by | ARTICLES, BLOG, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, TAXES
When is a tax not a tax? When it’s a user fee — at least in New Jersey. That’s what one lawmaker is attempting in the legislature. A bill that would tax water based on use, in order to “ is fix a crumbling water delivery infrastructure in the state.”
The problem is that a tax already exists for that purpose. It was enacted in 1984, and is charged as a public utility franchise tax on water system operators of $0.01 per 1,000 gallons of water delivered to a consumer in order to “ensure clean drinking water in New Jersey.” This new tax/fee would be instituted on tap water, adding 10 cents for every 1,000 gallons of water a home uses.
Considering that the governor of New Jersey, Phil Murphy, just raised taxes roughly $2 billion, this new “user fee” is utterly ridiculous. New Jersey must be trying to catch up to New York, which already taxes water (albeit bottled, not tap.) New Jersey should kill this bill.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, CONSTITUTION, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, HYPOCRISY, LAW, TAXES
New York Governor Cuomo leads a four-state lawsuit against the federal government over the tax reform law that passed last fall. Governor Cuomo declared it “a practical act of self-defense against an adversarial federal government” and suggested that the bill was aimed to target left-leaning states.
But everybody who has any knowledge of taxation and its constitutionality knows that Cuomo’s assertion is ludicrous. The SALT deduction – and ALL deductions – are at the complete discretion of Congress. And as long as deductions apply under the same rules to every taxpayer no matter where situated, constitutionality can never be an issue.
Cuomo’s sudden role as tax crusader is laughable at best, hypocritical at worst. Cuomo and his cronies would do well to focus on reducing their states’ tax burden for their citizens instead of over something that is patently constitutional.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, CONSTITUTION, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, IRS, TAXES
The State Department, in tandem with the IRS, has stepped up enforcement of an Obama-era law that blocks Americans with ‘seriously delinquent’ tax debt from receiving new passports — and will, at some point — be allowed to rescind existing passports of people who fall into that category.”
The roots of this law began back in 2012, when a report issued by the GAO suggested the possibility of tying tax collection to passport issuance, in an effort to collect revenue. Soon thereafter, Senator Harry Reid introduced a bill in Congress that did just that, with a threshold of $50,000 in delinquency. The bill had been attempted several times in Congress over the last few years before finally being passed in late 2015; it was quietly tucked into a highway-funding bill (HR22).
Though there are exceptions to the rule (emergency and humanitarian travel, for instance), valid criticisms of the rule were raised. For instance the law isn’t limited to criminal tax cases or even situations where the government fears you are fleeing a tax debt; your passport can now get revoked merely because you owe more than $50,000 and the IRS has filed a notice of lien. Yet a $50,000 tax debt is easy to amass today and tax liens are pretty standard. The IRS files tax liens routinely when you owe taxes. It’s the IRS’ way of putting creditors on notice so the IRS eventually gets paid; the Joint Committee on Taxation estimated that the new law would raise about $400 million over the next decade.
A serious problem, however, looms for millions of U.S. citizens living abroad. Passports, obviously, are essential for travel, residency permits, banking, school, and work visas; yet, the IRS has documented trouble with getting mail properly to expats.
Furthermore, National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson, say the notices to debtors often come at the same time the State Department is notified of the taxpayer’s debt, in some cases leaving not enough time to resolve tax issues before passport problems occur.
None of that seems to matter to the IRS, which has reported that 220 people have turned over $11.5 million to repay their full debts as of late June, while 1,400 others had set up payment plans to reduce their debts. Essentially, more than 350,000 Americans face passport denial when applying or renewing, with little to no recourse for an agency plagued with problems.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, FED, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, HYPOCRISY
I’ve written about Andrew Weissmann in these pages before, and this article, written earlier in the year, recently came to my attention. Weissmann has a history of despicable lawyer practices, and this latest article shows growing concern about his past tactics — which could ultimately affect his role in the present investigation. I have reprinted the article below:
The top attorney in Robert Mueller’s Special Counsel’s office was reported to the Department of Justice’s Inspector General by a lawyer representing whistleblowers for alleged “corrupt legal practices” more than a year before the 2016 presidential election and a decade before to the Senate Judiciary Committee, this reporter has learned.
Described by the New York Times as Mueller’s ‘pitbull,‘ Andrew Weissmann, a former Eastern District of New York Assistant U.S. Attorney, rose through the ranks to eventually become Mueller’s general counsel at the F.B.I.
In 2015 Weissmann was selected to run the Department of Justice’s criminal fraud section and was later handpicked by Mueller to join the ongoing Special Counsel’s Office investigation into the alleged obstruction and alleged collusion between Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and Russia.
But Weissmann’s rise to the top was rocky from the start. Although he’s been described as a tough prosecutor by some, his involvement in a case targeting the Colombo crime family in a New York Eastern District Court was the first of many that would draw criticism from his peers, as well as judges.
Civil rights and criminal defense attorney David Schoen, was the lawyer who reported Weissmann. Schoen met with Inspector General Michael Horowitz and several FBI officials to discuss Weismann in 2015. Schoen, who says he has never been a member of a political party, told this reporter his concerns about Weissmann do not stem from politics but from Weissmann’s ‘egregious’ actions in previous cases. He became involved in Colombo crime cases more than 20 years ago after evidence revealed that the prosecution withheld exculpatory evidence in the case.
Schoen said he decided to revisit the case based on new witness information and “recent evidence that has come to light in the last several months.”
“The issue with Weissmann both pre-dates and transcends any of these current political issues,” said Schoen, who also used to represent the ACLU in Alabama. “I have met with Senator (Charles) Grassley’s staff and the DOJ IG about these issues and that was well before all of this…I care about these issues as a person who chose this profession and am otherwise very proud to be able to practice law, as the proud son of an FBI agent, and as a civil rights attorney dedicated to doing my part in trying to improve public institutions.”
John Lavinsky, a spokesman for the DOJ’s Office of Inspector General, declined to comment on Schoen’s meeting with Horowitz.
Weissmann also declined to comment for this story.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, POLITICS
The Wall Street Journal published a ridiculous article, “The Gender Pay Gap Is a Lot Bigger Than You Think” that used every possible misconception, misstatement, and lie about the gender gap.
The author, Maddy Dychtwald, talks about an 18 cent pay gap differential, but instead of acknowledging that any differentials that exist relate to choices, the article only focuses on retirement funds.
There are many reasons for a pay gap – but it isn’t merely because of one’s gender. It has been shown time and again that many women have alternative career paths by choice: different jobs, amounts of time worked, lifestyle flexibility, and risks in occupation to name a few; therefore, any difference in the pay is a result of those choices and not some sort of discrimination. Dychtwald’s conclusion implies that a gender wage gap is “damaging to women” because women will likely have substantially less money saved and earned over her lifetime. Yet she doesn’t even consider that, for many women, working full time may be “damaging” to women who have alternative life goals — such as raising a family — and that amassing retirement funds might not be the ultimate end focus.
Wage gaps exist as a result of job choices, not gender. It is totally distressing that the Wall Street Journal’s typically consistent and balanced reporting on the concept of gender pay gap allowed this outrageous article to be published — without response.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, HYPOCRISY, TAXES
FEE.org recently shed light on the ridiculous behavior of Oxfam, a charity that is supposed to be dedicated to fighting poverty. Indeed, their statement of purpose proclaims “The purpose of Oxfam is to help create lasting solutions to the injustice of poverty. “
However, careful reading of their most recent report show that Oxfam spends most of its time, energy, and our donated funds monitoring and writing about the false “need” to reducing wealth and income inequality – the very opposite of fighting poverty. If poverty is the “state of being very poor” then it follows that the elimination of such destitution would mean moving from being very poor to less poor, i.e., increasing wealth. Thus, it would follow that an increase of wealth would to be an inherently good as a means to achieve the goal of poverty reduction, right? Not so with Oxfam. Growing wealth is increasingly seen as a bad thing.
Indeed, last year, Oxfam seemed preoccupied with the notion that some people have too much wealth. In their 2017 report, “Oxfam condemns the fact that there is now a dramatic increase in the number of billionaires around the world. It considers this phenomenon as indicative of “extreme wealth.”
The fact is that economic growth is NOT a zero sum game – the more growth there is, the more benefits to all levels of society. There is no doubt that the creations of Bill Gates and Steve Jobs have had enormous effects in reducing world poverty – despite the fact that they became billionaires in the process.It is also the fact that an increase in the amount of wealthy persons indicates that upward mobility can and is being achieved by more people. In fact, “global extreme poverty has fallen dramatically over recent decades. It is likely that extreme poverty will be eliminated within the current generation. This won’t satisfy Oxfam, however, because it concerns itself with the rich, not the destitute.”
Not content with having mismatched priorities, Oxfam has also cobbled together a list of suggestions for global, national, and local governments, suggestions that do not relate to poverty reduction. Oxfam urges “policies to tackle all forms of gender discrimination, promote positive social norms and attitudes towards women and women’s work, and rebalance power dynamics at the household, local, national and international levels.”
When a charity loses its purpose and becomes a social engineering, social justice organization, one should not be supporting it. Poverty is egregious. Lifting folks out of poverty is important. To not realize that increasing world economic growth and wealth – yes, and even making many more billionaires – has been what has been so effective in reducing world poverty, simply shows economic illiteracy. berate an increase in wealth and instead desire to “level the playing field” betrays its mission; Oxfam is to be avoided.
