Trump

[Benedictus]

19 hours ago, CatherineM said:

I suspect that someone important will run as an independent. An actor, a celebrity, pro athlete, maybe a former general or admiral or astronaut. Will be a moderate that people on the ends will hate, or someone with no real platform. 

Plus you have to pay to give up US citizenship. Although paying double tax smells of elderberries for those living overseas.

[Ash Wednesday]

1 hour ago, Benedictus said:

Plus you have to pay to give up US citizenship. Although paying double tax smells of elderberries for those living overseas.

As an expat -- I'm confused by this... 

[Archaeology cat]

9 hours ago, Ash Wednesday said:

As an expat -- I'm confused by this... 

If you make over a certain amount, you pay US income taxes plus the income tax in the country you live. Under that amount, you might have to report earnings but not pay taxes. I can't remember the cut-offs now. We didn't earn enough in the UK to have to opay double.

[Ash Wednesday]

38 minutes ago, Archaeology cat said:

If you make over a certain amount, you pay US income taxes plus the income tax in the country you live. Under that amount, you might have to report earnings but not pay taxes. I can't remember the cut-offs now. We didn't earn enough in the UK to have to opay double.

Yes, that's where I was confused, as the US and UK have a treaty where most peasants like myself don't have double taxation. But yeah I suppose if you're a notable person of wealth it would be different.

[Guest]

Mark Shea's reply to Catholic Votes "What Now" article................What's with all the "What now?" analysis.  The answer is obvious: work to defeat him.  Make sure that he and his base of racist, misogynous, fascist dolts are ground into the dirt and become a permanent spent force in American public life.  Period.  Don't give me the "But abortion!" song and dance.  He is indistinguishable from Hillary on abortion.  But he is not indistinguishable on the dog's breakfast that are his other "ideas".  He is a visible-from-space worse candidate than Hillary, which is something only the Party of Stupid could achieve.  I have no problem with any Catholic who, in obedience to Ratzinger's 2004 letter, supports her, not in order to support her policies that contradict the faith, but to defeat his even worse policies.

 

I live in Violet Blue Washington and will be voting for Joe Schriner as my protest vote.  But if I were in a contested state, I'd vote for Hillary to deny him the palm.  Don't give me a load of hogwash about that being a sin.  As Cdl. Ratzinger says:

 

"A Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil, and so unworthy to present himself for Holy Communion, if he were to deliberately vote for a candidate precisely because of the candidate’s permissive stand on abortion and/or euthanasia. When a Catholic does not share a candidate’s stand in favour of abortion and/or euthanasia, but votes for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons."

[KnightofChrist]

Mark Shea always judging people and getting away with it.

[PhuturePriest]

3 hours ago, KnightofChrist said:

Mark Shea always judging people and getting away with it.

Is that a judgment on Mark Shea?

[KnightofChrist]

14 minutes ago, PhuturePriest said:

Is that a judgment on Mark Shea?

I don't think so but I know I didn't call him or his supporters racist, misogynous, fascist dolts. I don't have superhuman powers to know that.

[PhuturePriest]

Just now, KnightofChrist said:

I don't think so but I know I didn't call him or his supporters racist, misogynous, fascist dolts. I don't have superhuman powers to know that.

Well, it is a definable judgment. But I was mostly just joking because of the ironic sense of the statement.

I don't think everyone who votes for Trump is any of those things, though some demonstrably are. I would certainly argue his rhetoric conduces those things, and I agree with Shea's many criticisms of Trump, but there are some reasonable Trump supporters who support him for various reasons unrelated to those unfortunate aspects of him (such as concern for the economy and a trust in him for his successful persona in business.)

Anyway, I don't always agree with Mark Shea and how he sometimes makes blanket statements like that. But I'm afraid you in turn made a blanket statement against him saying he's "always judging people and getting away with it." You could argue that was hyperbole, but Mark could say the same about his statement.

[Benedictus]

9 hours ago, Archaeology cat said:

If you make over a certain amount, you pay US income taxes plus the income tax in the country you live. Under that amount, you might have to report earnings but not pay taxes. I can't remember the cut-offs now. We didn't earn enough in the UK to have to opay double.

I also had to declare all foreign bank accounts, not sure if it's automatic or if there's a threshold.

I found the whole thing complicated, esp in terms of how it worked out in relation to property and rental income, trust funds, shared non US liability and interests in various countries.

I got an account and tax specialist to sort this all out This was costing me at least a $1000 a year, simply to work on this for the IRS and be compliant without disadvantaging myself in the process. 

Not too long ago it was reported overseas peeps have been increasingly renouncing US citizenship because it get's a headache sorting this all out. I assumed this was because those on lower incomes would find it difficult to navigate and comply. But maybe it's richer people making a calculated decision after all.

 

[KnightofChrist]

"Always" and "racist, misogynous, fascist dolts" are in no way equal. And I'm sorry but I've read his blog many times and many times I've seen him make very similar and nasty judgements of people. I've never understood why he seems to get a pass yet someone like Voris does not. 

[CatherineM]

My income is partially US and partially Canadian. The Canadian government charges tax on my US income but let's me take 15% off of it. So I pay double tax on 85%. 

[Guest]

Jason Hall summarizes why I have been shouting myself hoarse about the menace posed by "conservative" Catholicism's self-imposed bondage to Movement Conservatism: 

 

"The marriage of the pro-life movement to the Republican Party and subsequent betrayal of the movement by the party have done very little to lessen the movement's loyalty to the party but have done a great deal to lessen the movement's loyalty to, you know, life."

 

And, I might add, it has taught a large portion of conservative Catholics to treat the GOP as the true Magisterium, to regard the Holy Father as a threat to the "faith" (meaning the dogmas of the GOP), and to regard the Church as eternally on probation and in danger of judgment by their inner inquisitors whenever the Church does not measure up to GOP standards of approval for violence and grinding the faces of the poor.  The result has been a political subculture that *says* its core non-negotiables are human life and family, but which spends most of its real energy on Mammon, the death penalty, beating up the poor, and xenophobia.  The spectacle of Priests for Life devoting its energies to backing Donald Freaking Trump as some kind of prolife hero just drives the final nail in the coffin.

 

We need a new prolife movement.  One that is fully devoted to the protection of human life from conception to natural death and not to the defense of GOP Culture of Death priorities while using the unborn as human shields for that. -  Mark Shea

[Maggyie]

I'm as anti Trump as they come, but Mark Shea is the worst. Truly. The worst. 

[CatherineM]

He's right about conception to natural death.