Let us say that you own and run a highly successful (and dearly valuable to you) business. Your children, and even grandchildren are taking some interest in it too.
1. Would you be comfortable being bought out (giving up ownership and control) largely in return for an uncollateralized note? And in particular, an uncollateralized note from the purchaser, Donald Trump, or any business where he has full control? Check the box:
1.
A, YES:_____
B, NO:______
2. Would you be comfortable giving up virtual total control of your company for a 4 year period to Donald Trump, or any business where he has full control? Check the Box:
2.
A, Yes:________
B, No: ________
2. Can you please email us your vote, simply cut and paste to your email with your answers.
Can you also pass this survey to any Trump voters you know. We will report out the results of this survey. Our email is [email protected]
One of the Trump “storm troopers” actually broke into Trump’s dostors’ office and took Trump’s medical records! If you recall, Trump did not allow the release of his medical records (like his tax returns), as presidential candidates typically do. Instead, we got a bizarre letter from his doctor (Bornstein) where the doctor stated “unequivocally”, that Donald Trump “will be the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency”. Now we learn that this statement was actually dictated by Trump. This whole sad episode is worth a read.
But it is not funny. Clearly Trump lied, and “covered up” these most important credentials, that is credentials that would have revealed his physical and/or his mental fitness to be president. Would you want to hire anyone, once it was revealed that they lied and covered up critical facts about themselves that would impact their ability to perform the tasks that were required?
What could be simpler. Simply watch fox network shows from time to time and note the advertisers. Don’t buy their products or services and tell everyone you know about your action. For example, I used Expedia to book hotel and plane reservation, no longer now. There are plenty of other choices.
Consider this, why would an advertiser pay money to advertise on a show when the ad itself will delete customers? Radio and tv advertising is expensive and only moderately successful anyway. If it served to actually repel more customers than it attracted, an advertisers’ response would come very quickly indeed. The Fox show followers, prospective targets of an advertisement, are only some fraction of an advertisers’ current customer base. If all others who object to where Trump and his cohorts are taking our country, and who coincidentally are in the advertisers customers base, and the advertiser risked losing any/all of that group, things will change very quickly.
Follow the dollars and you will be amazed how quickly things can change.
3/29/18
Our friends tell us that we are preaching to the choir. And we can’t help agreeing with them SO LET’S FIGHT BACK! How? We always say follow the money. It seems that various Fox talk shows love Trump and have given him and his enablers a generous pass for behavior and policies that would have led any other president to be impeached by now. It’s past time!
So we started a list of advertisers, first, on Fox’s Lou Dobbs show. We intend to avoid doing business with all of them. But before that we will send them each a note.
Our first note sounded like this: “We are customers of yours, but now question our relationship, as you advertise on various Fox programs that promulgate, excuse, distort and rationalize Trump’s errant and damaging policies. We need to defend ourselves, our children and grandchildren from the damage this administration is doing to the country that we love. We have decided to no longer do business with entities that advertise on these poisonous shows. We did love your company, but feel this is the best way to have some impact, small though it may be”.
And here is the list so far. If you can help, email us additions as they occur. And please let us know about any responses to your email. Email us at: [email protected]
Expedia, Phillips Colon Health, PCMatic.com, PC Medic, Judicial Watch, Men’s Warehouse, Claritin D, Capital One Bank, Joseph A Bank, Nissan, Nissan, Alpha Romeo, TIAA, Quicken Loans, One A Day vitamins, Uline.
We are sure that the various Fox programs, such as Hanity, have another list of regular advertisers. We need some volunteers to monitor these shows too. It is past time to boycott all of them. Please help by adding to the list, which you can send us as you discover them, and we will add it to our published list. Maybe you can send a copy of our script above, or one other of your liking to these companies to help support the cause. Thank you, and the generations to come will thank you too.
The most troubling detail for all of us about this ….. we will get to that shortly…
The payoff of Stormy by Trumps’ attorney to cover up for Trump, was likely an election law violation. Further, it is hard not to see Trump colluding with his attorney on the payoff. Lawyers are unlikely to layout that kind of money absent getting reimbursement from somewhere. But will the sycophants and Trump supporters really care about that? That is “ordinary” business for Trump. So what?
No, the really shocking thing that should keep all Americans (and his sycophants) awake at night is a thousand times worse.
It is Trump’s willingness to take such a risk with a porn star (according to the person who would know, Stormy herself). In an age of AIDS, Trump didn’t even take the precaution of wearing a condom!
Betting that Stormy (or he himself) didn’t have AIDS is one unnecessary and stupid enough bet, either putting himself or her (and Melania too) at great risk. But isn’t that the kind of bets he is making for all of us?
America is now tied to him and his awful judgement while he leads us on a path with a palpable risk of destruction.
P.S. Now Trump and enablers are saying that Stormy’s claims are not “accurate”
I guess that means they are just mostly true, if not precisely true, right?
(Webster definition of “accurate”: exactly true, precise in all details.)
Feb. 17: It’s not just the ease of getting killing machine weapons, but the mental conditions that lend a tendency to wish to use them, specifically depression treated by SSRI drugs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors), like Prozac et al. To be successful, drugs like these can make many who take them feel powerful, emboldened, angry, impatient, in many ways, the opposite of depressed. So in some adverse reactions, there is suicide (which is rage against oneself) and violence against others, who may have been perceived as the causes of one’s own depression, which then turns into anger, rage, and revenge.
The gun industry and the pharmaceutical industry are big money makers and big political contributors. So expect not much intent to get to the bottom of this societal scourge. As usual, follow the money.
What if Mueller’s investigation fails to lead to Trumps’ impeachment? Or if the investigation is somehow ended by firing Mueller?
Many more public demonstrations are extremely likely in either case. Hopefully they will be peaceful, but surely they will be disruptive. Thousands of people in the street, by their mere presence, will inadvertently be blocking traffic and workplace entrances. How will the Trump administration respond?
We believe that the administration is preparing for just such an eventuality. One example is the expansion of the private prison system.
Let’s be honest with each other. This is the president who equivocated ligitimate protestors with Neo-Nazis, when referring to an incident where an innocent woman was run down and killed and 19 others injured by a neo-nazi during a lawful protest. Trump said that there “was blame on both sides.” Joe Biden recently remarked, this was the telling moment for him. Surely many others too. This Trump comment will go down in history as one of the greatest presidential blunders of all time. But we should be glad he couldn’t keep it to himself, as it truly revealed Trump for what he was.
This is what we are dealing with now. There are not enough prisons presently to house or threaten all the potential protestors, and the presidents’ collaborators, like Jeff Sessions, know this, and thus they may be preparing. This needs to be tracked carefully.
12/19/17: The tax bill passed, now what? The republicans are set to celebrate a longed for victory. But how should we measure success? do we just check it off a list today, or do we wait to measure what today’s action causes? The bulk of economists that we have been following warn that the tax cuts, mainly focused on large corporations and the well to do, will lead to massive deficits.
The Republicans argue that the tax cuts will pay for themselves by creating more jobs and higher wages, while leading to higher tax collections. And they may be right. But what if they aren’t? What if the economists are right? Can we safely assume that no one knows for sure that these tax cuts will be successful at stimulating the economy, creating more jobs, and if the “trickle down” effect will create more wealth for everyone. What makes the administration appointees smarter than the mainstream of professional economists?
Using some logic, in a case like this, no one knowing for sure what the future holds, maybe being a 50/50 coin toss. logicians would correctly argue to weigh the outcomes if the economists are right and the Republicans are wrong and vice versa, since no one has sufficient certainty of outcomes.
So knowing what we do know already, that the tax bill largely rewards the wealthiest folks, gives a pittance to the middle class, and actually takes away from those most in need (the Republicans are already talking about cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security), (The cuts mentioned will be the bow to the hardline deficit hawks, without which the bill would not have passed). and absent the hoped for stimulus, will create unfathomable deficits. (A recent well researched article in the Atlantic reports that, in 2018, “the 670,000 households earning more than $1,000,000 a year will collectively benefit more from this bill than the 113,000,000 families earning less than $75,000”).
So let’s give the Republicans plenty of room. Say there is only a 25% (and not 50%) chance that the tax cuts fail to create the offsetting stimulus, dramatically ballooning the deficit. Surely rational folks would agree that there is at least some risk that the stimulus calculous is wrong, and if so, we all need to look at the outcome of a miscalculation. In short, let’s say the Republicans are wrong.
The government will either have to borrow money, much more money, or print money, to pay for all the things that Trump and the Republicans want to do (that is, build the wall, reinforce the military, rebuild the infrastructure, etc.) . Let alone the things we are already doing. All while insisting that their wealthy constituents pay less for them.
Well Trump has a bad history of defaulting on debt, even using the bankruptcy code to bail himself out. So if they miscalculate, the harm to our lenders will be enormous. Interest rates, even short of an actual default, will surely perk up, while bond buyers wait for better rates before committing more funds, like a tide going out. At the very least, the interest on our ballooning deficit will overwhelm our economy. Its pretty close to doing that already.
This means that the government will have no choice but to accelerate inflating our currency, that is, simply running the printing presses 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, no end. It’s easy to print money. And what’s scary about that is that inflation tends to benefit real estate, Trumps’ primary holding, making his mortgages easier to pay off, while increasing rent, hotel rates, and commercial property values. Trump surely knew this, if little else. And if he didn’t, it probably was explained to him by one of his collaborators.
We know a bit from studying history what inflation and hyper-inflation was like. Not fun at all if retirees have to use a month of savings to buy a day’s worth of groceries.. Ditto for all folks on a fixed income. Even if the risk is only 25%, is it worth taking? The problem is that this is a win/win risk for Trump.
The frustrating thing is that all the rest of us are thrust into taking that risk by a minority party that does not have the interest of most of its’ citizens in mind. It is a group that generally would actually either benefit from hyper-inflation or not be harmed by it.
And what if the Republicans are right? That the tax bill will dramatically stimulate the economy producing new jobs. Wait, aren’t we about at full employment already?
How much real benefit will be created? Well we already know that many of our citizens will be hurt by this tax bill.. Maybe the tax bill is going to be like “good medicine”, but maybe too, there is that 25% chance that it will kill us. Most people are not that sick to want to take that chance.
It is almost incredible that this new tax plan so transparently benefits Trump and his cohorts. Has he no shame?
Many of his largest donors, such as Carl Icahn, (along with Trump and his kids) have business tax structures that will be uniquely benefited by this tax proposal. Simply by having what are called “pass through” entities, they will qualify for this new 25% rate, which is incidentally a marginal bracket about the same as an average wage earner. Even if the pass-through income is in the millions (which it may well be in Trumps’ own case). And, of course, the average wage-salary earner will not be able to use this tax structure. However, it is simple to restructure business entities to qualify as pass through entities. If you are working for a boss, not so easy.
We wouldn’t be surprised if many high earning executives opt to become independent contractors, attempting to set themselves up as “pass through entities” in order to game the tax system.
Trump tried hard to get rid of the alternative minimum tax (“AMT”). This tax was designed to snare those avoiding income taxes by claiming outsize tax deductions, such as depreciation on real estate and interest on real estate loans. This perfectly describes Trump’s portfolio. The AMT survived in the final passage, but in a form far less onerous to the folks likely to be affected by it. Although Trump wails against the AMT, it was the most effective tool developed to prevent the exploitation of loopholes in the tax law.
Let us clarify that feature. Say you purchase an income producing building, such as a hotel, for 35 million dollars. You do it with borrowed money. Maybe you put up only 5 million dollars. You get to depreciate the building by over 1 million dollars a year ((based on its’ total value, not what you have ‘at risk” (a relatively small sum)).and you are able to take the “loss” of this $1,000,000 on your tax return, even as the property goes up in value.. You also get to deduct all the interest on the 30 million dollar loan used to buy the property. That is a couple of a million dollars right there. So even if the building generated a million dollars of net profit, you would get to pay no income taxes on that money. And you would get to shelter other, totally unrelated, income from taxes too. Basically, by having sufficient real estate investments, you could have arranged to pay zero income taxes on millions of dollars of income, but for the AMT, which did require some tax payment, even if smaller. (No wonder why Trump wouldn’t release his tax returns!) The AMT still stands, though effectively weakened, as a modest defense against those who seek to exploit our tax code, after the recent passage of the new law.
Trump and his cohorts can still get rid of some of their real estate, exchanging it, like exchanging an apartment complex for a hotel, for example? No problem, just use tax code Section 1031, and voila, you get yourself an instant upgrade without paying a penny of capital gains tax. And again, under the Trump proposal, when you pass away, your beneficiaries can sell it off paying not a penny of capital gain taxes either, after having paid a far reduced estate tax.
Until the introduction of the AMT, many multi-millionaire real estate investors like Trump (and mine and oil drilling and oil well investors too) were paying virtually nothing in income taxes. The alternative minimum tax was introduced to prevent folks like Trump from paying close to nothing, in income taxes. Of course Trump is on record for hating this tax and of course he wanted to get rid of it entirely, as the AMT has put a big monkey wrench in his personal tax situation. (It is really easy to see why so many in the oil and gas industry was supporting Trump’s tax law, ditto the commercial real estate industry.
So, if you are president, why not help yourself to all the personal benefits that you can? So the original proposal did end the AMT. We are curious why the Republicans didn’t go along with Trumps’ original desire, and the initial cut of the tax law, that completely ended the AMT? We can only imagine that they are worried about the next election cycle, as the truth of this tax law seeps down to the “masses,” and the inevitable recognition slowly occurs, that the Trump base was deluded in believing that this tax law was for their benefit.
Another negative feature aimed directly at the “middle class” is the $750,000 loan limit for residential mortgage interest deductibility. . In so many markets, a reasonable home for an upwardly mobile family of five or six, costs more than $750,000. To rich folks, coming up with the cash to keep their mortgages (if they need one at all) to $750,000 is no problem. To upper middle class folks, it can be a hardship. And please note how tax deductible interest on commercial mortgages, the kind Trump has plenty of, has not been limited at all.
Ending the “death tax” (estate tax) is an incredulous feature of the original Trump proposal. This would not have helped anyone not in the $5+ million dollar, net worth, if single, and $10+ million, net worth, if married, categories. And of course it would have added to the deficit. The Trump argument was that it will stimulate the economy and create jobs. And one can at least see how the funeral business will be benefited because multimillionaire families can opt for more lavish funerals knowing that they don’t need to pay a “death tax”.
In fact, the law did pass, but with a modification. There will still be an estate tax, but it will effect far fewer rich people than the old one. it doubles the exempted amounts to $10 million if single and $20 million if married.
What is not clear is how gifts will be taxed. Now, a couple can give away over 10 million dollars without paying any gift tax. If this new arrangement ends the gift tax entirely (which has always been linked to the estate tax) than any talk in a future administration of re-instituting gift or estate taxes, may stimulate massivegifting ahead of any reversion back toward prior tax law.
Merely by setting up a special type of trust, and tax free transferring (gifting) real estate, or other, assets, to it, one could easily shield multi-billion dollar fortunes from any future re-institution of an estate tax. These type of trusts could be widely used, because they can be structured to be flexible enough to permit re-investments, like purchasing new real estate, private homes, luxury cars, yachts, jet planes, condos, or anything else that could be used by the taxpayer. All assisted by IRS Section 1031. And the cash flow from these trusts can be legally distributed, tax free, due to the depreciation tax benefits, to the beneficiaries, which would include Donald Trump and his family. The taxpayer wouldn’t have to “own” the asset to get all the benefits of ownership. By the way, Trump claimed to be an expert on using the tax code to his advantage, so he surely knows this stuff, even if he doesn’t know anything else.
Watch this carefully, as linking the reduction of estate taxes to the gift tax, will mean that a future government will never be able to retrieve any taxes from these $20 million and below estates, all while US deficits continue to grow. Wealthy folks will simply gift their assets to irrevocable trusts or family members (if they hadn’t already done so) at the mere talk of re-instituting any new estate-gift tax regime.
And finally, watch carefully if the step-up in basis rules, which now exist, will remain.
The last iterations of estate tax law, opted to modify the step-up rules In the original, years ago, attempt to end the estate tax in the Bush administration, an idea was instituted to “carry over” basis of property at death, which meant that the beneficiaries of heavily appreciated assets would pay a capital gain tax on gains from the decedent’s original cost, upon a later sale or liquidation of those inherited assets. Tax legislators realized that ending the estate tax while also permitting beneficiaries to not pay a tax on gains of long held property seemed an unfair advantage. Basically, a wealthy family would be further enriched by the death of its’ patriarch, because it could than finally liquidate the assets absent any income taxes. Income taxes that would have been due had assets been sold prior to death.
The concept, which was in effect for a few years, proved unworkable, as recalling basis of assets acquired long ago was very complex, not practical and sometimes impossible. . But that was the Republican compromise when they originally tried to end the “death tax” completely back than. It just smacked of too much unfairness, that is to allow the ultra rich to pay zero taxes on highly appreciated property, merely by holding on to it till death, when it than could be sold by their beneficiaries. The republicans did succeed in enormously raising the exemptions, so many fewer folks than had to worry about estate taxes. And they were able to retain the step up in basis rules. Now the exemptions will shelter over 10 million dollars per individual, and if married, over 20 million dollars.
As mentioned, the step up rules now allow beneficiaries to sell those highly appreciated inherited assets, like real estate, while not even incurring the capital gain tax.
Of course, Trump did not try to change these millionaire friendly step-up-in-basis rules. Not a word about this in the new bill. The continuance of the step-up in basis would mean that when Donald Trump dies, his beneficiaries, will pay estate taxes, but they would be able to sell off any or all of his real estate without paying a penny of capital gains taxes, even though the Donald got to deduct millions of dollars (interest and depreciation) by owning the real estate while he was alive.
Finally, we ask, how does this substantial reduction in the estate tax stimulate the economy? Will these very rich people hire more workers just because they wouldn’t eventually have to pay an estate tax or a capital gain tax? More likely they will spend less and save more, knowing that they will be passing down so much of those savings. In short, this substantial reduction in the estate tax will simply increase the deficit and/or increase middle class taxation.The money to run our country has to come from somewhere.
Surely the darkest part of the original tax proposal was the Trump wish to end the medical deduction. Now expenses that exceed 10% of income can be deducted. But nursing homes are expensive. Suppose your parent/parents wind up in one. Or maybe even you or your spouse. While the family stretches to afford it, probably in many cases depleting long saved funds in IRA’s, retirement accounts and other savings, that potential $100,000+ plus expense would not be deductible. This would increase long term care costs by over 30% in most cases. Many people will run out of money a lot sooner. Rich folks don’t have to worry much about this because long term care costs are a much smaller fraction of their income and net worth. We think that this was the most brutal aspect of the original Republican tax proposal, and truly mirrors Trump’s complete lack of empathy for other people. We note here that this provision was modified to continue the medical deduction. You can bet that a republican waive occurred when those constituents considered what was at stake for them if the medical deduction was to be eliminated. In fact, their protests probably led to a revision reinstituting the deduction, and even slightly enhancing it. You can absolutely bet that they were worried about the next election cycle.
We do hope that Trumps’ push to have modified the tax code is eventually accompanied by new demands to see his own tax returns. Undoubtedly his tax proposal will save his family (and cohorts) millions, while leaving the middle class holding the bag, their children inheriting unfathomable national debt..
Some simple calculations, while studying those tax returns, will reveal his personal percentage dollar savings that can be attributed to this tax proposal. His “working men” constituents would be livid as they begin to understand this. Maybe than those constituents will see how conned they were. The public needs to renew its’ demand for Trump to release his tax returns!
11/22/17- critical update:
A critical component of the about to be voted on Republican tax law is the repeal of the individual mandate in Obamacare. This virtually guarantees that Obamacare fails and that private health insurance rates will skyrocket. Consider that the law also ends the medical tax deduction (exceeding 10% of income), making these premiums not tax deductible. Just prior to Obamacare, a decent family health insurance plan cost upwards of $20;000 a year. At least these premiums have been tax deductible. Now, absent the mandate, the premiums will surely be higher. And not deductible. This will create real hardship for many Americans.
11/29/17: A shameless lie
Bos Trump actually said that this new tax law.will “cost him a fortune”. Of course this lie insults most experts who studied the available information. But now that the law passed, it is probably ultimately going to be true. Yes, he will save millions of dollars in taxes in the very short term. (We know already that Trump is not a long term thinker).
But when it comes to hard earned money, his ardent average supporters will soon be able to see they were conned. After all, they do confront paying taxes each year. And when it comes to real money (not fake ideology) people tend to sober up quickly. Many will come to see that they gained nothing for what they lost, or mainly they just lost. So, if by the word “fortune” one means credibility, trust, belief, honor, it will cost Trump all of that, and his collaborators will share in the cost too.
Let us caution our readers about one of Trump’s favorite negotiating tactics though. Trump starts negotiations with outrageous demands, which he knows rational counterparties would never agree on. Than he will yield on one or two of them, so the counterparty feels some sense of relief, and goes along with the rest. It’s an old tactic, but it often works.
This tactic was likely employed in originally proposing ending entirely the medical deduction, and the placing of the mortgage interest deduction at the $500,000 level.
The $10,000 deduction cap on property taxes and sales taxes that prevailed will still injure that upwardly mobile middle class group who, in the majority, did not vote Republican.
