FACT Sheet: Tax Haven Abuse by the Numbers

• $100 billion: The amount that the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations estimated in 2008 that the U.S. lost in tax revenue due to offshore tax abuse every year
1

• $1 trillion: the amount of unrepatriated foreign profits sitting offshore
2

• $810 billion: The average outflow of illicit money from developing countries per year between 2000-2008 as estimated by Global Financial Integrity
3

• 18,857: The number of registered businesses at one address in the Cayman Islands
4

• 217,000: The number of companies housed at 1209 Orange Street in Wilmington, Delaware
5

• 759: Number of offshore subsidiaries in tax havens for Citigroup, Bank of America, and Morgan Stanley combined
6

• 83: number of the 100 largest U.S. companies that use offshore tax havens - including the big banks taxpayers bailed out in 2008
7

• $57.2 billion – Amount of money Egypt lost to trade mispricing and other forms of commercial crime between 2000 and 2008
8

• $2: Daily earnings for at least one third of Egyptians
9

• 30%: Corporate share of the nation’s tax receipts in the mid 1950s
10

• 6.6%: Corporate share of the nation’s tax receipts in 2009
11

• 64%: Publicly traded U.S. parent companies incorporated in Delaware
12

• 51%: Publicly traded U.S. subsidiaries incorporated in Delaware
13

• 6.2%: Next highest percentage of subsidiaries incorporated in any other state
14


Citations
1 Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. TAX HAVEN BANKS AND U. S. TAX COMPLIANCE STAFF REPORT
http://levin.senate.gov/newsroom/supporting/2008/071708PSIReport.pdf
This $100 billion estimate is derived from studies conducted by a variety of tax experts. See, e.g., Joseph
Guttentag and Reuven Avi-Yonah, “Closing the International Tax Gap,” in Max B. Sawicky, ed., Bridging the Tax Gap: Addressing the Crisis in Federal Tax Administration (2006) (estimating offshore tax evasion by individuals at $40-$70 billion annually in lost U.S. tax revenues); Kimberly A. Clausing, “Multinational Firm Tax Avoidance and U.S. Government Revenue” (August 2007) (estimating corporate offshore transfer pricing abuses resulted in $60 billion in lost U.S. tax revenues in 2004); John Zdanowics, “Who’s watching our back door?” Business Accents magazine, Volume 1, No.1, Florida International University (Fall 2004) (estimating offshore corporate transfer pricing abuses resulted in $53 billion in lost U.S. tax revenues in 2001); “The Price of Offshore,” Tax Justice Network briefing paper (March 2005) (estimating that, worldwide, individuals have offshore assets totaling $11.5 trillion, resulting in $255 billion in annual lost tax revenues worldwide); “Governments and Multinational Corporations in the Race to the Bottom,” Tax Notes (2/27/06); “Data Show Dramatic Shift of Profits to Tax Havens,” Tax Notes (9/13/04). See also series of 2007 articles authored by Martin Sullivan in Tax Notes (estimating over $1.5 trillion in hidden assets in four tax havens, Guernsey, Jersey, Isle of Man, and Switzerland, beneficially owned by nonresident individuals likely avoiding tax in their home jurisdictions), infra footnote 3.

2 Drucker, Jesse. “Tax Holiday for $1 Trillion May Lure Back Profits Without Growth.” Bloomberg. 17 March 2011 http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-17/tax-holiday-for-1-trillion-may-lure-profits-without-spurring-u-s-growth.html

3 Kar, Dev and Curcio, Karly. Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries 2000-2009. Jan 2011

4 Government Accountability Office, International Taxation: Large U.S. Corporations and Federal Contractors with Subsidiaries In Jurisdictions Listed as Tax Havens or Financial Secrecy Jurisdictions, Dec 2008. http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d08778high.pdf

5 Shaxson, Nicholas. (2011) Treasure Islands: Tax Havens and The Men Who Stole the World (p.143). London: The Bodley Head

6 Government Accountability Office, International Taxation: Large U.S. Corporations and Federal Contractors with Subsidiaries In Jurisdictions Listed as Tax Havens or Financial Secrecy Jurisdictions, Dec 2008. http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d08778high.pdf

7 Id.

8 Kar, Dev and Curcio, Karly. Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries
2000-2009. Jan 2011

9 Bronner, Eithan. “Mubarak Denies Corruption and Defends His Legacy.” New York Times. 11 April 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/11/world/middleeast/11egypt.html?scp=1&sq=Egypt%20%242&st=cse

10 Kocieniewski, David. “G.E.’s Strategies Let It Avoid Taxes Altogether.” New York Times. 24 March 2011 http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/25/business/economy/25tax.html?_r=3

11 Id.

12Dyreng, Scott, Lindsey, Bradley P. and Thornock, Jacob R., Exploring the Role Delaware Plays as a Domestic Tax Haven 28 April 2011 http://ssrn.com/abstract=1737937

13 Id.

14 Id.

http://fact.gfip.org/documents/FACT_Tax_Haven_Abuse_by_the_Numbers.pdf?utm_source=hootsuite&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=linktracking

How America Is Like 18th Century Europe: Our Imperialistic Attitude Has Led to Endless Wars

By William Astore, Tomdispatch.com
Posted on May 12, 2011, Printed on May 13, 2011

The killing of Osama bin Laden, “a testament to the greatness of our country” according to President Obama, should not be allowed to obscure a central reality of our post-9/11 world.  Our conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, and Libya remain instances of undeclared war, a fact that contributes to their remoteness from our American world.  They are remote geographically, but also remote from our day-to-day interests and, unless you are in the military or have a loved one who serves, remote from our collective consciousness (not to speak of our consciences).

And this remoteness is no accident.  Our wars and their impact are kept in remarkable isolation from what passes for public affairs in this country, leaving most Americans with little knowledge and even less say about whether they should be, and how they are, waged.

In this sense, our wars are eerily like those pursued by European monarchs in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: conflicts carried out by professional militaries and bands of mercenaries, largely at the whim of what we might now call a unitary executive, funded by deficit spending, for the purposes of protecting or extending the interests of a ruling elite.

Cynics might say it has always been thus in the United States.  After all, the War of 1812 was known to critics as “Mr. Madison’s War” and the Mexican-American War of the 1840s was “Mr. Polk’s War.”  The Spanish-American War of 1898 was a naked war of expansion vigorously denounced by American anti-imperialists.  Yet in those conflicts there was at least genuine national debate, as well as formal declarations of war by Congress.

Today’s ruling class in Washington no longer bothers to make a pretense of following the letter of our Constitution -- and they sidestep its spirit as well, invoking hollow claims of executive privilege or higher callings of humanitarian service (as in Libya) or of exporting democracy (as in Afghanistan).  But Libya is still torn by civil war, and Afghanistan has yet to morph into Oregon.

“Enlightened” War, Then and Now

History does not simply repeat itself, yet realities of power, privilege, and pride ensure certain continuities from the past.  Consider how today’s remote wars and the ways they reinforce existing power relations for a privileged and prideful elite echo a style of European warfare more than three centuries old.

Surveying the wreckage of the devastating Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648), fought feverishly across Germanic territories by most of Europe, monarchs like Louis XIV of France began to seek to fight “limited” wars.  These they considered more consistent with the spirit of a rational and “enlightened” age.  In their hands, such wars became the sport of kings, the real-life equivalents of elaborate chess matches in which foot soldiers drawn from the lower orders served as expendable pawns, while the second or lesser sons of the nobility, fulfilling their duty as officers, proved hardly less expendable knights, bishops, and rooks.

As much as possible, the monarch and his retinue tried to keep war-making and its disruptions at a distance from thriving economic and manufacturing concerns.  In many cases, in the centuries to follow, this would essentially mean exporting war to faraway, “barbaric” realms or colonies.  In the process, death and destruction were outsourced to places and peoples remote from European metropoles.

In fact, this was precisely what enraged our founders: that the colonies in America had become a never-ending battleground for French and British imperial ambitions from which the colonists themselves reaped the whirlwind of war while gaining few of its benefits.  A close reading of the Declaration of Independence, for instance, reveals a proto-republic’s contempt for wars fought at a king’s whim and guaranteed to reduce the colonists to so much cannon fodder.

Refusing to surrender the hard-fought right as British men to have a say in how they were taxed, how their families and lands were defended, and especially for what purposes they themselves fought and died, the founders forged a new nation.  Given this history, it’s not surprising that they granted to Congress, and not to the President, the power to declare and fund war.

In this way, a noble experiment was born, and it worked, however imperfectly, until the devastation of a new thirty years’ war in Europe (better known as World Wars I and II) propelled the United States to superpower status with all its accompanying ambitions stoked by existential fears, whether of yesterday’s godless communists or today’s god-crazed terrorists.

Inside the Washington Beltway: The New Court of Versailles

In the eighteenth century, France was the superpower of Europe with a military that dwarfed those of its neighbors.  And who dictated France’s decisions to go to war?  The answer: the king, his generals, and his courtiers at the Court of Versailles.  In the twenty-first-century, the U.S. celebrates its status as the world’s “sole superpower” with a military second to none.  And who dictates its decisions to go to war?  Considering the lessons of Iraq, Afghanistan, and now Libya, the answer is no less obvious: the president, his generals, and his courtiers within the vast edifice of Washington’s national security state.

France’s “enlightened” wars were fought by professional armies and mercenaries, directed by a unitary executive who did as he pleased, and endured by the lower orders who had no say (even though they provided the brawn and blood).  Similarly, our twenty-first century masters plunge us into their version of enlightened wars and play their version of global chess matches.

The analogy can be pushed further.  In pre-revolutionary France, the First and Second Estates (the clergy and the nobility) constituted less than 2% of the population but controlled nearly all of France’s wealth and power.  Their unholy alliance kept the Third Estate (everyone who wasn’t a churchman or a noble) under their collective thumb.

Now, consider the United States today.  Our equivalent to the First Estate would be the clergy of finance and banking (the religion of the almighty dollar).  Look for them in their houses of worship on Wall Street.  Our Second Estate equivalent would be the movers and shakers inside Washington’s Beltway.  Look for them in the White House, the Pentagon, Congress, and on K Street where the lobbyists for the First Estate tend to congregate.  The unholy alliance of these two estates leaves the American Third Estate -- you and me -- with the deck stacked against us.

When it comes to war, the American ruling class has relegated the members of its Third Estate alternately to the role of “foreign legionnaires” in overseas service, or silent spectators passively watching moves on the big board.  These, in turn, are continually interpreted for us by retired members of the Second Estate: generals and admirals in mufti, hired by the corporate media to provide color commentary on Washington’s wars.

Small wonder that today’s Beltway elite is as imperious and detached as yesterday’s Court of Louis XIV.  A colleague of mine recently endured a short audience with some members of our Second Estate near Dupont Circle in Washington.  In his words: “They were at once condescending and puzzled by ‘tea party types,’ as they referred to them, which was to say that they inadvertently admitted to being out of touch and were pretty okay with that.  ‘Look,’ I finally said, ‘you cannot continue to pick someone’s pocket while hectoring him about how stupid and uninformed he is and then be surprised that he gets angry.’”

Whether it be unwashed “tea party types,” “retarded” (according to ex-courtier Rahm Emanuel) progressives, or other members of a disgruntled American Third Estate, the Washington elites who wage war in our name simply couldn’t care less what we think, just as Louis XIV and his court couldn’t have cared less about their subjects’ desires.

Endless “limited” wars fought for the interests of the ruling class, massive deficit spending on those wars, a refusal to recognize (or even understand) the people’s growing disgruntlement, a “let them eat cake” mentality: all of this is familiar to a historian.  And like those old French masters of limited war, our new masters of war are hemorrhaging legitimacy.

The Crash and Burn of Old Regimes

In isolating the American Third Estate from war -- indeed, in disengaging it from any meaningful public debate about this nation’s perpetual war-making -- our rulers have conspired to advance their own interests.  Yet in deciding everything of importance out of view, they have unwisely eliminated any check on their folly.

Consider again the example of pre-revolutionary Versailles.  A top-heavy, remarkably dissolute, and openly parasitic bureaucracy plundered the commonweal of France in its pursuit of power and privilege.  Can we not say the same of Washington today?  In its kleptocratic tendency to enrich itself and its accountability-free deployment of military power globally, the American ruling class bears a certain resemblance to French kings and their courts which, in the end, drove their country to economic ruin and violent revolution.

Fed up with its prodigal and prideful rulers, France saw the tumbrels roll and the guillotine blades drop.  How many more undeclared “enlightened” wars, how many more trillions of dollars in war-driven debt, how many more dead and wounded will it take for the American people to reclaim their power over war?  Or are we content to remain deferential to our ruling class and court -- and to their less-than-liberty-loving overseas creditors -- until such a time as their prideful wars and prodigal trillion-dollar-plus “defense” budgets bring our great democratic experiment crashing down?

William J. Astore, a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF), now teaches at the Pennsylvania College of Technology. His books and articles focus primarily on military history and include Hindenburg: Icon of German Militarism (Potomac Press, 2005). He may be reached at wastore@pct.edu.

© 2011 Tomdispatch.com All rights reserved.

View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/150915/

Study: 44 million could lose Medicaid coverage under GOP plan

By Noam N. Levey, Washington Bureau

10:07 AM PDT, May 10, 2011

Reporting from Washington

House Republican plans to repeal the new healthcare law and to convert the Medicaid insurance program into a block grant to states could force as many 44 million poor and disabled Americans out of the program over the next decade, according to a new analysis by the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation.

Hardest hit would be states, many in the South and West, that have not built up their healthcare safety nets in recent years.

These states would have received a large influx of federal money in the healthcare law President Obama signed last year. In 2014, the law will make all Americans making less than 133% of the federal poverty level eligible for Medicaid.

The House GOP plan, authored by Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), would eliminate that expansion and also slash $750 billion in federal spending on Medicaid over the next decade. The plan was approved by the House last month, though it is not expected to pass the Democratic-controlled Senate.

The Medicaid program, which insures more 50 million poor and disabled people, is jointly funded by the federal government and by the states, each of which operates a slightly different program.

Because of these differences, the cuts to each state would vary widely, according to the analysis of Ryan's plan.

Florida, for example, could see a 44% cut in federal funding for its Medicaid program by 2021, the report concludes.

Other states projected to see major cutbacks in federal aid include Wyoming, Alaska, Colorado, Georgia, Oregon and Nevada.

Nationally, the Kaiser report estimates that federal assistance for Medicaid will drop 34%. Illinois, with a projected 32% cut, and California, with a 31% cut, are expected to suffer relatively less than some other states.

Least affected would be Washington, Vermont, Minnesota, the District of Columbia and Iowa.

Many states are already struggling to hold together their Medicaid programs while trying to balance budgets and deal with millions of new enrollees who signed up for the insurance program during the last recession.

Ryan has touted his budget plan as a way to preserve Medicaid by offering states more flexibility to wring savings from their programs. "States will no longer be shackled  by federally determined program requirements and enrollment criteria," he said of the block grants.

But many experts -- including the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office -- have concluded that House budget proposal would more likely simply result in major cutbacks.

"The repeal of the ACA combined with the adoption of the Medicaid block grant would add millions more to the  number of uninsured Americans and  compromise Medicaid's role as the health safety net in the next recession," said Diane Rowland, executive director of the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured.

The commission produced the report in conjunction with the Washington, D.C.,-based Urban Institute.

noam.levey@latimes.com

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-gop-medicare-analysis-20110510,0,2528525,print.story

Wis. lawmaker proposes new bargaining restrictions

Associated Press - May 11, 2011 2:35 PM ET

MADISON, Wis. (AP) - Local police and firefighters would no longer be exempted from key restrictions on collective bargaining under a proposed bill.

A bill introduced by Independent Rep. Bob Ziegelbauer of Manitowoc would eliminate collective bargaining rights for public safety employees on health care and pension contributions. The bill does not require employee contributions to health care and pension funds, but would allow municipalities to mandate them.

Ziegelbauer says the bill is an attempt to apply key parts of Gov. Scott Walker's controversial budget repair bill to police and firefighters without "blowing up" the entire collective bargaining process. Ziegelbauer voted for Walker's bill.

Walker's bill curtails collective bargaining rights for most public employees, but exempts police and firefighters. A judge has blocked the law from taking effect.

http://www.wbay.com/Global/story.asp?S=14626518

Comcast taps FCC Commissioner Meredith Attwell Baker for D.C. office

May 11, 2011 | 12:58 pm

Cable giant Comcast Corp. has hired Federal Communications Commissioner Meredith Attwell Baker as senior vice president of government affairs for its NBCUniversal unit.

Baker Baker, who will resign from the FCC, is the latest hire for Comcast, which has been beefing up its already formidible lobbying team since taking over NBCUniversal. Earlier this year, Comcast wooed National Cable & Telecommunications Assn. President Kyle McSlarrow away from the association to be president of Comcast/NBCUniversal Washington.

“Commissioner Baker is one of the nation’s leading authorities on communications policy and we’re thrilled she’s agreed to head the government relations operations for NBCUniversal," McSlarrow said in a statement.

A Republican who served as a commissioner for a little less than two years, Baker's hire so soon after voting in favor of Comcast's deal to acquire majority control of NBCUniversal from General Electric Co. raised eyebrows among some media watchdogs.

"This is just the latest -- though perhaps most blatant -- example of a so-called public servant cashing in at a company she is supposed to be regulating," said Craig Aaron, president and chief executive of Free Press, a nonprofit media reform organization.

Not everyone took such a hardline.

“Commissioner Baker has been a consummate public servant," said Media Access Project policy director Andrew Schwartzman. "While her viewpoints have often differed from ours, she has always been open-minded, conscientious and dedicated to acting in the public interest as she saw it.”

As for her move to Comcast, Schwartzman said in an email that he is "unhappy in a generic sense that the door revolves in Washington," but "this one is no different, and no worse, than what happens all the time."

It is not uncommon for government officials to end up working for companies that they used to regulate. Former FCC Chairman Michael Powell, for example, recently succeeded McSlarrow as head of the NCTA. Dick Wiley, an FCC chairman in the 1970s, went on to become one of the most powerful communications lawyers for the media and telecom industries in Washington, D.C. There will be some restrictions on Baker's lobbying activities with Comcast and her old FCC bosses and other administration officials.

Before her appointment to the FCC by President Obama, Baker was acting assistant secretary of Commerce for communications and information, and acting administrator of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration under President George W. Bush.

-- Joe Flint

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2011/05/comcast-taps-fcc-commissioner-meredith-attwell-baker-for-dc-office.html

House Republicans Shred Constitution With Backdoor Proposal of Permanent War

John Nichols | May 11, 2011

House Republicans like to talk -- and talk, and talk -- about their regard for the founders and the Constitution.

 
 
House Speaker John Boehner, Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, R-Tea Party, and their circle even attempted -- in unsettlingly bumbling manner [1] -- to read the document into the Congressional Record at the opening of the current Congress.
 
Now, however, with a backdoor plan to commit the United States to a course of permanent warmaking, they are affronting the most basic premises of a Constitution [2] that requires congressional declarations of all wars and direct and engaged oversight of military missions.
 
The House Republican leadership, working in conjunction with House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon, R-California, has included in the 2012 defense authorization bill language (borrowed from the sweeping Detainee Security Act) that would effectively declare a state of permanent war against unnamed and ill-defined foreign forces [3] "associated" with the Taliban and al Qaeda.
 
The means that, despite the killing of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan (which GOP leaders in the House have refused to officially recognize as a significant development), the Department of Defense will be authorized to maintain a permanent occupation of Afghanistan [4], a country bin Laden abandoned years ago, and a global war against what remains of bin Laden's fragmented operation.
 
Instead of an explicit declaration of war with Afghanistan or the ill-defined global conflict, the GOP leaders has slipped language into the spending bill that simply announced theU.S. is "engaged in an armed conflict with al Qaeda, the Taliban and associated forces" and that claims an old "Authorization for Use of Military Force necessarily includes the authority to address the continuing and evolving threat posed by these groups."
 
That's about a wide-ranging as it gets, and the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee argues that the language makes a mockery of the Constitutional requirement that Congress check and balance the executive branch [5] and the Department of Defense when it comes to questions of extending wars.
 
(The language included in the spending bill) would appear to grant the President near unfettered authority to initiate military action around the world without further congressional approval," argues Congressman John Conyers, D-Michigan. [6]"Such authority must not be ceded to the President without careful deliberation from Congress."
 
Conyers and 32 House Democrats have written [7] Armed Services Committee Chairman McKeon asking that he "immediately call hearings... so that the American people have an opportunity to consider the serious impacts that this legislation could have on our national security."
 
That's the right call.
 
Who says?
 
James Madison, the essential author of Constitution.
 
Madison observed in the founding years of the American experiment that: "Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manners and of morals engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
 
The Madisonian impulse is kept alive today not by House leaders who claim to revere the Constitution while adandoning its principles but by those members of Congress who object to permanent war for the same reasons that thewisest of the founders did.
 
Here is the Conyers letter: [7]
 

Dear Chairman McKeon:
 
We are writing concerning certain troubling provisions in H.R. 968, the Detainee Security Act of 2011, which we understand are likely to be considered as part of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) of the Fiscal Year of 2012. Whatever one thinks about the merits of the Detainee Security Act, it is a serious enough departure from current counterterrorism policy and practice to merit consideration apart from the NDAA. Accordingly, we request that you use your chairmanship in the House Armed Services Committee to immediately hold hearings so that the public can further consider the various provisions within the Detainee Security Act.
 
Among the many troubling aspects of the Detainee Security Act are provisions that expand the war against terrorist organizations on a global basis. The Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) of 2001 was widely thought to provide authorization for the war in Afghanistan to root out al Qaeda, the Taliban, and others responsible for the 9/11 attacks. That war has dragged on for almost ten years, and after the demise of Osama Bin Laden, as the United States prepares for withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Detainee Security Act purports to expand the "armed conflict" against the Taliban, al Qaeda, and "associated forces" without limit. By declaring a global war against nameless individuals, organizations, and nations "associated" with the Taliban and al Qaeda, as well as those playing a supporting role in their efforts, the Detainee Security Act would appear to grant the President near unfettered authority to initiate military action around the world without further congressional approval. Such authority must not be ceded to the President without careful deliberation from Congress.
 
The Detainee Security Act also unwisely requires that all terrorism suspects eligible for detention under the AUMF be held exclusively in military custody pending further disposition. The practical effect of this provision will be to undermine the ability of the FBI and local law enforcement to participate in counterterrorism operations, which could have serious negative impacts on national security. Moreover, in a recent hearing in the House Armed Services Committee, Department of Defense General Counsel Jeh Johnson noted that, rather than help clarify detention authority, the military custody provision in the Detainee Security Act would create serious litigation risk for the government.
 
The Detainee Security Act contains several additional troublesome provisions that relate to Guantanamo. The Detainee Security Act in effect requires that terrorism suspects be tried in military commissions, thereby cutting out Article III federal courts from conducting terrorism trials. This is unwise, as Article III federal courts have convicted over 400 individuals of terrorism-related offenses since 9/11. Military commissions, mired by legal problems and controversy, have convicted only six. The Detainee Security Act would also make permanent current transfer restrictions on Guantanamo detainees, further undermining the ability of the President to close the offshore detention facility. In our view, restricting the President in this way is unnecessary to promote a robust national security that keeps the American people safe.
 
Whatever one thinks of these various proposals in the Detainee Security Act, it is clear that they will have serious consequences and should be examined extensively. We therefore request that you use your chairmanship to immediately call hearings on Detainee Security Act so that the American people have an opportunity to consider the serious impacts that this legislation could have on our national security.
 
Sincerely,
 
Representatives John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.), John Dingell (D-Mich.), Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), Bob Filner (D-Calif.), Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.), Maurice Hinchey (D-NY), Michael Honda (D-Calif.), Jesse Jackson (D-Ill.), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas), Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), John Lewis (D-Ga.), Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), James McGovern (D-Mass.), George Miller (D-Calif.), Jim Moran (D-Va.), Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), Donald Payne (D-N.J.), David Price (D-N.C.), Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), Bobby Scott (D-Va.), Jackie Speier (D-Calif.), Fortney “Pete” Stark (D-Calif.), Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.) and David Wu (D-Ore.).
 

Source URL: http://www.thenation.com/blog/160594/house-republicans-shred-constitution-backdoor-proposal-permanent-war

The Assassination of Osama bin Laden Statement by the United National Antiwar Committee

The U.S. government has used the pretext of finding Osama bin Laden to justify their invasion and occupation of Afghanistan. Now that bin Laden is dead, they can no longer claim this motive. Our demand remains the same: Bring the troops home NOW!

The Obama Administration does not intend to end military operations. The war apparatus of weaponry, drones, bases, mercenaries, and reliance on highly secret special forces like JSOC (Joint Special Operations Command) to do its dirty work with no oversight by Congress or the public has increased along with an escalating war budget. Violence and war are the conflict resolution methods preferred by the U.S. leadership.

In pursuit of oil and domination, the U.S. so-called “War on Terror” has caused the deaths of tens of thousands Afghans, well over a million Iraqis, as well as the loss of 6,000 U.S. soldiers. To pay for this bloodshed and destruction, the U.S. has spent trillions of dollars to expand the war machine and benefit the rich that could have gone for jobs, education, health care and green energy alternatives. As poll after poll has demonstrated, the U.S. population has turned against these wars and wants the troops brought home.

President Obama is using the assassination of bin Laden to re-legitimize U.S. militarism and to build up popular support for U.S. military actions abroad and his own re-election at home. The country is put on high alert to create an atmosphere of heightened fear and anger, a tactic frequently used when Americans turn against government policies. Soon after President Obama announced the killing of bin Laden, hyper-patriotic flag waving demonstrations broke out on campuses, in front of the White House and even at baseball games.

The jingoistic atmosphere engendered by Obama’s extra-judicial assassination of bin Laden has put Muslim Americans in jeopardy. It has increased Islamophobia across America. After the announcement of bin Laden’s murder, racists defiled a mosque in Portland, Maine with the slogan “Osama today, Islam tomorrow.” In Oregon, a Muslim center had to cancel an event after receiving threats. Mosques across the country, fearful of attacks, have increased security. This is the ugly impact at home of the so-called “War on Terror” abroad. UNAC urges the entire antiwar movement to stand with our Muslim brothers and sisters against these racist attacks.

The administration will no doubt use the ‘successful’ mission to justify further secrecy, denying any kind of democratic oversight over U.S. foreign policy. It sets a precedent for saying the U.S. has the right to attack anyone that the administration designates an enemy at any place, any time and legitimizes secret renditions, torture and indefinite incarceration without trial. These increased Executive powers are included in current legislation and reauthorization of the USA PATRIOT Act and must be opposed.

Our democracy, civil rights, and civil liberties are threatened. They will argue that the need for secrecy makes it even more important to prosecute Bradley Manning, Julian Assange, and WikiLeaks for publicizing documents that expose the lies and criminal behavior of the government. On top of that, it will be used to further authorize FBI harassment and grand jury probes against antiwar and Palestine solidarity activists. All of these victims of the U.S. government are put in further jeopardy by the atmosphere created by the assassination of bin Laden. Eventually those fighting the massive cutbacks and attacks on unions will become the victims of this restriction of our civil liberties.

The extra-judicial assassination of bin Laden, like the NATO bombing of Libya, is clearly designed to remind the masses of workers and students rising up in the Middle East against U.S.-backed dictators that Washington is still boss. It is also an attempt to roll back the growing opposition to the occupation of Afghanistan by war-weary working people in the U.S. There is no possibility that this assassination will bring security, democracy, or peace in the Middle East or America.

We will not be intimidated. In spite of U.S. grandstanding and the wars without end, millions of people around the world are throwing off the yoke of years of repression and claiming their right to determine their own destiny. The Arab Spring shows that people will not allow fear and militarization to suppress the yearning for freedom. People across the U.S. are not fooled by government lies and have turned against the wars and occupations. The unions and their supporters in the thousands in Wisconsin stood up against the corporate-controlled state government to fight back against the attack on collective bargaining and the cut backs of social services. Their actions inspired many and others will follow.

This is the time to forge unity and to step up our opposition to U.S. wars and occupations. We must stand with those who are victimized and those who struggle for freedom and a better life. We need to build a movement independent of all political parties that mobilizes powerful mass actions to challenge reactionary government policies. We need to march and continue to march until we meet our goals of peace and justice.


Bring the Troops, War Contractors, Mercenaries
and War Dollars Home NOW!
U.S. Out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Libya NOW!
NO to Islamophobia!
Hands Off the Arab Spring!

*****************

United National Antiwar Committee
UNACpeace.org

5/6/11

Effort To Dismantle Federal Unemployment Insurance Program Launched in Congress

Posted by: Mitchell Hirsch
May 06, 2011

Less than five months after approving a reauthorization of federally-funded unemployment insurance benefits as part of an agreement that also extended the tax cuts for Americans with the highest incomes, leading members of Congress are looking to break that agreement and dismantle the unemployment benefits program while leaving the tax cuts for the wealthy in place.

A bill introduced yesterday in the House by Rep. Dave Camp (R-MI), Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, and in the Senate by Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Ranking Member of the Senate Finance Committee, would give states the ability to seize the federal funds allocated for unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless and use them for other purposes, including bailing out state government funds and substituting for employer unemployment taxes.

The measure would also allow states to reduce the number of weeks of federally-paid emergency and extended unemployment benefits, reduce the amounts paid or eliminate the benefits entirely.  One provision would allow a state to take the federal benefits funds and use them to finance its depleted unemployment trust fund rather than collect employer taxes, or to pay regular state benefits instead.

The bill is rather cynically titled the Jobs, Opportunity, Benefits and Services Act of 2011 (pdf)  – the “JOBS Act”.  They can call it whatever they want – it’s still just a vehicle to steal the guaranteed benefits from long-term unemployed job-seekers, those workers hurt the worst by the continuing unemployment crisis.  More than 4 million workers currently receive federal benefits through either the Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) or Extended Benefits (EB) programs.  And, as Congressional research has shown, the nation’s unemployment insurance system has kept more than 3 million Americans from falling into poverty.

Federal unemployment insurance benefits are only available to workers who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own and have not been able to find work after exhausting their eligible weeks of regular state benefits, which in most states includes up to 26 weeks.  These federal benefits continue to be an essential means of support for those seeking new work in a job market that is barely growing fast enough to keep up with population-related increases in the labor force.  And while the unemployment rate is back at 9 percent nationally, the average duration of unemployment for jobless workers is nearly 9 months.

But these facts and the struggles of millions of unemployed workers seem to hold little sway with some lawmakers, who appear bent on shutting down unemployment insurance programs at every level.  They couch this proposal in language reminiscent of the welfare reform debate of the 1990s -- with lots of references to “flexibility”.  In a statement announcing the bill, Rep. Camp says it’s “about giving States the flexibility to spend current funds better,” and Rep. Geoff Davis (R-KY), a co-sponsor, says the bill will give “States the flexibility to make better choices about how to spend Federal unemployment benefit dollars.”

But unemployment insurance is not welfare – it’s an insurance program that guarantees benefits to eligible workers to help them sustain themselves and their families while they search for new employment.  It is those guaranteed benefits that this proposal would allow states to take away from jobless workers and use for things like bailing out state trust funds or substituting for employer taxes.

Other members of the House Ways and Means Committee were quick to blast the measure.  Ranking Member Rep. Sander Levin (D-MI) and Human Resources Subcommittee Ranking Member Lloyd Doggett (D-TX) issued a statement saying the proposal “takes a hatchet” to the unemployment insurance program.  Rep. Levin said the bill’s supporters are “proposing to end this year’s guaranteed benefit for the long-term unemployed, just like they’ve proposed ending the guaranteed benefit for Medicare recipients.”

“This legislation takes money out of the pockets of the long-term unemployed and throws it to states, many of which have mismanaged their trust funds,” Levin said.

“This is a surprise assault on the jobless, which encourages the states to terminate assistance to 4 million long term unemployed Americans,” said Rep. Doggett.  “It represents only the latest attempt by Republicans to blame the unemployed for unemployment on the very day that ongoing unemployment claims had their largest weekly increase since last July.”

Unemployed workers are already facing attacks on benefits in a number of states.  Michigan and Missouri have recently cut their maximum state benefit weeks from 26 to 20.  Florida is close to enacting even harsher reductions in state benefits eligibility.  In addition, states including Tennessee, Wisconsin and North Carolina have already allowed federally-paid extended benefit programs to cease making payments.

It is true that many states now have insolvent unemployment insurance trust funds, and have taken on debt to the federal government by borrowing to pay state benefits.  And both the high numbers of jobless workers and the prolonged duration of the labor market downturn have contributed significantly to that insolvency.  But many of those states failed to adequately finance their trust funds during good economic times, and thus were not sufficiently prepared for the recession.  Some now look to use their current solvency issues to go after the very benefits that the unemployment insurance system is there to provide – as the newly-proposed “JOBS Act” would encourage them to do.

Attacking unemployment benefits will not restore solvency to unemployment trust funds, or solve the issues relating to state debts and employer taxes.  A bill introduced by Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL), Jack Reed (D-RI) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) – the Unemployment Insurance Solvency Act – would address those issues, allowing states to waive interest payments for two years, averting immediate tax increases for employers, and maintaining benefits for jobless workers.

Meanwhile, with the introduction of the benefit-robbing “JOBS Act” the assault on unemployed workers by some in Congress has achieved a shocking new low.  By seeking to break the agreement to continue federal unemployment benefits, allowing states to dismantle the federal program and steal unemployment benefits from jobless workers -- while maintaining the tax cuts for the wealthy -- some lawmakers are turning ‘trickle-down’ pseudo-economics into sado-economics.

Call your Representative and your Senators in Congress toll-free at 888-245-0215.  Tell them to oppose Rep. Camp’s and Sen. Hatch’s bill to dismantle the federal unemployment insurance program.  Tell them to oppose stealing benefits from unemployed workers.

http://unemployedworkers.org/sites/unemployedworkers/index.php/site/blog_entry/effort_to_dismantle_federal_unemployment_insurance_program_launched_in_cong

Video: "16 Corporations or We the People?"

With Bin Laden dead, can we have our rights back?

On Sunday, May 1, President Obama announced the death of Al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, the notorious terrorist who spearheaded the 9/11 attacks against the U.S. While the predominant reaction from around the world has been one of relief and joy, bin Laden’s death reminds us of just how big an impact the 9/11 attacks had on us and the way we perceive and treat each other.

While the U.S. was already grappling with the immigration issue, 9/11 triggered a major overhaul of legislation that imposed stringent restrictions on immigration and gave the government much greater power to infringe on the rights of citizens and visitors to this country. The U.S had essentially gone into lock-down mode domestically, and U.S. foreign policy became more aggressive. At the time of the attacks, Barack Obama was an local politician only known in Chicago, and largely unknown to the world. He wrote a short article for his local newspaper, the Hyde Park Herald, in which he reacted to the tragic events of that day and suggested a cautious approach to its repercussions. He stated-

The essence of this tragedy, it seems to me, derives from a fundamental absence of empathy on the part of the attackers: an inability to imagine, or connect with, the humanity and suffering of others. Such a failure of empathy, such numbness to the pain of a child or the desperation of a parent, is not innate; nor, history tells us, is it unique to a particular culture, religion, or ethnicity….

We will have to make sure, despite our rage, that any U.S. military action takes into account the lives of innocent civilians abroad. We will have to be unwavering in opposing bigotry or discrimination directed against neighbors and friends of Middle Eastern descent. Finally, we will have to devote far more attention to the monumental task of raising the hopes of embittered children across the globe—children not just in the Middle East, but also in Africa, Asia, Latin American, Eastern Europe, and within our own shores.

Obama’s emphasis on steering clear of blind rage and discrimination, as a way of blaming certain groups for the attacks, seems prophetic now. Over the last ten years, we have witnessed increasingly stringent immigration enforcement, and a steady dissolution of civil rights and attitudes towards immigrant communities, especially Muslim-Americans and South Asians. This view was echoed by Chris Hedges, a senior journalist and war correspondent who witnessed 9/11 and was plunged into its aftermath. In an address at a fundraising event on Sunday night as news of bin Laden’s death was creeping in, Hedges remembered-

When I was in New York, as some of you were, on 9/11, I was in Times Square when the second plane hit. I walked into The New York Times, I stuffed notebooks in my pocket and walked down the West Side Highway and was at Ground Zero four hours later. I was there when Building 7 collapsed. And I watched as a nation drank deep from that very dark elixir of American nationalism … the flip side of nationalism is always racism, it’s about self-exaltation and the denigration of the other.

The risks and backlash that both Obama and Hedges referenced have materialized over the last decade and placed the U.S. at a crucial crossroads where the decisions we take now will significantly impact the America of the future. In its fifth week, Breakthrough‘s human rights Facebook game America 2049 takes players to their mission in Phoenix, Arizona, which has been in someway the epicenter of the immigration debate.  In Phoenix, players confront heightened debates around severely restricted immigration policies. Players are also confronted with a scenario where ethnic celebrations and festivals have been outlawed for fear that “they promote dissent and unnecessarily emphasize differences between populations.” The game presents players with choices for how to address such a situation in the future, and by referencing historical artifacts, shows how our present could very well lead to the dytopic future that the game depicts. One example of this historical reference is a 1920s songbook – “O! Close the Gates.” (see photo) – that demonized immigrants in popular culture.

In Level 5 of America 2049, players also meet Cynthia Espinoza. Watch her testimonial about the need to preserve America’s multicultural heritage:

America 2049 addresses the rights of immigrants, including forced immigrant workers, in a country that has struggled to reach a rational solution to the “foreign threats” amplified by the attacks of 9/11. The attacks changed the immigration issue in America dramatically, sparking off a wave of new legislation or a tightening of existing ones. In an intriguing article, the Southern California Public Radio (SCPR) outlined five ways in which Osama bin Laden — and the 9/11 attacks he masterminded — altered the immigration landscape in the U.S. These include, perhaps most notoriously, the establishment of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which has been responsible for a growing number of deportations each year, as well as the now-canceled Secure Border Initiative network (SBInet) or the “virtual fence” that was planned for the entire stretch of US-Mexico border. The erosion of basic rights accelerated with the Patriot Act, which considerably expanded the government’s ability to conduct surveillance over Americans.

The calls for comprehensive immigration reform have intensified over the past few years, making it even more pressing to address the rights of immigrants who have no criminal records and are working hard to become part of American society. Another aspect of the immigration debate that is brought up in America 2049 is the degradation of immigrant worker rights and forced migration. While the tragedy of 9/11 caused the government to enforce stricter anti-immigrant legislation, one of the side effects has been the neglect of immigrant worker conditions. In America 2049, players discover an actual account by a Puerto Rican laborer at Camp Bragg, Rafael F. Marchan, who protested against his deplorable working conditions in the early 1900s. Unfortunately, such situations still exist today, as reported by the New York Times about a story of “500 Indian men hired by Signal International of Alabama for rebuilding after Hurricane Katrina were confined in squalid camps, illegally charged for lodging and food, and subject to discrimination and abuse.” The fact that such forced servitude of immigrant workers continues a hundred years on from the example in America 2049 proves that prompt action must be taken to restore basic human rights for everyone.

So while the world celebrates the end of a tyrant, we must remember that more than celebrating a death, we must take this opportunity to work towards lasting peace and respect for basic rights for everyone, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion or background. Osama bin Laden caused much havoc around the world and claimed countless innocent lives, but letting his actions be used as a reason for the dissolution of respect and rights for hard working, innocent people can simply not be justified. As a statement that circulated virally soon after bin Laden’s death was announced said- “If Osama Bin Laden is dead, can we have our rights back?” Ten years on, let’s make that our main goal.

http://restorefairness.org/2011/05/%E2%80%9Cwith-osama-bin-laden-dead-can-we-have-our-rights-back%E2%80%9D-%E2%80%93-how-the-effects-of-911-could-lead-to-america-2049/