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The Boston Tsunami Effect

April 16, 2013 by 8 Comments

My deepest sympathies and wishes for a speedy recovery to the people who were injured and  to the families who lost loved ones in the horrible explosions at the Boston Marathon.  Hopefully you have good medical insurance and lawyers because you will be out of the headlines in a week and sadly like the 911 victims, you will probably abandoned to your own devices.

You are not the Boston Tsunami Effect.

Today at breakfast I heard the conspiracy theorists are already blaming Barack Obama and the US government for what was an act of butchery. At the time of this writing there are no publicly announced suspects for the carnage, but conspiracy plays into the hands of those who wish to discredit the US government and play the political blame game. It keeps us all distracted from the real issues.

I sincerely doubt the US government would create this type of incident, there are many who believe 911 was a government act, I do not. I do believe the government used the events of 911 to get Americans to consent to a massive erosion of their rights in the name of safety. I do suspect like 911 this event will birth new laws further restricting individual rights. The nature of government is to take power and never to relinquish it.

That is not the Boston Tsunami effect but it leading there.

As seems to happen after each Presidential election cycle we see a new wave of immigrants from the US to other parts of the world. People fleeing for political reasons. Panama and Boquete garners it’s fair share of that wave. The wave has been growing recently with people fleeing the “socialist” government of Barack Obama. People who are coming to Boquete looking for housing and properties in a far more socialist country than the one they are leaving.

There are two new reasons the wave will grow into a small Tsunami. Obama, the socialist, is offering to steal from all of us who paid into Social Security by using something called chained CPI which in essence will not allow Social Security to keep up with inflation. This offer to the Right is being accepted with open arms by some since it pilfers the worker to subsidize the wealthy. Not a very socialist act. If this happens, many Baby Boomers will be pushed out to sea with out row boat or oars as they retire, if they can ever retire.

The second reason is fear, fear is a great motivator. Now not only the fear of losing assets, not only the fear of inflation with decreased retirement income, not only the fear of hordes of immigrants but now add the fear of exploding pressure cookers. Pressure cookers can be bought without a license or background investigation, at least for now. You can also buy nails for shrapnel and mix them with basic gunpowder, a mixture of charcoal, saltpeter and sulphur. This is what some suspect was the low tech explosive of choice in Boston. No government can ever prevent the acts of insane people but they can try, and trying erodes the rights of all citizens.

I fear the Tsunami of potential immigrants who join those arriving here daily with no interest in being in Panama other than the fact immigration is easy and they read it was a good place to retire from someone selling beach front property. They are fleeing an old life because of fear, not coming to a new life for what it offers.

Immigrants who say to realtors things like, “I want a nice house but I don’t want no Mexicans next door” or “how come these people don’t speak English” or “that’s not the way we do it in Kansas!”  Guess what Todo,  you’re not in Kansas anymore. If you come to Panama thinking Panama is just like Kansas,  but with more freedom, be sure you pack your ruby slippers because you will need to click those heels to get back.

The-Ruby-Slippers-from-The-Wizard-of-Oz


Filed Under: Featured, Opinion

Enter the Plutocrats

April 4, 2013 by 7 Comments

According the the CIA World Fact Book, Panama has 29% of it’s population living below poverty levels, what ever they are.

Noble Bugle comarca

“Strong economic performance has not translated into broadly shared prosperity, as Panama has the second worst income distribution in Latin America. About 30% of the population lives in poverty; however, from 2006 to 2012 poverty was reduced by 10 percentage points, while unemployment dropped from 12% to 4.4% of the labor force in 2012.”  CIA

The same source puts the USA at 15% of it’s population below the poverty level, the US Census Bureau has charts and figures to show the same thing.

Perhaps more interesting is this chart from a Paper called Who Rules America,

wealth percent

The top 10% is one thing, but the top 0.01%, the truly wealthy are the more interesting.

“Folks in the top 0.1% come from many backgrounds but it’s infrequent to meet one whose wealth wasn’t acquired through direct or indirect participation in the financial and banking industries.”  Who Rules America

These are the people that are the movers and shakers that have the wealth to make massive donations to politicians to keep their most favored tax status.

In Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. 310 (2010), a landmark United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that the First Amendment prohibited the government from restricting independent political expenditures by corporations and unions. The court opened the door wide for an new form of government, a plutocracy. Those with the deepest pockets can control public opinion by spending some of their wealth on marketing their ideas.

These people, without any conspiracy, are the new rulers, the Plutocrats.

Plutocracy (from Greek πλοῦτος, ploutos, meaning “wealth”, and κράτος, kratos, meaning “power, dominion, rule”), also known as plutonomy or plutarchy, is rule by the wealthy. Its first known use was in 1652.[1] Unlike systems such as democracy or anarchism, plutocracy is not rooted in an established political philosophy and has no formal advocates. The concept of plutocracy may be advocated by the wealthy classes of a society in an indirect or surreptitious fashion, though the term itself is almost always used in a pejorative sense. Wikipedia

Latin America has been famous for it’s Plutocracies, a few wealthy families running countries, the US entered that club, again.

In 2005 Citigroup, the same Citigroup that was too big to fail and received billions in taxpayers dollars published a series of three documents sent to investors.

“The latest Survey of Consumer Finances, for 2004, has been released by the Federal Reserve. It shows the rich continue to account for a disproportionately large share of income and wealth in the US economy: the richest 10% of Americans account for 43% of income, and 57% of net worth. The net worth to income ratio for the richest 10% of Americans increased from 7.4x in 2001, to 8.4x in the 2004 survey. The rich are in great shape, financially.

We think this income and wealth inequality (plutonomy) helps explain many of the conundrums that vex equity investors, such as why high oil prices haven’t seriously dented growth, or why “global imbalances” are growing along with the equity bull market. Implication 1: Worry less about these conundrums.

We think the rich are likely to get even wealthier in the coming years. Implication 2: we like companies that sell to or service the rich – luxury goods, private banks etc. Favored names include LVMH and Richemont. ” Citibank report

These should be  alarming and can be downloaded here as PDF files if you are curious to read them all. LINK  They point out the change and transition of what was a more democratic country during my youth into a Plutocracy.

Why the change now, Citibank has an answer to that too.

“But this thesis is not without its risks. Plutonomies have existed before and they have come to an end.

To this end we see four primary risks. The first, war and/or inflation. Secondly, financial collapse. Three, the end of the technological revolution. Finally, political pressure to end the increase in income and wealth inequality. ”

Since 2007 we have seen deflation, now under control by creating inflation, we have been at war without end but it has not affected the super rich just those who pay with their taxes and blood.

What do the Plutocrats want, nothing new, more money and more power. What thats means to the average person is the big question. Here I am guessing. I believe the Plutocrats will ensure against a collapse of fiat currency, hyper inflation makes things complicated for them since many of their assets are in equities. I believe they are manipulating the markets in precious metals, they earn from currency fluctuations, they earn from inflation, but controlled inflation. This has all been done before.

“Beginning in the early 1970s, Hunt and his brother William Herbert Hunt began accumulating large amounts of silver. By 1979, they had nearly cornered the global market.[6] In the last nine months of 1979, the brothers profited by an estimated $2 billion to $4 billion in silver speculation, with estimated silver holdings of 100 million ounces (6.25 million pounds).[7]

During the Hunt brothers’ accumulation of the precious metal, prices of silver futures contracts and silver bullion during 1979 and 1980 rose from $11 an ounce in September 1979 to $50 an ounce in January 1980. Silver prices ultimately collapsed to below $11 an ounce two months later. The largest single day drop in the price of silver occurred on Silver Thursday.[1] Wikipedia

Look at silver and gold now, there are profits being taken and like many bubbles or ponzi schemes the last one’s in lose big, add Bitcoin, the new Internet currency to the list.

gold_1_year_o_b_usd silver_1_year_o_b_usd

“An equally pressing question, though, is what those increasingly hefty incomes at the very top mean for the lives of everyone else. And a big, newly revised paper (LINK pdf) by the University of Chicago’s Marianne Bertrand and Adair Morse finds that there is a connection, but not a happy one: The gains of the rich have come alongside losses for the middle class.” Washington Post

Those I know who have huge sums of money have very diversified portfolios, stocks, bonds, land, income producing real estate, precious metals etc. They control the economy and profit from fluctuations but lose big if a currency collapses.  Several of these people I know have bought big into farmland, they think food and water will be the next big earning opportunity. Increasing food prices are a function of both climate change and increasing world population. Expect food riots in the not too distant future, again.  As we are seeing water issues in Boquete now, expect more in drier places in the near future. Wars will be fought over potable water supplies.

What is going to happen is simple and painful. The Euro and US dollar will continue to devalue against real goods like oil and food. The middle class will become poorer due to the devaluation and emerging economies will want and will take a bigger share of the pie. This will mean a leveling into a new class structure, the ultra poor in many countries will stay poor, the working poor will work harder for less in real buying power, the middle class will be redefined to wage slavery and the ultra rich will get richer and more powerful. In the US you can call this the new plantation society, for much of the rest of the developing world, like Panama, those who have education and marketable skills will actually see improved opportunity and lifestyle at the expense of developed nations in decline.

I am glad to be in Panama, I wish my children were also.


Filed Under: Featured, Government, Opinion

No deposit, no return, we are all disposable

March 25, 2013 by 29 Comments

I write this as a frustrated US Citizen who lives in another country, looking back over my shoulder. This is a short essay, a rant, that if documented would require a long book. Since I will not bother with proof of anything, I call it fiction. Please disregard any facts that might slip into the ramble.

It is all a matter of perspective. If you live in the USA and are barraged by the media, you believe. You believe and you wave the flag. You believe the antichrist attacked on September 2001, that Iraq bore part of the responsibility and that the North Vietnamese did provoke the war in Vietnam. You believe the boys and girls in kaki are out around the world defending democracy. You believe there are unwashed hordes teeming to the southern borders trying to steal your jobs.

You believe there is a difference between elephants and donkeys, although there is some, there is less than you think. You are distracted by the issues of abortion, gay rights and gun control. Although they are all valid issues, they are manipulated to divide and to have you lose perspective of the big issue, you do not control your government. People who buy and sell politicians control your government, the rest is a burlesque show, a circus in the Imperial Roman sense of the word.

You believe all of this because you heard it, read it, saw it in the media, you think you formulated an opinion, but it was already made and sold to you. The media suppressed Ron Paul who said, the USA provoked the attack on Sept 11 2001 by interfering in the affairs of nations half way around the world, why confuse anyone with a second opinion. The media makes you think Republicans and Democrats are different. Surprise, they have the same foreign policies, they serve the same masters.

If you can remove yourself from the daily barrage, the flag waving vitriol, the jingoism and xenocentric view of the world you might think differently. It requires some effort and perhaps you are too busy working, watching basketball or some celebrity event to make the effort.

After the close of WWII Dwight D. Eisenhower, a retiring president, warned of what he called the military industrial complex. It was a warning unheeded and actually rather late. As the USA invasions of Banana Republics in the past and interference in elected democracies in places like Chile prove, the USA has always considered the world open for it’s economic exploitation. As well documented in the book, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, the game is control using debt and obligations and the use of our children in uniform as the last resort in maintaining USA’s concept of democracy around the world.

No other country in the world has its military busy defending democracy with hundreds of outposts all over the world. Not even at the peak of the cold war did the former USSR have so many bases in so many far flung places defending communism. Why does the US Taxpayer pay in cash and the US military pay in the blood of our youth to defend other nations?

If you leave the confines of the borders, if you read news from other sources, if you visit the Banana Republics you can gain a fresh perspective. In all the world we the masses, the poor and the middle class are disposable. Those who control the world are not conspirators nor covens, but as so well documented, the wealthy and the corporations they control. Our sons and daughters are not defending democracy, we are defending our corporate rulers.

Those multinationals like Halliburton that made billions in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan incite wars for profit.  They use patriotism as a cover and earn billions for their shareholders around the planet. We and the other billions of wage slave are just disposable tools, for the factories, for the military, we are no deposit, no return people. We are easily replaced because the canons of religion dictate make more babies.

In his work, like this, a fiction, Trinity, Leon Uris explained the use of the Catholic Church for production of cheap labor in Ireland. British Protestant factory owners paid the Church leaders to encourage poor Catholic families to have more children, more cheap labor. If you don’t believe that fiction just ask why organized religion continues to incite people to reproduce as families have trouble feeding and clothing those who already exist. Think about how much better the standard of living would be if good religious families without income would stop having babies. Belief in a deity and subordination to men claiming to represent your deity are not the same thing.

Some of us who leave the comfort of the USA and migrate to other countries gain other perspectives. We see that in some other countries there are no armies or armies that do very little. These countries rarely have wars, not one or two every generation like the great democracy to the North. We see other countries can afford universal healthcare, can allow their workers a month of vacation without fear of being replaced on the job. The country that claims to be the best in the world is not, it has morphed from a land of opportunity to a land of wage slavery.

Education, which was among the best in the world has slid to poor, but no one reads the UN reports or believes them, that would violate nationalism. Pause to wave the flag. The middle class needs to borrow heavily to end their sons and daughters to public Universities.

Then there is the question of food. Food in the USA has always been inexpensive, not so now. The small farmer is trying to make a small resurgence but agribusiness runs the market. Chickens are loaded with antibiotics and hormones and live a short life in misery. Pigs have it equally bad. The milk people drink comes form cows injected with hormones banned in other countries. The produce is genetically designed for shipment and to look good, not for nutrition or flavor. Monsanto owns the Dept of Agriculture, they are destroying farmers that do not play by their rules. The isles of the markets are populated with toxins labeled as food. All this to earn more money for big corporations.

Cigarettes are bad for you, but Coca Cola is worse. Which one is regulated and which do you feed your children? The media has sold you on both ideas. When all those sugars give you diabetes you head for the doctor and big pharmaceutical companies have you for life.

Medicine is run by and for the benefit if pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies. The FDA that is supposed to test drugs relies of the same Pharmaceutical companies for their funding. Doctors are wage slaves trying to pay off their massive student loan debts. The healthcare system that people are told is the best in the world is bankrupting anyone who cannot pay absurd insurance premiums, including the doctors who need to pay massively for more insurance.

Ask any emergency room physician how many people he sees on a shift due to marijuana induced problems, then ask about alcohol. Why is there a war on drugs. Prohibition of alcohol failed, so has what followed, prohibition of drugs. Follow the money. Who is earning megabucks protecting you from something that was never a threat until it became illegal and therefore profitable.

Ask why the USA has the highest incarceration rate in the world. How in the land of the free can the for profit prison industry use prisoners for slave labor. Stay out of prison because you might not like being a wage slave but being a real slave is even worse.

I could go on but if you read this much you get the idea. You need to stay on the treadmill until death to pay for the privilege of buying  more crap made in China. The media has convinced you that you need a bigger fast better widget than the one you already have that still works. Vance Packard wrote that book a long time ago and you live it now. Most people cannot afford to retire, they will work until death.

Some of us left. Some of us might have a different perspective from the outside, if we can find a balance between Fox and RT News. There is a balance, but none of us will ever really know the truth beyond that the greed of the few throughout history has created hardship and misery for the masses. There is nothing new here, it is written in all human history, nothing has changed from before the days of Imperial Rome.

What is the solution?  I have no idea. Whether you sit on the right wing or the left, realize you sit playing the same game with a losing hand. You and I are both part of the system, most likely on the wage slave side. We are all mushrooms in the dark being fed,  mushroom food. Revolutions just change the people at the top. Capitalism is king, Socialism does not work, Communism is just another ruling elite. There is no way I know other than to change the rules of the game, the game is rigged.

The ancient Greeks had their polity system, maybe if we had an educated public, direct democracy would work, we have the technology. Yet it will never happen when the people with the most to lose control everything including education and media. People who can govern themselves need education and need enquiring minds, it is not going to happen, so the rulers will always rule. The names will change, the results will not.

Writing this was an exercise in pressure release, your opinions may vary but at least I feel better having expressed my human frustration with the world as I see it.


Filed Under: Opinion

Curtain call for 2012, what is coming to Boquete in 2013?

December 31, 2012 by 8 Comments

I am going to take a risk based upon the pulse I feel in the Boquete Panama community. Some of these observations are based upon what is happening, some on projections and some on clear speculation as I peer into a recycled crystal ball.

crystal-ball

The wave of new immigrants to Boquete Panama will continue, people from the United States will join others from Canada, Europe and Venezuela. Many of the Americans will come, rent and leave within the year because they think they are fleeing Socialism only to discover Panama is far more socialist than what they are leaving.

2012 showed that financial deals that sounded too good to be true, were indeed too good to be true; COACESS, Financial Pacific and Pronto Cash all washed out in 2012. Expect great new opportunities lusting for your money in 2013 and expect some of them to fail too. With all of the regulation Panama has of it’s financial industry there is no effective regulation, just laws selectively enforced when it is good press or good for those in power.

Boquete is a great place to retire as long as you understand this is a rural area based on an agricultural and tourist economy. The US Panama free trade agreement will change the agricultural economy and many small farms will need to change or they will fail. Climate change is already effecting coffee production and should it continue, coffee will become a lesser part of the local economy. That is a shame since our coffee is wonderful.

Tourism has developed as an industry in Boquete during the world wide recession. It has always existed here, but tourism has grown tremendously in the past few years. It is likely to continue to expand if the government does not destroy all of the ecotourism destinations with dams and pavement.

Union Fensoa will keep installing street lights even where the streets are really paths for cows. The cattle need to find their way also. The question will be whether they will move the poles out of the Boquete David Highway or just cut them flush with the new blacktop.

Expect the road to David to be completed in 2013, the same with the airport in David. I predict direct flights from David to Tocumen. If Copa or Air Panama are into speculation one of them might try David to Florida, but I am not holding my breath.

When the transportation corridors are open look for new commercial projects to start. Also some large new hospitality projects, like the environmentally destructive project in Jaramillo Abajo. I do not understand why developers have not figured out that what makes Boquete unique and desirable is the environment. Cutting down the trees and paving the mountain eliminates all that makes this area special.

Panama is a land of opportunity, if you have the knowledge and correct connections, but most expats who come here to build a business fail. They fail because they don’t have the knowledge or the correct connections, this is not Kansas.

Boquete will see still another crop of restaurants, seems many new immigrants want to open restaurants. No one knows the Boquete market size, how many people live here at any time, how many are dining out, how many venture out at night, who has sufficient discretionary income. Still without market informaiton investors will come, invest and often lose. Still other ventures are bitten by the labor laws, the sound regulations, the health laws, the immigration laws etc. Some of these new ventures will succeed, most will last less than one year.

The BCP will have it’s best season of plays ever, hopefully people will pay to see them even if it means being out after 8pm. The Tuesday market will continue to grow and evolve as the hub of the expat community in Boquete. The meetings will continue and become more interesting. Bid4Boquete will have their best year ever and the community will continue to support needs of it’s most needy and the dogs too.

For all those here it will be a year of inflation, change and politics. Panama is heading toward primaries in 2013 and in 2014 a new cycle of politicians all of who will promise to clean up corruption and none of whom will.

I do not see anything dramatic changing in Boquete in 2013, just a continuation of growth without a plan, despite the fact there is plan and immigration without understanding by those fleeing known into unknown. On the positive side hopefully we will see an evolution into a stronger tourist economy for all the residents here who need to earn their daily rice and lentils.

One final note, I can predict with some security, that for me the January winds will not be a bother to me since I am taking a vacation from my full time vacation and will be writing from venues to the far south for about a month.


Filed Under: Featured, Opinion

The Tragedy in Connecticut

December 15, 2012 by 21 Comments

There is no way this post will make any impact, the lines in the sand are drawn and emotions run high regarding gun ownership in the USA. I am a firm believer in private gun ownership, a former NRA member and a former firearms dealer in Arizona. Still the slaughter in Connecticut has given me pause for reflection.

The placement of a comma in the Second amendment in the US Bill of Rights makes for a very strong argument for legal, unrestricted gun ownership in the USA.

Amendment II

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

The counter argument is that “the right of the people to keep and bare arms” is a dependent clause, tied to the well regulated militia, todays National Guard.

Regardless of the comma, it is time for some debate over how that right might be granted more intelligently than today. According the a Gallup poll US gun ownership is in decline.

gun-ownership-declining1-thumb-615x446-108406

That conflicts with FBI numbers on background checks, which show only sales through licensed dealers, not the vast number of resales.

FBI_NICS_Background_Checks

In either event there are hundreds of millions of guns in the US in civilian hands. In my opinion private gun ownership is a good thing. It helps to keep a government under control when it has a genuine concern that an armed population might take things into their own hands. I have little trust for any government to care about it’s people.

Still the crazies get guns and slaughter people, adults and now children. Where is the balance between sane gun ownership and insane people having guns. I actually think Panama has a reasonable balance, as usual on paper not in reality.

In Panama the law says permanent residents may buy guns and carry concealed weapons. They must be licensed and the gun registered to them. Each person needs to do the following to get a license and renew it every five years.

1. A Psychological Exam
2. Submit a urine sample for drug testing
3. A DNA sample for possible future identification
4. Finger Prints
5. A bullet exemplar for future comparison
6. 25 hours of range practice

On paper, this restricts gun ownership to those who are legal residents, were sane at the time of purchase, were not on drugs at the time of purchase and allows followup to identify legal weapons used illegally.

If you added some fiscal accountability to victims of gun related crimes tied to the registered owner Panama might have an example for the US.

Owning a gun is like owning a car, it is a tool. Both are potentially dangerous and like driving a car a gun owner should be licensed and tested to demonstrate responsibility. Resales should be restricted to dealers who need to be sure the new owner passes over the same hurdles.

This will not unduly burden lawful gun owners. In Arizona I had to take classes to get a concealed weapons permit, it was not burdensome and I had learn gun safety. This might prevent some, but not all, of the tragedies that seem too occur too often in the US today.


Filed Under: Featured, Opinion

I keep thinking of the Bunker People

December 13, 2012 by 1 Comment

For many years in Arizona I sold camping gear, it was a good business and some of my best customers were survivalists. The survivalists always knew the end was just around the corner. I called them the Bunker People, both because they had all outfitted their survival bunkers and they reminded me of Archie Bunker. For those of you too young to recall, All in the Family was a big item on 1970′s television, this clip will help to understand that as much as things change they stay the same.

Some people believe all the Internet rumors about the end of the world coming on the Winter Solstice, 21 December 2012, or 211212 or 122112 depending on how you like to read the Gregorian Calendar,which is only one of many options out there. Many of the bunker people are looking to the Mayan Calendar with an ominous premonition that when it ends the world ends with it. Fear not like the Hindu Calendar, the Mayan calendar recycles.

What we do know is that each generation has always felt that they were in end times and that those following them were inadequate for the tasks ahead. This quote could be from any number of eras or speakers.

“Our youth now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for their elders and love chatter in place of exercise; they no longer rise when elders enter the room; they contradict their parents, chatter before company; gobble up their food and tyrannize their teachers.”
― Socrates

The only constant we will find is change, but in the big recycling calendar of civilization nothing really changes. I doubt much will change on Dec 21 2012, but fear not, the Bunker people will find something else to require their bunkers, maybe Planet X is coming again?

For those who willing to believe NASA is not part of some conspiracy to hide the facts about the end of the world to prevent pre Dec 21 2012 panic there is a simple page debunking all the various theories that have become urban legends. NASA Link


Filed Under: Opinion

The devil made me do it

November 14, 2012 by 10 Comments

Yesterday I was told twenty-seven states in United States have petitioned to leave the Union. Today I heard thirty-six States, so I decide to check out this resurrection of the prelude to Civil War. The impending end of the United States of America due to secession of the States.

I tracked the petitions down to the hosting website, Whitehouse.gov. The official website of the President of the United States has a section called We the People, where any anonymous registered user can create and sign an online petition. The most optimistic anti Union people were wrong, there are petitions from fifty states. That’s correct, anonymous people from anyplace in the world signed petitions that read like this one from the great State of Mississippi.

“Peacefully grant the State of Mississippi to withdraw from the United States of America and create its own NEW government

As the founding fathers of the United States of America made clear in the Declaration of Independence in 1776:

“When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.”

“…Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and institute new Government…”

I think that based on its history, Mississippi should be encouraged to leave the United States.

Therefore I, as Elmer Fudd, signed the petition from Panama to have Mississippi secede from the Union.


People this real and this is a joke. You all need to chill out.

If you want an interesting read that should be far more widely read on the current state of the US, allow me to recommend this article sent me by a reader and Boquete Coffee drinker in the US.

Published in Psychology Today LINK

The real message is that for the US to survive and prosper, the country needs to stop the dream of empire, cut foreign military adventures and focus on needs at home. This might echo some of the totally ignored words of Ron Paul on foreign policy.

Therefore, Elmer Fudd did a petition of his own and you can sign it, if you wish.

Bring the troops home, from everyplace.
The current financial needs of the United States of America requires a reallocation of resources for the good of the people of the United States of America.

According the Psychology Today in an article entitled “Why America is in Decline”

“The U.S. currently has (depending on the source of information) somewhere between 800 and 1,000 military bases in over 50 countries, and still regards itself as the world’s police force.”

Signers of this petition request the US close all foreign based not needed for the current security of the USA and bring home our troops.

LINK so you can sign the above petition

You can be assured regardless of the number of votes for this petition it will not happen ether.


Filed Under: Opinion

Open letter to new immigrants, you are welcome here but …

November 10, 2012 by 11 Comments

I want to be the first to say to the huddled masses who want to leave the United States after the Obama victory that you are welcome to join us in Boquete Panama. It might be helpful to understand some differences between the United States and Panama. Since I have no interest in selling you anything, you might find my perspective a contrast to the many people hustling Panama online. This post is intentionally negative, but it is also intentionally a contrast.

Panama is not part of the United States. I feel compelled to say that because I have read so many comments and questions on various Yahoo groups from people who are looking to immigrate here with families and find work in Panama. You will need a passport to enter Panama. Although English is widely spoken among educated Panamanians, the official language here is Spanish and you will need to speak Spanish to get a job or function efficiently almost anyplace outside of immigrant enclaves like Boquete.

As an American passport holder you can enter Panama as a tourist for six months and recycle that entry in one day by visiting Costa Rica. That policy can be changed and has been as little as 30 days in the past for tourists. Tourists cannot legally work in Panama. If you work as a tourist and are caught you will be fined and possibly deported. Tourists and retirees cannot work here without a work permit from the government and tourists and people with retirement visas cannot legally get work permits.

The laws are different here,  the government can create or change laws in days and they are in force as soon as recorded. Recent events have shown, when a law is very unpopular the people attempt to shut the country down until the law is repealed, they have succeeded several times recently.

Immigrants often learn the legal system is of no value to them, there are many corrupt lawyers and forget a malpractice suit, a lawyer will not sue another lawyer. Even if you can find one to file a lawsuit, he with the most wealth or best political connections will likely prevail in the lawsuit.

Many people buy property here. Too often people buy Right of Possession (ROP) property, only to discover others have claims on the land. The buyers might discover they own nothing but a document after a legal battle. You need a lawyer to make an intelligent purchase and need to hope the lawyer is honest. Just because the lawyer speaks English does not make them honest. You can buy titled property safely, most of the time but need to check on liens, tax liabilities etc before buying. There are no escrow services here and although I have heard of people selling title insurance I have never actually seen anyone benefit from Panama title insurance.

We have many English-speaking carpetbaggers here. Some of these people fled their criminal past in other countries and came to Panama because the laws on White Collar crimes like fraud are weak at best. You can buy a house from the honest Gringo and find out he never owned it. You will have little recourse and may have lost your investment.

If you are from the USA you will find your money is good here. The currency of Panama is the Balboa, but the Balboa only exists as coins, the paper currency here is the US dollar. That is convenient,  but if you believe the dollar is doomed, so is the Balboa. Unless the government decides to really upset the economy and change the currency; which they could do.

Domestic and farm labor is available and appears to be very inexpensive. However the labor laws in Panama are 99% skewed to the worker. An employee has Social Security of which you must pay a percentage. Employees are legally entitled to a month vacation each year and you need to pay decimo, a 13th month of wages each year. In essence an employee works eleven months and is paid for thirteen. You also need to pay severance after ninety days of employment, terminating an employee can be expensive . If you hire someone for $2 an hour, the real cost is closer to $2.80 without factoring in severance.

If you are fleeing socialism, it is here already. In Panama the government owns the canal, a couple of banks, half of Cable & Wireless, a telephone company, a part of the electric utility, the Colon Free Trade Zone, part of the coast to coast oil pipeline and probably a lot more. Social Security provides not only a meager retirement income but medical care also. Your medicare, medicaid and with some exceptions your health insurance will not work here. If you have Tricare you can get reimbursed, but most US health insurance does not work here in Panama.

Despite any rumors to the contrary we have taxes in Panama. There is a 7% VAT on most purchases other than food, medicine and agricultural goods. There are import duties on almost everything and transporting goods from overseas is expensive. There are property taxes and although there are some exonerations, you need to be sure you actually have them or your tax bills will grow with penalties and interest. The liability might first be discovered when you try to sell your property. If you do work, there are also income taxes and Social Security taxes.

You can start a business and as long as you do not work in your own business unless you get a work permit. You can profit from your enterprise as a shareholder but if government inspectors find you working expect a hefty fine.

With all of the negative said, if you are careful and do not check your brains at the airport Panama is wonderful. Panama is a great place to live. I have been here more than six years and love it but it does require a reset of expectations and not everyone is willing to make the necessary changes. Too many people come and leave within two years, some with less than they had when they arrived, that is my reason for the splash of ice water.  This was a counterbalance to the sales pitches that are on most internet sites about Panama. Consider the changes you need to make to adjust to a new country, visit, rent and see if it for you before you sell your assets and buy your family a one way ticket.

 


Filed Under: Contrasts, Featured, General Interest, Government, Immigration, Legal, Opinion, Taxes

A man for all reasons

October 31, 2012 by 35 Comments

This will be my last commentary on US politics until after the US presidential election. My comments from a mountain in Boquete Panama will not influence one vote anyplace but the venting regulates my blood pressure and prevents ulcers.

I have come to the conclusion that all of those who regale me about the Marxist, Socialist, Communist, Arab Muslim from Kenya must be right and I am going mad. It seems each time I listen to Mitt Romney I become more convinced he is both the right and the left, the alpha and omega of all things.

Regardless of the event, his mercurial personality and ever evolving stand on all things makes him a master negotiator. As Newt Gingrich said “you cannot debate a liar’. A slanderous statement, that states the black and blue that Newt felt after a primary debate. Newt once considered Mitt a liar, now of course Mitt is the golden boy, no longer the Mr. Mercury. Politics does make strange bedfellows, not literally of course. I would hate to imagine those two curled up under the sheets, god would weep at the immorality.

Now we have the tragedy of Hurricane Sandy, which was sent by god to devastate only blue states. Before the Hurricane hit Mr. Mercury said “It is immoral to borrow money for Disaster relief. It makes no sense at all. FEMA should be privatized.” Please imagine disaster relief brought to you by Halliburton with security by Blackwater, managed by Dick Cheney. I might not be a big fan of the Federal government but at least their goal is to help not to profit. The National Guard consists of your neighbors not mercenaries.

The role of government is to help it’s citizens, not multinational companies. Mr. Mercury has shifted stances on Gun Control, yes when Governor of Mass, no, now when he needs the Tea Party vote. He has shifted positions on abortion, something a President cannot change regardless of opinion. I suspect he has shifted positions dogs traveling on the roof of his car, now they should be allowed to drive.

It is good to have a flexible politician. He has a tax plan but he will not tell us what it is, it’s just better. I like better too, we need more that is better, less that is worse.

Mr. Mercury supports other politicians that believe rape is god’s will and that women should be grateful for the children it brings. However if those babies are born into poverty they have no need for food or education, they just need to make to eighteen and enlist as cannon fodder in the military. Thanks Mitt, that’s a hell of a deal.

Mr. Mercury wants to move healthcare back to where only those employed by large corporations and the government can afford it or qualify. Yet if elected Mitt will have some of the best medical care in the world paid for by the taxpayers.

Mitt would reduce taxes again despite the fact the big reduction by GW Bush helped plunge the government into debt and did not benefit the economy. Mitt, however will be unaffected because most of his assets are offshore and we only know about his convoluted taxes for two years. The tax benefits Mr Mercury uses to hide his wealth are only available to the very wealthy, maybe they should be eliminated; I doubt that will happen.

Mr Mercury opposed the Auto bailout, it started under GW Bush, continued under Obama and Mitt and his friends made millions from the bailout. Those Communist loans did save a ton of jobs that he now says are going to China. GM and Chrysler both deny the truth because Mitt probably does plan to export Jeep production to China for his personal gain. Bain Capital certain has done it before and is doing it now, but Mitt is only a retiree of Bain.

America needs Mitt, America needs more money for defending the Middle East, money borrowed from China. America needs to lower taxes, again to encourage more trickle down economics. It was the George Bush the first who called that plan of the late great actor Ronald Reagan “Voodoo Economics”. How history has been rewritten to say it did any good, only George Orwell could say.

We must not forget the military and veterans, unlike Mitt. Obama who was too young for Vietnam, Mitt was ripe and ready. Being a god fearing patriot Mitt weathered Vietnam in the hazardous streets of Paris France assisting his church not his country. I was not a big fan of the war in Vietnam either but I tried to enlist and was rejected as defective and when my lottery number came up I went to my physical and failed yet again. Mitt never had the opportunity to have my experience of rejection or the experience of others in combat. Still Mitt is the champion of militarists and the Multinationals that benefit from wars. I missed the news about his children enlisting in the military. Even the royalty of Great Britain do their military service, not Mittens nor his flesh and blood.

If America elects Mr. Mercury, Americans will get what they deserve, a fast path to economic oblivion and we in Panama will get a lot of new quality expats who flee the fast track to a Plutocratic, Fascist America. What a tragedy that people cannot see beyond the media empire of Rupert Murdock and think for themselves based on the facts.

Please remember Mercury is toxic to humans, but not to worry Mitt will eliminate the EPA also.


Filed Under: Featured, Opinion, Politics

A black eye for Panama

October 27, 2012 by 1 Comment

Yesterday, 26 Oct 2012 was a bad day for the people of Panama. Throughout the country people took to the streets to protest Law 72 which would allow the government to sell the Colon Free Trade Zone.

What made the day bad was not the fact the people took to the streets, that happens here, too often. Taking to the streets is a way to get the government to listen to the people they are supposed to represent. The people of Panama are vocal when they feel the government is ignoring them. The bad part happened when the protests turning into looting and violence.

It is acceptable to block a street or slow traffic, not desirable, but acceptable. What happened in Panama City yesterday and in Colon for several days was looting and destruction of both public and private property. That is not acceptable, that is anarchy.

When a government, any government, turns a deaf ear to the people they encourage acts of anarchy. Anarchy negates government and undoes the role of government completely. Yesterday Panama City experienced localized anarchy, the hope is the government will learn they cannot govern in a vacuum, they must provide a forum for the governed to voice their opposition and weight those concerns.

The problem of unresponsive government is not unique to Panama, but the small size and organized resistance here has proven several times in the last few years that government unrestrained will not be tolerated. Currently the Assembly is busy repealing Law 72. It will be repealed by Sunday, as fast as the law allows. La Prensa

Why did they needed to wait until millions of dollars of damage was done and people died. The government made a big mistake in the way the law was passed and what support they might have had was washed away by the methods used.

Let us hope this lesson is heeded and the tranquil Panama we know and love returns on Monday.


Filed Under: Government, Opinion
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