Slashdot Mirror
EU Overturns Agreement With US On Banking Data
Following the lead of the civil liberties committee which last week recommended dropping it (against the wishes of the US), qmaqdk writes "The EU parliament overturned the previous agreement with the US which allowed US intelligence agencies to access EU banking data."
Good for them, way to grow a spine, Europe! Now if only American banks had the same motivation to protect its customers data from the very same agencies.
Now they'll just have to go back to the old fashioned way.
In case of emergency, break law
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
I'll show you mine if you show me yours.
sigs... don't talk to me about sigs....
It's a shame that similar action won't be forthcoming when it comes to the lopsided extradition treaties though.
N.B. These don't apply to all EU member states but are particularly bad with our spineless foreign office.
If God forks the Universe every time you roll a die, he'd better have a damned good memory.
About time the EU showed some backbone and told the US where to stick it. The US has bent everyone else over and had their way far too long. Now that the US's economy is a mess, the dollar is weak and getting weaker and the Euro is fast taking the place the Dollar once had, the US needs to be sent a strong, loud and clear message that it's hay day is over and it's going to have to rely upon diplomacy, cooperation and fair play instead of idle threats and ham-fisted foreign policy towards it's allies.
In case of ambivalence, create emergency
"The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool" - Jane Wagner -
Americans that want to avoid taxes, can now bank in Europe again.
Right, so to stop a few corrupt individuals and companies in the US avoiding paying tax in the US by banking in Europe, every banking transaction that passes through Europe (or the EU, with 27 countries and over 500m people - that's more than all of North America) should be reported to the US... Something about setting ones own house in order before messing with other people's springs to mind.
Moving on, it is nice to see that the (democratically elected) European Parliament is finally able to stand up to the (appointed) Council of Ministers (and the US); the Lisbon Treaty does have its good points (even if it was pushed through in a rather undemocratic way). Now if only the rest of it could get implemented and the Swedish Pirate Party could get their second MEP into office.
The same thing will come back again and again under a different name each time. And besides there are other ways. Somebody "accidentally" leaves a suitcase full of backup tapes of customer info in a taxi... No problem
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
Yes, AGAIN, it's not like the US always had the right to see EU banking data.
Furthermore the world is a bit bigger than only the US and the EU, there'll always be opportunities.
They'll still be able to see the cashflow going out of the country though, unless it's foreign money.
In short: not a valid argument and props to the EU for finally deciding that they will not kiss American ass any longer.
Of course the EU has no interest in the US gaining access to EU banking data. There is no way in Hell they would willingly give up this info. The US intelligence community probably is saying they are only looking for information for anti-terrorist data. The EU isn't refusing the providing individual pieces on information. They just don't want to submit to US supremacy. They don't even need to. However, information leads to power. Power leads to control. The EU is not looking to give the US that kind of control. In the "conspiracy theory" direction, the EU has several "families" that are collectively owed trillions in debt, owed by the people, collectively, of the US. Also, these families do not want any information (money trails), leading back to them, in any regards to their use of power and control in their day to day (behind the scenes) puppet mastering.
Who, besides the fanbois, said he was?
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
Americans that want to avoid taxes, can now bank in Europe again. Soon the USA will follow suit and allow Europeans who do not wish to pay taxes to be shielded from Europe.
Nope. Sorry. This has nothing to do with sharing records for tax collection. This agreement allowed intelligence agencies in the U.S. to secretly access banking information for all customers, including non-U.S. citizens. The tax data sharing agreements are separate and above board and require the bank to supply data only on those required to pay income tax in the U.S. (or whichever country they share with). Virtually all countries participate in tax data sharing now, so I'm afraid you can't get out of paying your taxes simply by banking in Europe.
If I can be modded down for being a troll, can I be modded up for being an orc, or a balrog?
The Americans tax their citizens on their world-wide income, no matter where they live. The reverse isn't true. So why would a rich European want to hide in a high tax, high unemployment country with record gun crime and without a decent health care system? Though I may sound a little harsh on your system, you under-estimate your fellow Americans. My job is to sell luxury real estate to the wealthy, and I also arrange private banking in Monaco. Virtually none of my American clients are eager to avoid paying taxes.I won't name other nationalities, for fear of being accused of stereotyping, but I will say that in my experience Americans are in the very top percentile of honest tax payers. Though you may have problems with corporations, where every tax dodge is purely for the benefit of the shareholder, you should have more faith in your fellow citizens. Overall you can be proud of them.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
For starters, we don't seem to be bombarded with "with us or against us" rhetoric.
Also, current administration has at least enough tact to not encourage negative attitued towards, say, France; or "Old Europe".
One that hath name thou can not otter
Yeah - that's exactly the problem nowadays - it's all "politically correct".
But under the hood - same old, same old.
Actually, as I understand it, this one was more a case of I'll show you yours if you'll show me mine.
The intelligence "sharing" is done precisely because each side could get in legal and/or political trouble for spying on its own citizens without good cause. On the other hand, if it's just foreign intelligence provided by a friendly state, well, that's OK, then. This is as much one in the eye for certain EU governments (whose appointed representatives previously forced this measure through at European level mere hours before the Lisbon Treaty kicked in and meant the elected MEPs would get a say, remember) as it is for the US.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Wait a minute, you actually think Al-Qaeda is a country?
Other than that you are right that there are still plenty of countries without these agreements, hence my previous post.
Putting their own petty concerns over the safety and security of American citizens.
Hmmm, I was going to tear you an new one crying BS on high taxes & unemployment (the US & EU have essentially the same unemployment)...then I saw why everyone wants to claim residence in Monaco.
http://www.globalpropertyguide.com/Europe/Monaco/Taxes-and-Costs
Personal income tax: 0%.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
This ain't about tax avoidance at all.
It has always been the case that those Americans who want to avoid taxes can do so in the US easily -- simply setup up a non-profit for the purpose, and be done with it, safely and legally. I know quite a few Americans who do just that, and don't bother with offshore accounts.
Shipping data wholesale to the US authorities is a legal problem in Europe mostly because there privacy protection still has some limited meaning.
How's Obama any different than Bush?
The US is still oppressing their rules and wishes onto the rest of the world.
Nothing has changed.
Obama is using diplomacy to get other countries to do what we want, while Bush used more or less thinly veiled threats. Whether or not that's better is debatable, but at least in theory it will give other countries more of a choice in the matters.
It will soon be illegal for an American or any entity operating in the United States to use the SWIFT money transfer service.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
How's Obama any different than Bush?
Bush was honest about what he believes.
Bush's agenda was all about maintaining the physical safety of Americans, even if privacy had to suffer. (I disagree with this too BTW)
Obama's agenda is all about claiming high ideals while brokering backroom deals to do whatever the fuck he wants to anyway.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
It seems to me the US is quick to access other countries' data, but it far less willing to provide equal access to internal data as well.
Hence this would either level the playing ground or put a stop to US demands.
Wait a minute, you actually think Al-Qaeda is a country?
They must be. We are at war with them.
Drugs and teenage sex are countries too, I suppose.
If I can be modded down for being a troll, can I be modded up for being an orc, or a balrog?
And why is this bad? It's a simple matter of "path of least resistance". Monaco offers 0% income tax. However, some nations stipulate proof of living there. So, Monaco pulls in revenue from their citizens taxes whom in turn charges their clients (foreigners) a fee of residency. It's a bloody brilliant ruse! In the end, both Monaco and their "clients" win.
As the ol saying goes...."Don't hate the player. Hate the game."
Life is not for the lazy.
Are you talking about Obama or the teleprompter? If you do not know what I'm talking about, just catch him speaking when the teleprompter is down or out of action. In that regard, Bush seems about equal or better then Obama.
That's interesting, I was unaware of that (I don't live in the US, though).
Do you have any video with a good example of what you claim?
How's Obama any different than Bush?
Obama is using diplomacy to get other countries to do what we want, while Bush used more or less thinly veiled threats. Whether or not that's better is debatable, but at least in theory it will give other countries more of a choice in the matters.
How's Obama any different than Bush?
Obama is using diplomacy to get other countries to do what we want, while Bush used more or less thinly veiled threats. Whether or not that's better is debatable, but at least in theory it will give other countries more of a choice in the matters.
I'm not sure if there is a boundary between "diplomacy" and "veiled threats". Sometimes it seems that "veiled threats" is actually one of the tools of diplomacy.
While I do not condone threat in foreign relations, I'm skeptical it is not part of the repertoire of the so-called diplomacy.
well you have the white wash cover up version i thought up while using the john, the servers were in the US and the data was just picked off from the copper lines, the europeans found out and moved the servers to europe, and the US asked for the data, the eu agreed, some politics and certain dates made it possible, then it was voted on and the US lost the info, possible payback for the cia-italy and the boeing-airbus, oh and lichenstein
Al-Qaeda, Iran, North Korea...
EU members have their own intelligence agencies (presumably with reasonable access - subject to privacy laws and various checks - to all that banking data) that deal with al-Qaeda, Iranian and North Korean operatives should they operate in or through EU.
Americans that want to avoid taxes, can now bank in Europe again. Soon the USA will follow suit and allow Europeans who do not wish to pay taxes to be shielded from Europe.
If they earn their money in US, then transfer to a European bank would originate in US, ultimately, and can be monitored.
If they didn't earn their money in US, and they don't reside there, then why is it any business of US government in the first place?
(I understand you may have that written in your laws, but it's not like that would the the first silly American law, and the world at large has no obligation to help you enforce such laws - no more so than it has any obligations to help you enforce your online gambling ban.)
If they earned their money abroad, come there to pick it up, and then enter US, then your customs should be trained to deal with it.
Well, if Bush was as bad with a teleprompter than Obama is without one, then I'd say that it's still a definite improvement.
The european government consists of two elements - the commission and the parliament.
What you need to know in short:
The commission is appointed, completely undemocratic, and holds most of the power and does most of the actual activity. It also bends over backwards whenever the US wants something. It was the commission who gave away our flight data, our personal data, our Internet data and now our banking data.
The parliament is elected, is the democratic body, and has very limited powers (though they have shifted around a bit with the last reform). It isn't exactly a mecca of reason, but it more often than not stops the worst excesses of the commission.
So once again, I applaud the parliament. They're fighting uphill battles against the commission all the time.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
This agreement allowed intelligence agencies in the U.S. to secretly access banking information for all customers, including non-U.S. citizens.
Uhhh, no; it does not. You may want to look up what SWIFT actually does:
The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication ("SWIFT") operates a worldwide financial messaging network which exchanges messages between banks and other financial institutions. SWIFT also markets software and services to financial institutions, much of it for use on the SWIFTNet Network, and ISO 9362 bank identifier codes (BICs) are popularly known as "SWIFT codes".
So what the intelligence services could access up to now where payments, or more precisely, messages that where trasnmitted via SWIFT. The dodgy money changer, around the corner, doesn't use SWIFT for transfers and SWIFT wouldn't know about your banking relationships, unless you're the final beneficiary from a payment via them. And there's no point for them to store data on an end-customer level, since it's a messaging service between financial institutions, exclusively.
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
Does it actually matter?
I want a president who surrounds himself with smart people and listens to them. That's a smart leader, not necessarily one who is the best at everything.
ha!
"The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool" - Jane Wagner -
Well, if Bush was as bad with a teleprompter than Obama is without one, then I'd say that it's still a definite improvement.
I'm not sure. In a way, I'd much rather he be less charismatic, less smooth.
Drugs and teenage sex are countries too, I suppose.
So where would one apply for a visa to these countries? I can think of a few teenagers who'd love to go, and get off my lawn in the process. Win-win!
People replying to my sig annoy me. That's why I change it all the time.
"There is no valid reason for anyone to be able to have private bank data."
Yes, US agencies should be able to "accidentally" pass all banking data of EU companies to their US competitors. After all, we are all friends, aren't we? Nobody would dare to abuse that.
The US government would "never" tolerate industrial espionage ... no siree ... never ... starting tomorrow ... or maybe next year ... well definitely 2012 ... under certain conditions ... not.
This is about the SWIFT database that catalogs international transactions, not the contents of your Swiss bank account.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Ah something was denied to the US the US defense trigger some have comes out automatically without thinking. You have to be aware of that this treaty was a mutual spy upon you treaty. The US could not legally spy on the transactions of its own citizense but they could more or less spy upon the europeans, and vice versa, so what happens is that the data gets exchanged (all friend countries so why even doing some spying?) and then suddenly the US government has "YOUR" data (as well as all european governments and foreign agencies).
Before wishing us evil, think twice that the EU government has basically stopped a blatant spy attack of the US government against its own citizens and vice versa. Besides shifting banking data also opens the door to industry espionage especially in the banking sector.
Kicking all this was a good thing for both sides.
I hope the same will happen to whatever the dreaded Acta group currently negotiates. The EU parliament already is pretty pissed that they do not get any information as well there is a very high chance that the Acta groups treaties never will make it through the parliament no matter what is in there, they already made a significant number of people angry so that they vote against it automatically.
I would not be so harsh about Obama,he has to face an entirely different situation. Bush also was not honest about his believes, most of the Iraq war just was done to get a handful of US corporations to cash in. Cheneys company was one of the huge winners of this deal, the international soldiers the loosers.
Obama currently fights an entirely different battle, Bush gave to him a basically fucked up country, not close to bankrupcy but with a serious debt problem, an pushing everything through is a problem because the entire parliament is just whores on the payroll of lobbyists anymore. So to get your agendas even remotely through you have to do some rearrangements with the current political situation. The situation of Bush was much easier because he just reigned for the payroll of the lobbyists and did not care about anything else.
For that I personally think Obama has been doing very well, but my personal opinion simply is you cannot rule the US anymore, there is too much greed selfishism and too much bribery (on legal level via donations) going on. I personally doubt anyone could do better than Obama did, I think 99% of all people in his position would even do worse.
I forgot that is how I judge the situation as an outsider.
So you'd have no problem posting all your transaction records here then?
404: sig not found.
Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain are the worst but not the least. Most of the countries in Europe have spending and Debt levels that (as a percentage of GDP) are double the US level everyone is worried about. ...
Uhm, the US federal deficit stands at 10.64%, only slightly lower than the 12.5% of Greece, the worst performer in the Euro zone at this time. Portugal seems to have a deficit of 9.3%, Spain 11%. The I in PIGS is Ireland with 11%, not Italy. Mind you, these are the worst performers in the Euro zone, and relatively small economies, the average figures of of the entire Euro zone are looking a lot better than the US right now, and definitely better than the UK. The market doesn't only look at cold, hard figures though.
About the Euro tanking vs the dollar, I remember almost a decade ago, the Euro was worth about $0.70, now it stands at twice that amount. Both those extreme values are unrealistic and harmful, it would be better to have a stable exchange rate close to 1:1
That's a subtle hint to Mod Parent Up!
Or don't. Whatever. Still funny.
Your brain is not a computer.
Why just teenagers? >:-)
Undemocratic? We got not one, but two votes on the Lisbon Treaty here in Ireland :)
In fairness, the Treaty was signed by people's elected governments (democracy - you vote in a government to run your country as they see fit), and in countries other than Ireland, was not in conflict with the constitution (despite scrutiny in a number of countries it was found not to be a problem). Even in Ireland, if the government had wanted to, they could have passed almost all of Lisbon without a constitutional amendment (the amendment was only necessary for certain items). As far as I know, the main difference with Ireland is that the constitution is very detailed, and a previous amendment pretty much meant all European treaties had to be appended by constitutional amendment.
Besides, direct democracy isn't very sensible - Switzerland is an example (or indeed the history of constitutional amendments in Ireland). The majority can hold up essential reform (like not letting women have the vote till late 60s/early 70s) or pass dubious votes (e.g. the minarets vote) where a government, despite having to keep an eye on what voters want, does have some freedom to enact unpopular measures that may nevertheless be needed.
Anyone who thought Lisbon was a bad idea should have come here to Ireland to see the appalling scaremongering tactics by the opponents (Lisbon will mean your foetuses aborted, your sons conscripted, the elderly euthanised) as well as negative campaigning (the unpopular ruling government want you to vote Yes, fat cats want the gravy train to continue, etc.). These are tactics that political parties have refrained from using in general elections etc. as they just lead to a vicious downward spiral. The proponents used standard political tactics based on generalisation of arguments (so "Vote Yes for Recovery", "Vote Yes for Jobs", etc.). These kind of tactics are acceptable enough and the public are familiar enough with them. You do have to sum up your arguments snappily on election posters. And all you need is some clever brainstorming to get your point across this way - no need to resort to dirty tactics.
Besides, as cynical as people are about politicians and the establishment - when *all* main political parties, opposition and government are speaking together - surely it should suggest that they may be right? Admittedly losing the first vote also showed they were incompetent.
-- *~()____) This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds...
I want a president who surrounds himself with smart people and listens to them. That's a smart leader, not necessarily one who is the best at everything.
It's very common for someone to have an over-inflated view of their own abilities. Such people will only perceive others to be smart if those others agree with everything they say.
This is how you wind up with idiots surrounded by yes-men in charge.
I'm just happy that the guys I helped elect to represent me in the EU are doing their job.
The EU Parliament is the only directly elected EU institution (the members of the European Comission are nominated by countries' governments - and many are in the pockets of some lobbyist or other - and the Council of Europe is made up of representatives from each EU countries' governments) and it is the most consistent defender of things like consumer rights and the privacy of the EU citizens.
I would like to remind every EU Slashdotter that if you are an EU citizen, no mater where you live in the EU (even outside your home country) you can vote for the EU Parliament - most people in the EU are not exercising this right so your vote will be even weightier.
One of the possibilaties is that SWIFT moves to Switserland where the EU has nothing to say. The banks do not really care, so it would be an easy solution for them. That would mean that new laws would be made (perhaps in each country individually) to avaoid the transfer of the information to Switserland (and then to the US).
This will be a lot harder to avoid and could take several years if it would happen at all.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
erm. That's like saying that BACS is a messaging service between financial institutions, exclusively.
Sure, SWIFT is used for bank to bank payments, but it's also used for customer to customer payments.
That most individuals don't transfer funds large enough to justify the expense of SWIFT messages don't mean that they can't - I've done it myself before now (not for a particularly high value transfer, just one that I didn't want to go through multi-day clearing cycles on).
At the 'tax avoidance' or 'terrorist activity' level, and for inter-country cash transfers, SWIFT is definitely a mechanism that would be used by individuals, and so it's very understandable that someone trying to monitor the flow of funds would want to know what's passing over it.
I'm also delighted that the EU have said that the US can't monitor the use of SWIFT in Europe. Obviously various EU countries will have their own intelligence services doing nefarious things but (in theory) they're subject to EU law.
Net impact on security is minimal, because of that domestic coverage. Anything found by an EU security service can be shared with the US, and if the US want to find the destination of a specific transfer they can ask an EU agency to help them (which generally they'll do, but under the auspices of EU law, which means they wont trawl the transactions of every EU citizen, including the ones that aren't acting illegally).
Considering how much value the GBP lost already it'd take a gigantic drop.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Was this bank service, like, handling the transactions that finance world terror groups and insuring their privacy?
I'm sorry, I don't see why that excuses a foreign Government monitoring the financial transactions of people, companies and financial institutions in my country.
Drugs and teenage sex are countries too, I suppose.
I remember when they were the same country.
And a wonderful place it was, too!
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
This is how you wind up with idiots surrounded by yes-men in charge.
So just about every leading body and government ever?
Having spent a few years as a lobbyist in the European Parliament during the EU software patents directive, I can tell you that it's very easy to affect the MEPs.
I learned that they're mostly lost, and the centre-left guy will vote your way just as quickly as the centre-right guy will, so which one you voted for doesn't make a huge difference, but talking to them does. (FWIW, the best party in there is clearly the Greens.) Tell them your concerns and show them your evidence. Showing evidence is essential so they can justify their vote.
Please help publicise swpat.org - the software patents wiki
Judging by the terrorists who tried to mix an explosive that takes 7 hours to produce with no vibrations, on a 5 hour flight, and the terrorist who set fire to his trousers, I think the US intelligence services would be well advised not to place an upper limit on the stupidity of Al Quaeda members.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
That's not including the 25% value added tax which is slapped on everything I purchase
25% VAT? Where do you live in the EU then? VAT is 15% in most of the EU. Also, for a 'small business owner' you seem to completely fail to understand how VAT works. Value Added Tax is a tax on value added. You charge VAT on things that you sell, deduct from that the amount of VAT that you paid on things that you bought, and only pay the remainder to the government. If you're paying the full VAT amount on stuff that you're buying, then it means that you're not producing anything.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Small correction. The EU commission is named in the following way: The EU Parliament votes for the EU Commission chief (in this case Barroso), the chief assembles his team and after that the team must be validated by the Parliament again.
right...
Obama's agenda is all about claiming high ideals while brokering backroom deals to do whatever the fuck he wants to anyway.
He certainly disappointed on the wiretapping issue - caving even before being elected.
But from what I'm seeing its more of a case of being pushed back from his ideals.
For example - the whole healthcare thing - he tried to do it 100% out in the open, tried to let congress do it while he was hands-off even. But after 6 months of pretty much nothing he really had no choice but to start trying to go the backroom way. And don't confuse me for a supporter - I think nationalized healthcare is the wrong way to go - the current system is fucked because of partial socialization - we need to go the other way and eliminate the health 'insurance' industry completely - return to real insurance (catastrophic coverage only, no HMOs, etc). But the way its played out seems as plain as day to me.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Assume any given case ambivalent?
Absence of proof != proof of absence.
And the next President writes her script on the palm of her hand.
Yup, the campaigning here would have been funny if the situation hadn't been a serious one. Coir (a front for a militant pro-life Catholic fundie group) were particularly dishonest in their scaremongering. My favourite was the one in which we were threatened with the minimum wage coming down to around 2. Of course, when asked, the people producing those posters couldn't provide any source for that.
Yup, I was rather relieved to see it go through on the second vote. We're too bogged down in deference to the Catholic church, and corruption in Ireland is as common as Saturday morning hangovers.
-- Using the preview button since 2005
The guy you were responding to used the word "debt", not "deficit". There is a difference.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Isn't it illegal for the US government to ask someone else, whether it's a foreign government or a telecom company or a 13 year old Russian hacker, to spy on someone if it's illegal for them to do the spying themselves? From what I recall, this is what happened with the telecoms a while back.
Now the remaining question is: how do we make sure that EU banking data is adequately mined for leads and clues and that the US is warned the instant something is detected? Because it just so happens that the US is the party that's most at risk, and the EU is the party with porous borders to Islamic nations around the Mediterranean, and an indigenous Muslim population numbering several million which demonstrably contains radical elements. So it's fine if the EU wants to do the data-mining for itself, but it has to be done.
The EU will now probably find that it needs a "federal" investigation agency because letting 23-odd governments in on what queries are run is a recipe for leakage. So it needs to be one agency that's capable of keeping a secret. In case they already had one, now is the time to give it some manpower and computers and let it cooperate with whoever is doing the profiling in the US, because sharing data on *suspect* individuals and *suspect* transactions is well within the scope of conventional police cooperation.
As an interim measure we can probably agree on a few queries with at least one "bogus" query which, if leaked, will cause visible changes in shady people's banking. If the new hopefully-soon-to-be-operational "EU FBI" passes that test they may actually be a help.
VAT 15% in the EU?
How such a misleading and uniformed post can be rated (as of now) "3, Informative"?
The rates you posted are a bit outdated. Now I hate Wikipedia links, but they do have an up to date list. As you will see the average VAT rate sits at about 20%.
right...
Don't think that will work. There is a tax information sharing agreement, and as data flows both ways on that one, it isn't affected. SWIFT does international wire transfers and doesn't know what happens to the money once it has been transferred.
Anyway, if you want to avoid tax, you put your money in Switzerland or Leichtenstein, or maybe Cayman Islands or British Virgin Islands. Those countries are not in the EU.
It isn't just the EU. If you wire money from India to China for example, that most likely goes through SWIFT, and that gets reported to the US.
The guy you were responding to used the word "debt", not "deficit". There is a difference.
The story is the same when you look at national debt. The OP claimed the EU was at twice the levels of the US, but google disagrees with this claim.
The national debt of the US approaches 100% of GDP, roughly the same as the UK.
Greece meanwhile is struggling with a debt of 120% of the GDP. According to the wsj article linked above, Spain has a national debt below 70% of GDP. Portugal was above 75% last year, I didn't see figures for this moment. None of these amounts are anything close to twice the level of the USA, as the OP claimed. Only Japan and Zimbabwe seem to reach that level.
This deal was only about the US government being allowed to monitor all money transfers made by SWIFT and had noting to do with any European organisation being allowed to see money transfers inside the US. Please note that the US government was already monitorying all money transfers made by SWIFT secretly before the previous agreement (or the one before that). But as I understood it, there was some (gentlemen's) agreement that the US government would share their finding of terrorist activities after having analyzed the data.
The German Chancellor has said that it's OK for her tax-collectors to buy & use bank data that was stolen...
http://newsfeedresearcher.com/data/articles_w6/data-german-laws.html
Since most Western Govs are broke, they're going after any cash they can, whatever it takes.
So don't worry about the intelligence guys being deprived; they'll just call their buddies in IRS, (who still have access to US accounts in the EU, I believe). Chinese walls, I hear you say? Know how to recognise one? It's got a grapevine growing over the top...
Failing that, they'll steal the info, (directly or indirectly).
Yes, but that is precisely my point: 15% is not the average, it is the minimum (Canary Islands being an exception).
In fact the 15% in Luxenbourg has been subject of hot political debate because of sales tax evasion through there.
The GP post is dead wrong.
And in the near future VAT in Europe will go up, as it will be the easiest way to tackle the now very famous deficits...
I am even more sorry, I do not see why that excuses my own government monitoring the financial transactions of people, companies and financial institutions in my country.
The big joke here is that we Americans actually had the double think of publicly asking for permission to spy on everyone. Europeans, on the other hand, have known for centuries that spying is something that you do in secret and don't ask. Thus, while we Americans are like, "uh, we can't spy on Europeans because we are not allowed", the reality is, the British, French and Swiss intelligence services probably know from data mining what I'm going to eat for lunch before I will.
This is my sig.
Denmark - 25%
Hungary - 25%
Sweden - 25%
There are only one country, Luxemburg, that only charges 15%
Since when is the US high tax or high unemployment?
I think the far easier answer to why Europeans donät hide their money in the U.S. is that it's much convenient to hide it in Switzerland, Luxemburg, or Lichtenstein.
Look at the posts in this thread and tell me who has an "us vs. them" mentality. Bush didn't do anything to convince Americans to dislike Europe (rumors of Freedom Fries are greatly exaggerated), and he didn't need to do anything to convince Europeans to dislike the US.
Obama is just as beholden to special interests as Bush was, his record setting fund raising didnät come out of nowhere after all. The problem is that he promised change and even the parts that were well within his control have failed.
1)More transparency such as putting health care reform documentation online before it was voted on OR even allowing the debates to be televised like everything else - Fail
2) Promising not to hire lobbyists for his cabinets lasted all of week.
This is not to say that he hasn't done some things correctly, but for most people living in the US his likability (which is very high) is staring to take a back seat to an honest evaluation of his accomplishments (which have been few because of his unability to organize his own party behind him) and that's why his popularity dips ever lower here. There's already backlash against at the level of elected officials and it's starting to look like the next round of elections wont be a fun one for the Democrats even this soon after Bush.
In addition: I was very specifically replying to this statement:
This agreement allowed intelligence agencies in the U.S. to secretly access banking information for all customers, including non-U.S. citizens.
.
This is very inaccurate at the minimum, or could - by less tolerant dudes then me - be construed as a whacked out conspiracy theory.
At the 'tax avoidance' or 'terrorist activity' level, and for inter-country cash transfers, SWIFT is definitely a mechanism that would be used by individuals
No it wouldn't. An individual might be part of a SWIFT message, but this is absolutiely not necessarily the case. This doesn't discount the fact that intercepting SWIFT may prove useful to intelligence outfits. But it is certainyl not so that SWIFT enables prying into actual bank accounts, which the original quote implied.
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
SWIFT messages contain destination bank account details. Anybody monitoring those messages can thus see any funds being transferred to specific bank accounts over the SWIFT network.
Although SWIFT itself isn't a clearing house, it's used by CHAPS, by TIPAnet, by others (I can't remember if SEPA use it) as a transport mechanism. Between those uses and foreign payments, SWIFT messages definitely contain person-to-person payment transactions.
Sure, they also contain company to company transactions, settlement transactions between clearing banks and clearing houses, and other payments, but that's like saying that all bittorrent traffic is legal because some of it is for Linux distros.
However, re-reading your initial message, I think I'm now in agreement with you. SWIFT wont track individuals as a customer, it's merely a transport mechanism over which some transactions will occur.
In that context, BACS is actually little different; the counterparty positions for BACS are at the financial institution or 'very large corporation' level, not at individual levels. But the counterparty positions can be derived within SWIFT if you're analysing all of the messages anyway (albeit by interpreting all of the payment requests, reversals, rejections and other traffic, which across the whole of SWIFT would require enough hardware to make me jealous).
I think you misread me.
0% income tax is good for individuals. If you can afford to live there.
http://www.globalpropertyguide.com/Europe/Monaco/Living-There
Note the residency requirements - deposit about $100,000 in a local bank.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
To be honest, I don't see why anyone should care. I certainly don't, because:
1. I'm not an American (though of course US policies are still of concern to me, as they are to anyone in the world).
2. Appearance is what matters for things such as diplomacy. Obama doesn't appear to have the village idiot image that Bush projected merely by stepping in front of the cameras. How he achieves this is up to him (and his staff).
3. Ultimately, what matters most are the actual policies, which are orthogonal to all this.
You have to be aware of that this treaty was a mutual spy upon you treaty. The US could not legally spy on the transactions of its own citizense but they could more or less spy upon the europeans, and vice versa, so what happens is that the data gets exchanged (all friend countries so why even doing some spying?) and then suddenly the US government has "YOUR" data (as well as all european governments and foreign agencies).
The USA doesn't have much call for "mutual spy upon" treaties anymore. The US gov't has been actively spying on it's own citizens for years now, and openly admitted to it, legal or not. They might not have the same access to ISPs and phone companies in the EU, but I'm sure active monitoring is fully implemented across Europe as well. I don't know what anyone can do about either situation. There's no real incentive for Americans not to spy.
There's been enough put out in the open (like confirming warrant-less wiretapping in the US) without seeing the legal or political consequences that are meant to prevent such things.
Since when is the US high tax or high unemployment?
Ever since it was turned into a socialist regime sometime around 2008 or 2009, I think. Or so I've heard, anyway.
How's Obama any different than Bush?
Bush was honest about what he believes.
Perhaps, but I find that doubtful. The primary thing that struck me about Bush was how amazingly long he went without admitting anything went wrong, even when it was clear that it did. It wasn't that he'd defend a course of action against negative information and critics, but rather that he'd talk about things going well. If we take the major example of justification for Iraq, I can concede that Bush believed Iraq had WMD and was a direct threat to the US. However, when it was clear how enormously wrong the WMD line was, his speeches smoothly morphed into "spreading freedom and democracy" and "fighting Al-Queda" without addressing, either vocally or administratively, that huge error.
I piss off bigots.
Obama currently fights an entirely different battle, Bush gave to him a basically fucked up country, not close to bankrupcy but with a serious debt problem, an pushing everything through is a problem because the entire parliament is just whores on the payroll of lobbyists anymore. So to get your agendas even remotely through you have to do some rearrangements with the current political situation. The situation of Bush was much easier because he just reigned for the payroll of the lobbyists and did not care about anything else.
I think this is an interesting time for the American Executive branch, as Mr. Obama follows a President who consolidated a lot of power in the office. Illustrated especially with the Health Care Reform process, I am starting to see this time in American politics as the age of Congress (Legislative branch). Mr. Obama is getting a hard time from many for not getting enough done after promising so much, but I don't see much of it as his responsibility. The job has a lot that falls under his responsibility, and the broad term of "leader" is definitely a major component.
However, he is a President not a Prime Minister, and so has much looser ties to Congress than the latter does with Parliament. As much as the public expects him to lead Congress, even the best shepherd will have trouble if his flock is, say, suffering from physically or mentally degenerative diseases. If the same political party has a massive majority in both the upper and lower houses, and STILL can't send finished bills off to the President to be signed into law, I see that as a major failing of Congress above and beyond anyone else. Mr. Obama is an easy political target as a result, but for the time being I think it's hurting the US to single him out. Whether or not Mr. Obama could be doing better, Congress DEFINITELY should be doing better, and I think public opinion and pundits alike should start targeting them as primary offenders.
Obama's agenda is all about claiming high ideals while brokering backroom deals to do whatever the fuck he wants to anyway.
He certainly disappointed on the wiretapping issue - caving even before being elected.
But from what I'm seeing its more of a case of being pushed back from his ideals.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't large portions of addressing the wiretapping issue take place in Congress, via mechanisms like Senate oversight committees, and so on? If the executive branch implemented a widespread and unconstitutional program that violates privacy rights of huge numbers of Americans, isn't this a matter of checks and balances? True, as the new President he could use the executive branch to work to undo what it is in the process of doing, but why does the expectation of change stop there?
1st, it's 1e5 Euro, not $
2nd, there's a profits tax at a rate rate of 33.33% (I have no idea how it is applied to individuals)
It was in his roll as a congressman that he caved on wiretapping. He signed off on a bill that attempted to legalize what had been happening.
He could, at the very least, have done nothing. But he actively supported the bill after earlier comments saying that the practice needed to be halted - not just given official blessing by congress.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
It was in his roll as a congressman that he caved on wiretapping. He signed off on a bill that attempted to legalize what had been happening.
He could, at the very least, have done nothing. But he actively supported the bill after earlier comments saying that the practice needed to be halted - not just given official blessing by congress.
The point isn't what role he's played, it's the responsibility others have (not in the role they played, but their present lack of action as a branch of the government) that are seemingly being ignored.
The point isn't what role he's played, it's the responsibility others have (not in the role they played, but their present lack of action as a branch of the government) that are seemingly being ignored.
Just because the other kids are jumping off the bridge doesn't mean he should too.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
You forgot the other complaint about the US, that we refuse to raise taxes so we just print more money.
The point isn't what role he's played, it's the responsibility others have (not in the role they played, but their present lack of action as a branch of the government) that are seemingly being ignored.
Just because the other kids are jumping off the bridge doesn't mean he should too.
Everyone sure is missing the point.
Everyone sure is missing the point.
No. I think you are missing the point. You want to argue that more people than just Obama have responsibility.
The point here is that in a subthread about Obama's responsibility, it is no surprise that Obama's responsibility is the topic of discussion.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Everyone sure is missing the point.
No. I think you are missing the point. You want to argue that more people than just Obama have responsibility.
The point here is that in a subthread about Obama's responsibility, it is no surprise that Obama's responsibility is the topic of discussion.
It seems that a sub-thread about the Presidents' responsibilities (Bush and Obama) is an appropriate place to suggest that Congress has its share. It's not about Obama vs other people, it's about blaming the President as an easy target. You yourself pointed out Obama's role in the problems of today when he was a member of Congress. In those days, Bush was blamed for things like the prolonged war in Iraq, when obviously it couldn't have played out the way it did without the aid of Congress.
The point isn't Obama at all, or Bush, or either political party. The point is that purely using whomever is President as a scape goat falls far short of addressing any problems the country is facing, when so much of it is facilitated or enabled by Congress. It's arguably redundant here to point out the President's role at all in such things, when it's already such a strong and obvious focus for American political pundits and public advocacy groups.
In this sub-sub-thread, I asked about Congressional roles in whatever oversight or investigation needs to be done to address the unconstitutionality of warrant-less wiretapping, and your response was pointing out Obama's complicit actions when he was in Congress, which seems to support my supposition that Congress has direct responsibility in this matter. However, I don't care which politicians were involved, or if they are now President. The issue is that Congress didn't stop it then, and they aren't doing anything to stop it now.
As you say, I'm arguing that more people than Obama (or more accurately, the person holding office as President) have responsibility. So far your responses to this have been 1) Obama did indeed share responsibility when he was in Congress, implying that Congressional responsibility exists here, and then 2) Obama shouldn't "jump off a bridge" if everyone else does, also implying that other people are participating in the same negative actions.
I say you missed the point because I'm not denying Obama's role in any of this, I'm pointing out his role is only part of it, and primarily it's the part that is targeted for blame. As he has and is playing a role, he deserves his share of blame, but singling him out as a figure head for Congressional failings as as wrong with this President as it was with the last President. Congress should be blamed for its failings, the President for his failings. It seems like the American political/media system hasn't figured out how to effectively do the former.
It seems that a sub-thread about the Presidents' responsibilities (Bush and Obama) is an appropriate place to suggest that Congress has its share.
To you it does. Got your original point, didn't care. tl;dr
When information is power, privacy is freedom.