Apr 07

Today’s News 7th April 2017

  • Clipping Iran's Wings – Winners & Losers From Congress' New Sanctions

    Authored by James Durso via RealClearDefense.com,

     

    Iran’s aviation sector will spend much more time taxiing before takeoff if the Countering Iran’s Destabilizing Activities Act Of 2017 becomes law. The bill enjoys bipartisan support in the U.S. Senate, and the House of Representatives is considering a companion bill, the Iran Ballistic Missiles and International Sanctions Enforcement Act, which also enjoys bipartisan support. 

    The Senate bill has three primary provisions: (1) Imposing mandatory sanctions on persons involved with Iran’s ballistic missile program; (2) Applies terrorism sanctions to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC); Requires the President to block the property of any person or entity involved in specific activities related to the supply, sale, or transfer of prohibited arms and related material to or from Iran.  The House bill primarily focuses on throttling the supply chain that supports Iran’s ballistic missile program. 

    The Senate and House bills have the support of Iran-wary groups, such as The American Israel Public Affairs Committee  and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies who feel the bills do not violate the letter or spirit of the “nuclear deal,” the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as they do not target Iran’s nuclear program.  In his Senate testimony in support of the JCPOA, then-Secretary of State John Kerry stated: “We’re not going to come back and just slap [sanctions] on again, but that absolutely does not mean that we are precluded from sanctioning Iranian actors, sectors, as any actions or circumstances warrant.”  The bills face opposition by JCPOA supporters, such as the National Iranian American Council, and the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans who feel additional sanctions for any reason will derail the JCPOA. (Sanctions levied by the U.S., the European Union, and the United Nations are usually for the proliferation of nuclear weapons or ballistic missile technology, support of terrorism, or egregious human rights violations.)

    In March 2016, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Iranian airline Mahan Air for supporting Iran’s ballistic missile program.  Making Mahan Air a two-time loser, as it was sanctioned in 2011 “for providing financial, material, and technological support” to the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).  Iran Air was also sanctioned in 2011, primarily for transporting goods prohibited under United Nations Security Council Resolution 1803, which required Iran to “cease and desist from any and all uranium enrichment,” and any research and development associated with centrifuges and uranium enrichment. The Iran Air sanctions were lifted to secure Iran’s assent to the JCPOA, but Iran Air and Mahan Air have been active in supporting the Assad regime in Syria, leaving Iran Air vulnerable to non-nuclear-related sanctions in the future.

    Iran has no strategic airlift capability, so it has pressed into service its private and state-owned air carriers, Iran Air, Mahan Air, and Yas Air (formerly Pars Air; sanctioned by the UN, the EU, and the U.S.). These carriers make up Iran’s airbridge to Syria and its allies, the Bashar Assad regime, and Lebanese Hezbollah, a creature of the IRGC.  The Mahan Air fleet and the Iran Air fleet are mostly Airbus airframes; Yas Air’s fleet is mostly Russian aircraft

    In February 2016, Iran Air agreed to purchase 118 Airbus commercial aircraft worth an estimated $27 billion.  In July 2016, Iran Air and Boeing agreed to the sale of 80, and leasing of 29, passenger aircraft worth an estimated $16 billion, with the first deliveries scheduled for 2018.

    Congressional opponents of Iran want to cancel Boeing’s agreement with Iran, but it will be more practical to allow the executive branch sanction the buyer, Iran Air, which will be possible under the Iran Terror-Free Skies Act of 2017.  Thus, Boeing can declare force majeure to avoid contract penalties, and Members of Congress can avoid the bad optics of voting against a large export contract and all those jobs.

    How can the U.S. ensure Iran Air is eliminated as a tool of Iran’s apparat of subversion in Syria?

    • When Iran Air flights make their next appearance in the Syrian theatre of operations in support of the Assad regime or Hezbollah, the U.S. sanctions the airline under the authority of Executive Order 13572, Blocking Property of Certain Persons With Respect to Human Rights Abuses in Syria Or, if the IRGC is designated a terrorist organization, apply sanctions to Iran Air as a confederate of the IRGC. The U.S. may prefer to wait until it has achieved its goals vis-à-vis the Islamic State before acting.
    • Boeing regretfully suspends its dealings with Iran Air.
    • Because the U.S. is concerned about the safety of civil aviation, it reminds interested parties that it did issue a license for the inspection and repair of Iran’s civilian aircraft “so long as those services were performed outside Iran so the parts and services could not be misdirected to Iran’s military aircraft.” Iran refused to take advantage of the license, but it will be useful to remind Iran and its surrogates of this when they wave the bloody shirt when tragedy strikes, which is likely given Iran’s poor aviation safety record.
    • The U.S. refuses export licenses for U.S-made components bound for Airbus aircraft to be sold to Iran Air.
    • If Airbus decides to install substitute components, the U.S. places the type certificates for those models, the narrow-body A320, the long-haul A321, and the long-range A350, under review. (The “type certificate” is issued by a regulating body, such as the American Federal Aviation Administration or the European Aviation Safety Agency, to signify the airworthiness of an aircraft manufacturing design or "type." Once the certificate is issued the design cannot be changed, at least not without significant time and expense.)
    • Once the type certificates are under review, the U.S. approaches the countries that are Iran Air destinations and requests that, due to the now-nonconforming aircraft configurations, the countries withdraw landing privileges for those aircraft. A similar approach will be made to countries along those routes with the request that they deny flight permits to those Iran Air aircraft until the type certificate review is completed  (A “flight permit” is the “permission required by an aircraft to overfly, land, or make a technical stop [a stop for refueling or essential repairs] in any country's airspace.”
    • If the Airbus and Boeing options are off the table, Iran Air may have to turn to Russia and China for aircraft. The U.S. does not have much leverage here, but China and Russia will be dealing with a desperate buyer and will act accordingly.  Russia and China are wise enough to know dealing with a terrorist-designated IRGC is what’s commonly known as a “bad idea” and will pile on restrictions regarding the use of the aircraft to give them an excuse when the aircraft turn up in Syria. However, by then they will have been paid.
    • The clandestine sellers of parts for Iran’s remaining U.S.-origin aircraft will price their wares accordingly.

    Other considerations

    • Boeing will have to be made whole, as the sale has been factored into its stock price, but President Trump’s suggested “big order” of stealthy F/A-18 Super Hornets may do nicely, thank you. Utilization of the Export- Import Bank of the United States (EXIM) would greatly aid in the facilitation of the sale, and perhaps resuscitating the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC). 
    • The U.S. should re-issue the license for inspection and repair of Iran’s Boeing aircraft at a location outside Iran. America will do this for its own satisfaction as Iran will ignore the offer as it did before.  
    • Iran Air will be unable to compete with the rival carriers from Gulf countries, which the U.S. can trade for something, maybe in the dispute between U.S. and Gulf airlines over government subsidies.

    The winners and losers

    • Winners: Syrian citizens on the receiving end of Iranian guns; Israel, which will get a breather if Hezbollah is hobbled; Lebanese citizens, who will get a breather if Hezbollah is hobbled; Boeing
    • Losers: Airbus; any IRGC smuggling scheme that is using the flights to and from Syria; Iranian citizens, who will lose the chance to travel safely from their prison republic.

  • ISIS, Al-Qaeda Praise Trump's Attack

    Having perhaps lost the support of much of his anti-war base, President Trump appears to have won praise from two new groups…

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    Even even more ironic, today is the 100th anniversary of the United States entering World War One.

  • "Nuclear War Much More Likely" Paul Craig Roberts: In Dangerous World, Putin Will Not Trust America

    Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,

    Don’t be fooled by appearances.

    President Trump is only at war with the Deep State on one level.

    On another, the Deep State already run everything – when it comes to foreign policy, economics, politics and the mainstream narrative that is meant to set & sync headlines, clocks and consumer habits around the world.

    War is brewing, as Trump hinted strongly in his upstart presidential campaign, but it will come, ultimately, at the terms of the long-running organ that actually steers U.S. policy.

    After a very dubious “chemical attack” in Syria to stir the pot (the White Helmets did not even use gloves when picking up, touching and treating supposedly contaminated children), it is clear that war could erupt overnight with any number of middle eastern ‘enemies,’ or with North Korea, Russia or just about anyone else.

    And one narrative that has been almost constant from the establishment power base and their media lapdogs during the last cycle has been dogging Russia in anyway it can – from baseless hacking accusations, to controversial sanctions talks, to attributing ultimate responsibility for chemical warfare attacks.

    One can clearly see that a fight is being picked. If the story doesn’t fit, they’ll force it, or just find another excuse.

    This, in short, is why the well respected Paul Craig Roberts says we are one step closer to “going poof” – it is three steps back to the thermonuclear cold war, only this time the leaders aren’t even attempting to work it out diplomatically.

    According to Dr. Roberts, foreign policy figures in the days of Kennedy and Krushchev were actually attempting to trust and deescalate, fearful of setting things off.

    Today, foreign policy men and woman seem dogged and emboldened by the chance for destruction.

    As USA Watchdog reported:

    Dr. Roberts, formerly a top editor at the Wall Street Journal, says nuclear war is the most dire problem Americans face. This comes at a time when trust between Russia and America is at all-time lows.  Dr. Roberts says, “The danger is both warning systems, ours and the Soviets (Russians).  During the period of the cold war, there were many false alarms of incoming missiles.  Both sides would see incoming missiles, and yet no one believed it, and the reason they didn’t believe it was that the governments were working together to defuse tensions.”

     

    “You had Kennedy with Khrushchev.  You had Nixon who gave us SALT-1, an anti-ballistic missile treaty.  You had Carter who gave us SALT-2.  You had Reagan and Gorbachev who ended the cold war.  So, all during these periods when false information of incoming missiles came in, no one believed it, but if you have distrust between the two powers as we now have, and Putin has said on a number of occasions we can no longer trust the Americans, if you can’t trust and you get incoming missile alerts, you are much more inclined to believe it.  So, the prospect of nuclear war is more likely.  Washington and the media . . . are creating distrust among their populations with Russia with this constant anti-Russian propaganda.  With all this bogus and false allegations about Russia. . . . the chances of all this going poof are very high.”

    via Greg Hunter’s YouTube channel

     

    Combine all the mistrust, aggression and attempts to conflate conflicts into a larger disaster.

    The debt situation, the economics and the social indicators are all abysmal and depressing. The morale of the country has devolved, and mutated strangely with the pockets of information and counter-information that reside online.

    And there are those who’d prefer to torch things off, collect on military industrial contracts during prolonged war, and start things over when people have sobered up to the grim new realities.

    These will be trying times.

  • Pentagon Releases Video Of Tomahawk Cruise Missile Launches

    Having unleashed 59 Tomahawk missiles into Syria, The Pentagon has released video of the attacks against Assad’s assets…

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    And here is video of the impact on the Al Shaerat military airfield being bombed showing the large ammo depot blasts – Syrian opposition says airbase struck by US military was used by Assad regime to ‘kill thousands’…

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    How long until President Trump retweets these images with a ‘punchy’ hashtag?

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    It seems this action should quieten down the Democrats’ Russian narrative for a while?

  • Wall Street Analysts Respond To Syrian Air Strikes

    With stocks tumbling and bonds and bullion bid, Wall Street's best and brightest weigh in on what traders should expect next after news of the cruise missile attack.

    Investors are looking for response from Russia and other countries to gauge market impact of the U.S. strike on Syria (via Bloomberg)

    Westpac Banking Corp (Sean Callow, senior strategist)

    “Markets should have been prepared for U.S. military action given Trump’s comments but the strike was on the early side of expectations, especially since it occurred halfway through the Trump-Xi meeting.”

     

    “While we have probably already seen the sharpest market response, there is likely to be a lingering sense of unease over how quickly Trump switched from rhetorical support for the Syria/Russia storyline about fighting terrorists.”

    Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank (Ayako Sera, market strategist)

    “This was a huge surprise, especially at this timing, when Trump is meeting with Xi. People expected North Korea to be on the table as things weren’t going smoothly internally in the U.S. and wanted to focus on external policies — but instead, it was Syria where he took action.”

     

    “Whether the market reaction is temporary or will continue will depend on the reactions from the international community.”

     

    “Hopefully Russia will also be critical of Syria’s gas attack, but without international unity it’s a negative for the U.S.”

    Scotiabank (Gao Qi, currency strategist)

    “Markets will be paying more attention to political and event risks, so it’d be risk-aversion trade going forward. Under such circumstances, emerging-market currencies, including the yuan, tend to be weaker, while the safe-havens like yen would be stronger. Whether it’d turn out to be knee-jerk reaction or medium-term trend, it’d depend on how things evolve in Syria and North Korea.”

    AMP Capital Investors (Shane Oliver, head of investment strategy)

    “It’s a surprise that the strike occurred so quickly. That’s why you’ve seen this risk off right now in markets. Unless this signals some sort of escalation in the war in Syria with heavy increase in U.S. involvement, it’s unlikely to have a lasting impact in markets. We have seen these things in the past and invariably you see the short-term negative reaction, and it proves very short-lived.”

    Principal Global Investors (Jim McCaughan, CEO)

    “The attack on an airfield in Syria is really not surprising in the circumstances. The move to safe havens is more just in case anything goes wrong. If this turns out to be a pretty surgical strike against the Syrian military, I think the market will get over it and recover again.”

     

    “I think the market is really only worried about something going wrong in the execution here. That’s not the most likely outcome. So I think this might be quite temporary in terms of market impact.”

    Capital Investment Management (Alan Tseng, vice president)

    “With the uncertainty in international geo-politics, investors are taking a wait-and-see attitude, reducing their holdings of stocks.”

    For now markets have stabilized after the initial risk off knee jerk lower…

  • "Russian Forces Were Notified In Advance": Pentagon Statement On Air Strikes In Syria

    Pentagon Spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis has issued the following statement on the U.S. strike in Syria in which US ships launched 59 Tomahawk cruide missiles at Syria.

    Statement from Pentagon Spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis on U.S. strike in Syria

     

    At the direction of the president, U.S. forces conducted a cruise missile strike against a Syrian Air Force airfield today at about 8:40 p.m. EDT (4:40 a.m., April 7, in Syria). The strike targeted Shayrat Airfield in Homs governorate, and were in response to the Syrian government’s chemical weapons attack April 4 in Khan Sheikhoun, which killed and injured hundreds of innocent Syrian people, including women and children.

     

    The strike was conducted using Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles (TLAMs) launched from the destroyers USS Porter and USS Ross in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. A total of 59 TLAMs targeted aircraft, hardened aircraft shelters, petroleum and logistical storage, ammunition supply bunkers, air defense systems, and radars. As always, the U.S. took extraordinary measures to avoid civilian casualties and to comply with the Law of Armed Conflict. Every precaution was taken to execute this strike with minimal risk to personnel at the airfield.

     

    The strike was a proportional response to Assad’s heinous act. Shayrat Airfield was used to store chemical weapons and Syrian air forces. The U.S. intelligence community assesses that aircraft from Shayrat conducted the chemical weapons attack on April 4. The strike was intended to deter the regime from using chemical weapons again.

     

    Russian forces were notified in advance of the strike using the established deconfliction line. U.S. military planners took precautions to minimize risk to Russian or Syrian personnel located at the airfield.

     

    We are assessing the results of the strike. Initial indications are that this strike has severely damaged or destroyed Syrian aircraft and support infrastructure and equipment at Shayrat Airfield, reducing the Syrian Government’s ability to deliver chemical weapons. The use of chemical weapons against innocent people will not be tolerated.

    And moments after the Pentagon statement, House speaker Paul Ryan said that the US action was “appropriate and just.”

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  • Gold Spikes To 5 Month Highs; Stocks, Bond Yields Sink As US Begins Syria Operation

    While the initial reaction to Rex Tillerson's statements was relatively understated, the actions of tonight have sparked a much more considerable move in stocks (lower), bonds (lower in yield), and gold (higher)…

    Gold spiked to the highest since November 10th – erasing 90 % of the post-Trump election losses…

     

    S&P is fading fast…

     

    And 10Y Yields crashed through support to the lowest since Nov 17th…

  • Trump Statement On Syria Air Strikes

    Shortly after he concluded his dinner with Xi Jinping at Mar-A-Lago, Trump authorized the airstrike against Syria in which at least 60 cruise missiles were launched, and delivered the following brief statement:

    My fellow Americans, on Tuesday Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad launched a horrible chemical weapons attack on innocent civilians. using a deadly nerve agent, Assad choked out the lives of helpless men, women and children.

     

    It was a slow and brutal death for so many, even beautiful babies were cruelly murdered in this very barbaric attack. No child of God should ever suffer such horror.

     

    Tonight I ordered a targeted military strike on the airfield in Syria from where the chemical attack was launched. It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons.

     

    There can be no dispute that Syria used banned chemical weapons violated its obligations under the chemical weapons convention and ignored the urging of the UN Security Council.

     

    Years of previous attempts at changing Assad’s behavior have all failed and failed very dramatically. As a result the refugee crisis continues to deepen and the region continues to destabilize threatening the United States and its allies.

     

    Tonight I call on all civilized nations to join us in seeking to end the slaughter and bloodshed in Syria. And also to end terrorism of all kinds and all types.

     

    We ask for God’s wisdom as we face the challenge of our very troubled world. We pray for the lives of the wounded and for the souls of those who have passed and we hope that as long as american stands for justice then peace and harmony will in the end prevail. Goodnight and God bless America and the entire world. Thank you.

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  • Is Your "Democracy" Actually a Totalitarian State? Take This Quick Quiz

    Authored by Charles Hugh-Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

    The USA is already a Totalitarian State with a Ministry of Propaganda that works overtime to generate a flimsy illusion of "democracy."

    Is your "democracy" (or republic) actually a Totalitarian State? That is, is it a "democracy" or "republic" in name only? To find out, take this quick quiz.

    1. Does your government (federal, state and local) seize citizens' assets without due process? In other words, the rule of law is dead; the state is the law. If the answer is yes, Your "democracy" is already a Totalitarian State. The answer in the USA is a definitive "yes."

     

    2. Does your government impose tyranny by complexity? If so, the average citizen lacks the wealth and connections needed to fight the seizure of private property without due process or recourse. In the USA, the answer is "yes," the government is a tyranny by complexity.

     

    3. Is your government essentially "for sale" to wealthy elites? If the answer is yes, Your "democracy" is already a Totalitarian State–or more accurately, a fascist Totalitarian State.

     

    4. Does your government spy on its entire citizenry? If the answer is yes, Your "Democracy" is already a Totalitarian State. The answer in the USA is a definitive "yes."

    Well, you have your answer: the USA is already a Totalitarian State with a Ministry of Propaganda that works overtime to generate a flimsy illusion of "democracy." Please read the following links if you seek documentation of these systemic abuses of centralized power.

    Orwell and Kafka Do America: How the Government Steals Your Money–"Legally," Of Course (March 24, 2015)

    Government in the USA is expropriating the private property of its citizenry without due process on a vast scale. I have provided documentation of this extraordinary reality many times over the years.

    The various levels of government have a variety of "legal" (haha) means to steal your property without due process or recourse: civil forfeiture, absurdly expensive traffic fines that lead to jail sentences in the local debtors prison-gulag, forfeiture of assets, including land, should government agents find the marijuana plants they planted on your property (surprise!), the state steals your money in a bank account and notifies you after the fact that the state suspects you owe it taxes, though they have zero evidence of that claim–and on and on.

    The courts place no limits on the central state's power, for they are simply one side of the same statist coin, and so we have a totalitarian kleptocracy that in true Orwellian fashion claims it is a functioning "democracy":

    Criminalizing Poverty For Profit: Local Government's New Debtors Prisons (October 20, 2009)

    "Upholding the Law" or Simply Theft by Other Means? (October 26, 2009)

    Theft By Other Means II: When the State Steals Property, Is It Not Theft? (November 10, 2009

    State Over-Reach: Stripmining the Citizenry for Fun and Profit (November 13, 2009)

    Death of Donald P. Scott (Wikipedia); (source):

    "In October of 1992, millionaire recluse Donald Scott and his bride of two months, Frances Plante Scott, lived in a storybook wooded valley in the mountains high above Malibu, Calif. Trails End Ranch is almost completely surrounded by state and Federal park land, and the neighboring government entities had made numerous attempts to buy out Scott and annex his property.

     

    Stymied in their attempt to buy the Scott ranch, government officials hit on an alternative plan. Contending an officer had seen "marijuana plants growing under the trees" during a drug-seeking overflight, agents from various jurisdictions gathered quietly outside the locked gate to the ranch in the morning mists of Oct. 2, 1992.

     

    After greedily studying the maps of the 200 acres of prime land they were told they'd be able to grab under federal asset seizure laws should they find as few as 14 marijuana plants, they cut the chain on the gate with bolt-cutters and raced a mile up the dirt drive to the ranch, complete with police dogs.

     

    Frances Scott was in the kitchen, brewing her morning coffee, when dozens of men in plainclothes and brandishing guns — no badges or warrants in evidence — came swarming in. Understandably, she screamed for her husband, still asleep upstairs.

     

    Donald Scott, 63, came hurrying down the stairs, a handgun held over his head. The officers shouted for him to lower his weapon. He did. They shot him dead."

    Your government in action–completely legally, of course. I hope you approve. The irony of tragedies like this is that when young Americans faced similar "law enforcement" tactics in the late 1960s and early 1970s via COINTELPRO and other blatant violations of constitutional rights, we were written off as radical hippies who were a threat to something (certainly not democracy, but "something." Like perhaps an illegal war and an out-of-control secret government?)

    Now that average citizens are facing similar tactics, they might find it interesting to study the COINTELPRO campaign of the FBI and other "law enforcement" officials against the anti-Vietnam War movement three decades ago.

    According to attorney Brian Glick in his book War at Home, the FBI used four main methods during COINTELPRO:

    1. Infiltration: Agents and informers did not merely spy on political activists. Their main purpose was to discredit and disrupt. Their very presence served to undermine trust and scare off potential supporters. The FBI and police exploited this fear to smear genuine activists as agents.

     

    2. Psychological Warfare From the Outside: The FBI and police used a myriad of other "dirty tricks" to undermine progressive movements. They planted false media stories and published bogus leaflets and other publications in the name of targeted groups. They forged correspondence, sent anonymous letters, and made anonymous telephone calls. They spread misinformation about meetings and events, set up pseudo movement groups run by government agents, and manipulated or strong-armed parents, employers, landlords, school officials and others to cause trouble for activists.

     

    3. Harassment Through the Legal System: The FBI and police abused the legal system to harass dissidents and make them appear to be criminals. Officers of the law gave perjured testimony and presented fabricated evidence as a pretext for false arrests and wrongful imprisonment. They discriminatorily enforced tax laws and other government regulations and used conspicuous surveillance, "investigative" interviews, and grand jury subpoenas in an effort to intimidate activists and silence their supporters.

     

    4. Extralegal Force and Violence: The FBI conspired with local police departments to threaten dissidents; to conduct illegal break-ins in order to search dissident homes; and to commit vandalism, assaults, beatings and assassinations. The object was to frighten, or eliminate, dissidents and disrupt their movements.

    I've published many first-hand accounts of the kleptocratic predation of the state of California. I invite you to read this carefully:

    Welcome to the Predatory State of California–Even If You Don't Live There (March 20, 2012)

    First the state steals the $1,343 and authorizes its parasitic predatory bag-"person" Wells Fargo Bank to steal another $100 for handling the state's theft.

    A week or two later the citizen is notified of the theft as a fait accompli. Now the onus is on the law-abiding citizen to attempt to reclaim his own money from a distant, all-powerful Kafkaesque state agency. How can this be legal in a nation supposedly operating under rule of law?

    Let's be very clear about what happens here in America on a daily basis:

    1. The state (or other agency of government) steals citizen's money without due process.

     

    2. Then, in a move akin to the executioner making the condemned buy his own death bullet, the state authorizes the "too big to fail" corporate bank which received billions in taxpayer bailouts to steal $100 from the citizen for the digital theft of his money by the state.

     

    3. If the citizen needed that money to pay rent, buy medication to stay alive, etc., tough luck, Buckwheat, the state of California has your money before they notify you of the purported tax liability and now you enter the Kafkaesque insanity of pleading for a "refund" of your own money from an agency designed to thwart transparency and the reclamation of your own money.

    So if you get evicted and are living in a cardboard box and pass away due to inability to buy your meds, hey, the State of California's political class and special interests could care less: they want your money and the rule of law doesn't apply to them.

    If you understand that a purported tax liability is one issue and due process is another far more important issue, then you understand that we now live in an totalitarian nation where "rule of law" is only invoked at the convenience of the political and financial Elites for propaganda purposes.

    The state of California has three basic methods of looting law-abiding citizens:

    1. The old "you didn't pay a $25 filing fee, the fine is now $499 which we took from your bank account." Never mind you have the cancelled check endorsed by the state, proving they received it and cashed it; the Board of Kafkaesque Authority claims "we didn't get the check" and loots your account for the $499 (true story.)

    2. "Fishing expeditions" where companies and citizens are dunned for taxes and fees they might owe, though there is no evidence they do in fact owe fees and taxes. I received many emails describing these fishing expeditions, for example, merely having a license is "evidence" that you must have unreported income.

    3. Enforce all sorts of dubious claims, most importantly:

    A. That anyone collecting a pension from work performed while residing in California is liable for California taxes on that pension, regardless of where they live;

    B. Any income resulting from something invented in California must be reported as income in California, regardless of where the income is derived from or where the inventor now lives.

    In other words, residency has no meaning. Any income remotely connected to California–for example, you had the idea while residing in the state–obligates you to pay California income tax on that idea in perpetuity.

    You know the dominant emotion that the government at every level generates in law-abiding, taxpaying citizens? Fear. And for good reason.

    Welcome to the United States of Orwell, Part 1: Our One Last Chance to Preserve the Bill of Rights (March 26, 2012)

    Welcome to the United States of Orwell, Part 2: Law-Abiding Taxpayers Are Treated as Criminals While the Real Criminals Go Free (March 27, 2012)

    "I received a letter last year that we owed the state of California's Franchise Tax Board $90,000 for taxes in the year 2008. We replied to the Franchise Tax board in a similar manner as RT stating that:

     

    — Did not reside in California in 2008

    — Did not file a State income tax return in California in 2008

    — Did not have any outstanding tax issues with California in 2008

    — Did no business in California in 2008

    — Owned no property in California in 2008

     

    The CA Franchise Tax board responded by putting a lien on us in the state – fortunately, our banks and assets have no business in CA or I am certain our accounts would have been robbed as well.

     

    After a great deal of uncertainty and angst, I found an accountant in CA who advised us that we needed to file a complete CA tax return for 2008 even though we did not owe any tax. We filed the return and received a response that we owed the state $625 to cover the State's collection fees. We paid the fee and within two weeks received a "refund" check for the $625.

     

    On reflection, we felt as if we had been "held up" by some powerful gangsters and if it had not been for an honest tax accountant we would have suffered much financial damage."

    Welcome to the United States of Orwell, Part 3: We had to Destroy Democracy in Order to Save It (March 28, 2012)

    Welcome to the United States of Orwell, Part 4: "Consumer Protection" Just Another Federal Reserve Power Grab (March 29, 2012)

    The Dodd-Frank bill, like Obamacare, is tyranny by complexity. Consider the Glass-Steagall Act, at 37 pages in length, and the 2,319-page monstrosity of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act.

    If you still doubt the government is the tool of elites, please read this:

    The Purchase of Our Republic (by Y. Falkson) (June 5, 2014)

    Centralization and sociopathology are two sides of one coin: the central state:

    Centralization and Sociopathology (May 21, 2013)

    At the lower levels of the kleptocracy, employees of the government enrich themselves by legalizing their own looting.

    Pay Our Pensions Or We'll Throw You in Jail: the Legalization of Looting (March 19, 2014)

    "Improving Public Safety" and Theft By Other Means (January 15, 2010)

    What happens to once-legitimate governments that devolve into totalitarian kleptocracies? They lose their legitimacy ("the Mandate of Heaven") and fall.

    Smith's Neofeudalism Principle #1: If the citizenry cannot replace a kleptocratic authoritarian government and/or limit the power of the financial Aristocracy at the ballot box, the nation is a democracy in name only.

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