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J

JosephKK

Jan 1, 1970
0
any evidence for that claim?

and to refuse a request to leave would have meant the entire country
fighting against the US troops.

The not too poorly reported events since the run-up to the invasion
until today makes it clear enough. I remind you of how we treated the
Shah of Iran and Osama bin Laden over time. Hamid had better beware.
 
J

JosephKK

Jan 1, 1970
0
Good grief. That wasn't the point of my relating the fundamentals,
which seems like it was a good idea, since you have little grasp. But
even if it were, the most you could say is there may be a
determination if someone actually was associated, if the capturing
power decided "it felt like it." If done, the procedure would
(should) not be done under civil law. Your idea of war and being in a
war-zone is fantasy-like. Sure a non-participant could "be there."
Whether they can do anything about being captured or not depends upon
their _power_, or whatever a capturing power decides to _grant_ them,
not their "rights." "Someone" in a state of affairs fearing for their
survival does not care about anyone elses' pre-existing "rights,"
unless the cost to them (of consideration) in ensuring their own
survival is of no or very little consequence. This is reality, as
much as you would deny reality.

It is as if you don't really get the idea that Al-Qaeda is making
membership vague, just for the purpose of being hard to ID. I said at
the outset that a body of law for this scenario is not well developed
yet. And that is true. Just because of that, you think you can just
throw the whole thing into the civil domain of "rights." Now there is
a pipe dream.



You are just so badly wrong. _Nothing_ guts it, as it is
fundamental. That's why a war prisoner can be held for as long as the
conflict goes on, without any sort of "personal" charge against them.
It is not a civil case, where someone individually did something wrong
and is charged for it. A soldier is never normally considered for
"murder charges" even if they killed 100 others. It does not even come
up as a question, but it would in the civil world. Your basic issue
is simply a matter of whether or not they actually are party to the
conflict, not whether they have rights. That alone is fair enough,
but the rest you have badly bollixed.

The determination could _at most_ be whether the prisoner _shall_ have
rights, not that they _do_. For they were not imprisoned for a crime
by a civil authority, where their _pre-existing_ rights demand a trial
on the basis of a prima facie commission of crime, and only then are
rights stripped for determined sentence terms upon conviction. (There
are no "sentencing terms" for a war prisoner, as they held for the
duration.) As a prima facie warrior captured by an opposing war
power, the war prisoner doesn't have any rights to _start with_,

Incorrect. The guarantee of those rights is what the Geneva
conventions(s) are all about. And as a direct consequence why the
handling of Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib are crimes.
 
J

JosephKK

Jan 1, 1970
0
My accountants and financial advisors are telling me to take more out
of the business and invest/employ/share/donate less. And to maximize
loopholes in the process. That's no fun. I hate golf.

John

Maybe you need better advisors, those sound like leaches advising you
to be the same as them. Go shopping for other advice.
 
J

JosephKK

Jan 1, 1970
0
On Sun, 29 Jun 2008 16:00:24 -0700, the renowned JosephKK

On Sat, 28 Jun 2008 18:28:31 -0400, Spehro Pefhany

On Sat, 28 Jun 2008 21:05:08 GMT, the renowned James Arthur

Richard The Dreaded Libertarian wrote:
James Arthur wrote:
John Larkin wrote:
James Arthur wrote:
"Have you ever witnessed the anger of the good shopkeeper, James
Goodfellow, when his careless son happened to break a pane of glass?
...."
But think of how many jobs Green Energy will create.

I thought of it already...Hillary mentioned it as an economic + climate
plan, which we could then sell to the rest of the world and...cash in!

Obama too. He proposes $150e9 to help green Detroit.[1]

The premise is that money or corporations are holding back progress.
And that other countries are too dumb to do smart stuff.

Conclusion: Let's give money to corporations!

Reminds me of the World's Fair in New Orleans, where everyone was going
to get rich providing services to each another.

Or their casino mania: "We'll all get rich gambling in one another's
casinos--we can't lose!"
Ah, reminds me of the classic techniques to increasing the GDP and
reducing unemployment:

1. Have ten million people dig holes, and another 10 million fill them.

2. Everybody washes their neighbor's dishes for $40 an hour.
That's wrong-headed. The problem is the *gap* between rich and poor.

And there are a lot fewer rich than poor, so, as a practical matter, I
propose a *maximum* wage. About, say, $40/hr.

Penalties for hard work and overtime.

That ought to make everyone happy.

Oh, feh. For almost 100 years they've been trying to tax the income of
the rich, who have consistently found loopholes.

Loopholes schmoopholes. Compare % of total taxes paid to the % of
population for each income group:

http://perotcharts.com/category/challenges/taxation/


We need to lose the income tax, and instead, tax _outgo_:

Buy a $300,000 house, pay $30,000 purchase tax.
Buy a $300,000,000 mansion, pay $30,000,000 purchase tax.
Buy $300,000,000,000 worth of stocks & bonds & commodities & crap,
pay $30,000,000,000 purchase tax. ;-)

It could be just that simple.

I'm down with it. The simplified accounting alone would
save Americans not less than 2 weeks' overhead a year.
That's a 4% GDP boost.


Cheers,
James Arthur

Anthing like that kind of a tax on financial markets would cause an
instant *depression*.


Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

Even a 1/100 of 1 % transaction tax would take a lot of noise out of
the financial markets.

Not sure about that.. there are roughly 0.1% - 1% costs associated
with buying and selling securities just from the buy-sell spreads and
market-maker mechanism, with commissions on top. AFAUI, the UK has a
0.5% "Stamp Duty" levied on share transactions, and London is
certainly a competitive financial center.

As to the effect.. not sure it's positive. A high cost of
buying/selling might make people hold off to try and make back losses,
which could result in a mass capitulation and bigger drop than would
otherwise happen.



Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

Not so sure about that. Current computerized brokers are now below
us$10 per order including million $ transactions.

Active traders can get *free* (sic) stock trades (zero commission) but
that should set off some alarm bells. If you buy and immediately sell
a security you will still lose money, because of the market-maker
spread between bid and ask prices. In the case of a million dollar
stock transaction, you will lose thousands of dollars even if the
stock price doesn't change. Oh, plus your $10 (I guess it buys the
trader a latte, but the spread makes his Mercedes payment).


Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

True enough. That is one reason of many i am not a day trader.
 
J

JosephKK

Jan 1, 1970
0
On Sat, 28 Jun 2008 21:05:08 GMT, the renowned James Arthur

Richard The Dreaded Libertarian wrote:
James Arthur wrote:
John Larkin wrote:
James Arthur wrote:
"Have you ever witnessed the anger of the good shopkeeper, James
Goodfellow, when his careless son happened to break a pane of glass?
...."
But think of how many jobs Green Energy will create.

I thought of it already...Hillary mentioned it as an economic + climate
plan, which we could then sell to the rest of the world and...cash in!

Obama too. He proposes $150e9 to help green Detroit.[1]

The premise is that money or corporations are holding back progress.
And that other countries are too dumb to do smart stuff.

Conclusion: Let's give money to corporations!

Reminds me of the World's Fair in New Orleans, where everyone was going
to get rich providing services to each another.

Or their casino mania: "We'll all get rich gambling in one another's
casinos--we can't lose!"
Ah, reminds me of the classic techniques to increasing the GDP and
reducing unemployment:

1. Have ten million people dig holes, and another 10 million fill them.

2. Everybody washes their neighbor's dishes for $40 an hour.
That's wrong-headed. The problem is the *gap* between rich and poor.

And there are a lot fewer rich than poor, so, as a practical matter, I
propose a *maximum* wage. About, say, $40/hr.

Penalties for hard work and overtime.

That ought to make everyone happy.

Oh, feh. For almost 100 years they've been trying to tax the income of
the rich, who have consistently found loopholes.

Loopholes schmoopholes. Compare % of total taxes paid to the % of
population for each income group:

http://perotcharts.com/category/challenges/taxation/


We need to lose the income tax, and instead, tax _outgo_:

Buy a $300,000 house, pay $30,000 purchase tax.
Buy a $300,000,000 mansion, pay $30,000,000 purchase tax.
Buy $300,000,000,000 worth of stocks & bonds & commodities & crap,
pay $30,000,000,000 purchase tax. ;-)

It could be just that simple.

I'm down with it. The simplified accounting alone would
save Americans not less than 2 weeks' overhead a year.
That's a 4% GDP boost.


Cheers,
James Arthur

Anthing like that kind of a tax on financial markets would cause an
instant *depression*.


Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

Even a 1/100 of 1 % transaction tax would take a lot of noise out of
the financial markets.

Have you checked the NY tax on NYSE shares traded?

Never heard of such. Even a quick search on the Internet gave no
clue. I hope you can provide some backup.
 
J

JosephKK

Jan 1, 1970
0
NOTE: I posted the above after reading "tax _outgo_" without
checking Rich's list. Buying stocks and bonds is NOT outgo,
it's investment, and must not be taxed.

Perhaps. How much of stock transactions is investing and how much is
speculating?
 
J

JosephKK

Jan 1, 1970
0
Even better! Everyone's a winner, and everyone gets a prize.

The most common complaints are not that a particular person
is doing poorly, but that someone else is getting more. CEOs,
oil companies, etc. This proposal would fix that completely.

And civic-minded go-getters would be inspired to work harder
than ever (within their 40-hour limit) to make things better
for everyone else.

Cheers,
James Arthur

Damn, doesn't make your cheeks hurt too much?
 
J

Jim Yanik

Jan 1, 1970
0
The not too poorly reported events since the run-up to the invasion
until today makes it clear enough. I remind you of how we treated the
Shah of Iran and Osama bin Laden over time. Hamid had better beware.

IOW,NO evidence for your claim.
 
M

MooseFET

Jan 1, 1970
0
"They are an
oppressed minority in China and would have likely faced death if
returned to China but nobody else wanted them."

Hmm... pay back Fidel for the Mariel boatlift?

The answer turned out to be to include a bribe. IIRC Albania took the
5 that got let go.
 
M

MooseFET

Jan 1, 1970
0
Nope. Only if an entity that is both domestic and non-registered buys
it.  

Now you are making the nice simple VAT tax idea more complex.

The non-domestic buyer would pay the tax in their own country.
 
M

mpm

Jan 1, 1970
0
Sheesh.  Done.

Update:
Thanks to Jim providing the link to the actual text of the Geneva
Conventions, you will note that in Convention 3, Article 23, the
words...

"No prisoner of war may at any time be sent to, or detained in areas
where he may be exposed to the fire of the combat zone, nor may his
presence be used to render certain points or areas immune from
military operations."

Gitmo is at best, a make-shift prison facility for these individuals.
There are no combat operations taking place there, and no missiles
flying overhead.
So I repeat, it is a prison, not a war zone.
 
J

James Arthur

Jan 1, 1970
0
JosephKK said:
[snip]
NOTE: I posted the above after reading "tax _outgo_" without
checking Rich's list. Buying stocks and bonds is NOT outgo,
it's investment, and must not be taxed.

Perhaps. How much of stock transactions is investing and how much is
speculating?

Why does it matter?

Cheers,
James Arthur
 
R

Richard The Dreaded Libertarian

Jan 1, 1970
0
Maybe we should apply the sales tax only to things that people enjoy.

Of course, if we could get them to cut the bureaucracy back to
Constitutional levels, this would all pretty much become moot.

Thanks,
Rich
 
R

Richard The Dreaded Libertarian

Jan 1, 1970
0
Is buying an oscilloscope consumption?

I think if I wrote the rules, I'd only tax new stuff, not used.

So, if you buy your scope new out of the showroom, it's taxed. Get
a used one off ebay or whatever, it's not taxable because in theory
the tax was paid when it was bought new.

And I really don't consider stock speculation (which drives inflation,
which decreases the value of your shopping dollar) to be investment.

Oh! And tax the purchase of chips at casinos! ;-)

Cheers!
Rich
 
R

Richard The Dreaded Libertarian

Jan 1, 1970
0
How about a fixed wage, $40 should be OK, paid for a 40 hour week, no
matter whether you have a job or not? Then everybody would pay exactly the
same income tax... that would simplify the bookkeeping.

John, I had no idea you were a communist!

Or is this supposed to be tongue-in-cheek?

Thanks,
Rich
 
R

Richard The Dreaded Libertarian

Jan 1, 1970
0
Even better! Everyone's a winner, and everyone gets a prize.

The most common complaints are not that a particular person is doing
poorly, but that someone else is getting more. CEOs, oil companies, etc.
This proposal would fix that completely.

And civic-minded go-getters would be inspired to work harder than ever
(within their 40-hour limit) to make things better for everyone else.

And when everybody gets a $40 handout, how do you get anybody to work
at all, except at gunpoint? For the most part, people are quite lazy.

Thanks,
Rich
 
R

Richard Henry

Jan 1, 1970
0
Update:
Thanks to Jim providing the link to the actual text of the Geneva
Conventions, you will note that in Convention 3, Article 23, the
words...

"No prisoner of war may at any time be sent to, or detained in areas
where he may be exposed to the fire of the combat zone, nor may his
presence be used to render certain points or areas immune from
military operations."

Gitmo is at best, a make-shift prison facility for these individuals.
There are no combat operations taking place there, and no missiles
flying overhead.
So I repeat, it is a prison, not a war zone.

Are they POWs?
 
S

Simon S Aysdie

Jan 1, 1970
0
Incorrect.  The guarantee of those rights is what the Geneva
conventions(s) are all about.

I'm sorry you can't see past all the wordiness of those, and have an
unclear notion of rights that the drafting lawyers share. /The basic
sum is that the prisoner of war gets treated humanely./ One can grant
that to animals, who have no rights. Rights in the sense of a free
human simply don't exist for a prisoner of war, because they are by
definition not free, and are not assumed to have some pre-existing
assumption of innocence before shown guilty (which is about crime
within a civil society/population). It ain't there and never has
been, and this not even a matter of being indicted for a crime.
"Rights" is the language of a free human in a civil society/
population. You make a categorical error. This is about humane
treatment to provide some measure of reasonable relief from the
brutality of war, and an acknowledgement that "if you give my guys
back okay, I'll give your guys back okay." But it is categorically
still in the domain of war, not peace, not civil society.

All the lawyerly verbiage in the world won't make green into red. It
won't change _privileges_ granted to prisoners of war into fundamental
rights. Privileges are not rights. They never have been, not even in
civil society/governance, no matter how much some hack lawyer/judge/
legislator bollixes the language.

If you were to say there can possibly be boundary cases that test the
categorization, or make a case that a categorization would be a nice
thing for a Power in a war to do in doubtful cases, then I would not
have a problem with that. But you need to get the basic understanding
of categorization down first.
 
J

Jim Yanik

Jan 1, 1970
0
JosephKK said:
James said:
Spehro Pefhany wrote:
John Larkin wrote:

Spehro Pefhany wrote:

James Arthur wrote:

Richard The Dreaded Libertarian wrote:
[snip]
We need to lose the income tax, and instead, tax _outgo_:

Buy a $300,000 house, pay $30,000 purchase tax.
Buy a $300,000,000 mansion, pay $30,000,000 purchase tax.
Buy $300,000,000,000 worth of stocks & bonds & commodities & crap,
pay $30,000,000,000 purchase tax. ;-)

It could be just that simple.
I'm down with it. The simplified accounting alone would
save Americans not less than 2 weeks' overhead a year.
That's a 4% GDP boost.
NOTE: I posted the above after reading "tax _outgo_" without
checking Rich's list. Buying stocks and bonds is NOT outgo,
it's investment, and must not be taxed.

Perhaps. How much of stock transactions is investing and how much is
speculating?

Why does it matter?

Cheers,
James Arthur

every investment is speculation.

Futures contracts are a bit different than stocks,though.
Oil futures only require 1% of the value in cash to buy,while other
commodities require more.Some futures contract buyers actually take
delivery of the commodity,speculators don't.
To slow down the oil futures speculation,raise the amount of cash needed
for purchase.
 
R

Richard Henry

Jan 1, 1970
0
I'm sorry you can't see past all the wordiness of those, and have an
unclear notion of rights that the drafting lawyers share.  /The basic
sum is that the prisoner of war gets treated humanely./  One can grant
that to animals, who have no rights.  Rights in the sense of a free
human simply don't exist for a prisoner of war, because they are by
definition not free, and are not assumed to have some pre-existing
assumption of innocence before shown guilty (which is about crime
within a civil society/population).  It ain't there and never has
been, and this not even a matter of being indicted for a crime.
"Rights" is the language of a free human in a civil society/
population.  You make a categorical error.  This is about humane
treatment to provide some measure of reasonable relief from the
brutality of war, and an acknowledgement that "if you give my guys
back okay, I'll give your guys back okay."  But it is categorically
still in the domain of war, not peace, not civil society.

All the lawyerly verbiage in the world won't make green into red.  It
won't change _privileges_ granted to prisoners of war into fundamental
rights.  Privileges are not rights.  They never have been, not even in
civil society/governance, no matter how much some hack lawyer/judge/
legislator bollixes the language.

If you were to say there can possibly be boundary cases that test the
categorization, or make a case that a categorization would be a nice
thing for a Power in a war to do in doubtful cases, then I would not
have a problem with that.  But you need to get the basic understanding
of categorization down first.

I would have no problem with them being classified as POWs and treated
accordingly. I would have no problem with them being classified as
criminals and treated according. Duck!&W chose to classify them as
neither of those, but something else, and since no rules, treaties or
laws apply to "somthing else", they claim to be free to treat them in
any way they wish.

That is un-American, barbarian, criminal behavior, in my opinion.
 
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