Taking it Outside http://hocb.net/ ObWi meta till it hurts en-us Nucleus CMS v3.51 © Weblog http://backend.userland.com/rss http://hocb.net//nucleus/nucleus2.gif Taking it Outside http://hocb.net/ Tax Avoidance in India and the Corporate Form http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=536
Vodafone sued and eventually won at the Indian Supreme Court, which ruled that Indian law did not give the tax authorities jurisdiction to tax offshore stock purchases, even if such a purchase resulted in a change in control of a business located in India. The Indian gov't was displeased and thus proposed in its 2012 Finance Bill to reverse the result of the ruling retroactively, not only for Vodafone but for similar transactions dating all the way back to the 1960s. Needless to say the business community is up in arms, and quite rightly so on the retroactive point, it seems to me (and there are a great many other objectionable aspects of the bill). Here's a FT article on the subject, which also notes that the US Chamber of Commerce is asking Geithner to pressure India on the bill (strangely, Sec. Geithner does not return my calls when ask him to do something).

What interests me is that the business community is indignant because India seems to think it can tax the offshore share transfer and reminds me of some of the corporate form discussions at the mothership. The business community's basic position is that "I sold stock of non-Indian company X to non-Indian company Y, not the Indian business, so you can't tax me." But, no one pays a multi-billion dollar purchase price because they like the design of the stock certificates in Mauritius (or, these days, the corresponding electronic journal entries). They're buying the operating business in India, and India attempting to tax the offshore share transfer is some kind of horrible affront, as if they can't imagine life without the corporate form, or where it's only respected in certain instances.

In any event, I guess we'll see if the full court press by the international business community can get India to drop the bill, in conjunction with pressure on the United States Department of the Treasury (I would bet yes). ]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=536 Wed, 9 May 2012 03:47:21 +0900 Following Proper Procedures http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=534 this story about America's second most hated agency: the TSA (the IRS being first, of course).

It is one of several instances that I recall reading* about TSA horribleness where the response from the higher ups has been the same as it was in this case, "TSA has reviewed the incident and determined that our officers followed proper current screening procedures in conducting a modified pat-down on the [4-year-old] child." In a statement about "patting down" a 10 year old boy with a new insulin pump that was placed over his groin, the TSA stated that it "is reviewing the passenger's screening experience to determine whether procedures were appropriately applied."** (emphasis added in both cases)

Terrific! Even more interesting about the statement quoted by MSNBC in the article is that they only portion of the mother's story about the 4 year old they bothered to dispute (unless MSNBC didn't bother to print it, which is always possible) was "TSA officers did not suspect or suggest the child was carrying a firearm" as the mother claimed. Other claims made by the mother include that "a TSO began yelling at her daughter," and "They told her she had to come to them, alone, and spread her arms and legs," and " a TSO then said the entire airport would be shut down and flights would be canceled if Isabel was not restrained.Isabel was reportedly referred to as a 'high-security threat.'" and "When Isabel would not stop crying, the TSOs apparently called for backup. Eventually, Brademeyer says, they were asked to leave the airport."

But, all is well: "After a manager intervened, Isabel was cleared through security and Brademeyer made it to the family's departing flight." Hooray!

If you're patting down 4 year olds, maybe you ought to take a step back and think about WTF you're doing. I mean, I suppose this is further proof of Milgram's results, since the authoritah says it's okay, but if the "procedures" approved body cavity searches....?

*sorry, no additional links

**The statement also included this wonderful prose: "We regret the family's perception of the experience was not positive...." Usually people find, or at least perceive, strangers fondling their underage children quite positive, so who knows what's wrong this this family, eh? And, does anyone find the TSA process positive, ever?]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=534 Wed, 25 Apr 2012 05:39:11 +0900 Are we Frakking Nuts? http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=532 jaw dropper of an article. It begins: The CIA is seeking authority to expand its covert drone campaign in Yemen by launching strikes against terrorism suspects even when it does not know the identities of those who could be killed, U.S. officials said.

Uh, whut? Surely this is unprecedented, oh wait: The practice has been a core element of the CIA’s drone program in Pakistan for several years.

Awesome. And: In Pakistan, the CIA “killed most of their ‘list people’ when they didn’t know they were there,” said a former senior U.S. military official familiar with drone operations. The agency has cited the Pakistan experience to administration officials in arguing, perhaps counterintuitively, that it can be more effective against al-Qaeda’s Yemen affiliate if it doesn’t have to identify its targets before an attack.

In the CIA's defense, that certainly would cut out the red tape before one can shoot off a Hellfire missile. "Who are you shooting at?" "We don't know, but yeee-haaaaa!"

Creative use of passive voice bonus: Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, as the Yemen-based group is known, has not been linked to a major terrorist plot since its failed attempt to mail parcels packed with explosives to addresses in Chicago in 2010. The death of Awlaki in a CIA drone strike last year is thought to have diminished the group’s ability to mount follow-on attacks.

Is known by whom? Is thought to have diminished by whom? And yet: But U.S. counterterrorism officials said that Awlaki’s death did not extinguish the group’s determination to attack the United States.... So it's not only a war on terror but a war on determination?

Obama administration officials have refused to provide details of how militants are targeted or to disclose the identities of those killed.

So, apparently, this is a way to avoid such pesky questions.

We're so totally screwed.]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=532 Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:33:07 +0900 Our Glorious Adversarial System of Justice http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=529 long article along with other accompanying information (see here for just one additional sample) regarding shoddy work by FBI forensic analysts and the failure of the Justice Department to notify defendants/convicts and/or their attorneys of the issues, which may have, and has, led to exoneration of convicts based on subsequent DNA analysis. I was reading the main article this morning on my phone but the main WaPo site has much more information regarding specific cases, forensic evidence, and other things.

It is, quite frankly, astonishing, not so much for the actual issues reported by the Post but for what's not there, as the investigation they're reporting on seemed extremely narrow and focused, as if the Justice Department/FBI didn't want to look any closer for fear of what they might find (i.e., thousands, if not tens of thousands, of wrongly convicted defendants across the country due to flawed FBI forensic work). Even more damning, of the cases that they did investigate and discover flawed evidence, they failed to inform defendant and/or defense counsel of the issues. Also troubling, while FBI labs may have high standards for a match, it appears that when it came to actual testimony given by FBI personnel, they were basically allowed to say their conclusions were much more certain than the actual scientific evidence warranted, with little or no consequences.

The Post follows up today with another piece. Noting that, in the "in the government’s high-profile terrorism trial against Omar Abdel Rahman, the 'blind sheik'.... Frederic Whitehurst, a chemist and lawyer who worked in the FBI’s crime lab, testified that he was told by his superiors to ignore findings that did not support the prosecution’s theory of the bombing." Oh rly? And then, "After the Justice Department’s inspector general began a review of Whitehurst’s claims, Attorney General Janet Reno and FBI Director Louis J. Freeh decided to launch a task force to dig through thousands of cases involving discredited agents, to ensure that 'no defendant’s right to a fair trial was jeopardized,. as one FBI official promised at a congressional hearing. The task force took nine years to complete its work and never publicly released its findings. Not the results of its case reviews of suspect lab work. Not the names of the defendants who were convicted as a result. And not the nature or scope of the forensic problems it found."

And: "The documents and interviews tell a story of how the Justice Department’s promise to protect the rights of defendants became in large part an exercise in damage control that left some prisoners locked away or in the dark for years longer than necessary. The Justice Department continues to decline to release the names of defendants in the affected cases."

And: "The chief of the lab’s explosives unit, for example, 'repeatedly reached conclusions that incriminated the defendants without a scientific basis' in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, Bromwich wrote. The head of toxicology lacked judgment and credibility and overstated results in the 1994 Simpson investigation. After the 1993 World Trade Center attack, the key FBI witness 'worked backward,' tailoring his testimony to reach the result he wanted. Other agents 'spruced up' notes for trial, altered reports without the author’s permission or failed to document or confirm their findings."

But: "Task force participants said [AG Janet] Reno signed off on the decision allowing prosecutors to decide what to disclose, because normal legal and constitutional requirements give prosecutors that discretion."

Well that's nice.

I think another large piece of evidence that the adversarial system of justice that operated in the United States, which is constantly defended by people who should know better as the "best" method at arriving at the truth, is fundamentally flawed by creating an "us vs. them" mentality on the part of prosecutors and FBI/police, whose overriding goal becomes to convict whoever happens to be sitting in the accused's chair.

]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=529 Wed, 18 Apr 2012 22:38:15 +0900 Who is the top U.S. sports star? http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=527
To run through the 4 "major" sports, is there anyone that rises above the rest in Major League Baseball right now? Albert Pujols perhaps, but he seems sullied by his departure from St. Louis. Maybe a few years ago Alex Rodriguez? Justin Verlander, maybe?

In the NBA, again a few years ago maybe Kobe Bryant, but he's now on the decline. One might look to LeBron James, but as with Pujols, his star has been diminished by his move to Miami, and really does not to seem to be the unstoppable force he was in Cleveland. Kevin Durant may get there this year if Oklahoma City makes the finals, but he's not there now.

In the NHL, it used to be Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin, but Crosby has been hurt and Ovechkin seems lost. Anyone else?

In the NFL, again a couple years ago you could easily point to Peyton Manning and Tom Brady, but Manning sat out last year with a neck injury and that Brady's Patriots lost in the Superbowl to the NYGiants (again) has taken a lot of the luster away. Drew Brees has been overshadowed by the Saints bounty scandal.

More broadly, there used to be Tiger Woods in Golf (and overall), but he's basically been gone since November of 2009, and Phil Mickelson has... never been the top ranked golfer in the world. With the Olympics coming up this summer maybe we'll see a Michael Phelps resurgence or Ryan Lochte become a star, or some unknown, but as always those tend to be fleeting in the U.S. The Williams sisters are on the wane in women's tennis and I don't have a clue who the top ranked U.S. male star is right now. Boxing has been out for a long time, and soccer still has a ways to go here.

Anyway, just seemed odd that there doesn't seem to be anyone leading the charge in U.S. sports generally, or any individual sport in particular. Thoughts anyone?]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=527 Thu, 12 Apr 2012 23:14:15 +0900 If you've been arrested, you must have done something wrong http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=524 WaPo (via AP) reports today on the latest glorious decision of our SCOTUS. The good Mr. Kennedy writes that if people are going to be placed in the general jail population, "courts must defer to the judgment of correctional officials unless the record contains substantial evidence showing their policies are an unnecessary or unjustified response to problems of jail security." (emphasis added). Query whether someone could ever make such a showing.

Thus, even in this case, where the accused (if that's even the correct term) in the words of the WaPo "was forced to undress and submit to strip searches following his arrest on a warrant for an unpaid fine, though the fine actually had been paid. Even if the warrant had been valid, failure to pay a fine is not a crime in New Jersey," it's just too damned bad. Geez, that sounds kind of unreasonable, what's going on here?

Oh, the WaPo again: In 1979, the Supreme Court upheld a blanket policy of conducting body cavity searches of prisoners who had had contact with visitors on the basis that the interaction with outsiders created the possibility that some prisoners got hold of something they shouldn't have. For the next 30 or so years, appeals courts applying the high court ruling held uniformly that strip searches without suspicion violated the Constitution. But since 2008 and in the first appellate rulings on the issue since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks appeals courts in Atlanta, Philadelphia and San Francisco decided that authorities need to maintain security justified a wide-ranging search policy, no matter the reason for someone's detention. (emphasis, once again, added)

Not sure what to say here other than it appears security justifies all sorts of things, even where people should know better.]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=524 Tue, 3 Apr 2012 11:09:07 +0900 Budgetary/Tax Armageddon http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=522
1. The current budget authorization ends on 9/30/2012.
2. It now appears we may hit the debt ceiling in December.
3. On 12/31/2012, the 2001/2003/2010 individual rate cuts expire.
4. On the same date, the payroll tax cut expires.
5. There are several business tax breaks that expired at the end of last year (including things like the R&D credit) that have yet to be extended.
6. Many other provisions expire at the end of this year, including the AMT patch [Update: the AMT patch actually expired last year] and the expansion of 100% depreciation.
7. Also at 12/31/12, the 1.2T sequestration kicks in as a result of the failure of the Super Committee.

Further, other than perhaps reaching an agreement on a continuing resolution for a few months near the end of December to avoid a government shutdown a little over a month before the Presidential election, no one seemed to expect any of these things to be resolved before the Presidential election. Thus, these will have to be addressed in a lame-duck session of Congress that will last around 5 weeks.

If they're not, then we'll see a massive tax increase combined with large cuts in federal government spending beginning 1/1/2013, along with the possibility of a default on the U.S. gov't's debt right around that time; all this with an economy that currently has an 8.3% unemployment rate (though improving). That scenario, it seems to me, would be economically devastating to the country.

But addressing all the above issues would likely be impossible in a lame-duck session due to lack of time. The only potential solution suggested was perhaps they could reach a deal to extend everything for X months to give the next Congress time to attempt to address these issues in a less rushed manner. One other suggestion was just to not have a lame duck session, let all the expiring tax provisions expire and sequestration kick in, and maybe then Congress could come to some sort of agreement on budgetary/entitlement/tax reform under the threat of destroying the economy.

If I had to guess, I'd say there would be some sort of short-term agreement to kick the can to the next Congress on most/all of these issues, but who knows. It's not going to be pretty. ]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=522 Tue, 27 Mar 2012 05:33:53 +0900 Fault lines http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=520 I'm grateful to Ugh for raising issues about the mothership of late. While this post isn't directly about issues there, it's about a wider issue that links to the mothership. To start off, this quote by evilrooster:

Feminism is one of the cleaving issues; there's a subset of the right who are turning it into as dirty a word as liberal, for much the same reason. But anti-feminism doesn't just include people who think that women don't need to make such a fuss because things are pretty much OK. It also gives cover to some truly vicious types who will -- trust me on this -- go after visibly female people with every kind of nastiness they can think of.

I'm thinking that anti-feminism today is similar in many respects to racism in the late 50's. (It seems telling that the word that would correspond to racism (misogynism?) doesn't really work in terms of distribution or collocation) It is always fraught to compare historical eras, and some might complain about comparing, say, the National Review in the 50's with random blowhards on teh interwubs, but to me, the comparison seems apt, especially seeing how Buchanan got drop-kicked from MSNBC for various observations that were racist in nature, pointing to a evolution in our perception of the toxicity of racism in discourse. Of course, I don't want to suggest, especially in light of the Trayvon Martin case, that we have overcome racism, and perhaps I am being over optimistic to think that the anti-feminist remix of Pat Buchanan will get kicked off the air in 2062, but if you accept the parallel, it raises the question what do we do now.

It was suggested in a later comment that you want an appropriate mix of commentators, so if the previous parallel is correct, really holding people's feet to the fire about anti-feminist comments is going to really skew the audience. I mean, imagine calling out every 'racist' in the late 50's and say they couldn't participate in the discussion you were having. It seems you would have a rather confined list.

However, I wonder if part of that is not due to the way we define feminism. Annie Lennox said in an interview that

Her views expand to feminism and her opinion that men should be welcomed into the movement. "I don't think feminism is about the exclusion of men but their inclusion ... we must face and address those issues, especially to include younger men and boys," she says, before adding that she is particularly surprised that more gay men don't see themselves as feminists. "I would like to see the gay population get on board with feminism. It's a beautiful organisation and they've done so much. It seems to me a no-brainer."
Being "non-inclusive" can sound "strident and aggressive" and has probably hurt the feminist movement, she adds.
Her views expand to feminism and her opinion that men should be welcomed into the movement. "I don't think feminism is about the exclusion of men but their inclusion ... we must face and address those issues, especially to include younger men and boys," she says, before adding that she is particularly surprised that more gay men don't see themselves as feminists. "I would like to see the gay population get on board with feminism. It's a beautiful organisation and they've done so much. It seems to me a no-brainer."
Being "non-inclusive" can sound "strident and aggressive" and has probably hurt the feminist movement, she adds.

On the other hand, another problem is that while racism didn't drive the capitalist bus, in many ways, sex does. Lennox also noted:

She is more reticent when commenting on the vogue for female singers to perform scantily clad – a far cry from her own black campaign T-shirt, trousers and hat worn at last year's concert. "The world has become more sexualised. I thought the world was already sexualised when I was younger but it sells and sells and now it's just a marketing device.

To tie this back to the mothership, I wonder what mixture of discussion and rule making we need to have. How much 'back getting' is needed? Or am I disagnosing the wrong problem?

]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=520 Sat, 24 Mar 2012 18:18:44 +0900 Open Thread: Status of the Mothership http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=518
As for me, I've never really been into Doc Sci's posts for the most part (no offense Doc!), and would like to see more from Eric/Gary/Seb/russell (LJ's been holding his own).

As for comments, well, perhaps there should be a little more banning-type activity for offensive comments, but that certain people have certain hobby horses, I''m not sure what to do. It does get tedious and repetitive at times, but at least they're willing to engage and are not complete and utter trolls (at least in my view).

Anyway, thoughts anyone?]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=518 Wed, 14 Mar 2012 18:33:22 +0900 SUPER March Madness http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=516
Unfortunately the dictators that be at the NCAA have seen fit to fiddle with the otherwise pretty much perfect 64 team tournament in the past 12 years or so, first adding the 64-65 "play-in" game and then last year deciding that it would be good to have a "First Four" games, expanding the field to 68 teams, with 8 of them playing to earn a spot in the "first round." This, to my mind, is too much piddling. Thus, I set forth below my proposal for March Madness that I think has the virtue (if you can call it that) of both (i) inviting many more teams to the tournament on a periodic basis, and (ii) satisfying the NCAA's most basic need of "MONEY! MONEY! MONEY!" (Warning: I've posted this thought elsewhere before, including at the Mothership). As follows:

March Madness should return to the basic 64 team format that served it so well from 1985-2000, but only for 3 out of every 4 years. Every fourth year, however, like the Olympics and World Cup, they should hold what I call "The SuperTournament," consisting of 256 teams. That sounds a little insane, I know, but read on!

This is more feasible than it sounds.
First, it would only require a single extra Th-Sun weekend (256 => 128 => 64).
Second, while I haven't run the numbers, it would result in about the same number of games being played across NCAA Division I basketball because....
Third, you would cancel the Conference Tournaments. If 256 of the 345 teams in Division I conference basketball make the tournament, there's no need for your conference to hold one and there should be no whining from the teams left out in the cold.
Fourth, to facilitate everything, teams from 1 to 256 would be seeded solely by computer rankings at the end of the regular season (or, alternatively, 1-64 could be seeded and then 65-256 could be distributed randomly to the top 64 seeds). The tournament could continue from there or be re-seeded after the first weekend.
Fifth, to make up for the cancellation of the conference tournaments and ensure some minimal level of attendance, the top 64 seeds would get to play the first two rounds (assuming they won in the first round) on their home court. Thus, e.g., instead of playing in the ACC tournament Duke and North Carolina would each host 2 NCAA tournament games.
Sixth, this would end the stupid arguments about "last 4 in, last 4 out" that seem to populate my television these days.
Seventh, a four-year college player would almost certainly get a chance to play in at least one NCAA tournament.
Eighth, how awesome would 64 games be each of the first two days of the Tournament? Talk about buzzer-beater potential.

Counterarguments:
First, increased travel burden on teams not hosting the first two rounds as compared to traveling to their conference tournament (which are generally geographically based, though that is changing a great deal these days).
Second, no way would conferences agree to cancel their tournaments (but this would only be once every four years).
Third, renders the regular season meaningless.
Fourth, great, even more first (and second) round blowouts.
Fifth, too hard to fill out a 256 team bracket for your office pool.

Anyway, just thought I'd throw this up. ]]> General http://hocb.net/index.php?itemid=516 Sat, 10 Mar 2012 03:38:39 +0800