Friday, February 27, 2009

CONNECTING THE DOTS

02/27/2009

CONNECTING THE DOTS

Item, the drug cartel wars in Mexico

Item, the mutiny of border guards in BenglaDesh

Item, take over of Swat Valley in Pakistan by the fundamentalists

Item, coca production in Columbia, Bolivia, poppy production in Afghanistan

So what do all these have in common? everything, actually they are all the same one problem, though some may see one or another angle to the problems, many, however, fail to see the common threads. But first we need to remember that ALL humans are mostly the same, even the educated and the rich have the same basic human traits of the rest, the uneducated and the poor, And the second, if the first is true, which it is, what can happen over there can also happen here, we are not immune because we are white, black, educated or or richer or Americans, what is happening over there can also happen here.

As I had mentioned in my radio interview, back in march 2005, the problem with Mexico is not that they don't have money, especially with all the oil revenues, it was that the rich were hoarding money and corrupting the politics and justice systems. Previously I have also said that if you corrupt the system for your gain, then you, yourself, also suffer the consequences of a corrupt system. In poor countries it is easy to bribe someone, but when bribery becomes the norm then more and more monies are required to corrupt someone, unless, the people are so poor that they can still be bought off cheaply. Mexican rich and the middle class are no longer safe.

Safe heavens for the rich become smaller as the poverty and the corruption rises.

Unless you have been living in a bubble, you know what is happening in these various countries I have used in my example above, and just in case you do live in a bubble, here is some information. In Mexico drug lords have a war going on , not just between themselves, but also against the police and the army, kidnappings, murders, torture, assassinations are becoming the norm and no one is safe. Columbia and Bolivia have insurgencies tied to the drug trade, they have the same problems with corruption. In Bengla Desh, the border guards had a mutiny and they killed or kidnapped one hundred forty of their own officers, over seventy corpses have been discovered, seventy are still missing, And in Pakistan the government relinquished the control of the Swat Valley to the radical Islamists. Sway Valley used to be a summer heaven for the rich, where the poor population was used as virtual slaves for the summer months by the rich vacationers. Well ok, not as virtual slaves , but the poor people of Swat were just very happy to serve the vacationing for what ever money they could earn.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

READING ASSIGNMENT

02/26/2009

READING ASSIGNMENT

mANY OF US WATCH THE NEWS EVERYDAY, ALL DAY, thinking that there are new things in what they are watching, anticipating every new word for a newer thrill, while most of the news people feed us is garbage, and yet we are hooked on it.

NO, th e news is not really new, nor is the entertainment program, ( name your favorite program here please) has anything new to inform you off. so here is a link to what I posted on here back in April of 2007, see if you see in the news of what i said back then.






http://tombstone001.blogspot.com/2007/04/eyes-wide-shut_24.html

NADEYA SULEMAN

02/26/2009



NADEYA SULEMAN


CALL THE POOR GIRL BY HER PROPER NAME PLEASE,

calling Nadeya Suleman, the Octomom, is just horrendous, her name was revealed "prophetically" back in 1983, the James Bond movie named her what she is, the "OCTOPUSSY", get it right, she is the real thing.

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

YOUR COMMENTS

02/25/2009

YOUR COMMENTS

OK, I have reset the comment settings on this page, you can leave your comments, anonymously at any time, I would like to know what you think, anytime, good and bad are all welcome

I PICKED A BAD DAY, OBAMA SPEAKS

02/25/2009

I PICKED A BAD DAY, OBAMA SPEAKS

IN HIS 1980 MOVIE "AIRPLANE " Lloyd Bridges starts out by saying "I think I picked the wrong day to quit smoking." Then he says he picked the wrong day to quit drinking. ...,,,,,,,,

Some days I wonder about the mindset or our leaders and of our own selves.

Nadya Suleman thinks it is ok what she did, she will go back to college and get a degree and will be able to support her brood, all fourteen of them, may be it is time we looked in to irresponsible people making babies they can not afford, yes I have talked about it for years also.

Why is it that the nation is upset about her irresponsible behavior, but we keep quiet about tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of similar idiots having kids all over the country.

http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/24/pf/Lost_decade.moneymag/index.htm

plim@moneymail.com

Dear sir,

your article is misleading and confused, As you laud the stock market return of 4.5 percent and S&P return of 3.4 percent per annum over the last twenty years, you did not compare these to to the housing prices jumping by three hundred percent, college education and medicine up by five hundred percent in the same period. Of course we all know that the government figures have been a total lie, stating the inflation rate of under three percent, over the same period, thus anyone invested in the market was losing money.

Now then, getting back to Nadya Suleman, and her expertise on child rearing, her desire to become a psychologist and a counselor, she is not that far off the main stream , is she. We are a nation given to listening to idiots and following their advice as experts, be it Jerry Springer, Rush Limbaugh or Neal Boortz. We listen to Dr. Phil, Leeza and the crew of post menopausal out of work has beens of "The View".

http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/25/news/economy/bernanke_house_hearing/index.htm?postversion=2009022513


Federal Reserve chief says mortgage market woes must be solved to fix financial markets, even if it means helping irresponsible borrowers.

Why not Nadya Suleman, should she not expect to be bailed out also?

In the real world some one would say, where is the fix in all of this, why IS Ben Bernake still around? Why does anyone give a shi''' about what he thinks, was he not on the fed when all this crap broke loose? Why do we need to bail out the banks that caused the problem in the first place?

The truth being , that the "prosperity" of the last many years WAS in fact due to the bad loans, isn't this ironic, the "wealth" was being created due the irresponsible behavior, so what is the fix? Will we go back to the same bad habits that got us in to this mess in the first place? And if not then why are we spending " giving" money to the banks that should be losing their "assets".


So then, in other words, I am right again, we are going in to a deprression of biblical proprotions, the world has changed and it is not for good, you want to send your daughter out to suck dick , may be that is the only freedom you have left.

Monday, February 23, 2009

A MARCH TOWARDS SOCIALISM

02/23/2009

A MARCH TOWARDS SOCIALISM ( AND IT WILL BE CALLED A "NEW SOCIAL SYSTEM")

Previously I have advised about a government owned bank, now CITI is about to be taken over. Why is the government not calling it a government owned bank? Yet the march to socialism continues. Over the years I have written about this danger of "untold wealth", about the "creation of wealth" and our adoration of , if not out right worship of money.

Sooner or later, we all will have to change our lifestyles, willing or not our lives HAVE already changed, at least for the foreseeable future. Only problem is that ninety percent of the people still have no idea what has happened, or are unwilling to accept this new reality, the paradigm shift.

As we keep digging the hole of the deficits deeper, and the rich refuse to create jobs to feed the poor, which only proves I have been right all along, housing the banks and the industries are being taken over -helped- by the feds, the illusion of free market economy dims.

On individual and moral basis, we have failed to prove we are capable of taking care of ourselves, to take care of our responsibilities. While many in the nation looked down upon the Katrina victims for waiting for someone else to come to their aid and feeling that it was the responsibility of the government to take care of them, today everyone, from bankers to automotive executives to average laid off worker to a home owner who took on too much debt are looking for the government to bail us out, are we all not just like those Katrina "victims"? Of course we are all victims, and uncle Sam is the only sugar daddy.

Friday, February 20, 2009

RHETORIC WILL NOT SAVE AFGHANISTAN

02/20/2000

RHETORIC WILL NOT SAVE AFGHANISTAN

The "Arab News" always amazes me, they write article that sound as if they were written by a schizophrenic, with a total dissociation from reality. They talk about an Islam that only exists in there imaginations but is never put in to practice by its followers. This recent article is an example,

http://arabnews.com/?page=7&section=0&article=119445&d=21&m=2&y=2009&pix=opinion.jpg&category=Opinion


In a perfect world, one would expect that Muslims, who make up about a fifth or more of the world population, would have been opening schools for boys and girls to educate their Afghani cousins. That the "Islamic" governments would have been telling the Afghans that the ways of the "Mujahedeen and Taliban and the insurgents are all wrong and unIslamic. They would have propaganda machines telling the Afghans that the way to get the foreigner troops out is to get together and unite in the development of their country. That corruption and bribery are against Islamic values, That Islam has nothing against education of girls, or even modern sciences. That Islam does not condone the oppression of the people by the government, it does not tolerate and considers prejudices, all to be equal. But then we don't really want anyone to know the real Islam now , do we?

Thursday, February 19, 2009

AUDACITY OF HOPELESSNESS III

02/19/2009

AUDACITY OF HOPELESSNESS III


The bailout package will help some home owners not all, is what the head lines tell us. So what else is new, we knew this all along. Then there is the audacity of the new green jobs. Like I told, well wrote to Mr. Bush, that ethanol was a stupid idea, - that was at least six months to a year before the US NEWS and World report and the National Geographic exposed the flaws_. The new green jobs is the new stupid idea, a total waste of money, but we will find out only after the money is spent.

Building of wind turbines, have you heard from Boone Pickens lately? Having individual wind turbines on individual homes makes sense. Having solar panels on homes makes sense. But when you are taking about square miles of wind turbines and solar panels, you are overlooking the one, most important item in your theory of global warming.

If it is true , as advertised, that the global warming will change the weather patterns, then how do you predict what the weather will be, within a few years, at your chosen location, what if there are long term wind shift patterns, what if the tornadoes in Texas become stronger and tear up your turbines, and California and New Mexico and Arizona become tropical wonderlands with more rains, floods and vegetation?

Oil prices have dropped by seventy percent, as the global recession takes hold, the oil consumption is decreasing, if the economy stay in doldrums, which it will, the need for an alternate energy source becomes less and less important. At the time when we are going to commit untold billions to energy development and conservation.

If we succeed in developing an economy that is not dependent on oil, oil prices go down, the income of oil producing countries goes down, from Russia to Iran to the gulf countries, poverty as well as instability of their regimes increases, not to say anything of the decrease in their arms purchases, and buying of luxury goods. Islamic fundamentalism in the gulf increases. And our friends from the house of Saud are thrown out on their kiesters.

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

BAILING OUT THE BAILOUT

02/18/2009

BAILING OUT THE BAILOUT

Let me tell you I am not for Obama, I did not vote for Obama, do not believe he the greatest thing since Abrham Lincoln, he has a long way to go to prove or disprove a danm thing.

I am not for the bailout either, I believe it is a damn waste of money aand only differs the inevitable collapse of the economy and the social order.

The Republicans who are up in arms need to shut the heck up and sit the f'''' down now. Because first you did not do a damn thing when Bush was screwing up the country and set the economy up for a fall, ( read below how for years I have detailed the economic crisis and explained step by step how Bush policies were going to take the country down) .


And secondly, if Obama was doing what you say he should, that is to do nothing you would have accused him of being callous and uncaring, like Bush was during Katarina.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

AUDACITY OF HOPELESSNESS II

02/17/2009

AUDACITY OF HOPELESSNESS II

Once again, like the fools that we are we want to increase spending, what did we learn in school?
Wealth is increased by saving, and investing , not spending.

As long as the United States was saving money, we were advancing, but for the last thirty years since Reagan, we have tried to get rich by spending money, it has not worked, it will not work. Even now the best we can hope for is to delay the day of reckoning, even that hope is slim, may be none.

Founder of Islamic TV station accused of beheading wife


AUDACITY OF HOPELESSNESS

02/17/2009

AUDACITY OF HOPELESSNESS

http://http//cnnmoneytalkback.blogs.cnnmoney.cnn.com/2009/02/13/the-audacity-of-hopelesness/


The plan set in motion by Reagan is complete, we are a tax free and a broke third world country, where the rich don’t pay taxes, and the poor fend for themselves, any questions?


http://http//cnnmoneytalkback.blogs.cnnmoney.cnn.com/2009/02/16/the-stock-market-isnt-as-bad-as-you-think/


Simply put, the global unemployment rate is about fifty percent, poverty rate around sixty may be? Half the people in the world would do anything to have three meals a day, Most of the people have no health care, no clean drinking water, no minimum wage, workers rights, or even human rights. Then tell me how great it is to be in a global economy, and explain to me how I compete with these people for a job, and what I can sell them. Also tell me what I must give up to stay competitive, and tell me how we are helping the people in Tibet and Darfur.


Like I have been saying it for years that human beings are made obsolete by the modern technology. Recently a news item said that there were doctors and lawyers in Miami looking for work. Computer engineers and auto workers are laid off by hundreds of thousands, while an unemployed mother of six conceives eight more, and this from one of the smartest people on earth, then where is hope, what is the reason for being hopeful.

Humanity is at a crossroads, we either quit breeding or we will have to separate ourselves among the needed and those for whom there is no possible useful function, then take care of those who are needed and leave the ones that are excess to their own devices, be it in Darfur, Tibet, Pakistan, Afghanistan or wherever.

I had proposed this in my writing of the " A NEW WORLD ORDER, 2003" which is posted on this blog elsewhere, you have to follow the url


http://tombstone001.blogspot.com/2006/09/new-world-order-2003.html


With all the pretensions and pronouncements to the contrary, the end of the world as we know it, as you know it is near.

Friday, February 13, 2009

DISCUSSING MONEY AND POLITICS

02/13/2009

DISCUSSING MONEY AND POLITICS

FOR SOME IT IS DIFFICULT TO SEE THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE MONEY MESS WE ARE IN AND THE POLICIES OF THE GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED STATES. TIME AND AGAIN I HAVE TRIED TO GET THE PEOPLE TO SEE HOW THE TWO ARE INTER -RELATED, HERE AGAIN I TRY TO EXPLAIN.

The discussion started on the blog of Teagan Goddard's political wire, about how Dodd will write a book, about the financial crisis

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2009/02/12/dodd_will_write_book_on_financial_crisis.html#comment-6228944

here is what i had written

Will he explain how the politicians were bought off, How the SEC turned a blind eye to an obvious and on going scam, will he say how free trade and real jobs being lost to slave labor in Chinese and Indian factories made US workers useless. How cheap debt, (lower interest rates) made available to the federal government to make deficits low (lower interest on the cumulative national debt), created the housing bubble. How so called democrats, representing the workers fell in bed with the bankers on Wall Street? '''

And to this a mr jiriskin replied

slave labor in Chinese and Indian factories" To the extent that slave labor does or does not exist in these places, it is not a factor in the loss of US jobs. In India for a long time and in China in the last decade there has been a more-or-less free market in labor at wages that are better than the subsistence wages of the countryside. We lost jobs because enough others CHOSE to work for wages sufficiently lower that the cost of shipping finished goods back here did not make up the difference.There are enough legitimate arguments around free trade that you don't need to bring up this (now very old) red herring."cheap debt, (lower interest rates) made available to the federal government" This is really confusing to me. You want the government to offer to pay a HIGHER interest rate to its lenders?"(lower interest on the cumulative national debt), created the housing bubble" I'm no economist, but my understanding is that the real interest rate on ARMs and other weird instruments was actually quite high, that the teaser rates were loss leaders that had nothing to do with what the government pays for its debt, that a lot of investors engaging in wishful thinking bought these now-securitized instruments without doing due diligence. How does your theory fit with all this?"so called democrats, representing the workers fell in bed with the bankers" well, yes and Republicans and workers' pension funds and the workers themselves, and just about everybody else".

There is a phenomenon, called "the inter-connectedness of things", also some times called "the butterfly effect".

Thus" "slave labor in Chinese and Indian factories"

""To the extent that slave labor does or does not exist in these places, it is not a factor in the loss of US jobs. In India for a long time and in China in the last decade there has been a more-or-less free market in labor at wages that are better than the subsistence wages of the countryside. We lost jobs because enough others CHOSE to work for wages sufficiently lower that the cost of shipping finished goods back here did not make up the difference.""

Do we forget that these places are over populated, As related to the number of jobs available, thus people there will work for extremely low wages as per required by the free market standards? And that when we move some of "our" jobs overseas because of low wages the number ob jobs in this country is reduced thus the pressure on wages here is eliminated and the people on the lower end of scales have actually a lower wage growth. The numbers here prove it everyday.


Mr Jirisken writes ""cheap debt, (lower interest rates) made available to the federal government" This is really confusing to me. You want the government to offer to pay a HIGHER interest rate to its lenders?

No I do not want the federal government to pay high interest rates, but,

1/ the extremely low interest rates have reduced the incentive to save,

2/ extremely low interest rates have allowed the government to borrow more and more and not to raise taxes, but if and when ( and it will) inflation starts to rise and there is a need to to raise the interest rates, the interest on the cumulative federal debt will increase in such a manner that the government could not even pay the interest on the debt with the current tax income and will have to reduce services and benefits and will go in default.

3/ the extreme money growth along with the artificially lower interest rates under the
Greenspan FED did allow Mr. Bush to finance his two wars with borrowed monies, but it also allowed the bankers and hedge funds and speculators to finance the housing bubble as well as allowed the American consumer to live beyond its means.

ABOUT THE MOTHER OF EIGHT

02/13. 2009

ABOUT THE MOTHER OF EIGHT

is it not against the law to take advantage of the mentally challenged? Then why the media are allowed to abuse these folks in the name of freedom of information or the pretense of helping the poor. The side show has expanded from the magazines like the "Star and the Enquirer", to shows like Springer, to the Idol and other reality shows all over the air waves, Get the freaks off the air. Please ! It only encourages the mentally challenged and the dysfunctional! YOU DO NOT ENCOURAGE PATHOLOGY!

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

THE REAL WORLD, ,, AGAIN

02/11/2009
THE REAL WORLD,, AGAIN!

http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docID=cqmidday-000002992666

FORD PLANS RESTRUCTURING



December 02, 2008 2:50 PM

Washington's efforts at reforming, stabilizing, boosting the economy may work in the short run yet, but they are doomed. The fact remains as the population keeps increasing, fewer and fewer people are needed to perform the actual "work". That is the problem today with the social security and Medicare already. It is not that we only have two workers to support each retiree, it is that more workers are not needed to perform any gainful "functions" and thus have reasonable income to base the tax on. You can see the problem, if you can relate one to the other, in the auto industry. As the leaders of the three auto makers are in Washington again, hats in hand, their problem is not that they flew in on private jets, (the whole idea is a created distraction form the real problems) the problem is that they need fewer workers ( read automation and technology) and pay them less now , and to make less in profits, ( TO COMPETE IN THE GLOBAL MARKET), and thus the contributions to support the retiree's pensions and health care have fallen. It is the same problem in social security, fewer workers, lower wages, and more beneficiaries. At the same time, it would be funny, were it not so ironic that the congress and the senate are accusing the auto makers of mismanagement and poor planning, is it not the kettle calling the pot black!

Monday, February 09, 2009

TARP EXPLAINED (financial assets reevaluation and transfer system)

02/09/2009

TARP EXPLAINED it is really a financial assets reevaluation and transfer system

Now why would a smart man like Hank Paulson go and name his plan TARP, Troubled Assets Relief Program. Now any one knows there can be no such thing as an asset that is suicidal or suffers from a adjustment disorder, even though we know many of the assets of the American are suffering from just such an episode. But words can be deceiving and TARP by its name sounds like you are trying to hide something, by covering over it with a tarp. So here I go out on a limb and propose a new name for the plan. I think we should call Mr. Paulson's plan "Financial Assets Reevaluation and Transfer System", here now, it explains everything. That the financial assets of the bank are being reevaluated and are being transferred to the government, and the acronym "FARTS" can be clearly understood by any lay person in the country. At least we Americans will know what we have got.

A GOVERNMENT BANK

02/09/2009

A GOVERNMENT BANK


The time has come for the government to start its own bank. Not the Treasury or the federal reserve, but a regular bank owned and operated by the government. Put away the bail out, the stimulus, and take the money as a reserve to start the bank, writing loans, mortgages, even issuing credit cards with regular strict lending standards, just cut out the bull crap of the SBA that takes six months and more to issues a small business loan. Since we have seen that the banks taking money from the federal government are only keeping it or paying bonuses to their executives while the average American suffers, and the small business can not get any money, the best option now would be for the government to get in to banking and hire bureaucrats on the cheap as opposed to high dollar bankers.


The current banking system has failed and it has failed the country, we surely don't need to hand the same more money, I wrote about this before that the government is throwing good money after bad, that the TARP was a farce and a failure, I have been proven right. The government should not be in the business of creating jobs, it should concern itself with collecting taxes on incomes. The jobs will again be created as the small businesses and individuals can borrow money and start new ventures, thus the jobs will be created like they should be.

Handing out money to states and counties and cities does not make much sense either as the money will be lost to corruption and diverted to the friends and families of the politicians. in contracts.

Tuesday, February 03, 2009

THE WEAKEST LINK

02/03/2009

THE WEAKEST LINK

Time and again I have said, "Life is a game of connect the dots, if you don't connect all the dots, and don't connect them in the right order, you don't see the whole picture".

So it is when one wonders about Tom Daschle, or Timothy Geithner, or Larry Craig, Elliot Spitzer, Bill Bakker, Bill Clinton, Rudi Guillaini, Casey Anthony, Nadya Suleman, the Jonesboro Arkansas School shootings, Jonesboro, Georgia middle School 11 year old being tasered, or Jonesboro Georgia High school dance teams performance, one must realise these are not isolated incidents, this IS who we are, who we have become, this is US, the U.S.

These stories and the people in them may be unrelated, but over all they representative of the current state of our country, where anything goes is the rule of the day. Even as we face the greatest fiscal crisis of our times, if not of all times, the Washington is still refusing to reform its ways. People are still trying to get rich quick, connections and nepotism are still the rule.

What difference is there among these people, Nadya Suleman getting impregnated with eight kids, or the CitiBank giving its employees bonuses, or a father putting his daughter naked on the web, it is all the same, no morals, no boundaries, and pure unadulterated greed.

We are waiting for a bailout from a situation of our making. We believe it will be fixed, so no one is talking about the upcoming civil unrest, the world wide starvation, ( yes, including here), wars over resources, and cannibalism.

It is all a part of the new world order, if here in the United States you have not heard about the Chinese being worried about civil unrest, or Iran and Pakistan being unstable, have not heard of the French and the English workers striking for jobs and job security it does not mean it is not happening.

We live in the age of information, so it is said, then why are we dumber than ever?
There are a few reasons, in general we Americans, are too important to worry about the rest of the world, Vietnam and Iraq not withstanding , our interest in the foreign lands is minimal at best.

But then again, the media were not out here warning us of the impending doom, of banking collapse, or the unscrupulous loans, of the real estate mess, of the coming jobs crisis, not that we were interested any way , but someone should have been raising cane! Surely I was not the only one talking, warning, getting on talk shows, writing to the White House, to my senator about our ruinous fiscal policies.

The truth is that the news and information media, including the networks, the newspapers and magazines and even the "right wing" talk radio never wanted the people to know the truth, for their own reasons, actually their lively hood was dependent on your remaining ignorant and uninformed, even misinformed.
The question was asked on the Anderson 360 blog, that Is Media partly to blame

http://business.blogs.cnn.com/2008/10/26/is-the-media-partly-to-blame/

and here is what i had said



October 27th, 2008 350 GMT

It is just like the right wing conservatives, blame all their screw ups on the media so they can wash their hands from all blame. On the other hand the media have been a bunch of dopes not investigating diligently and reporting and being caught up in the “AMAZING BOOM”. For over ten years, I have , myself, blogged about the ridiculous appreciation of assets, of creating money from thin air, the dangers of very low interests rates that promote spending and reduce the incentive to save. Of inability to save for anything with a very low interest rate on savings thus the need for zero down loans. And have been called crazy for complaining about the building of a house of cards. I am afraid that we are in for a world wide depression, that will change the face of governments the world over.
But in the end we must look to see who really owns the media? Are they not going to benefit from even a depression once again?


Not all the blame can be laid at the feet of the media though, surely if someone wanted to eat just poop, there would be vendors galore to provide the substance, and so it has been. And what better proof of this can be found that we have MTV, Spike, Bravo, Nickelodeon and Disney, We have Leeza, Springer, Martha Stewart and the View.

ONLY LITTLE PEOPLE PAY TAXES

02/03/2009

ONLY LITTLE PEOPLE PAY TAXES

So it is that "only little people pay taxes" said Leona Helmsley. If an average person is behind in taxes, the IRS goes crazy, we are considered scoff laws and threatened with prison and leins are placed on our properties. But now first it was Timothy Geithner and now Tom Daschle, both nominated for cabinet positions and we find out that both had been making " minor" oversights. To me it reeks of corruption of the priviliged. Don't tell me they did not know the law, and if they did not how are they being placed in positions of Authority in matters financial.

Does the senate have any back bone? Are they all so corrupt? Sadly yes, in The united States of America the government is becoming as corrupt as in any third world country. It is no longer enough to just scam and lie and cheat, if you are rich and powereful you can thumb your nose at the laws and when caught just say I was using Turbo Tax, I wonder how many indviduals could get away with it.