Tea Party logic...

"we won't vote for any tax rises on 2-3% of the population"

"but if you don't vote for them, everyone gets hit by a tax rise on everyone, our economy could collapse, the stock markets are going to lose confidence."

"We don't care, we won't vote for any tax rises".

A Common Law Christmas to all and a Happy New Year.

May no harm, fraud or loss come to you now or in the New Year.

Everything else ... in the UK anyway, is by consent ie, by contract. Legal... but not law. And that to the legal entity that is your birth certificate, copyrighted by the crown yet not to be used for identification.

Which leads to .... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHiAZGlImMs


"I am not a number, I am a Free man."

RIP Patrick Mcgoohan

Sorry... posted twice somehow.

The Col: Mr Blobby could be said to have a very destructive persona. He would be very bad as any kind of minister.

At least the police wouldn't be able to put words in his mouth as they've been caught doing recently.... It's hard when all he says is "blobby", they won't be able to lie and invent evidence that he's called them "plebs".

I don't those caught in the act recently will be on Santa's list next year!!

The Col: Mr Blobby could be said to have a very destructive persona. He would be very bad as any kind of minister.

At least the police wouldn't be able to put words in his mouth as they've been caught doing recently.... It's hard when all he says is "blobby", they won't be able to lie and invent evidence that he's called them "plebs".

I don't those caught in the act recently will be on Santa's list next year!!

The Col: ... what again!!

I wondered why I found a gold nugget the size and shape of Mr Blobby this morning. It just was soooo strange. lol

... Well, the world didn't end. Another 'hope and joy' that the world will end and a selected few will survive has yet again proven false.

... Someone will no doubt try again and predict an '''end date''', that some being or beings intends to kill almost all of us.

But that then begs the question.... These people must hate life, yet God said it was good! Sometimes it seems some people can't see the wood because of the trees.

Merry Christmas All.

Swiss banking giant UBS has agreed to pay $1.5bn (£940m) to US, UK and Swiss regulators for attempting to manipulate the Libor inter-bank lending rate.

It becomes the second major bank to be fined over Libor after Barclays was ordered to pay $450m to UK and US authorities in the summer.

Regulators worldwide are investigating a number of banks for rigging Libor.

Libor tracks the average rate at which the major international banks based in London lend money to each other.

The bank also admitted to manipulating Euribor and Tibor - the equivalent interest rates set by lenders in the eurozone and in Tokyo.

UBS said it had agreed to pay fines to regulators in three different countries:

$1.2bn (£740m) in combined fines to the US Department of Justice (DoJ) and the Commodities Futures Trading Commission
£160m to the UK's Financial Services Authority (FSA)
59m Swiss francs (£40m) to the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority

.... where we didn't have to regulate them.

And yet another branding of socialism as has been passed on thanks to the cold war. It seems the type of socialism that is practised that is called a commune is forgotten.

Repeating... repeating.. repeating.

Iamon lyme: yes, they are..

"will offer to pay every and all expense incured in moving that business into their area, that would be nuts..."

Not all, but enough to make it a point.

"Incentives are usually in the form of tax breaks and elimination of needless regulations."

It's usually a mix. It's those on the low end who usually suffer as a result. Eg Texas has cut it's education budget.

"seriously, you really don't know what I mean by over regulation?"

No I don't. it's a relative term. I accept the need for regulation when it has been proven by cases of businesses cutting corners that are for the most part common sense.

eg ... a 454g pack of sugar must contain at least 454g, maintain good kitchen hygiene.

Iamon lyme: It has been often the case that businesses are given 'costs' by governments. So no... it doesn't really cost them. It costs the tax payers of that area.

"and bled by too big a tax burden."

Profits seem ok for many big companies... 'bled' is an exaggeration.

"needless regulations"

What regulations would you call needless? An example.

Iamon lyme: So in other words.. taxable income.

I covered that in my last post to you.

I know the difference having worked in several accounting posts, studied economics at school, business studies.

"No, but I could agree that...."

The Daily Mail is unreliable..

"seeing as how you've brought up the issue of lunancy, how many people in a list of the top 6,000 earners in the UK do you believe can be found on that list?"

Some.. but that depends on what you call lunacy.

Iamon lyme: Awwwww I thought I'd return the favour. ... All things being equal.

... again, the figures are ... taken out of context. I've tried to give you the opportunity to recheck your stated figures and the validity of such......

But no.... you have to believe your "power of narrow minded nick pickery."

READ>>>>>>>

"A gaping hole in this argument is that by the HMRC’s own admission, a great deal of this drop was accounted for by (the non-PAYE paying) super-rich bringing forward their income (‘forestalling’) and declaring it in 2009/2010 tax year instead, ahead of the pre-announced 50p tax rise. The key point is, by its nature forestalling can only happen once – those who did so could not have kept doing it in the years after; they would have had to have paid up. The 2010/2011 yield was thus artificially deflated; totally anomalous, and unreliable as a baseline. There may have been other more permanent forms of evasion in the mix, but the only way of knowing this – and the true effectiveness of the 50p tax – for sure would have been to wait for 2011/2012 returns. Which is presumably by Osborne avoided doing just that (given there was good evidence it raised a significant sum of money).

And so to last week’s numbers. They too take 2010 figures, on the number of people declaring an income above £ 1 million, compare it to 2009 and note a drop – leaving the Telegraph and Mail to argue without evidence that they have all moved abroad. But just as with the tax yield, these figures are highly distorted and unreliable, given we know many top rate payers moved their income for 2010 forward to 2009 (this is especially likely to be the case with millionaires, as few would be on PAYE)."

Live by the Daily Mail.. DiE by the Daily Mail.

I mean... would you agree with the daily Mails view Sarah Palin and all those who believe the same way she does are lunatics?

Bwild: lol I'll aim to be less of a head screwer next time

Timeline...

2003 -- 242,000
2007 -- 489,000 ((economic boom peak))
2009 -- 242,000 ((slump in property and share prices))
2010 -- 454,000
2011 -- 431,000 ((Global slump of 1.7%))

So our slump in millionaires was 1.2% higher than the Global average.
Asia has overtaken the USA in biggest number of millionaires.
Total world wealth levels have fallen for the first time since the big fall in 2008.
If property prices rise in the UK, the millionaires club will increase.

Bwild: yes..... it's because of dates the articles were written. One is written in June 2012, the other in May 2009.

The clue is in the dates man!!

Oh... I get it... someone used the Daily Mail as a source of reliable information.

Baaaaddd idea.

Especially if you don't read the story properly

Britain's millionaires' row has nearly halved in size due to the slump in property and share prices.

The number of millionaires in the UK has fallen from 489,000 at the peak of the economic boom in 2007 to 242,000, reducing the elite club to 2003 levels. Soaring property prices stoked a boom in the British rich list but the collapse in the housing market has suddenly reduced the net worth of thousands of former property millionaires.

The Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) said a very large number of people had entered the lower echelons of the rich list due to the runaway property market and had dropped straight out again once prices faltered, falling 17.7% in the last year.

"Having just crept over the threshold, most of these people have crept back under it again - many, perhaps, without ever knowing that they had become millionaires for a temporary period," said Douglas McWilliams, the chief executive of CEBR.

Owners of buoyant share portfolios have also seen their asset base deteriorate, with a 70% drop in City bonuses also playing a part in the decline.

The CEBR has scrapped its forecast that the UK would have 760,000 people whose wealth runs into seven figures by 2010. With property prices on the retreat, the CEBR admitted the figure would now be far lower. However, McWilliams said the number of millionaires should rise from 2011 onwards once property prices stage a recovery. "With property prices near to bottoming out, we would expect the number of millionaires to start to rise again in 2011," he said.

Those with robust enough fortunes to remain in the millionaires' club have seen their wealth decline by about a quarter.....

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/may/27/uk-millionaires-number-falls

The number of millionaires in Asia has overtaken North America for the first time in a sign of wealth shifting across the globe due to the economic downturn, according to a new report.

In the Asia-Pacific region there are now 3.37 million men and women with more than $1m (£635,000) in the bank, compared with 3.35 million in North America, Capgemini and RBC Wealth Management's latest world wealth report revealed.

But the overall level of wealth in North America is still the highest in the world, with its millionaires, such as Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, controlling $11.4tn, while Asian businessmen control $10.7tn – although wealth levels declined twice as fast in North America as in Asia in 2011.

Millionaires in the US, Japan and Germany still make up more than half the world's richest, but total world wealth levels fell for the first time since the worst of the economic downturn in 2008.

In the UK, which has the fifth highest number of millionaires, membership of the elite club dropped 2.9% from 454,300 to 441,300, while both Germany and France saw increases.

The world's wealthiest have $42tn at their disposal, down 1.7% on 2010, with all regions seeing a fall, except the oil-rich Middle East.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/jun/19/world-wealth-report-asia-america-millionaires

HSBC has confirmed it is to pay US authorities $1.9bn (£1.2bn) in a settlement over money laundering, the largest paid in such a case.

A US Senate investigation said the UK-based bank had been a conduit for "drug kingpins and rogue nations". Money laundering is the process of disguising the proceeds of crime so that the money cannot be linked to the wrongdoing. HSBC admitted having poor money laundering controls and apologised.

"We accept responsibility for our past mistakes," said HSBC group chief executive Stuart Gulliver in a statement. "We have said we are profoundly sorry for them, and we do so again." The bank said it had spent $290m on improving its systems to prevent money laundering and clawed back some bonuses paid to senior executives in the past.

It also said it expected to reach an agreement with the UK's Financial Services Authority shortly. Last month it announced it had set aside $1.5bn to cover the costs of any settlement or fines.

The news followed the announcement of a similar but much smaller settlement with UK-based Standard Chartered bank, which will pay $300m in fines for violating US sanctions.

Iamon lyme: irrelevant.

"I think it's funny how you can support the legality of something you approve of, and ignore any question of morality, unless it suits you to do the exact opposite."

Assumption.. like most of your post.

Most people expect some form of tax avoidance, as long as firms don't get too greedy.

You do agree greed is wrong?

Iamon lyme: irrelevant straw man argument.

Iamon lyme: Those that are British.. mainly embarrassed at their employers action. Probably hoping they can find an honest employer who has moral standards who pays their way rather than one that has no morals.

After all, there are other firms who will pay their taxes, like small mom and pop operations who with other coffee/restaurant chains who do pay their fair share.. and that of Starbucks. As tax rates have to be higher in order to offset immoral tax avoidance.

At midday dozens of protesters who'd been waiting quietly inside the store stood up, unfurled their banners and leaflets and began chanting: "Starbucks - pay your taxes! Starbucks sucks money from the UK! Boycott Starbucks - tell your friends!"

The cafe's manager appeared unsure how to react. At one point it looked as though he was going to lock everyone inside. A small group of police officers went in and after half an hour the protesters left - peacefully but noisily - to join another group at a second Starbucks nearby.

As far as UK Uncut are concerned, Starbucks' offer to pay £20m is a marketing stunt. Many passing Christmas shoppers we've spoken to seem to agree that the law needs to be changed to force multinationals to pay more tax in the UK.

Starbucks has paid £8.6m in corporation tax in its 14 years of trading in the UK, and nothing in the last three years. The company had UK sales of nearly £400m in 2011 but has reported a taxable profit only once in its 15 years of operating in the UK.

Starbucks now says it expects to pay around £10m in corporation tax for each of the next two years, a move described by tax experts as unprecedented.

Actually.. maybe that should be White Castles.... Harold and Kumar style..

Bwild: .... maybe a McD's chain would be better... suit the apparent system of smoking and fighting better.

I'm seeing a number of posts and blogs on the net talking about Afghanistan being a big untapped mine.

As in.... there are about a trillion dollars of untapped (as the Afghans have never had any real mining industry) resources. Including lithium, the big must have metal of the mobile age.

The Russians knew it, hence their efforts to make Afghanistan a satellite state..... The arming of the Taliban in the 80's being sour grapes by US interests who did not want Russia getting hold of that wealth.

New surveys have confirmed the Russian records.

The Col: ... How are they doing it now.....It transferred some money to a Dutch sister company in royalty payments, bought coffee beans from Switzerland and paid high interest rates to borrow from other parts of the business.

It's decided not to use some of these as a method to reduce it tax liability, so far on it's royalty payments to the Dutch company.

HMRC (revenue and customs) is to get £77 million extra, which it thinks can help recoup £2 billion a year in tax lost through avoidance......

... imo, cut through the bull and give the HMRC twice that. The return would probably be in the £3.5 billion plus zone.

Starbucks is offering to stop it's aggressive tax avoidance in the UK, and pay corporation tax.

The threat of boycotting, sit ins and other protests as well as harsh criticism in the press has led them to the conclusion that although they operate 1/3 of the coffee shops in the UK.

... people in the UK don't like tax cheats. That the company should 'pay it's way', and being a multi national is no excuse.

The Col: Isn't everyone!!

The Col: If he's good.. they might make him an offer.. .. .

Übergeek 바둑이: As long as it doesn't turn into "who's the daddy!" .. ... well maybe when it comes to certain stubborn bankers.

.. quote from Ray Winstone, in the film "Scum".. old brit film on borstals.

ketchuplover: Good news, they now as others do have to operate more above the table. More transparency.

The Col: If he's not turned into a lamb for the BBQ ... longer.

Übergeek 바둑이: Very true.

"The UK does not benefit from high demand for raw commodities (this is what has saved Canada's economy.) "

Ours is more of a service based country now, but we still build many items used globally, but more on the electronics side.

"If Carney fails to deliver, he will be torn to pieces by the British banking establishment that traditionally has looked down on "colonnials." "

No. Our press is quite good at highlighting blame, and the banking establishment is at it's lowest reputation for a long time.

It's our politicians that are at risk of being torn to pieces.

The Col: Good. As he's taking over (as you probably know) the Bank of England gov'nor job.

Artful Dodger: I didn't say they did.

"You don't know radical Islam."

Is it any different from any other radical terrorist group that's been around for the last 100 years? I still get confused over reasoning on such things, especially considering how fluent reality seems to be regarding if they are freedom fighters or terrorists.

Raygun loved supporting terrorists!!

Any Canadians got a view on Mr Mark Carney... re the Bank of Canada. It is reputed he ain't bad and can think outside the box... Hence Canada having less of a problem than the USA or UK now.

Truth or Manure?

Artful Dodger: nooooooooo.... really?!?!

But.... http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/20/Peace_Bridge_Derry.jpg/800px-Peace_Bridge_Derry.jpg

.... This giving up by everyone... Do you think this bridge (see pic) could or would have been built if everyone kept giving up?

...........................
The Troubles were brought to an uneasy end by a peace process which included the declaration of ceasefires by most paramilitary organisations and the complete decommissioning of their weapons, the reform of the police, and the corresponding withdrawal of army troops from the streets and from sensitive border areas such as South Armagh and Fermanagh, as agreed by the signatories to the Belfast Agreement (commonly known as the "Good Friday Agreement"). This reiterated the long-held British position, which had never before been fully acknowledged by successive Irish governments, that Northern Ireland will remain within the United Kingdom until a majority votes otherwise. The Constitution of Ireland was amended in 1999 to remove a claim of the "Irish nation" to sovereignty over the whole of Ireland (in Article 2), a claim qualified by an acknowledgement that Ireland could only exercise legal control over the territory formerly known as the Irish Free State. The new Articles 2 and 3, added to the Constitution to replace the earlier articles, implicitly acknowledge that the status of Northern Ireland, and its relationships within the rest of the United Kingdom and with Ireland, would only be changed with the agreement of a majority of voters in both jurisdictions (Ireland voting separately). This aspect was also central to the Belfast Agreement which was signed in 1998 and ratified by referendums held simultaneously in both Northern Ireland and the Republic. At the same time, the British Government recognised for the first time, as part of the prospective, the so-called "Irish dimension": the principle that the people of the island of Ireland as a whole have the right, without any outside interference, to solve the issues between North and South by mutual consent.[27] The latter statement was key to winning support for the agreement from nationalists and republicans. It also established a devolved power-sharing government within Northern Ireland, which must consist of both unionist and nationalist parties.

These institutions were suspended by the British Government in 2002 after Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) allegations of spying by people working for Sinn Féin at the Assembly (Stormontgate). The resulting case against the accused Sinn Féin member collapsed.

On 28 July 2005, the Provisional IRA declared an end to its campaign and has since decommissioned what is thought to be all of its arsenal. This final act of decommissioning was performed in accordance with the Belfast Agreement of 1998, and under the watch of the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning and two external church witnesses. Many unionists, however, remain sceptical. This IRA decommissioning is in contrast to Loyalist paramilitaries who have so far refused to decommission many weapons. It is not thought that this will have a major effect on further political progress
......................................

It has been tried before, it was a hard process, it did work.

Artful Dodger: Just twelve..

Uganda is looking to extend it's laws on homosexuality. From being illegal and a punishable by upto 14 years, to being illegal and punishable by life imprisonment.... the death penalty clause dropped .. just. Some in the Ugandan parliament are still seeking the death penalty.

Three US evangelical groups have been named as spreading anti homosexual views based on the Bible that have led to this stage. And are still working to spread homophobia as harshly as possible.

The bill is still to be passed, and it's looks like the President of Uganda is the only one to stop it passing.

Artful Dodger: Nahhhhh, just how hard it is. 'Quick fixes' are unlikely to do any good. Step by step, compromise and respect that basically... they all just want to live normal lives without the violence.

Artful Dodger: And the only real way to kill Hamas ... all of them I mean, is to go in street by street.

No force likes cleaning streets out. With over 1.7 million people in Gaza ... .. it's a MAD decision to make.

... The kids and his father were not Hamas btw.

My friend and colleague Jehad Mashhrawi is usually the last to leave our Gaza bureau. Hard-working but softly spoken, he often stays late, beavering away on a laptop that is rarely out of arm's reach. He has a cool head - unflappable, when others like me are flapping around him. He is a video editor and just one of our local BBC Arabic Service staff who make the office tick.

But on the Wednesday before last - only an hour or so after Gaza's latest war erupted with Israel's killing of Hamas military commander Ahmed al-Jabari - Jehad burst out of the editing suite screaming.

He sprinted down the stairs, his head in his hands, his face ripped with anguish. He had just had a call from a friend to tell him the Israeli military had bombed his house and that his 11-month-old baby boy Omar was dead.

Most fathers will tell you their children are beautiful. Omar was a picture-book baby.

Standing in what is left of his burnt-out home this week, Jehad showed me a photo on his mobile phone. It was of a cheeky, chunky, round-faced little boy in denim dungarees, chuckling in a pushchair, dark-eyed with a fringe of fine brown hair pushed across his brow.

"He only knew how to smile," Jehad told me, as we both struggled to hold back the tears. "He could say just two words - Baba and Mama," his father went on.

Also on Jehad's phone is another photo. A hideous tiny corpse. Omar's smiling face virtually burnt off, that fine hair appearing to be melted on to his scalp.

Jehad's sister-in-law Heba was also killed. "We still haven't found her head," Jehad said.

And his brother is critically ill in hospital with massive burns. His chances are not good.

Jehad has another son Ali, four years old, who was slightly injured. He keeps asking where his baby brother has gone.

Eleven members of the Mashhrawi family lived in the tiny breezeblock house in the Sabra district of Gaza City. Five people slept in one room. The beds are now only good for charcoal. The cupboards are full of heaps of burnt children's clothes.

On the kitchen shelves, there are rows of melted plastic jars full of Palestinian herbs and spices, their shapes distorted as if reflected from a fairground mirror. And in the entrance hall, a two-foot-wide hole in the flimsy metal ceiling where the missile ripped through.

Despite the evidence pointing towards an Israeli air strike, some bloggers have suggested it might have been a misfired Hamas rocket. But at that time, so soon after the launch of Israel's operation, the Israeli military says mortars had been launched from Gaza but very few rockets.

Mortar fire would not cause the fireball that appears to have engulfed Jehad's house.

Other bloggers have said that the damage to Jehad's home was not consistent with powerful Israeli attacks but the BBC visited other bombsites this week with very similar fire damage, where Israel acknowledged carrying out what it called "surgical strikes".

As at Jehad's home, there was very little structural damage but the victims were brought out with massive and fatal burns. Most likely is that Omar died in the one of the more than 20 bombings across Gaza that the Israeli military says made up its initial wave of attacks.

Omar was not a terrorist.

Of course every civilian death on either side - not just Omar's - is tragic. The United Nations says its preliminary investigation shows that 103 of the 158 people killed in Gaza were civilians. Of those, 30 were children - 12 of whom were under the age of 10. More than 1,000 people were injured.

The Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev said every non-combatant death or injury was tragic and an "operational failure".

In Israel, too, there were fatalities: four civilians and two soldiers. There were also many injuries. But the fact the Israeli Ambulance Service was also reporting those suffering from anxiety and bruises is an indication of the asymmetric nature of the conflict.

Jehad's baby Omar was probably the first child to die in this latest round of violence. Among the last was a six-year-old boy, Abdul Rahman Naeem, who was killed by an Israeli attack just hours before the ceasefire was announced.

Abdul Rahman's father, Dr Majdi, is one of the leading specialist doctors at Gaza City's Shifa Hospital. The first he knew of his son's death was when he went to treat a patient, only to find it was his own boy.

Apparently, Dr Majdi had not seen Abdul Rahman for days. He had been too busy dealing with the wounded.

Artful Dodger: Yes.. killing always solves the problem.

Artful Dodger:

http://www.cartoonstock.com/newscartoons/cartoonists/pfe/lowres/pfen274l.jpg

"Yeah well what about when the US kicked the Indians out of their native land and killed them indiscriminately?"

It's a parody on a peaceful nation..

Artful Dodger: You might need help then..

http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSK1vpxD7IIZ6ZgCsv7jS1hOICccj3XLjyXOCA-3KDo0XU8NYpY2wm12vlRCw

It's the only right thing to do

Artful Dodger: So.. you are three lefts?

Artful Dodger: Not graphically. You are slipping or it's Sunday!!

Artful Dodger: At least that one IS red!!

Any spam picks... Monty Python style??

Artful Dodger: Is it? That the abuse levels in the US are high is of no importance to you? It's much better just to complain about how Muslims.. sorry Soviets.. sorry Vietcong.. sorry Americans.. sorry Indians... sorry Mexicans... Spanish are?