies (Lynne Larkin) sent a joint letter to Congress expressing their concerns about “serious shortcomings,” “omissions,” and “major flaws” in the 9/11 Commission Report and offering their services for a new investigation (they were ignored)

* Former military analyst and famed whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg recently said that the case of a certain 9/11 whistleblower is “far more explosive than the Pentagon Papers”. He also said that the government is ordering the media to cover up her allegations about 9/11. And he said that some of the claims concerning government involvement in 9/11 are credible, that “very serious questions have been raised about what they [U.S. government officials] knew beforehand and how much involvement there might have been”, that engineering 9/11 would not be humanly or psychologically beyond the scope of the current administration, and that there’s enough evidence to justify a new, “hard-hitting” investigation into 9/11 with subpoenas and testimony taken under oath.

* A 27-year CIA veteran, who chaired National Intelligence Estimates and personally delivered intelligence briefings to Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, their Vice Presidents, Secretaries of State, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and many other senior government officials (Raymond McGovern) said “I think at simplest terms, there’s a cover-up. The 9/11 Report is a joke”, and is open to the possibility that 9/11 was an inside job.

* A 29-year CIA veteran, former National Intelligence Officer (NIO) and former Director of the CIA’s Office of Regional and Political Analysis (William Bill Christison) said “I now think there is persuasive evidence that the events of September did not unfold as the Bush administration and the 9/11 Commission would have us believe. … All three [buildings that were destroyed in the World Trade Center] were most probably destroyed by controlled demolition charges placed in the buildings before 9/11.” (and see this).

* 20-year Marine Corps infantry and intelligence officer, the second-ranking civilian in U.S. Marine Corps Intelligence, and former CIA clandestine services case officer (David Steele) stated that “9/11 was at a minimum allowed to happen as a pretext for war”, and it was probably an inside job (scroll down to Customer Review dated October 7, 2006).

* A decorated 20-year CIA veteran, who Pulitzer-Prize winning investigative reporter Seymour Hersh called “perhaps the best on-the-ground field officer in the Middle East”, and whose astounding career formed the script for the Academy Award winning motion picture Syriana (Robert Baer) said that “the evidence points at” 9/11 having had aspects of being an inside job

* The Division Chief of the CIA’s Office of Soviet Affairs, who served as Senior Analyst from 1966 – 1990. He also served as Professor of International Security at the National War College from 1986 – 2004 (Melvin Goodman) said “The final [9/11 Commission] report is ultimately a coverup.”

* Professor of History and International Relations, University of Maryland. Former Executive Assistant to the Director of the National Security Agency, former military attaché in China, with a 21-year career in U.S. Army Intelligence (Major John M. Newman, PhD, U.S. Army) questions the government’s version of the events of 9/11.

And other government officials:

* U.S. General, Commanding General of U.S. European Command and Supreme Allied Commander Europe, decorated with the Bronze Star, Silver Star, and Purple Heart (General Wesley Clark) said “We’ve never finished the investigation of 9/11 and whether the administration actually misused the intelligence information it had. The evidence seems pretty clear to me. I’ve seen that for a long time.”

* Former Deputy Secretary for Intelligence and Warning under Nixon, Ford, and Carter (Morton Goulder), former Deputy Director to the White House Task Force on Terrorism (Edward L. Peck), and former US Department of State Foreign Service Officer (J. Michael Springmann), as well as a who’s who of liberals and independents) jointly call for a new investigation into 9/11

* The Group Director on matters of national security in the U.S. Government Accountability Office said that President Bush did not respond to unprecedented warnings of the 9/11 disaster and conducted a massive cover-up instead of accepting responsibility

* President of the U.S. Air Force Accident Investigation Board, who also served as Pentagon Weapons Requirement Officer and as a member of the Pentagon’s Quadrennial Defense Review, and who was awarded Distinguished Flying Crosses for Heroism, four Air Medals, four Meritorious Service Medals, and nine Aerial Achievement Medals (Lt. Col. Jeff Latas) is a member of a group which doubts the government’s version of 9/11

* Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense under President Ronald Reagan (Col. Ronald D. Ray) said that the official story of 9/11 is “the dog that doesn’t hunt”

* The former director of the FBI (Louis Freeh) says there was a cover up by the 9/11 Commission

* Director of the U.S. “Star Wars” space defense program in both Republican and Democratic administrations, who was a senior air force colonel who flew 101 combat missions (Col. Robert Bowman) stated: “If our government had merely [done] nothing, and I say that as an old interceptor pilot—I know the drill, I know what it takes, I know how long it takes, I know what the procedures are, I know what they were, and I know what they’ve changed them to—if our government had merely done nothing, and allowed normal procedures to happen on that morning of 9/11, the Twin Towers would still be standing and thousands of dead Americans would still be alive. [T]hat is treason!

If he’s nuts, Congressman Chafetz is in good company. And see this and this.” (Read more from washingtonsblog.com)

More Americans Give Up Citizenship As IRS Gets Aggressive Overseas

The number of American citizens and green-card holders severing their ties with the U.S. soared in the latter part of 2009, amid looming U.S. tax increases and a more aggressive posture by the Internal Revenue Service towards Americans living overseas.

According to public records, just over 500 people worldwide renounced U.S. citizenship or permanent residency in the fourth quarter of 2009, the most recent period for which data are available. That is more people than have cut ties with the U.S. during all of 2007, and more than double the total expatriations in 2008.

An Ohio-born entrepreneur, now based in Switzerland, told Dow Jones he is considering turning in his U.S. passport. Mounting U.S. tax and reporting requirements are making potential business partners hesitate to do business with him, he said.

. . . .

The stock market plunge of late 2008 and early 2009 may also have played a role in the spike in expatriations. Since 2008, Americans with net worth greater than $2 million have had to pay an exit tax assessed on their assets. With gains reduced or wiped out by the market collapse, those seeking to give up their U.S. citizenship had an opportunity to do so with less exit tax required. (Read more from foxbusiness.com)

Disturbing new U.S. law aims to end individual foreign bank accounts

The name of the bill is the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment Act (H.R. 2487) commonly known as the HIRE Act. This is the jobs incentive bill that was signed by the President on March 18th amid little fanfare.

Relatively small by Washington standards (“just” an $18 billion stimulus package) the bill was drafted to provide incentives to employers to hire more people but contains some very disturbing language concerning the ownership and transference of money to any overseas account. The truly galling part of the bill is that it attempts to require “foreign financial and non-financial institutions to withhold 30% of payments made to such institutions by U.S. individuals unless such institutions agree to disclose the identity of such individuals and report on the bank transactions”. Think about this – the U.S. government is attempting to strong arm foreign financial and non-financial institutions (think banks and law firms) to either withhold 30% of the transactions in a U.S. individual’s account (and presumably remit this to the U.S. Treasury) or disclose the account details to the U.S.. The language of the bill addresses both bank accounts and any foreign trusts (ie- Private Interest Foundations).

But what if a foreign, sovereign country has laws against the disclosure of this information? Well, the bill contemplates this as well. Here’s the actual language from the bill:

‘‘(F) in any case in which any foreign law would (but
for a waiver described in clause (i)) prevent the reporting
of any information referred to in this subsection or subsection
(c) with respect to any United States account maintained
by such institution—
‘‘(i) to attempt to obtain a valid and effective
waiver of such law from each holder of such account,
and
‘‘(ii) if a waiver described in clause (i) is not
obtained from each such holder within a reasonable
period of time, to close such account.” (my emphasis)

In other words, under this legislation, a U.S. citizen having an account with a foreign institution will be required to waive the privacy protection afforded by local law. If they fail to do this, the financial or non-financial institution is required to close the account. (Read more from primapanama.blogs.com)

Business Owners Pay for Layoffs

At Amazon Reptile Center Inc., owner Scott Solar is paying for the pink slips he issued.

After several years of growth, the company, which has two reptile pet stores in Montclair and Covina, Calif., ran headfirst into the recession. As employees left, they weren’t replaced, but recently the company decided to let go of three workers. In three years, the staff shrunk to five from 12. Now, like many owners, Mr. Solar will be paying a higher state unemployment insurance tax as a direct result of those layoffs.

State unemployment insurance taxes are paid throughout the year, as owners pay their other payroll taxes. States typically have a base unemployment tax, which owners will pay according to the size of their payroll. But as a company lays off employees, it develops a negative history or so-called “experience rating” that can boost that tax.

“We didn’t know there were repercussions, but we had to do it,” says Mr. Solar of his thin staff. “But now we’re going to be punished for keeping the business alive.”

Adding to the burden, a number of states are running out of funds to pay for their out-of-work populations. With jobless claims swelling and coffers depleting, at least 35 states are hiking unemployment tax rates this year, according to a survey by the National Association of State Workforce Agencies conducted late last year. (Read more from online.wsj.com)

Obama uses recess appointments to fill 15 posts

An emboldened President Obama filled 15 key administration posts Saturday by bypassing the Senate, defying the GOP as he announced his first recess appointments since taking office.

Among the appointees was Craig Becker, a Chicago-based labor attorney whose nomination to the National Labor Relations Board was blocked last month in the Senate. (Read more from washingtonpost.com)

Change?

Southern Avenger: Confused Confederates

This post will likely be shocking to some of my readers who see the Civil War as the just war. For a more extensive re-examination of it, read Thomas DiLorenzo’s The Real Lincoln.

For anyone who thinks the Civil War is justified by the abolition of slavery, I will say that slavery was abolished peacefully everywhere else in the world (see Emancipation Reform of 1861 in Russia). There was no reason to kill 600,000 young men to do it here.