Land Of The Flea

How Obama murdered the gun culture

"If you’re one of those gun owners who hasn’t done any major shooting in the last couple of years, or who hasn’t needed to purchase ammo in bulk, there is some bad news you’ve got to hear: You won’t be buying ammunition in bulk. At all. Time will tell if we must append the words 'ever again' to that statement, but in a few months, behind enemy lines here in New York state, there’s another stipulation all New Yorkers will have to add. You’ll have to pass a background check just to buy ammunition. It adds cost to the process, and there is no doubt that these costs will be passed on to the customer. This is governmental hostility to gun ownership in action." Continue reading →

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Apartment tenants told they must get rid of their guns

"Retired Marine Art Dorsch says his Second Amendment rights are in danger. His apartment complex, the Oakwood Apartments in Castle Rock, sent out a notice telling all residents to get rid of their guns. The 77-year-old retired US Marine Corps veteran sent a newstip to 9Wants to Know saying he's afraid he'll be homeless if he doesn't comply. The letter went out to residents on August 1 and says they have until October 1 to comply with updated 'community policies.' On page 2 is a brand new provision saying 'firearms and weapons are prohibited.' 'I'm a hunter. I'm a licensed conceal and carry person,' Dorsch said." Continue reading →

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Protected plates give growing number of officials the green-light to avoid fines

"In Colorado, special license plates issued to 100 state lawmakers and representatives not only shield them from radar tickets for speeding, but also prevent collection notices on past-due parking tickets. That’s because the legislative plates in Colorado aren’t entered into the Division of Motor Vehicles database. If someone with a special license plate blows through the speed limit and is caught on radar, there is no actual information in the state’s records to cross-reference the plate. A Denver-based CBS investigation revealed 16 legislative license plates that have accumulated more than $2,000 in fines and penalties that have not been paid." Continue reading →

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Small Businesses Are Trapped by ObamaCare

"Small businesses hoping to avoid the high costs of ObamaCare by switching to part-time employees got some unwelcome news last Thursday, as Paul Bedard at the Washington Examiner reported that the Small Business Administration launched a website to explain to employers that the federal government will add up the number of part-time staff employed to determine if enough hours have been worked to meet the 'full-time equivalent' criterion." Continue reading →

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Obama Thinks Americans Don’t Need to Know

"The day after his first inauguration, Obama proclaimed 'a new era of openness in our country.' Yet, in office, he’s driven state secrecy to new levels of absurdity. You may think that Americans have a right to know who we’re at war with, when the government thinks it can kill them, and whether the executive branch considers the personal data of all Americans “relevant” to terrorism investigations — but this administration begs to differ. As far as it’s concerned, you can’t handle the truth." Continue reading →

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Americans Giving Up Passports Jump Sixfold as Tougher Rules Loom

"Americans renouncing U.S. citizenship surged sixfold in the second quarter from a year earlier as the government prepares to introduce tougher asset-disclosure rules. The U.S., the only nation in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development that taxes citizens wherever they reside, is searching for tax cheats in offshore centers, including Switzerland, as the government tries to curb the budget deficit. Shunned by Swiss and German banks and facing tougher asset-disclosure rules under the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, more of the estimated 6 million Americans living overseas are weighing the cost of holding a U.S. passport." Continue reading →

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Lavabit chief predicts ‘long fight’ with feds (Q&A)

"Ladar Levison can't talk for legal reasons about the specifics of why he shut down Lavabit, his encrypted Web e-mail company, but he was hardly tight-lipped about the subject. Levison, a San Francisco native and an enthusiastic beach-and-sand volleyball player who moved to Texas to go to college, currently resides in Dallas. In an phone interview about the decision to shutter Lavabit, Levison spoke about the connection between Lavabit and the Patriot Act, how he thinks the laws regarding privacy ought to change, and how the American government is failing to uphold the U.S. Constitution." Continue reading →

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U.S. E-Mail Services Close and Destroy Data Rather Than Reveal Files

"The shutdown of two small e-mail providers on Thursday illustrates why it is so hard for Internet companies to challenge secret government surveillance: to protect their customers’ data from federal authorities, the two companies essentially committed suicide. In effect, both businesses destroyed their assets — in part or in full — to avoid turning over their customers’ data. Such public displays are far more difficult for large companies to make, and help explain why the most public efforts to challenge secret government orders have come from small companies and nonprofits." Continue reading →

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Border Patrol agent who shot Mexican teenager dead will not be charged

"U.S. authorities will not bring charges against a Border Patrol agent in Arizona who shot dead a rock-throwing Mexican teenager two years ago because the fatal injury did not occur in the United States, the Justice Department said on Friday. An unidentified Border Patrol agent shot Ramses Barron, a 17-year-old Mexican citizen, through the border fence in Nogales, Arizona, in the early hours of January 5, 2011. Over the past five years, U.S. border agents have fired into Mexico at least 10 times, killing six Mexicans, according to a report released earlier this year by the Washington Monthly and the Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute." Continue reading →

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A territorial tax system would help U.S. exports, jobs and prosperity

"Germany, a territorial tax country where wage levels are higher than in the U.S. and which has the highest job-creating 12-month trade surplus in the world of $248.5 billion, has its record lowest unemployment rate in 21 years. Germany doesn’t subject its citizens living abroad on top of the tax they pay their host countries, so Germans relocate abroad and capture foreign markets. Americans, unable to survive this double taxation, stay home, and the U.S. continues to lose export market share. The 'fruits' of the U.S. world-wide tax systems are a $721.8 billion 12-month world-trade deficit and $315 billion trade deficit with China." Continue reading →

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