Posts tagged United States
A Smattering of Random
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On Todd Akin
Every single one of these quotes is concerned with “legitimizing” rape. Sorry, rape-rape. Because if it’s not a ‘legitimate’ (or ‘true,’ or traumatic enough) rape, then the woman was clearly asking for it in some way. She wanted it, otherwise she wouldn’t be pregnant.
This is rape apologia. This is rape culture. This is a way to blame the victim. This is also a way to take away the victim’s bodily autonomy, again, by denying her access to abortion, because the anti-choice lobbyists have managed to convince most of us that abortion is controversial, but rape/incest is the constant ethical thorn in their side.
The anti-abortion movement is one predicated upon the punishment and shaming of women for being sexual beings. Had sex and got pregnant? Bear the consequences of your actions! Take responsibility. Because children are ‘consequences’ and somehow, abortion isn’t taking responsibility. It’s all well and good to throw these words at a woman who had sex and got pregnant. It’s her fault, after all. But those arguments don’t hold water when it’s rape, so you’re stuck in a moral quandary where some abortion slips through the cracks.
Ugh, this guy. And pretty much everyone around him, with their faux-outrage over something they actually support and believe.
What do you mean it’s 2012? All evidence points to the contrary.
FATCA
The Attack on Accidental Americans
The IRS is making a worldwide push to squeeze money from Americans living abroad and from anyone who holds dual citizenship, whether they know it or not. It doesn’t matter if the “duals”want US status, have never set foot on US soil, or never conducted business with an American. It doesn’t matter if those targeted owe a single cent to the IRS. Unlike almost every other nation in the world, the United States requires citizens living abroad to file tax forms on the money they do not owe as well as to report foreign bank accounts or holdings such as stocks or RSSPs. The possible penalty for not reporting is $10,000 per “disclosed asset” per year.
Why Obama’s FATCA Law Is A Threat To Business Growth
Americans living overseas are one of the groups that will be severely penalized. Simply stated, foreign financial institutions are treating U.S. citizens like lepers because they don’t want to deal with the IRS and be deputy enforcers of terrible American law. Here are comments from some of Americans living in other nations (all of whom wish to remain anonymous because they fear being targeted by a thuggish IRS).
- From an American with a spouse working in Germany – “…when he went to create an account, he discovered that the bond fund could not be sold to US citizens.”
- From a non-profit group operating in Europe – “…we received notification from [bank redacted] that they were terminating our account.”
- From an American working in Switzerland – “I’m in the process of having my…accounts with [bank redacted] forced closed, except for the mortgage. I’ve been unable to open an account with any other Swiss bank.”
- From an American living in Belgium – “…my portfolio of investments held at their bank was blocked. …He advised me that as of that date, I could no longer trade, but could only hold, sell or transfer my portfolio. I was banned from trading in either US stocks or all others.”
Something everyone needs to be aware of.
Lynching Remixed: The Execution of Troy Davis
”In their courageous act of petitioning the state to not avenge the killing of their beloved family member by taking another life, the Anderson family powerfully demonstrates the ways historically and currently that the death penalty has been/is used to punish Black men, ostensibly for being a threat to white women, men, and children. In addition to their moral conviction against the death penalty, they have a political conviction against it, namely that if it is not applied fairly, then it shouldn’t be applied at all. Even if, by chance, you morally believe in the death penalty, you can still be politically opposed to its use. Their self-sacrificial act, in the face of overwhelming evidence of Daryl Dedmon’s guilt, should challenge us all to think more critically about the death penalty, about racism, about policing, about state coercion and violence–in short, about what we really mean when we say “justice.” “
This is not what justice looks like.
