Racist Leftist Infiltrators Driven from Tea Party Rallies (includes video)
Leftist and racist infiltrators were forced to flee at tea party rallies in St. Louis, San Francisco, Oceanside and Greensboro.
Patriots: 4 Alinsky Thugs: 0
Crashing the Crashers: Tea Party Infiltrators Outmaneuvered in SF
The defense team came prepared with handy signs like these, complete with Velcro-attached arrows that could be moved to point to the perpetrators:
Amnesty International Head Supports “Defensive Jihad”
Reported: 22:15 PM - Apr/07/10
(IsraelNN.com) The head of the human rights group Amnesty International, Claudio Cordon, issued a letter supporting "defensive jihad" – a term which is used to support ideological terrorism around the world.
Three weeks ago senior Amnesty worker, Gita Chagall, expressed opposition to the fact that the organization was holding contacts with Muazam Bag, who is identified ideologically with the Taliban. The same day Chagall was suspended from her job, after 30 years of work for Amnesty.
While other human rights activists protested Chagall’s dismissal, Amnesty’s Secretary-General himself, defended the relationship between Amnesty and the Taliban follower, claiming that "defensive jihad isn’t against human rights."
Amnesty International has frequently accused Israel of human rights abuses.
Because he understood what the Constitution and limited government are all about.
Sockdolager: A tale of Davy Crockett, charity, and Congress
More Americans Give Up Citizenship As IRS Gets Aggressive Overseas
By Martin Vaughan, Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRESOf course, the other way of voting with your feet is called secession.
The number of American citizens and green-card holders severing their ties with the U.S. soared in the latter part of 2009, amid looming U.S. tax increases and a more aggressive posture by the Internal Revenue Service towards Americans living overseas.
According to public records, just over 500 people worldwide renounced U.S. citizenship or permanent residency in the fourth quarter of 2009, the most recent period for which data are available. That is more people than have cut ties with the U.S. during all of 2007, and more than double the total expatriations in 2008.
An Ohio-born entrepreneur, now based in Switzerland, told Dow Jones he is considering turning in his U.S. passport. Mounting U.S. tax and reporting requirements are making potential business partners hesitate to do business with him, he said.
"I still do dearly love the U.S., and renouncing my citizenship is not something I take lightly. But more and more it is seeming like being part of a dysfunctional family," said the businessman, who asked that his name not be used for fear of retribution.
"The tax itself is only a small part of the issue," the Swiss-based entrepreneur said. "It's the overall regulatory environment."
A minority of the recent expatriates are U.S. natives who have started a new life overseas. Most are people with family ties outside the U.S.: foreign professionals who acquired a green card while working in the U.S., or people who have received higher education in the U.S.
"Fifteen or 20 years ago there was a big rush to make sure your kids became U.S. citizens, for access to U.S. schools for example," said Timothy Burns, a tax lawyer at Withers law firm in Hong Kong. "Now we're seeing just the opposite."
Last month, the Treasury Department announced more rigorous requirements for Americans living abroad to report information on foreign bank accounts. The reporting requirement has been in place for years, but only in the most recent couple of years has the IRS gotten tough about enforcing penalties.
The information return must be filed by any U.S. citizen or resident whose balance in all foreign accounts combined exceeds $10,000 at any time during the year. Stiff penalties, up to 50% of the annual account balance, punish failure to file.
Others are giving up their U.S. nationality to avoid tax hikes in the U.S., as the government struggles under huge budget deficits. The top marginal tax rate is set to rise to 39.6% from 35% at the end of this year. A proposal to tax fund manager pay at ordinary income rates, instead of the 15% capital gains rate, is gaining currency in Congress.
"Everybody sees the tax rates are going up. At a certain point, it gets beyond people's pain threshold," said Anthony Tong, a tax partner at accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers in Hong Kong.
Unlike most jurisdictions, the U.S. taxes the income of citizens and green- card holders no matter where in the world it is earned.
In order to give up U.S. citizenship, a person must obtain or have citizenship in another country. The person surrenders their passport or green card during an interview with a consular officer in their new home country. He or she must also submit a form, including a list of assets, to the IRS to complete the process.
Chris Kavanagh of the American Institute in Taiwan, which represents U.S. interests in Taiwan, said 43 people gave up their U.S. citizenship in Taiwan in 2009, the highest that figure has been since 2003. He cautioned against drawing conclusions from that data, however.
The IRS says some of the swelling of numbers of expatriations towards the end of 2009 occurred because the agency made a push to notify people that had already surrendered their passport, but had not completed the process by submitting the IRS form. Until that form is received by the IRS, these people are still subject to U.S. tax. "There is some catch-up going on," said IRS spokesman Bruce Friedland.
The stock market plunge of late 2008 and early 2009 may also have played a role in the spike in expatriations. Since 2008, Americans with net worth greater than $2 million have had to pay an exit tax assessed on their assets. With gains reduced or wiped out by the market collapse, those seeking to give up their U.S. citizenship had an opportunity to do so with less exit tax required.
-By Martin Vaughan, Dow Jones Newswires; (202) 862-9244; martin.vaughan@dowjones.com
(Andrea Wong contributed to this article)
Gates of Vienna: Islam is Leaving Albania
Sunday, April 11, 2010
by Baron Bodissey
Most Westerners, myself included, know little about Albania. Over the last few years I’ve picked up a few tidbits of knowledge, but Albania is still largely terra incognita for me.
When I posted the Albanian translation of Geert Wilders’ speech the other day, I mentioned that many Albanians who are officially Muslims consider themselves Christians, and that the tradition has been passed down secretly within the families for centuries, but I didn’t realize how extensive this phenomenon was. Our Albanian translator, Ilia Toli Ph.D., has left a comment on the post giving more details:
I’m a Christian Orthodox Albanian. Now there’s a census in Albania and the religion will be one of the check-boxes. The biggest opposition to this are the Muslim authorities. They know that people by the millions will declare themselves Christians if given a chance, and that they’ll not be able to brag as they do now that Albania is 70% Muslim. Intermarriages are rampant and children declare themselves Christians. A strong motivation to do so is the fact that Turkey is the pariah of Europe. At every major terroristic event, Albanian Muslims denounce their faith by the hundreds of the thousands. In the northern, mountainous, sparsely inhabited part of the country there are still some oases of fanaticism.
There have been for centuries some Jews of Muslim outlook in Albania. They’re heirs to Shabetai Zevi and live in the countryside of Berat. By now they have no interest on Israel and Israel has no interest on them. They regard themselves just like another Muslim tribe. They’re called Donmeh.
There are a colorful variety of traditions among Albanian Muslims that point to their Christian non-distant past. For example, many have two names, one Christian at home and one Muslim in public. The point is that these all have been very diluted with time. There’s no special designation for these people.
There’s a great divide between Albanian Muslims of Albania and of the other neighboring countries. All terrorist groups caught in USA were from the latter. They’re more arrogant and assertive.
Sometimes Albanian Christians are even more assertively anti-Serbian, if not at a rhetorical level, because we’re suspicious patriots. By the way, personally I am not a patriot at all, I’m pro-Serbian.
These are the optimistic notes. On the pessimistic side, I don’t want Albania to be template for the future France. Islam is leaving Albania but not the Muslim ways. They’ll be around for the centuries to come. That can be easily noticed on what Albanians reproach themselves. Just an example. Albanians do not ask God to “please give me a horse”, they ask him to “please make the horse of my neighbor die.”
Among friends we try to totally avoid the topic of religion, and if it unfortunately happens, we all recite in chorus “but we’re grown up without religion.”
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