The Devil You Say

John F. Kerry and his wife have millions in off-shore tax havens? That's the least surprising news story of the year.

7 comments:

  1. Ymar Sakar11:56 AM

    The rich stay rich because they are smart. Or their accountants are smart at least. They have a lot more ways to redistribute wealth from the poor, the disenfranchised, the powerless, and the stupid than those accounts though.

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  2. Well, in fairness, most of Kerry's money comes from extracting wealth from the poor by selling them delicious ketchup.

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  3. Also in fairness, I'd like to have millions in tax havens, too.

    I'd like to have millions. I'd like the US to be a tax haven, but off-shore is a suitable sub.

    A small quibble: most of Kerry's money comes from having married a woman (cis-gender sexist that he is), one of whose companies extracts wealth from the poor by selling them an adequate ketchup.

    Eric Hines

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  4. ColoComment11:52 AM

    I think it was Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit [or was it here?] who highly praised the ketchup served at Whataburger, now bottled for sale on amazon.com.
    I don't remember if it was the spicy or fancy, though. Not my deal, though: I've thrown out 1/2 full ketchup bottles when they've gone 'way over their sell-by date. There is actually a time past which ketchup is no longer edible (don't ask.)

    I see nothing amiss in wealthy people investing anywhere and anyhow they wish, so long as it's legal & they pay all requisite taxes. Were I wealthy, I'd do the same, so how can I criticize them? What good would it serve, whom would it help, for them to un-diversify geographically (I presume they're invested in U.S. markets, as well), thereby taking on higher risk, or earn less on their investments than possible (sacrificing higher ROI out of patriotism? GMAFB).

    "Any one may so arrange his affairs that his taxes shall be as low as possible; he is not bound to choose that pattern which will best pay the Treasury; there is not even a patriotic duty to increase one's taxes." Judge Learned Hand. Helvering v. Gregory, 69 F.2d 809, 810-11 (2d Cir. 1934).

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  5. Oh, it's not just an adequate ketchup. There's a reason there's no Grey Poupon in the ketchup market.

    Strait-jacketed, establishment thinking. My favorite ketchup is KC Masterpiece BBQ Sauce Original. All ketchups are, at best, adequate.

    Eric Hines

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  6. It's true that most barbecue sauces are no better than ketchup. Except Georgian barbecue sauces, of course.

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