‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through our home
Not a creature was stirring but CNN’s gnome;
The stockings were hung by the family tree,
In hopes that St. Nick would come visit Philly.
The children were nestled all snug in their beds;
Except my wayward son, a sugar plum head;
With mamma in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap,
He snuck to the porch and sold 40 bucks of smack.
Then out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter.
Downstairs, to the entrance, I flew like a flash,
A yell of “Police!” and the front door was smashed;
When what to my wondering eyes did appear,
But cops with guns drawn, not a single rein-deer,
One arrested my son so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment he was not St. Nick.
More rapid than eagles, my house they did seize,
“How can you do this?” I pleaded from my knees.
“It’s called civil forfeiture,” bellowed the cop,
“I’ll take what I want, and I’m not gonna stop.”
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head
Soon gave me to know I had so much to dread.
“In just Philly alone, in just 10 years’ time,
One thousand private homes are now mine, all mine!”
“Loitering, jaywalking, BS traffic stops:
All excuses to rob you—’cuz we’re the cops!
TVs, cash, cars galore: everything is fair game,”
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name:
Then with that last word, he went straight to his work,
And stole all the stockings; then turned with a jerk,
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a snort, he said “Sucks your son blows.”
He sprang to his cruiser as his team he advised:
“The rest of our wish list, we’ll seize from good guys!”
And I heard him exclaim, ere they drove out of sight–
“Happy Christmas to all. On to the next house tonight!”
[Editor's Note: Oh yeah, didn't you know that selling drugs with a street value of $40 is MAJOR CRIME that destroys the moral fabric of the USA? This is — clearly — ABUSE of POWER, i.e. violations of the 4th, 5th and 6th amendments of the Constitution. This is just another example of tyranny! So, as long as YOU are not being "tyrannized", is it OK?]
Title III: Forfeiture - Comprehensive Forfeiture Act of 1984 - Amends the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Statute (RICO) to specify that property subject to forfeiture for racketeering activity includes: (1) all proceeds obtained directly or indirectly from racketeering activity; and (2) real and tangible and intangible personal property.
Makes property forfeitable to the United States upon the commission of the act giving rise to forfeiture. Permits the forfeiture of property which has been transferred to a third party, but includes a provision protecting innocent bona fide purchasers.
Authorizes a court to order the forfeiture of substitute assets of the defendant where the original property cannot be located or traced.
Authorizes a court to take appropriate action preserving the availability of property during the pre-indictment period effective for up to 90 days. Specifies the circumstances under which a temporary restraining order may be entered without notice to the affected party.
Authorizes the Attorney General to grant petitions for remission or mitigation of forfeiture. Allows the Attorney General to establish regulations governing the restitution and disposition of forfeited property.
Amends the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970 to establish general criminal forfeiture provisions for felony violations under titles II and III. Includes provisions similar to the RICO amendments of this Act, relating to property subject to forfeiture, third party transfers, asset substitution, pre-indictment orders, and disposition of property.
Creates a rebuttable presumption of forfeitability of certain property.
Authorizes a court to issue a warrant authorizing the seizure of property subject to forfeiture in the same manner provided for a search warrant, if other injunctive relief would not assure the availability of the property.
Provides that a criminal forfeiture proceeding shall stay any civil forfeiture proceeding with respect to the same property.
Sets forth procedures for an ancillary hearing to resolve third party claims. Makes it unlawful to invest the income of a felony drug violation.
Permits the forfeiture action to be brought in the district in which the defendant is found or is being prosecuted.
Amends the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970 to allow the Attorney General to transfer drug-related forfeited property to other Federal, State or local agencies.
Establishes within the United States Treasury, the Department of Justice Assets Forfeiture Fund to pay for maintenance of forfeited property, awards to informants, and valid liens and mortgages against such property.
Amends the Tariff Act of 1930 to provide for the seizure of vessels, vehicles, merchandise or baggage valued at $100,000 or less. Requires written notice of such seizure to all interested parties. Increases the surety bond for any person claiming interest in the seized property to $5,000, or ten percent of the value of the claimed property, whichever is less.
Establishes in the Treasury the Customs Forfeiture Fund to pay for maintenance of forfeited property and awards to informants.
Requires the deposit in such Fund of all proceeds from the sale and disposition of property forfeited under custom law.
Allows for the retention of forfeited property for official use or for transfer to other Federal, State or local governmental agencies assisting in related Federal law enforcement.
Increases from $50,000 to $150,000 the award of compensation given to informers for information leading to forfeiture.
Grants customs officers arrest authority and the right to carry firearms.
Repeals provisions of the Internal Revenue Code dealing with customs officers' law enforcement authority to conform to this Act.
Provides that seizures of property effected by customs officers shall be governed by this Act.
“The more power the government has, the greater the risk to the people and the more dangerous the abuse.” Edmund Burke, 1771.
Big government is organized crime in all but name, and the man in the street is numb to the universal risk in today’s world.
Politicians and bureaucrats are spending the world into oblivion while secretly hoping and expecting to escape debt with depreciated dollars: yours. The public is unaware.
Note that your “elected” politicians never talk about the ongoing depreciation (inflation) of paper money (U.S. dollars). They don’t want you to think about this. They would rather you think about Donald Sterling and his frivolous racial comments.
But you should be on high alert. Liquidity is not only negative; it is at its most negative level in history. Are we facing the second Great Depression or worse?
For the third time in 14 years, U.S. stocks are in a bubble and far more leveraged than ever before. There are now more corporate bonds outstanding in the U.S. than there are mortgage-backed securities. This is significant, and the heart of the next crisis and the debt bubble will be non-financial corporate debt.
Investors beware! Stockholders beware!
Thanks to the Fed, it now seems that we have a bubble in all asset classes much larger than 2007. The Fed and other central banks with their expansionary monetary policies, all designed to boost asset prices, are similar to a juggler who is trying to keep all his balls in the air. The Big One is coming and there will be no place to hide except in very depressed gold stocks.
Becky Gerritson: "...government is out of control!" and "...our representative government has failed us."
A federal judge on Thursday ordered the IRS to detail under oath how some of former agency official Lois Lerner’s emails went missing, as well as any potential methods for recovering them.
Judge Emmet Sullivan of the U.S. District Court in Washington gave the Internal Revenue Service exactly a month — until Aug. 10 — to file a report, which he demanded as part of a lawsuit from a conservative watchdog, Judicial Watch, against the agency.
Judicial Watch is seeking a wide range of documents from the IRS, including Lerner’s emails, as part of a Freedom of Information Act request. It has complained that the IRS didn’t tell it that the agency couldn’t recover all of Lerner’s emails from 2009 to 2011.
Sullivan cast his ruling as a compromise, and a potential way for Judicial Watch to get answers without the court wading any deeper into the matter. Judicial Watch had asked the court to potentially compel IRS officials to testify about the lost emails, through a process called limited discovery.
The FairTax is a consumption tax unilaterally applied to all Americans at the same rate. For businesses, payroll taxes would no longer exist. Our exports would include a heavy tax for overseas buyers purchasing our products, while our imports would be cheaper for us to purchase. I'm not sure how this would affect GDP, as more information is necessary.
According to the FairTax website, "Under the FairTax, every person living in the United States pays a sales tax on purchases of new goods and services, excluding necessities due to the prebate." The prebate gives every legal resident household an "advance refund" at the beginning of each month so that purchases made up to the poverty level are tax-free.
So a family of four making something like $50,000/year should not have to pay taxes, thus preventing an unfair burden on low-income families. Since the FairTax eliminates both federal and payroll taxes, you get to keep your gross pay amount of each paycheck earned.
John Adams said, “Without [term limits] every man in power becomes a ravenous beast of prey”. That being said, here are some of the reasons we believe our country needs Term Limits.
Term Limits can help break the cycle of corruption in Congress. Case studies show that the longer an individual stays in office, the more likely they are to stop serving the public and begin serving their own interests.
Term Limits will encourage regular citizens to run for office. Presently, there is a 94% re-election rate in the House and 83% in the Senate. Because of name recognition, and usually the advantage of money, it can be easy to stay in office. Without legitimate competition, what is the incentive for a member of Congress to serve the public? Furthermore, it is almost a lost cause for the average citizen to try to campaign against current members of Congress.
Term Limits will break the power special interest groups have in Congress.
Term Limits will force politicians to think about the impact of their legislation because they will be returning to their communities shortly to live under the laws they enacted.
Term Limits will bring diversity of people and fresh ideas to Congress.
[Editor's Note: If you want to get rich, i.e. advance from a low paying government bureaucrat job on the local or state level, THEN GET ELECTED TO THE US CONGRESS (House or Senate). Once you're elected, it's easy to steal from your campaign contributions or the Congressional budget allocated to your seat and staff. You can go on a government-funded junket with 'lavishly' paid expenses. The list of ways to steal from the government while in office is inexhaustible. There are only a few Congressmen who left Congress just wealthy instead of a multi-millionaire. Of course, there are several who arrived in Congress as multi-millionaires and don't need to steal from the government.]
