These 2 sub-sections deal with the detention of terrorism suspects.  The NDAA grants the president the authority to detain anyone, “who was part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners,” or anyone who commits a “belligerent act” against the U.S. or its allies, “without trial, until the end of the hostilities granted by the authorization for use of military force.”

The big controversy here is that the 2012 NDAA gives the president the authority to indefinitely detain American citizens without trial or even any proof of wrongdoing.  Go back and reread the previous paragraph and piece the puzzle together.

The president now has the power to use military force to detain American citizens indefinitely without trial for committing a “belligerent act”.  If I could embed a music file here it would be – “dom, dom, dom…”

Folks, wake up and smell the gun powder.  The United States of America is rapidly becoming the United Socialist States of Amerika.  Yes, I am well aware this is not a popular viewpoint and am 100% certain there will be lots of hate mail and notifications of un-subscribers in my inbox Thursday afternoon.

For many of you though, I am certain you are gradually (or possibly rapidly) awakening to the reality.  While I don’t agree with the OWS crowd, they are right to be angry with the current state of affairs in the US.

Some people claim the right thing is to stay and fight the good fight.  My question to you is how long will that take?  Are you willing to wait 5 years?  10?  30?  More power to ya…

We could also discuss the new FATCA (foreign account tax compliance act) that takes effect in 2013.  This little gem was slipped in to the HIRE (hiring incentives to restore employment) act as a means to track down and punish offshore tax cheats.

In reality it was created to shackle you and your money to a broke nation run by politicians who have no intellectual ability or desire to maintain sound fiscal policies.

If you are unfamiliar with the details, you can read my article over on EscapeWealth to learn more.

Essentially though what you need to know is this piece of legislation is going to make it much more difficult and costly for you to bank, invest, or do business offshore.

These laws are created for the sole purpose of controlling the citizenry; controlling your movement, your capital, and ultimately your tax dollars.  Ironically the unintended consequences will produce the exact opposite effect.

Obviously there will be many sheeple that remain holding fast to the belief that the ship can be righted, but the most productive citizens will move some or all of their business and investment assets to a friendlier environment.  Some will even move their own ass to a friendlier environment.

This will only serve to increase the velocity of the downward spiral.  Over the past couple of years the number of people moving out of the US has increased dramatically – even according the US Dept. of State’s own records.  While this number still remains relatively low, it only takes a few of the next Steve Jobs’, Bill Gates’, or Sam Walton’s to have a huge impact on the economy.

How would the current business landscape look if only these 3 visionaries were born in Sweden or Australia?  Would the US still have a dominant world position?

I’ve spent the last several days on a road trip through several Eastern European countries.  I’ve been in Lithuania, Ukraine, Serbia and now Bulgaria.  Tonight I had dinner at an amazing traditional Bulgarian restaurant and the tab for a 3 course meal for 5 came to be a whopping $34, including service charge.  The same mean in Austin, TX would have been over $100, minimum.

The income tax rate is a flat 10% and you can earn 8% on a 12 month CD at a major bank.  Sofia is a very nice city and there are beautiful mountains with great skiing nearby as well as exceptional beaches on the Black Sea just a few hours away.

Tomorrow I will be in Hungary for a few days then on to Poland.  With the exception of Ukraine, I could easily live very well in any of these countries.  Ironically many of these are former soviet countries with long histories of communism but they have somehow broken away from that mold while the western world is falling into the same trap they escaped from.

I am not proposing that you pack up and move to Bulgaria or Serbia per se, but you may want to consider finding your own perfect haven sooner rather than later.

With US politicians bankrupting the country, inflation driving up the cost of living and some of the highest tax rates in the world (at least for producers), now may be the ideal time to craft your own ‘Global Escape Hatch’.

This week I felt it would be important to address the topic, “What is Asset Protection?”  While you clearly have some idea what is involved in asset protection planning, I frequently get this question or some derivation thereof.

The quick and simple answer is that asset protection is a means of protecting your assets from future potential creditors or claimants.  From this perspective, a better definition may be that asset protection is a systemic approach to pre-litigation planning to deter lawsuits and encourage out-of-court settlements.

Another explanation may be that asset protection planning involves minimizing your personal and financial risks.  At Global Wealth Protection, we accomplish this with a 2 step process;

1. Create a veil of privacy for you and your assets
2. Create legal structures to segregate you from your assets while maintaining maximum control

By doing these 2 steps, we have accomplished the goal of making you appear unattractive to potential future creditors and claimants as well as provided you with the legal protections for those assets in the event that your veil of privacy is pierced.

Of course many people believe that they are not a target for litigation.  I have talked to enough people (read about  Susan and Frank – “Oh Good, the Government is Here to Help”), to know that lawsuits can come from nearly any source; tenants, credit card companies, friends, family, neighbors, contractors, coworkers, employers, employees, customers, and the list goes on and on.

There are many tools that can be used in asset protection planning.  One of the most basic tools is a Wyoming Limited Liability company (LLC).  A properly structured Wyoming LLC can offer you privacy (ownership is not disclosed to the state) and legal protections (Wyoming does not allow foreclosure of business assets) for your real estate, investment portfolios, private business interests, intellectual property, or nearly any other category of valuable asset.

Land trusts when combined with one or more Wyoming LLC’s can also be a very cost effective structure for protecting your real estate assets.  I work with many real estate investors who like this method as it offers them complete anonymity as well as legal asset protection from potential creditors.

I wrote a newsletter a couple of weeks ago titled, “Protect Your Assets Like the Uber-Rich” that addressed the specific topic of real estate asset protection.  After writing this article I had a couple of calls from friends of mine who are real estate investment professionals.  One has been in the business for over 10 years and another for over 30 years and both of them said this was the only method they use for protecting their real estate assets.

I am a firm believer in diversification of your assets among various investment categories as well as geographical diversification, or what I call ‘geo-arbitrage’.  This is effectively a ‘don’t put your eggs in one basket’ strategy from a global viewpoint.  I highly encourage clients to implement an offshore strategy as part of their asset protection planning.

At a minimum, clients should have an offshore bank account with some funds set aside for a rainy day.  You can grow your offshore presence with precious metals storage, brokerage accounts, or even managed accounts for the wealthier individuals.  The offshore world is the ideal scenario for web-based entrepreneurs.

For our online entrepreneur clients, we typically help them establish a Seychelles or Belize offshore company, offshore bank account, and offshore merchant account.  This gives online entrepreneurs an excellent opportunity to diversify geographically as well as lower his cost of doing business.

For those of you not up to date on US news, the FATCA requirements that are part of the HIRE act will make it much more difficult to set up and maintain offshore bank accounts and investments after 2013.  You have a very short window of opportunity to escape the draconian reporting and withholding requirements and establish your own offshore asset protection plan.

For those of you interested in developing your own private offshore asset protection plan, I can work with you one-on-one to formulate a strategy that works for your specific situation.

I will summarize by saying the 2 biggest mistakes people make are; 1- assuming they aren’t wealthy enough to need asset protection planning, and 2- waiting until it’s too late.

If you have a level of wealth that you cannot afford to lose, you need to minimize your risk.  And you need to do it before you have already been sued.  It will be much easier and cheaper to do it before it becomes necessary.

Call today to schedule your free 30 minute asset protection consultation.  Until next week, live well.

Now is the Time to Develop your own Asset Protection Plan Before it’s too Late

This week I want to stress the importance of developing your own asset protection plan now as opposed to later when it can potentially be too late.  In last week’s article, “Svetlana Takes Victor to the Cleaners”, we discussed Victor’s problems and how they could have been avoided if he had set the structure in place before his divorce.

For the past couple of days, I have been working with 2 clients who also wished they had a properly structured asset protection plan in place before they were sued.  I won’t get into the details, but Susan and Frank now have a $1.4M judgment against them in relation to a real estate deal that unexpectedly went bad.

I got the call earlier this week from Susan who explained the issues to me.  Basically there were some major, undisclosed problems with the property as well as partnership issues.  This lead to a default and foreclosure on the property giving them a total loss of several hundred thousand dollars.

Now Susan and Frank are looking at a $1.4M judgment which will completely bankrupt them both.  They had been working with lawyers who misguided them through this process and gave them bad advice.  Of course the lawyers can walk away happily with their fees while Susan and Frank are looking at financial destruction.

All hope is not lost here as we are working on an asset protection plan to help them salvage some of their wealth, but this would have been much easier, cheaper, and less risky had it been done one year ago.  Of course one year ago, Susan and Frank thought they were operating risk free.  Are you operating risk free?  Are you sure?

Of course potential future litigation is but one threat to your wealth.  In reality, the government is most likely your biggest threat.

Just this week, an article by Federal News Radio titled, “Library of Congress to Receive Entire Twitter Archive” was published discussing Twitter’s decision to release all old Tweets from all public users.

The privacy of the American people is rapidly deteriorating.  From last week’s article you may remember that the Senate recently passed a bill allowing the military to detain and imprison American citizens both in the US and abroad without trial for ‘suspicious activity’.

Now the Federal government is going to be privy to all of your Tweets including all of the previous years’ messages.  At what point does this madness end?

Much like the ‘war on drugs’ and the ‘war on terror’, these new measures are sold to the public with the message of protection of the American people.  In reality, it is nothing more than another power grab meant to criminalize normal behavior allowing the government to enslave and impoverish the American people while the ruling class (politicians) gets to live high on the hog.

This destruction of privacy allows the government another way to tap into your private and business communications looking for signs of ‘suspicious’ activity.  Quite frankly, if you follow me on Twitter (@gwpro) you have read articles about offshore banking, offshore companies, tax minimization and other topics that could already be construed as ‘suspicious activity’.

Considering the vagueness of the ‘destruction of privacy agenda’, who’s to say that you aren’t already being watched?  Normally I try to be positive and optimistic about the future, but this news story about Twitter really scares me.

I hope you don’t just dismiss this and think, “Oh good, the government is here to help”.  Now is the time to develop your own offshore asset protection plan.  At a minimum, you need to have an offshore bank account.  This would allow you to keep a portion of your cash outside the reach of US jurisdiction.

Consider this your starter kit towards developing your own ‘Escape Hatch’.  If you are unaware, you should know that under the Patriot Act, the government has the ability to freeze all of your US bank accounts without due process or even charging you with a crime for nothing more than ‘suspicious activity’.

Of course, it’s highly unlikely that any of you would have concern over this, but it only takes one wrong move and voila, you lose access to your money.  Considering there is no downside to having an offshore bank account, this is an easy low-cost way to begin your own offshore asset protection plan.

Contact us today to schedule your free 30 minute asset protection consultation

Living in Eastern Europe, I am somewhat sheltered from this, but with Facebook and all of the news outlets it’s impossible to avoid the implications of what’s going on with this movement.

The OWS movement reminds me of a scene from the movie ‘Network’ starring Peter Finch where he plays the role of network anchorman, presumably modeled after Walter Cronkite.  Click here to watch the scene.

Finch repeatedly says, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore”.  This was during the ‘70’s when the US was suffering from a recession, high inflation, high gas prices, and record high unemployment.  Sound familiar.

Today is a different world though.  We live in the age of Facebook, Twitter, text messaging and blogs.  We have reached a point of worldwide group consciousness never before seen in the history of mankind.

You can’t even burp in public anymore without someone recording the video on their iPhone, uploading it to YouTube and then sharing it with their 730 Facebook friends within seconds.

Some people believe the revolutions in Egypt and Libya wouldn’t have happened if it weren’t for social media.  I tend to agree.  It provided a virtual medium for people to organize and plan for their civil (and sometimes not so civil) disobedience.

I personally have been dismissing the OWS movement as a bunch of ignorant, lazy, out of work 20 something hippies who don’t understand how the world works.  To some extent, this is the case.

But admittedly, I have been wrong to dismiss this movement as short term hippie protest against capitalism.  I feel the anger is misplaced toward Wall Street and the majority of the blame lies in Washington.  I would feel a bit better if it were labeled, ‘Occupy DC’, but regardless there is merit to their protests, and it shouldn’t be dismissed.

People are angry with the current state of affairs, and rightly so.  Maybe they don’t understand the underlying causes of the ongoing economic crisis, but nonetheless they have the right to be disenchanted with the way things are being handled.

I am sure many of you (if not all) agree that something is just not right today with the world.  There is something out of sync.

We are angry that our elected officials have no fiscal responsibility and continue to rack up government debt that will drag down American productivity and decrease the quality of life for generations to come.

We are angry that huge corporations that fund political parties are not allowed to go bankrupt while our businesses suffer in the downturn.  We are angry that our neighbor stopped paying his mortgage 2 years ago but still lives happily in his house while we continue to pay a mortgage payment on a house that is worth half of what we owe on it.

We are angry that big corporations have record amounts of cash on their balance sheets, but still refuse to hire.  We are angry that the US seems to be turning into a fascist police state robbing you and me of our personal freedoms.  We are angry that we used to have great 6-figure jobs and now have to work 2-3 shit jobs just to make ends meet.

We are angry that old ladies and children are subjected to intrusive pat downs by bullying TSA agents when they want to fly cross country and visit family.  We are angry that politicians get to vote on the citizens’ healthcare and social insurance plans while they get to opt out in favor of much more lucrative plans for themselves.

We are angry when we go fill up our gas tanks for $90 and then read about the subsidies the oil companies receive.  We are angry when we hear stories about companies like Halliburton who received billions in government contracts that were never put up for public bid – especially when we know the former US Vice President was also the former CEO of Halliburton.

Clearly I could go on and on.  There is much to be angry about today.

The potential exists for the OWS movement to be the beginning of a US revolution.  Not in the sense that the people take up arms and storm the White House, but in the economic sense that people are fed up with the system and they stop feeding the beast.

This is essentially what has been happening in Greece over the past few decades.  Greece has a long history of stupid government.  In 1922 the Greek finance minister declared that each drachma would be cut in half and the balance of value would be replaced by 20 year bonds paying a 6.5% coupon.

Imagine you had 10k drachma in your bank account in 1922 and the next day you have 5k drachma and a 5k bond paying 6.5% interest for 20 years.  On the surface this sounds ok, but in reality the Greek government paid the coupon payments for a few more years then defaulted on the bonds.

Between 1940-1944, Greece re-denominated the drachma several times and created inflation that amounted to 160,000,000,000% during that period.  As you may imagine, the people developed a severe distrust for the Greek government.

It’s not hard to understand why so many Greek business people ran the majority of their businesses in the ‘black market’ and outside of the watching eyes of the incompetent policymakers.  Effectively the Greeks decided to stop feeding the beast.

They said, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore”.

What comes next though is critically important.

What do you intend to do about it?

Do you plan to join the OWS crowd all across America and hold up signs protesting your anger?  Do you plan to build a bunker under your house and stock it with water, can foods, gold, guns and ammo?

Or do you plan to protect the wealth you currently have and position yourself to profit from the market inefficiencies that are abundant today?

Obviously I am a big believer in proper asset protection planning.  It is critically important to create a veil of privacy around your assets to keep the wolves at bay.  A properly structured asset protection plan consists of limited liability companies (LLC), limited partnerships (LP or FLP), and asset protection trusts or living trusts to ensure your estate can pass on to your heirs without government interference.

I am also a big believer in providing value.  Is your skill set sufficient for the globalized job market?  Maybe you can learn a new language, get your master’s degree, learn how to write html code, learn to build wordpress sites, become proficient in options trading, or educate yourself on reading financial statements.  The options for improvement are virtually endless.  But sitting on your laurels does nothing to improve your own situation.

I recently talked with a friend of mine who saw a significant downturn in his business, so instead of whining and complaining then collected unemployment, he researched the job market.  What he found was that in a certain part of the country the job market was booming due to recent oil and natural gas exploration.  He packed up the car, moved there and got a blue collar job making about $80k per year.

Another friend who runs several different web stores went on a buying spree picking up website businesses selling for 1X profit.  Yes, 1X profit.  Sometimes even less.

I’ve got a couple of friends who have been buying up houses in a couple of specific markets for less than 50% of their sales price just 3 years ago.  They are buying only newer houses, renting them out, and selling them as investment property to investors around the world.  Then they do the property management on the backend.

Even my 15 year old daughter has taken it upon herself (sorry, I’m a proud papa) to leverage her skills into freelance work.  She recently started taking jobs on Odesk writing and promoting a couple of fashion blogs.  This is work she can do from anywhere in the world, it’s completely virtual.

There are thousands of available jobs on sites like Odesk or Elance and many people make their living doing various types of freelance work.  For those of you looking for higher paying jobs, a quick search on ExecuNet showed thousands of available jobs both in the US and abroad paying well into the 6 figure range.

The point is that there is opportunity everywhere.  In the ‘70s after the stock market crashed the majority of passive investors fled the equities markets.  But many people built great wealth buying at that time.

I’ve said it many times, but where turmoil exists, opportunity persists.  Personally I’d rather profit from the crisis instead of stock my bunker.

In last week’s asset protection newsletter titled, “I’m Buying Call Options on Entrepreneurship”, I discussed my bullishness on the innovation and creativity of the entrepreneur despite the stupidity of governments in the US and around the world.

The second paragraph of this article states;

The world truly revolves around entrepreneurship.  You are the dreamers, visionaries and ultimately the creators of economic growth and prosperity.  You are then ones responsible for constantly improving the welfare of the billions of inhabitants on this planet.

Yesterday evening, one of the world’s greatest entrepreneurs died after having battled cancer for the past several years of his life.  Steve Jobs’ name was virtually synonymous with entrepreneur during his lifetime.

Jobs cofounded Apple in the late ‘70’s only to be ousted by the CEO and board he hired several years later.  Approximately 10 years later, Jobs regained the reigns of Apple and brought the world a string of innovative products like the iMac, iPod, iPhone, and most recently, the iPad.

Early in his career he was considered the rogue underdog, but went on to become the tech CEO powerhouse building the 2^nd most valuable company in the world, behind Exxon-Mobile.  The last 10 years of his life could be considered as his most productive years where he continued to impact the world in a big way up until his death yesterday.

Here are a few of my favorite quotes from Jobs;

• “Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to…love what you do. – Your time is limited. Don’t waste it living someone else’s life”
• “You’ve got to find what you love… the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it.”
• “Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking that you have something to lose.”

The man truly embodied the spirit of passion, perseverance and an unwavering commitment to his own ideals.  Is there any doubt he was passionate about his life and his work?  Bravo to a living an extraordinary life Steve.

Steve Jobs is the modern day, real life equivalent to one of my all time favorite novel characters.  Howard Roark is the unyielding, visionary architect hero from the novel, “The Fountainhead” by Ayn Rand.”

While “The Fountainhead” may have been written nearly 70 years ago, it is more popular today than when it was originally published.  The hero, Howard Roark is an architect who wanted to build things in exactly his own way.  He was completely unwilling to yield to the whims of bosses, regulators, friends, family or even the university where he was studying architecture.

The book even begins with his dismissal from school because of his unwillingness to conform to the norms of the day in regards to architectural design.  He was brash, arrogant, not very personable, volatile, and difficult to work with.

He was also very passionate about his work, exceptionally brilliant, and built things that improved the lives of many.  Sounds just like Steve Jobs to me.

How about you?  Are you passionate about your life’s work?  Are you making a difference in someone’s life?  Are you providing value to the world?

I am not suggesting that we all strive to become the next Steve Jobs.  That would certainly be a tough act to follow.

In spirit however, we should all live our lives with a similar level of passion and an unwillingness to sacrifice our own ideals for the sake of something or someone else.

Personally I value individual creativity, productivity and the power of capitalism as the growth driver of the world economic engine.  I chose asset protection planning as a means to help entrepreneurs and investors their keep money and assets where they are most productive – in their own hands as opposed to the hands of the parasites that now seem to flourish around the world.

Additionally, personal freedom and adventure are ideals that I value highly.  What are your values?  Are you living them every day?

For those of you that have been reading my articles for any length of time, you should be aware by now that I am an ‘equal opportunity political hater’.  I am happy to rant on the stupidity of Mit Romney’s socialized healthcare plan, GW Bush’s destruction of privacy, or Barry O’s massive growth of the public sector.

Apparently last week’s newsletter struck a chord with folks.  I received the largest amount of hate mail ever.  When going through my email box, I felt like Tiger Woods’ personal assistant after he was busted for playing on the wrong green(s).

Below are a few of the responses I received (viewer discretion advised):

• I don’t care for snarky, smart a$$ed, know-it-all email assessments of others by a$$holes intent on separating me from my assets.  Take me off your f*****g email list.
• You are a naïve simpleton
• It’s all BS including you with the scare tactics. Remove me from your list.
• I’ve read your garbage email… If you don’t like what’s happening to our country.. Get The Hell Out!!!
• Rubbish!
• Do not contact me again ever!  F*****g dirty rotten c**t!

In addition, I received a record number of people unsubscribing from my email list.  To those that unsubscribed or took the time to send me hate mail I say, “Thanks you”.

I know I am doing something right when the vitriol runs so deep.

A few other emails (I deleted most of them) stated that I should not be so disrespectful to the President of the United States.  My response is that respect is earned, not granted through a position of power.  No one is owed my respect (or yours) without first earning it.

This week the leader of the free world has unveiled his plan to cut the national debt by $3T over the next 10 years.  A big part of that plan involves increasing the taxes on those that earn over $1M per year.

If he would just learn by the example set by a few of the states, he would realize that increasing tax rates on the wealthy only decreases tax revenue.  Just ask MD, NY, IL and OR.

Or just ask Vladimir Putin about how tax revenue soared in 2001 when the high progressive tax system was replaced with a low flat tax of 13%.  Russia’s GDP grew by 5% the next year and tax revenue increased over 25%.

It seems Keynes has been resurrected and now sits on Obama’s advisory board.  His economic policy is firmly planted in the short term and focused on the government’s ability to solve its people’s problems.

Keynes once famously stated, “In the long run we are all dead.”  While he was certainly correct, the fallacy of this thinking is that the long run does matter eventually.

In the past 50 years the US has only seen an annual budget surplus 5 times.  That means we have been pyramiding debt for 45 years.  Imagine how your finances would look if you spent more than you made in 9 out of every 10 years.

Bloomberg recently reported on an audit of the US Justice department spending habits for conferences held between 2008 and 2009.  In 2008 the bill rang up to $47.8M.  In 2009 it ballooned over 53% to $73.3M.  During these conferences they were buying muffins for $16 apiece and beef Wellington appetizers at a cost of $7.32 per serving.

At the conference of the Office on Violence Against Women, one of the breaks consisted of Cracker Jacks, popcorn and candy bars.  The cost was $32 per person.

Keep in mind our government was burning through cash buying $16 muffins and $32 candy during the deepest recession since the Great Depression.

Another interesting story that arose this week was the bankruptcy of Solyndra.  Solyndra is a solar panel manufacturer based in CA.  Two years ago Obama granted the company low cost government guaranteed loans in the amount of $535M.

The idea was to create 1,000 new jobs and move the country towards energy independence.  If my math is correct, these jobs came at a cost of $267,500 ($535M / 1000 jobs / 2 years).

Solar energy companies are only in business because governments are subsidizing their existence.  If there were no subsidies available, there wouldn’t be one single solar panel in the world.  It is just not economically viable.

Ironically one of the Obamessiah’s biggest supporters, billionaire George Kaiser, owns 35% of Solyndra.  Coincidence?  You be the judge.

All I know is that most entrepreneurs spend considerably less than $267,500 to create new jobs.  When government involves itself in business, it has the nasty habit of misallocating capital.  Do keep in mind that taxpayers are actually the ones who are paying this bill although Obama was the one who made the decision.  Did you vote for that?

We all know that economies move in cycles.  The problem with governments is how they chose to deal with these cycles.  Of course in my view they should just stay out of the way, but that is not a realistic solution.

The second best option would be to adopt a counter cyclical economic policy.  Basically what this means is that in good times when the economy is booming and tax revenues are high, governments should save for a rainy day.

This way when the economy reaches its low points, this cash can be used to stimulate with infrastructure projects and incentives for businesses.

The opposite of the counter cyclical economic policy would be to adopt a pro cyclical policy.  This means when the economy is booming, the government spends every last penny (and then some) to ride the wave.

Of course when the economy turns down, the government’s coffers are much lower due to lower tax revenues.  This only exacerbates the highs and the lows of the economic cycles making them much higher and then much lower.

The biggest problem with idiotic politicians is they tend to be pro cyclical when the economy is good (spending every last penny and then some), and counter cyclical when the economy is bad (spending in an effort to stimulate).

Guess what folks?  You cannot have your cake and eat it too.  At some point you have to either pay back your debts, or default.  And neither solution is good.

Earlier today I was having a spirited debate with a friend of mine – let’s call him Mike.  Mike is a successful small business owner who is firmly planted in the middle income class.  He is a great guy and a very hard worker.

Today he wanted to make the point that he agrees with Obama’s idea to increase the tax burden on those earning over $1m per year.  My argument is that this tax is utterly useless as the very high earners employ armies of accountants and lawyers to minimize their tax burden.

The legislation does nothing but complicates an overly complex tax code and gives the administration an excuse to hire more IRS agents and buy more guns.

Right now Americans already spend over 7B hours per year doing their taxes.  Quick math tells me we have spend an average of nearly 24 hours for every man, woman and child doing tax returns.

For an average person who makes $50,000 per year and works a 40 hour workweek, this means your cost of compliance amounts to $600.  But keep in mind, the cost is 24 hours for every man woman and child.  So if you prepare the tax returns for your family of 4, your cost is now $2400.

I am well aware many of you will say that you don’t really spend this much time completing tax returns.  I also know there are many of you that say this is a very low estimate.  But on average, IRS compliance now costs each American about $600 per year.

I told Mike earlier today that the US economy has now reached a point of no return.  He chastised me a bit for leaving the country, but I told him I didn’t want to be on the ship when it hits an iceberg.

For me, internationalizing my life was the right thing to do.  Minimizing my risks through proper asset protection planning, diversifying assets outside of the country and creating a veil of privacy are all things anyone should consider.

What are you doing to protect yourself and position for prosperity in the future?
Call today to schedule your free 30 minute asset protection consultation.  Until next week, live extraordinary.

For those of you not inclined to read the musings of Barry O and his legal minions, let me summarize his $447B plan for you.

• Cutting the payroll tax for employees and 98% of businesses
• Payroll tax holiday for adding workers or increasing wages for small businesses
• Expanding the SBA backed loan limits
• Tax credits for hiring unemployed veterans
• State funding for preventing layoffs, modernizing schools, improving infrastructure, and expanding broadband access
• Extending unemployment benefits
• Tax credits for hiring long-term unemployed workers
• Mortgage refinance programs
• Fully paid for by the President’s long term deficit reduction program

Well folks, doesn’t that make everyone feel better?  The Obamessiah rode in on his white stallion to save the day.  We are lucky to have him…

I don’t want to go into all of the details since you can find that on the site mentioned above or on any number of other news sites, but there are many fallacies in his logic here.

For example, $35B is targeted towards saving the jobs of 280,000 teachers.  Simple math tells me that taxpayers are paying $125,000 for every teacher job saved.  While I certainly value the work that teachers do, the price seems a bit high.

Another point of interest is the President’s plan to cut payroll taxes in half.  Considering that the Social Security Administration is now paying out more in benefits than it collects in revenue, does it really make sense for the President to propose a plan to cut its primary revenue source in half?

Based on the average estimate of several top economists, the jobs plan will create about 1.4M jobs.  Again, my simple math tells me this comes out to be over $300,000 per job.  Considering the median income in the US hovers around $40,000, where is the remaining $260,000 going to end up?

As I review the Obamessiah’s jobs plan, the thought that keeps sticking in the back of my mind is, “This is like putting a band-aid on a bullet hole.”

The US, as well as the rest of the modern world, is bleeding.  The bloodshed is coming from unscrupulous politicians looking to save their own asses and the asses of their campaign donors.  The free money era is coming to an end ladies and gentlemen.

Do you really think it’s a coincidence that Barry O proposes a jobs plan aimed directly at the middle class with one year left before the presidential election?  He is trying to buy political goodwill with the weak minded masses.

I am all for tax cuts and helping small businesses, but every proposal by this administration just increases the amount of red tape and thus the size of government.  Sure, it sounds nice to give tax credits and payroll tax cuts to small business, but who do you think is going to regulate this?

Voila, looks like the IRS is hiring again.  In addition, small business owners are now going to have to hire more accountants and lawyers to maintain compliance which increases their own cost of doing business.

Maybe I’m a naïve simpleton, but why not give a tax holiday for repatriating offshore profits held by US companies?  There is over $1.2T in profits held by US companies in offshore entities that will remain there as long as the US penalizes companies for creating efficient structures to compete globally.

Of course a big argument here is that the big corporations won’t actually use this money to hire new workers, but instead give it back to shareholders in the form of dividends or share buybacks.

My view is that even if corporations refuse to use this money to hire one single worker and use the money instead for shareholder enrichment, they would now feel richer and spend money more freely.  This would create an increase in consumption and companies would then need to hire anyway to meet demand.

But again, maybe my simple mind just doesn’t understand the way the world works.

Here’s another idea for the government – get the hell out of the way.  Eliminate agencies and departments that offer no increases in economic productivity and completely revamp the tax code.

In business, you want to create incentives for your workers to do the right things.  You pay operational people incentives based on profitability, you pay sales people incentives based on sales, you pay production people incentives based on productivity, and so on.

If you want to provide the right incentives as a nation, you need to start with a tax code that provides the right motivation.  Right now the tax code is so overly complex, it effectively makes all of us criminals by default.  It is virtually impossible to be 100% tax compliant.  Read Barry O’s jobs plan and you will see what I mean.

America became the world’s superpower because it was an innovative place where people could come and be free to run their businesses as they chose and not be restricted by oppressive government regimes.

America has now become what it was originally rebelling against.

We need to start at the foundation with a tax code that provides the right incentives.  A consumption based tax in the form of a national sales tax used alone or in conjunction with a low flat tax would immediately put this country back on the  path to prosperity.

I would propose either a national sales tax of 25% alone, or a 15% sales tax in addition to a 10% personal income tax.  Eliminate the corporate income tax, capital gains tax, investment income tax, death tax, and nearly every other tax that we probably aren’t even aware of.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh, ok – back to reality.  That was good to get off my chest.  But we all know the likelihood of this utopia becoming a reality is nil.

I would encourage you all to assess your own personal situation.  Are you well positioned for the world in the ‘Great Reset’?   Do you have the skills necessary to thrive in today’s economy?  Are you living the life you dreamed of as a kid?

Today is the day to take responsibility for your life.  Sure, I rant about governments and stupid politicians every week, but I am a firm believer in using this knowledge to improve your life and increase your wealth.

The quality of your life depends on how you react to what the world throws at you.  Are you living life on your terms?

Call today to schedule your free 30 minute asset protection consultation.  Until next week, live extraordinary.

Greg is a California entrepreneur who runs a very successful company.  He also has a very unique perspective on life and one of the few people I know that truly lives his passions every day.  Needless to say, I respect his opinion.  I called him because I wanted to know what his thoughts were on my recent email campaigns.

He told me that the promotional emails were not consistent with my ‘voice’.  He is a regular reader of my weekly newsletter and enjoyed hearing my viewpoint on various topics.  He was even so kind as to say my newsletters were intellectually challenging (although I probably misunderstood him and he just meant I was intellectually challenged…). 

I must admit, I agree with him 100%.  For this, I want to apologize to you, my readers.  These emails are a bit spammy and not consistent with my regular message.  As a fallible human, I am capable of mistakes.  This was one of them.  Oh well, life goes on.

As a lifelong capitalist pig, I unapologetically like to make money.  I do not adhere to the social entrepreneurship mantra that seems to be prevalent today, unless of course it makes more money.

The purpose of my newsletter is to enlighten you about current world events and economic situations that can affect your wealth and your lifestyle.  My goal is to provide value to you each and every week.  If I am accomplishing that goal, please let me know.  If not, also let me know what you want to see more of.

Informing you about things like the worldwide debt crisis, capital controls, invasive tax policies, threats to your privacy, and constantly berating the current president (and the next one as well), are my job.

I am also an eternal optimist.  I like to see the brighter side of life.  The glass is half full, yadda yadda yadda.  Because of this, I also want to make you aware of certain opportunities.

So while I do like writing this free weekly newsletter, I also enjoy eating and living indoors.  In order to do that, making money is a priority, and fun to boot.

Asset protection planning is the core of my business.  I work with clients, like many of you, forming US and offshore entities, setting up trusts and foundations, making offshore bank introductions, and helping you to minimize the risks that are so abundant today.

In addition to the fees I earn as an advisor, I also earn money by promoting products from companies that I trust.  You have my commitment that I will not promote products I have not personally vetted.

The recent campaign promoting the “Cash Flow Trading System” comes from a company owned by a friend of mine.  He is one of the brightest entrepreneurs I know.  His company goes out and searches for hedge fund managers and traders who have a 5-10+ year track record of verifiable success.

He then helps them publish their research.  My friend has a gift of finding amazingly talented traders.  He is also a marketing genius.  While his sales copy is bit spammy, the underlying product is very good quality.

I will continue to offer products to my readers via email, however going forward I will provide a brief introduction from me to alert you the following message is from a partner.  This way you can quickly delete any message that does not appeal to you.

I am committed to providing you with useful, actionable information that can potentially improve your quality of life.  I make no apologies for earning a living though.

On the topic of actionable information that can improve your life…

Moody’s just this week downgraded Japan from Aa2 to Aa3.  As I have stated in previous newsletters, nearly every major country in the world is broke.  The past few decades have been an experiment in fiat currency which gives countries around the world the ability to print money with no asset value backstop.

Up until August 15, 1971 the US dollar was convertible into gold.  At that time President Nixon temporarily suspended the ability for anyone to convert their dollars into gold.  During this time, world currencies traded at a set price against the US dollar.  The dollar was exchangeable for gold, giving the US dollar the world reserve currency status.  It also meant that every world currency has a fixed value in gold.

Without any asset backing for world currencies, we are at the mercy of politicians to be honest, ethical stewards of our nations (I nearly choked just typing that).  The past 40 years have allowed policy makers to over spend using their country’s treasury as their own personal piggybank.

They have lined their pockets and the fattened the wallets of their political contributors effectively creating an aristocracy that is legally allowed to feed off of the productive members of society through manipulation of monetary policy.

It seems this party is now coming to an end.  With Europe in financial shambles and many of the EU member states already getting downgrades, the US getting downgraded, and now Japan, even the ratings agencies are finally catching on.  Ironically it seems that most of the ratings agencies change their debt ratings months, or even years, too late.

While I consider S&P guilty of procrastination (read my article, ‘Where Turmoil Exists, Opportunity Persists’) with their downgrade of US debt, I find it rather ironic that Deven Sharma, the CEO of S&P, has been fired this week by the board for…wait for it…telling the truth.

Even more amusing though is that his replacement is none other than Douglas Peterson, COO of Citibank.  Let that sink in for a minute.  Go ahead, I will wait…

Yes sir folks, the new CEO of S&P is none other than the COO of Citibank, one of the biggest recipients of bailout funds.  Citi received a direct injection of $45B as well as $301B of bad loan

Regardless, I have several things to discuss with you so here goes.

The past week has been one of the busiest weeks of my life. We launched our new asset protection product, the Wealth Fortress Trust©, and haven’t even had time to put it up on the website. To be honest, I’m not sure I even want to list it on the site, due to privacy concerns.

It’s a very interesting hybrid product that I have never seen anywhere else. Due to the weaknesses of various other entities like FLP’s, LLC’s, corporations and trusts, we created this structure that combines the best attributes of all of the above without the weaknesses.

I have been completely overwhelmed by the number of emails and calls received since discussing this last week. If you have sent me an email or left a message, I will get back to you. Please be patient.

To answer some questions and summarize the highlights of the Wealth Fortress Trust©, here are a few of the details;
• It is a US based structure
• Offers complete anonymity
• Your name is not registered in any public record
• You retain complete control of the underlying asset
• Provides bulletproof asset protection from potential future creditors
• Low cost structure with minimal annual maintenance requirements
This product is perfect for;
• Investment real estate
• Segregation of your operating business from the real estate (if you own your building)
• Investment or trading accounts
• Large cash, or cash equivalent accounts
• Owing shares or membership interest of privately held companies
• Private investment partnerships
• High value business assets like equipment and machinery
If this appeals to you, please forward me an email with your name, number and your availability and we can schedule a call to discuss your asset protection needs.

In addition to this, I have been working diligently on producing the July issue of our EscapeWealth Ezine. We have partnered with EscapeArtist as the premiere portal for asset protection and financial information for expats or would-be expats.

We are very excited about this development and our new media partners involved. EscapeArtist has been around since the mid-90s and the site attracts over 15 million unique visits per year. We also have a subscriber database of 400,000 readers who receive our monthly Ezine.

If any of you work in the asset protection or financial arena and would like to tap into this very specific niche, please drop me an email and we can schedule a call to discuss options.

As a side note here, please do not contact me if you are only interested in blasting sales copy out to our 400,000 subscribers. I will only accept partners who are willing to provide real value to our readers. None of us need any more spam in our email box.

In the news today (July 13), Bernanke announced he may launch a new round of stimulus. Is anyone really surprised by this? I know I am not. It is only a matter of time.

The supply of dollars has more than doubled over the past 3 years and yet unemployment is still climbing. Interest rates are at all time lows, yet new and existing home sales are in the gutter. None of these attempts to control a market economy will ever work in the long run.

It seems the only ones benefiting from this stimulus measures are big business, aka friends of government. I would advise you to tread lightly with your investments and keep in mind who it is that’s pulling the puppet strings when you are allocating funds.

The US policymakers are still playing by the Keynesian rulebook of economics. Ironically Keynes was a big supporter of communist ideals like central planning. Keynes even praised Lenin for his 5 year plan.

Communism has proven over and over again that it just doesn’t work. Yet our policymakers still continue to play by his rulebook. As Einstein noted, “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results”.

Who are the insane ones now? The politicians or the ones that keep voting them in office…

On a lighter note, I have been reading an amazing book I would encourage each of you to check out. It is Beyond Wealth: The Road Map to a Rich Life by Alexander Green.

I don’t recommend books often, but this one certainly deserves a look. Alexander is the investment director of The Oxford Club. He has been writing investment research for many years and has a tremendous track record.

More importantly, he has found balance in his life and understands what is truly important. The book is a compilation of essays he has written over the years and pulls wisdom from great minds throughout history.

I’ve even had my 11 year old son read this book (of course he has also read The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand). If you are a reader (and everyone should be), give it a look.

We have partnered with EscapeArtist to now run their asset protection portal – EscapeWealth. I am very excited about this project as it allows us to partner with the world’s leading information portal for freedom minded individuals.

This week we published our first Ezine with 12 articles about such topics as offshore trusts, 2nd passports, privacy, protecting your retirement accounts, trading and investing, and a very unique business opportunity that can be run from anywhere in the world.

So instead of going through my usual rant about the current state of affairs and offering suggestions on asset protection planning, I will just encourage you to just read this month’s Ezine for the details.

I would also encourage you to subscribe to our mailing list so that you can get this Ezine delivered each month directly to your inbox. Enjoy.