SF Chronicle Headline 11/25/2011: Tech titans seek giant tax break

“Firms invest to lobby Congress to trim overseas profit levy from 35% to 5.25%.”

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/11/25/MNPO1M2LGM.DTL

This is big business leveraging an already bad situation; they know they have Congress over a barrel. It’s time for Congress to swim against the corporate tide and get on top of the problems they’ve helped create, with some unconventional ‘out-of-the-box’ thinking on all sides. Here’s one suggestion on how to handle this lobbying on overseas profits…go in the opposite direction…at least for now. One way or another, all profits come out of either consumer or taxpayer pocketbooks. However, foreign profits are unique in that they didn’t come out of the wallets of US citizens; they were generated abroad and could be brought to bear on America’s current problems. Swimming against the tide in this case would be something like the following scenario:

1) Pass the law requiring a balanced budget no later than 2012, or the entire Congress is turned out on its ear in a no confidence vote…by law, expenses can never again exceed revenues, except during a period when Congress has declared war.

2) For a period of time,90% of all foreign profits will be applied to the soveriegn debt overhang, until it is reduced to zero.

3) For any period during which the sovereign debt is zero, the levy on foreign profits will be reduced from 90% to 5.25%…corporations eventually get what they want, but they have to put some skin in the game and contribute to getting us out of this hole first…someone needs to pick up this mantle and get the bargain struck.

Before everyone becomes apoplectic over what I’ve just proposed, try looking at it this way: there are really only two money generating engines in our economy for reducing our sovereign debt: taxation or corporate America…the Fed just printing more money isn’t the answer. The taxation route is socialism in it’s most painful form; but corporate America taking it on might just be capitalism’s finest hour. Of the two, the corporate engine is by far the more efficient and robust; it’s the best engine we’ve got for climbing out of this hole…let’s put it to work!

 

SF Chronicle Headlline 11/22/11: Tobacco Lawsuit

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/12/01/financial/f033812S33.DTL

Philip Morris is suing the Australian government for their efforts to make smoking less attractive to the young and thus reduce the long-term costs to their public healthcare system. This is another global corporate titan putting greed and profit above public health and welfare. Here’s a wake-up for Philips Morris. Healthcare here in the USA is one of our biggest social challenges yet to be addressed, with healthcare costs in the meantime spiraling out of control. If smoking were eliminated entirely, it would probably reduce those costs by at least a third within the first year, and greatly attenuate the exponential out-year increases. In the very near future we should see the following choice being placed before American voters: given the choice between a) ever increasing taxation and employee contributions to cover healthcare,  or b) simply eliminating the sale of tobacco products, at least in this country…which does the public chose?

To get through the labyrinth of problems that need to be resolved, we’re going to be presenting the American public with some really tough choices. It will be a true test of American democracy: does the majority really rule this country for the periods they’re elected to serve, and the entire nation gets behind them, or does the loser do everything they can to undermine the majority and defeat our democratic processes…the future of our nation rides on the answer to that question.

NY Times Headline 11/22/11: Trustee Says More Cash Is Missing at MF Global

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B06E7DC1531F931A15752C1A9679D8B63&scp=3&sq=Trustee%20Says%20More%20Cash%20Is%20Missing%20at%20MF%20Global&st=cse

Another bruise on Wall Street and all the legislators who since 1980 have systematically removed all the controls from banking and the capital markets…screams for re-regulation…bring back Glass-Stiegel.

NY Times headline 11/22/11: Greenberg Sues US Over AIG Takeover

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/22/business/greenberg-sues-us-over-aig-takeover.html?scp=1&sq=Greenberg%20Sues%20US%20Over%20AIG%20Takeover&st=cse

What do you do for your next act when you’re a titan of Wall Street and became one of the richest men on earth by leading your company to ruin, almost single handedly bringing down the US economy, causing the Federal government to intervene at huge taxpayer expense? Why of course, you sue the Fereral government for their actions and dive even deeper into taxpayer pockets. Every taxpayer has a right to take this to their individual States Attorney Generals to have them, either individually or collectively, pursue Mr Greenberg and his prior board for any financial misfortune their prior actions or inactions may have caused the fair citizens of their State. Get the idea? What are you waiting for?