Chaos in USA

[Bob]

No John, people in North Korea are dying because their lunatic leader insists on threatening other nations

From an American this is just a crass statement, your country not only threatens other nations, it invades them, kills their people in huge numbers and leaves them when it finally sinks in to the thick heads that any victory will be purely imagined and all because they dont go for the book you got over there.
Nobody swallows that ***** of yours any more except for the retarded and deluded.
America had values and ideals once, now it just has loud mouthed 'patriots' with AR15s

[AtomKraft]

Agree.
The US is the most threatening Nation there has ever been.

[John Hill]

The US is the most threatening Nation there has ever been.

Don't you think that is a bit unfair?

Never forget that all of Europe (including associated islands ) would be speaking German today were it not for those brave Americans in their P-51 Mustangs who drove the Luftwaffe from the skies over England in 1940.

[PHXPhlyer]

John:
I don't know how to break this to you but I will try to do it gently.
The P-51 was first flown in late October 1940 and didn't enter service (with the RAF) until 1942.
The USAF didn't fly Mustangs in Europe until 1943.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Ame ... 51_Mustang

I think you may be confusing Mustangs with RAF Spitfires and Hurricanes,
Sorry.
Hope your bubble burst was not too traumatic.

PP

[John Hill]

.............................................

[Undried Plum]

Murricanes don't 'do' irony, John.

[Bob]

Oh dear

[Bob]

Gotta love those Repubes...hell yeah

https://www.wgbh.org/news/national-news ... s-to-blame

[boing]

Bob,

There are series of considerations that you are gleefully ignoring. Perhaps the most obvious one is that the article you provide uses graphs to show COVID death cases for Republican counties but entirely fails to provide similar graphs for Democratic areas.

There is in the USA a medical organisation called the Mayo Clinic, you may have heard of it, it is a place with a sterling reputation for medical expertise and professional conduct, I prefer to get my information from this source rather than some government associated media outlet (NPR) in Boston. You can access their COVID tracking website at;

https://www.mayoclinic.org/coronavirus-covid-19/map

You will note that the State of Massachusetts, of which Boston, the source of your article, is the major city reports the following statistics on 12/10/2021..

Fully vaccinated rate 72.4%, number of COVID cases per 100,000 population 69.3.

Strangely, the States that have most strongly resisted forced vaccination have the following figures.

Florida, fully vaccinated rate 62%, number of COVID cases per 100,000 population 8.4.
Louisiana, fully vaccinated rate 49.3%, number of COVID cases per 100,000 population 9.6.
Texas, fully vaccinated rate 55.5%, number of COVID cases per 100,000 population 12.4.
Georgia, fully vaccinated rate 49.7%, number of COVID cases per 100,000 population 12.4.
Alabama, fully vaccinated rate 46.6%, number of COVID cases per 100,000 population 10.7.

I will not bore you with other comparable figures. I would just point out that the southern tier states were predicted to be COVID disaster areas but they are actually faring far better than the North Eastern states.

The three strongly Democratic Western states report as follows.
Washington, fully vaccinated rate 66.2%, number of COVID cases per 100,000 population 21.5.
Oregon, fully vaccinated rate 64.9%, number of COVID cases per 100,000 population 21.2.
California, fully vaccinated rate 64.2%, number of COVID cases per 100,000 population 17.7.

Quite clearly this report from a highly reliable source shows that vaccination rates alone and political inclination alone do not explain the disparity in COVID cases. When Texas and Florida have such low COVID case figures as are reported by a reliable source it is quite obvious that the media message requires careful examination and not only that, the administration actually has no idea about the true cause, effect and treatment of the infliction. (yes, I did deliberately say infliction not infection.)


.

[Undried Plum]

The number of crackpots in the USA is alarming. That most of 'em are allowed to vote is disturbing. That the way they vote makes no **** difference to the way they are governed is almost reassuring.

[boing]

The number of crackpots in the USA is alarming. That most of 'em are allowed to vote is disturbing. That the way they vote makes no **** difference to the way they are governed is almost reassuring.

I think the very same thing could be said about the UK and indeed most of Europe. Supporting groups whose only claim to fame is removing 200 year old statues is hardly a logical form of government. What surprises me since I considered you to be a halfway independently thinking individual is your apparent support for loss of freedoms and free speech. Have you failed to notice the dramatic imposition of state authority that is extinguishing the rights and freedoms that once characterised the western countries? That is what many of the "crackpots" are opposing.

A philosophically difficult assessment but the final position that can be grasped is that you are only responsible for your own personal moral fate, you are not ultimately responsible for the lives of others, they are simply bit players and collaborators in your own development. Certainly kindness and support of others is an important life characteristic but ultimately, as Bill said:

“This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell, my blessing season this in thee!”

You appear to be critical of people who are simply holding true to their own beliefs. Tell me, as you lie dying, which memory do you wish to recall, that you bent with the wind, with every difficulty, or that you stood by your beliefs? When I look back on my life I would like to remember that, in the trail of chaos I left behind, I did help other people but ultimately I chose my own path through life and I will be finally able to say "Yes, I had screw-ups but overall I am pretty happy by the way things went."

.

[TheGreenGoblin]

I have met a number of ex US citizens over the years, mostly in SA, interestingly, who have renounced their citizenship, often for tax reasons but not always. Even our benighted PM did this, but it seems that that process is not so easy now.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... ship-stuck

Americans seeking to renounce their citizenship are stuck with it for now

As many as 30,000 citizens living abroad have been unable to secure a ‘loss of nationality’ interview during the pandemic

In recent years, Michael has come to regard the United States, the nation of which he has been a citizen all his life, as an abusive parent.

“I can acknowledge my past association with that person while at the same time wanting to keep future association to a minimum,” he said.

Michael – the name is false as he requested anonymity to avoid being inundated with hate mail – found his disaffection with his native country reach crunch point in 2020. The chaotic end of the Donald Trump era combined with the inequities exposed by the Covid pandemic made him despair of being an American.

“Coronavirus made me realize that in the US, if you’re not a member of the moneyed elite you’re left to fend for yourself with virtually no help from the federal government,” he said. “The farcical presidential campaign made me realize that I don’t want to be a member of a society in which my vote is made irrelevant by gerrymandering or the electoral college.”

And so Michael decided to renounce his US citizenship. Having moved to Finland 10 years ago, he would break the ties that officially bound him to a country whose values he no longer recognised.

That’s when Michael’s troubles really began. He discovered that along with thousands of other US citizens living abroad, he was caught in a Kafkaesque trap.

For almost two years, since the pandemic struck in March 2020, most US consular missions around the world have suspended their expatriation services for those wishing to give up US citizenship. The US embassy in London, the largest of its sort in western Europe, announces on its website that it is “currently unable to accept appointments for loss of nationality applications” and is unable to say when services will resume.

The US state department says giving up citizenship requires a face-to-face interview with a government official, and that it is too risky given coronavirus.

Delays have led to a growing mountain of disgruntled citizens. By some calculations, there may be as many as 30,000 people among the 9 million US citizens living abroad who would like to begin the renunciation process but can’t.

Joshua Grant is one of them. He was born and raised in Selma, Alabama, until he moved to Germany when he was 21 to learn the language.

He has been there ever since. He lives in Lower Saxony and married a German citizen last year. Grant, 30, feels ready to acquire German citizenship, but under German law he must let go of his US passport. Easier said than done.


He submitted a pile of paperwork to the US embassy in July 2020. Nothing has happened. He has written emails to the embassy staff, with no reply.

He contacted the office of US senator from Alabama Richard Shelby. They passed him on to the state department, which in turn passed him back to the bureau of consular affairs, which mentioned the pandemic.

“It’s very taxing. My whole life in Germany is on hold,” he said. “It’s funny: people in Germany tend to see the US as a liberal country where the rule of law was established, but I can’t even find anyone in the US government to talk to.”

Nine US citizens abroad who have found themselves unable to give up their nationality are now suing the state department in a federal court in Washington. The suit, brought on the plaintiffs’ behalf by the French-based group Association of Accidental Americans, likens the situation to feudal times.

“The US appears intent on preventing its citizens from exercising their natural and fundamental right to voluntarily renounce their citizenship,” it says.

Some people want to give up US citizenship because the government has been making the burden of being an American more onerous for those abroad. In 2010 the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) was passed, requiring foreign banks and other financial institutions to report on any clients they suspect of being American to the IRS.

The US is also one of only two countries (the other is Eritrea) that tax people on their citizenship rather than where they live. That forces Americans abroad to declare their global income to the IRS, with possible tax implications.

The impact of these burdens is reflected in the number of people who renounce each year. Between 2000 and 2010 it remained relatively steady at less than 1,000 people, but after FATCA came in, the numbers rose sharply to a peak last year of almost 7,000.

Some of the would-be renouncers are “accidental Americans”, having acquired citizenship because they were born in the US though they have lived elsewhere all their lives.

Boris Johnson was an ‘accidental American’ until he renounced his US citizenship in 2017.

That label could be applied to the UK prime minister Boris Johnson, who was born in New York but has not lived in the US since he was five. Johnson renounced his citizenship in 2017, having said he was outraged a few years earlier by having to pay the US tax authorities for gains on the sale of his London home.

Marie Sock, the first woman to stand as a presidential candidate in the Gambia, was forced to pull out of the race recently after she failed to get any response to her request to renounce her US nationality from the US embassy.

She explained in a video posted on Facebook that under Gambia election law, presidential candidates must be sole Gambian nationals.

James – also not his real name – was born in Texas but has not lived in the US since he was four. He now lives in Singapore.

He became disillusioned when he learned that because his son was born outside the US he would not be eligible for US citizenship, and yet because of James’s citizenship he would treated as if he were a US taxpayer. That struck him as a modern form of taxation without representation.

“The double standards really annoy me,” he said.

For the past year he has been trying to get through to an official who will help him renounce his citizenship, without success.

“I never asked for US citizenship, and now I’m not even allowed to give it up.”

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of ... ationality

The most interesting ex US citizen I met was a once wealthy businessman who had become a Cistercian Monk on Caldey Island.

https://caldeyislandwales.com/cistercian-monks

[boing]

I would not be surprised if it was covert State Department policy to create difficulty in giving up citizenship since it is a manoeuvre of many rich individuals to avoid paying taxes. As usual the little fellow is collateral damage.

I do not know who you would blame for the ridiculous US tax laws that assist US corporations and rich tax payers living overseas since the policies have been supported by politicians of both US parties for many years. The average taxpayer overseas is monitored closely but rich individuals can hide their income in "works of art" etc. with very little examination. The usual trick is to buy something expensive such as a home or painting which you call an investment hence reducing your current taxes and you have no future tax liability until the asset is sold. A nice way of reducing current taxation. Of course, this rule also applies to domestic transactions but the field of opportunity is much wider internationally.

[Undried Plum]

I have met a number of ex US citizens over the years, mostly in SA, interestingly, who have renounced their citizenship, often for tax reasons but not always. Even our benighted PM did this, but it seems that that process is not so easy now.

I am one who "discontinued the use of" my US citizenship. I'd never ever used it so the promise was meaningless.

Not long after I proudly received my Flying Badge in GD (Flying) Branch, I was unpleasantly surprised to receive formal notification from the New York Draft Board that I'd been given a very low draft number. I did what y'do. I passed the problem to my senior officer and he subsequently did the same, and so on and so on up the food chain. The matter actually reached the desk of the Secretary of Defence. Upshot was that I was required to discontinue use of my American citizenship. Win-win for me in later life as it absolved me of having to be a tax slave to The Empire.

I don't think I'd have done much to change the outcome of The American War in Vietnam anyway, so I was no loss strategically. They did lose quite a lot of potential tax revenue some decades later though, so fukkem.

[llondel]

The way I'd look at it, which might not agree with the view of the US government, is that having sent in the formal paperwork, that is the line in the sand for any liabilities and starts any relevant clocks ticking. If the government, for reasons of its own, choose to delay some of the formalities, anything that happens after that date should be exempt from their interference or extortion. If by that point you're outside the US, have no assets in the US and don't plan to go back for a visit (or fly close enough that you might get diverted there), it may limit their options.

[John Hill]

If by that point you're outside the US, have no assets in the US and don't plan to go back for a visit (or fly close enough that you might get diverted there), it may limit their options.

They have a very long reach you know. They might for example have you excluded from all international monetary facilities, they might put you on the international no-fly list, they might get some septic strumpet in the country where you are to lay complaints against you of a sexual nature then extradite you to face 'justice'. They might even have your subscription to Readers Digest terminated. Or they might just send a drone to vaporize you and your beloved.

[Undried Plum]

Getting someone to make sexual allegations is a particular favourite. That's how they attacked Julian Assange. He made the mistake of embarrassing The Empire by publishing truthfulness. They arranged for allegations to be made which even the Swedish Prosecutor recognised weren't worthy of a charge, but he's in maximum security prison Belmarsh now awaiting extradition to America to face some imaginary allegation of criminal behaviour in a country he's never even visited.

He showed what bloody liars USG are and he will never be forgiven for doing so.

It's a trick which is being used in the UK now too. The core of the Scottish Government (there's only about a dozen of them) cooked up a load of bollocks to lock Alex Salmond away for life. The conspsiracy, for that is what it was, failed because a jury recognised the ***** for what it was and acquitted him on all 13 charges.

When Craig Murray sent official secret telegrammes to the Foreign Secretary, while serving as British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, in which he pointed out the gross illegality of British complicity in American torture of political prisoners he was attacked by FCO with contrived allegations of sexual misconduct. It's seems to be a pervasive modus operandi.

[boing]

It is interesting to see that what you may call the "post British colonial" nations are all showing this trend towards increased Government authority and increased legalised Government surveillance. The United States, Australia, Canada and the UK are all involved, coincidentally, I am sure ( ), the members of the Five Eyes agreement. It will be interesting to see how this plays out, these governments are nominally for the people but they are increasingly imposing authority under "emergency powers, for our own good" arguments rather than by traditional law making processes. Can any emergency justify dictatorial authority?

Certainly, at least in the US, this over-reach will fail mainly because of the clumsy and short-sighted means being used to impose the authority. The Government, and the shadowy individuals and money sources which own them, can only ever be a small percentage of the population. To be successful the Government will ultimately need the muscle of law enforcement and the military which, at least in the US, are two of the very groups that the Government are alienating.

In the US the police are being demoralised to the extent that officers are leaving the force and the military is being alienated by dismissal of servicemen over Covid vaccinations. Now, you would think that any Government considering a power grab would wish to keep their "muscle departments" firmly on their side but this consideration does not seem to occur to the US ultra-left wing, they believe their strength is in the education establishments moving their acolytes into positions of authority and the support of groups such as Antifa.

Much focus now in the US is on the mid-term elections this year. The result of these elections will be strongly opposed by the losing side. We can fully expect riots along the lines of those which have recently occurred and inadequate police forces, even if they wished to get involved, will not be able to handle them. The State military forces could be activated but I doubt that these groups will be very enthusiastic. It will be an interesting time. I think that with the next series of riots popular patience will give way and we will see more "self help" and having contingents of trained, armed and disgruntled individuals out in the population could provide an interesting twist.

.

[Dushan]

If by that point you're outside the US, have no assets in the US and don't plan to go back for a visit (or fly close enough that you might get diverted there), it may limit their options.

They have a very long reach you know. They might for example have you excluded from all international monetary facilities, they might put you on the international no-fly list, they might get some septic strumpet in the country where you are to lay complaints against you of a sexual nature then extradite you to face 'justice'. They might even have your subscription to Readers Digest terminated. Or they might just send a drone to vaporize you and your beloved.

Sounds like someone is talking from personal experience (sans the drone part - yet).

[Bob]

..and in Today's News it becomes apparent that the standards of truth and integrity required of a US Congresswoman (or indeed of a US President iirc) are rather lower than that required by a Social media platform

..................Go USA