The inaugural edition of Testiphi, a new on line publication focuses on expatriates and has an article The FATCA Of The Matter
At last, someone is showing “There is another side of the story.” This article features Victoria Ferauge (aka Victoria) and Lynne Swanson (aka Blaze).
Victoria tells it as it is:
FATCA doesn’t stand a chance in hell of catching those tax evaders. People who are rich enough to move their money from one country to another and do it to escape taxes have many ways of getting around this law. All FATCA will do is cause a lot of damage to the innocent and destroy the ability of Americans to enjoy the fruits of globalization – to be as mobile as the British or the French or the Chinese.”
The article also reports on the growing underground movement of Isaac Brock Society, Maple Sandbox and Franco-American Flophouse.
Victoria again nails it:
“The movement has no real center or appointed leaders but it is becoming a powerful network” Ferauge, who successful battled cancer, said. “Google recent articles about Americans abroad and FATCA online and you will see hundreds of comments. This is the Diaspora in action. No sooner does an article come out then it is emailed, tweeted and posted all around the globe. The response is almost immediate with people weighing in from Thailand, Mexico, Europe, South America and many other places.
It’s quite extraordinary.”
So, let’s continue to fight. Except I don’t think anyone can call us underground anymore. We’re quite above ground and fighting the battle publicly.
This is wonderful! Linked and shared!
Blaze…
I continue to be amazed at your dedication to making more of the world aware of the harm and unintended consequences of FATCA. If the conspiracy of silence by the mainstream media in the U.S. continues after 3.5 years, then the alternate ways of increasing awareness can have impact. It is always going to be a hard narrative to tell, and frankly many “Americans” don’t care, (you are all tax dodgers after all!) but you have to stay in the fight in the long term to change perceptions. The drip, drip, drip of renunciations, and those willing to share their stories might finally break through the concrete of apathy
The fact is that Americans don’t care.
On a recent cruise I talked to several Americans about it. They are appallingly arrogant and ignorant. One lady thought that foreigners should report to the IRS if the company they worked for happened to be a foreign subsidiary of an American multinational. She thought that as a stockholder of such a multinational, the income of that foreign person was somehow her concern. I then said there should be reciprocity in that case. Oh no!! Heavens no!! That would not do!! She couldn’t understand my vitriol about Obama. She seemed to think that there was no such thing as “executive responsibility”, and that because the US disrespects the sovereignty of so many others anyhow, it was really no big deal. What an obnoxious and ignorant old hag she was!!!
Another old geezer thought that Obama (who signed FATCA after all) was the smartest man in the White House since George Washington. I told him that Obama was as dumb as a stick, and would not have accomplished anything without affirmative action and his mainstream media hallelujah chorus. That old fart claimed to be “lawyer”, and said that FATCA could in no way be imposed on another sovereign country. I told him that his Messiah Obama was trying to do exactly that, and then shrugged his shoulders thinking that it was ok.
Bottom line: We only have our own government and/or courts to protect us. Most Americans don’t know what is going on. This law does not affect Americans who live and bank within the United States. Others, as I saw for myself, thought that citizenship based taxation should be the norm. Finally I was pretty abrupt and rude with some of them on that cruise, suggesting that if they had Canadians managing their banks, they would not have had the bank insolvencies they had during the financial crisis. I also said explicitly that with what they have as President now, they would have been better off staying loyal to King George III in 1776.
I really cannot stand them.
@ArcticGrayling, I’ve had some very good conversations with Americans about this who are appalled and horrified at the implications of FATCA. Yes, at first, they find it hard to believe, and assume that either I’m exaggerating or don’t really know the facts. However, every single one of them has ended up understanding the issue and realizing how unfair FATCA is, and that most of us are in no way fatcats, but are simply regular folks like them, trying to live their lives.
I admit I have developed the tendency to quickly switch the channel when the news flashes up Obama, as it makes me angry just to see his face – to me, his face represents my nightmare. However, I can’t condemn all Americans – there are what? 350 million of them? And some of them are my relatives, who are also appalled at this farce.
I have vowed to fight FATCA, and to keep fighting as long as I can, but, for me, personally, to keep my sanity I have to temper my hatred, my fear, my outrage, so that I can continue to live a fairly normal life.
It disturbs me that politicians jump on an issue without thinking things through, that most of them seem to be out for themselves, rather than the folks that elected them – but that’s not an American phenomenon, as the recent scandals here in Canada have shown. World-wide, I think we need a better class of person representing us, but, honestly, how many ethical, responsible, empathetic people could a) be interested in becoming politicians, or b) could stay that way once they were elected?
@ Outraged Canadian…
I am outraged at Americans who voted for that imposter. I am also outraged at the mainstream media, which created him and that continues to idolize him.
A perfect example is how the media is covering for Obama on what is probably a fraudulent birth certificate. British National Archives do suggest that he was born in Kenya.
http://dcclothesline.com/2013/06/20/british-national-archives-show-a-son-was-born-to-obama-sr-in-1961-in-kenya/
Of course, if the mainstream media were to report this, they would be castigating themselves, and we know they will not incriminate themselves.
I am also outraged at the silence of the CBC on FATCA issue. I think they are silent because they were (and still are) part of the media hallelujah chorus that created him. The CBC appears willing to go against the interests of their own country to avoid making themselves look bad.
Arctic. When you dredge up that birther bullshit, then we discount every other thing you have to say.
@ KalC….
I didn’t present that as definitive proof. I merely said that there is information out there that SUGGESTS he was born in Kenya.
Do you have definitive proof otherwise?
Actually, there is even evidence from the Associated Press that he was born in Kenya.
http://www.infowars.com/ap-declared-obama-kenyan-born/
A newspaper report of June 27, 1984 had the headline “Kenyan-born Obama all set for the US Senate”.
Did Obama deny that in the 2004 Senate campaign? Perhaps you can show us where he issued an explicit denial in 2004? I haven’t seen one.
In fact, during that campaign, he was taken to task for not being natural born. Apparently his reply was:
“So what? I am running for Illinois Senator, not the presidency.”
@Arctic: I agree with KalC. We’re not here to debate Obama’s place of birth. He has provided the long version of his birth certificate from Hawaii.
KalC didn’t say you provided definitive proof. He said when you dredge up that issue, we discount every other thing you have to say.
If you want to debate that issue, I suspect there are websites devoted to that topic.
The issue is the role Obama and Congress played in imposing FATCA and other IRS nightmares on us and their unwillingness to do anything about it even though they are now very aware of the unintended consequences of FATCA.
Well…..let’s just suppose that the suspicions about his birth are correct.
If they are correct, he would have violated the American Constitution. It would mean that he has been ineligible to be President from day one. Would that not make any law to which he attached signature, including FATCA, invalid?
That would be very convenient for a lot of us.
@Arctic: You’re flogging a dead horse. Obama has provided his birth certificate from Hawaii. End of story.
It’s hard to express how very little I care about anything to do with Obama. Don’t care where he is born, don’t care anything about him. I care about FATCA and the US citizenship-based taxation model.