You matter, you are important and you are capable of knowing more than you do. You know that you exist and that can lead you to knowing other truths. If you bother, you can know other people and their truths.
If you are interested in a subject, click the tag at the bottom of any post for more posts on the same general subject.
Fox - U.S. Issues More Curbs to Corporate Tax Inversion Deals. In the most direct terms, American companies make deals with foreign companies to take the American companies assets and then they move their operations overseas thereby avoiding paying taxes. It is basically the asset robbing of America and very recently the Treasury Department enacted some laws to delay or prevent this action. The term Tax Inversion is used to describe this hiding of taxable income overseas, that is what the term refers to. So, a coupe of days ago the United States took action to prevent this crime. That is part one of this story. This came out April 4th.
The Hill - GOP tax writers rip Treasury for moves to deter corporate inversions. This article came out April 5th. Yeah, one day later the spin is on. The spin is that it is bad for our nation to keep our manufacturing jobs in the United States. If you hate Obama; but, want to keep jobs in America, you had better support this change which stops companies from outsourcing and leaving this nation with nothing. I don't like Obama; but, I like this policy and it has already worked.
CNBC - Pfizer, Allergan will mutually terminate merger over inversion rule changes, sources say. Here is a sentence from the article, "Pfizer had reportedly stood to cut its costs by more than $1 billion a year by changing its domicile." Why did the Bushes and the Clintons sign legislation that let American companies move overseas and save money by doing it?
I have been writing this blog for years and have never advertised it or monetized it, no ads on this site ever and there never will be because of me. I have never asked for a penny and don't want any now. What I want my readers to do, if they think I present people with useful information, is tell others to read it and let them see what is really going on. Have them start with the posts titled "What's going on" and tagged as "the big picture". What is going on is so obvious to me and I am saddened that more people don't see it all for what it is.
WikiLeaks - IMF Internal Meeting Predicts Greek 'Disaster', Threatens to Leave Troika. WikiLeaks has released the transcript of a conversation which was had between two International Monetary Fund (IMF) heads regarding Greece, it's bailout and Brexit (the British vote on leaving the European Union). I know most Americans don't follow these things; but, this post is not about the EU or the Greece bailout, it is about something much bigger.
Here is a quote from the transcript, "VELKOULESKOU:They want to finish that mission ideally by the 8th of April, so just a week. Or by the 12th or the 13th. Remember on the 6th and 7th of April they want to have this Washington Group debt meeting on the sidelines of the EWG [Eurogroup Working Group], and then.... " Basically, they are saying that the Greece decision has to be completed before discussing American debt in Washington; but, the two things are unrelated as the debt that is held is EU debt, not American. So you have to ask yourself what is the real connection.
The same person then discusses how they need to wrap up the negotiations because people in Greece are questioning the Income Tax Credit, not tax reform. Who do you figure gets the credit, the rich or the poor and why would the IMF want to give tax breaks when they also want to cut pensions and other benefits?
What becomes clear from the discussion is that the IMF plans on creating an economic "event" in order to get Greece to do what the IMF wants and that they can pick the time when the event will occur. It is also clear that this economic event will effect not just Greece and Europe; but, also the United States and probably all western nations. What I find really interesting is that none of the mass media has picked up on this story to any great degree. This is odd as the timing of the event is somehow related to the refugee question and the vote by Britain on whether or not it will stay in the EU.
Here is what I want my readers to take away from all of this. It is an admittance by the IMF that they plan economic crashes to achieve political policies that are based on providing less support for the middle class and poor and more tax breaks for the wealthy. Sort of sounds like what the west did after the last big crash, they gave tax breaks to the wealthy and increased taxes on everyone else while reducing government benefits and most people thought these things were accidents. Nothing in the global economy is ever an accident.
I was reading a New York Times article about how the protestors were working out their plans in strip malls weeks in advance of his coming. I thought that was odd, who is paying for the space? If they can afford the space then why don't they have pre-printed signs? Oh, yeah and how come the organizations funding the protests don't have to register as Political Action Committees? While those are all good questions, I have a better one, why didn't these people protest the wars in Arabia? Now that is a real good question because the protestors love to have signs that say, "No hate in our state" and some claim that they don't like the fact that Trump wants to limit people from Muslim countries coming here. If they care so much about the Muslims, why didn't they protest us bombing them?
Here is another question, when Cruz's SuperPac put out adds attacking Trump's wife, why didn't the media take Cruz to task; but, when Trump said that if Cruz was going to discuss wives, Cruz himself should be real careful? Yet the media has been talking for days about how Trump may have crossed the line? What line, Cruz's SuperPac actually televised this anti-Trump ad.
YouTube - Trump’s Wife's Nudes Are Being Using Against Him
So this story came out about a peaceful protestor who got pepper sprayed at a Trump rally; but, that story is not quite right. In fact the women punched a much older man in the face and then got pepper sprayed. The women who got pepper sprayed later claimed that the man she hit had fondled her. I have a question about that, you see the woman had been in a screaming match with the Trump supporters before hitting the man and he was in front of her but not close when she hit him. So if you watch the video you have to ask yourself, how long did she wait before she hit him because he doesn't even touch her in the video taken just prior to her hitting him, how did he get so far away before she came at him and hit him, she had to really reach out to hit him and oddly enough nobody who was there said the man had touched her. Now here is the funny part, the police are only investigating who pepper sprayed her and whether or not she was groped. Why aren't they charging her with battery for hitting the man? Simple answer, he didn't file a claim against her. He could have; but, he did not. Still, the police have the video evidence and should have charged her with battery; but, they didn't.
I have to say something, I don't particularly like Trump. Clearly I wrote that I had been for Sanders and no longer supported him because he acted like a cheap politician when it came to Trump. The thing is that while all the Republicans I know support Trump, they don't particularly like him either. What they care about is American jobs coming back. It is that simple. For reasons that I prefer not to go into, I am no longer sure that I could support Trump either. It has nothing to do with his wanting to halt and limit immigration, it has nothing to do with any of his policies, though I disagree with many of them. My reason involves a spiritual question that I prefer not to discuss at the moment. If Trump were to get elected and bring peace to the middle east, then I will discuss my questions. Still, I am bothered by all the propaganda and dirty tricks against Trump being used by the right and the left. I think it exposes their hypocrisy. I really don't like Trump supporters being compared to Nazis when most of my friends support Trump and had family members fight the Nazis. My dead uncle fought on Iwo Jima during World War II. He would have supported Trump, my dad would have too and he was highly decorated in the Korean war and hated communism and the Nazis. Here is a poll that was taken and never published, how many of you who support Trump thought we should not have fought Nazi Germany in World War II. I guarantee this poll was taken and will never be released. How do I know this, they took polls to see how many of Trumps followers thought the south should have won the civil war. How bout this question, how many Trump supporters fought in World War II compared to the other candidates. That poll was taken too, the polls asked people's age, that means the pollsters knew how many of Trumps supporters had lived through World War II.
YouTube - 7News - Denver investigating underground water storage. Keep an eye on all stories about water, something interesting and wrong is happening. Denver is now looking into underground water storage in case of drought. Why is this interesting, simple, why go to all the expense of storing water underground when you can store it above ground for much less.
Fox - State of California flouts its own enviro laws, claims county threatening multi-million-dollar suit. Okay, Caltrans drills tiny little holes so see what the groundwater levels are and many counties want them to obtain permits to "protect" the groundwater. In Sacramento they claim they are concerned about the Sacramento delta; but, that is not below ground. What might be interesting is to find out how much groundwater has been taken and the condition of the water table.
Christian Science Monitor - Debate over water rights intensifies as Saudis buy up swaths of US farmland. The short of the story is that Saudi Arabia is buying up desert property and draining the groundwater to grow alfalfa in the desert and then shipping the alfalfa overseas. I will ask a question that I have asked before, why are people allowed to take water during a drought and send it or its products overseas when the rest of us must ration water and not even water our lawns? Think about it.
I like comedies and find comedians to be very interesting people. I am amazed at how many comedians are shy, fiscal conservatives and often sad people in real life. Garry Shandling seemed different, I know that he was known for his kindness, pretty rare in such a competitive industry. He is regarded by other comedians to be one of the best standup comedians ever; but, I don't think standup is where he shined the most, I think he could tell a good story and his television shows were groundbreaking and amazing.
Shandling did one of the first scripted shows on HBO, the Larry Sanders Show. It was about a make believe late night talk show and mixed drama with comedy in a way that would have scared off most comedians. It was also so original that it should not be forgotten. I went on YouTube and got the finale of the show and I am going to provide a link to it. If you don't know much about him, watch the show and if you know him well, watch the show and remember him.
I went out last night for dinner with two friends of mine, we had a really great dinner and a pleasant conversation. Once again talk turned partly to politics. As I have written before I tend to be a bit of a socialist; but, my friends tend to be very conservative. In fact, all my Republican friends are supporting Trump. I mention this because the media tends to portray Trump supporters as fascist, Nazis that hate women and wish the south had won the civil war. I find this strange as none of the people I know that support have any of those beliefs and most of them are very well educated, not low information. While my friends and I may disagree about politics and policy, the fact of the matter is that my friends are just that because they are considerate, generous and loving people. The media doesn't like presenting them that way because it doesn't fit the desperate corporate media whose masters want only the puppets that they select for President.
Recently I read two articles that claimed that people were disillusioned with the process used to select a President. One implied it was because Trump was winning, the other pointed out that people were disillusioned because there is open discussion of manipulating the process to deny both Sanders and Trump a fair count based on votes and the open plan to change the rules of the Republican convention and go as far as putting up a candidate who hadn't even run for President. It should not be surprising that Republicans began losing more and more faith in the process right after all the articles and reports came out saying how the party establishment was going to rig the race to broker the convention.
The media is not a free media, it works for giant conglomerates and it's number one goal is to support those corporate interests and not to inform the public; but, instead to manipulate the public. That is what is truly sad about this election.
There is a very simple way for the Republicans to stop Trump from winning the election. Promise to not give any more tax breaks to the rich and give them to the middle class instead. Oh yeah and penalize companies for outsourcing jobs and refuse to give them ANY tax breaks. With all the talk by pundits about getting rid of Trump by violating the voters rights, why aren't they discussing jobs? Hillary won't do it, Cruz and Kasich think the solution is lower pay for Americans and bigger tax breaks for the wealthy, we have been doing that for 30 years and it has only resulted in fewer jobs that pay less. People are not voting for Trump because they love him personally, they are voting for him because the rest of the establishment has left them out to twist in the wind. Think about it.
