Wednesday September 13, 2006 Vol. 8 No. 183

In Today's Letter: Comment: Feeding the Greedy and Corrupt Offshore: EU Tax Haven Attack Goes On Wealth: Vietnam Tops Again Privacy & Rights: The Asset Protection Scam Artist

Global Taxes Feed the Greedy and Corrupt

Dear A-Letter Reader,

The late and far too influential liberal economist, John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946) once observed: "The avoidance of taxes is the only intellectual pursuit that carries any reward." We agree about that potential reward, but note that Keynes referred to tax "avoidance," which we repeatedly have explained is legal. That's as opposed to tax "evasion," which is not legal.

The trouble with taxes is those who feed upon them. Taxes are the lifeblood of the vampire-like government bureaucracy at every level. Without the billions in taxes millions of bureaucrats extract from our hard earned paychecks, oppressive government would wither and die like Dracula in the sunlight. Happy thought what?

But if you thought paying taxes to your city, county, state, and the federal government was "enough already" -- guess again. For several years now there has been a concerted international effort by dedicated welfare state leftists to impose global taxes on middle class and wealthy people in every nation, but most especially Americans who already pay for the largest slice of groups such as the United Nations.

And it is the money hungry UN bureaucrats who are leading the push for a global tax on you and me and everybody else who works for a living. These worthies want to impose on the already burdened taxpayers of the world, a new round of "global taxes" to finance the UN and its programs. This plan would supplement annual dues from each nation with direct UN taxes. In early 2002 we reported about a UN conference held in Monterey, Mexico, that we called "the tax collectors meeting from Hell" where plans were mapped for a UN "international tax organization," a one world IRS. The UN is demanding that the rich nations spend 0.7% of their gross domestic product on "development" aid. This is more than $300 billion a year, well over $3 trillion over the next decade.

Subsequently, French President Jacques Chirac, who never met a tax he didn't like, called for such world taxes, this time cloaked in fighting "world poverty." Chirac proposed an international tax on arms sales and every financial transaction to be used to "eradicate poverty." (Yet billions have been spent for this very goal in recent decades, most of it from the pockets of American taxpayers who finance U.S. foreign aid programs). Later he proposed a tax on all airline ticket sales which is now French law.

And backers of global taxes are still hard at work. The Global Policy Forum, a UN-affiliated leftist talk tank, says the short term goal is to "break down the taboo" of talking about global taxes. This is a stark reminder that the work against global taxes must continue. In 2005 the UN issued a report calling for a global tax on airplane tickets to help poor nations and 66 nations endorsed the report. At the 2005 G-8 summit, Chirac renewed calls for a global airline ticket tax and won support from several G-8 leaders. In March 2006 an alliance of 12 nations - Brazil, Chile, Congo, Cyprus, the Ivory Coast, Jordan, Luxembourg, Madagascar, Mauritius, Nicaragua, Norway, and the United Kingdom - agreed to adopt similar proposals.

As Sven Larson of the Heritage Foundation has written: "Global taxes feed incompetent, corrupt bureaucracies. National governments are good at wasting taxpayers' money, but at least there is hope they can be held accountable. International bureaucracies, like the UN and the World Bank, however, are above and beyond accountability. Nonetheless, some suggest that they should be given the right to tax American citizens directly. This is a particularly bad idea. The UN has the Iraqi oil-for-food scandal on its resume, and the World Bank is responsible for more failures than successes in global development."

In 2002, speaking for the Bush administration at the UN, then U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman said: "Global taxes are inherently undemocratic. Implementation is impossible." The U.S. also refused to sign or agree to a UN declaration endorsing Chirac's global UN taxes.

We certainly agree, but we should all be aware of what's going on.

That's the way that it looks from here,
Bob Bauman, Editor

LINK: http://www.washingtontimes.com/commentary/ 

 

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EU Tax Haven Attack Goes On

 Vietnam Tops Again in 2006

 Asset Protection Promoter Sued for Fraud,
Conspiracy and RICO...Just for Starters

A few years ago, an asset protection "expert" named Bill Reed wrote a book entitled Bulletproof Asset Protection. Reed recommended protecting assets by making them invisible, and controlling those assets through a Nevada corporation, using "bearer shares." 

"Remember," wrote Reed, "if a federal judge can find an asset, he can seize it. Conversely, what he can't find, or doesn't know about, he can't touch."

Now, Reed and his company, Asset Protection Group (APG) are being sued in federal court on behalf of more than 2,000 people who spent nearly $10,000 each to become APG "associates." Separately, a federal judge has appointed a receiver to oversee APG's business activities in response to a lawsuit by the Federal Trade Commission.

The lawsuit on behalf of APG associates makes claims of fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, conspiracy, breach of contract, unfair trade practices, unauthorized practice of law, violations of Nevada's racketeering act, unjust enrichment, and a number of other claims, against Reed and APG.

I've repeatedly warned Sovereign Society members not to get involved with bearer share companies without expert tax advice. I most recently wrote about this in the July issue of The Sovereign Individual, the Society's members-only newsletter. You can read the article (Worse Than Worthless: 3 Asset Protection Scams Exposed) by clicking here.

MARK NESTMANN, Privacy Expert & President of The Nestmann Group
www.nestmann.com