response 50 of 106:

May 8 01:50 UTC 2002

Tell us, Mr. Jamie, what does "semantics" mean?

response 52 of 106:

May 8 03:27 UTC 2002

Boy!  get him up against the ropes and he can't even block baby punches.  
Jamie, you'd better get some makeup or those bruises are gonna mark you 
like a train wreck.

response 54 of 106:

May 8 04:47 UTC 2002

#43: The correct spelling is "misspell."

response 56 of 106:

May 8 11:41 UTC 2002

51: "I wanted to generalize the term"  Translation: He wanted to sound 
educated, or at least a dumbass's idea of educated.

response 58 of 106:

May 8 14:33 UTC 2002

Re #45: You anti-Semantite!

Re #56:
Hmm...from http://www.andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/a.html:

"There's also the opposite case: when a singular noun ends in s. That's a
little trickier. Most style guides prefer s's: James's house. Plain old
s-apostrophe (as in James' house) is common in journalism, but most other
publishers prefer James's. It's a matter of house style."

response 60 of 106:

May 8 15:05 UTC 2002

Well, I didn't want to get into one of those interminable brighn 
arguments, but the fact is that "dumbass's" is standard.  From a 
practical standpoint, "a dumbass' idea" is indistinguishable from "a 
dumbass idea" when spoken, so you really have to say "a dumbass's idea" 
if that's what you mean.  And yes, I'd say and write "James's" 
before "James'."  I draw the line a "Moses's," however.  ;-)

response 62 of 106:

May 8 15:16 UTC 2002

(Slight modification to 61: One could interpret "dumbass idea" as "an idea
which is lacking in intelligence," but I personally think that's a stretch
-- it really means to suggest, "anyone holding this idea is a dumbass for
holding it" and is practically [! - key word] identical to "dumbass'[s] idea."
A better example would be "dumbass brother" and "dumbass'[s] brother," because
there IS a clear semantic distinction there.)

(Ideas can't lack intelligence, but brothers can.)

response 64 of 106:

May 8 16:58 UTC 2002

I think the most annoying rhetorical device I see abused in Internet dialogues
are the two combatants both claiming victory with little unbiased support.
(To presage ad hominems: Yes, I've done it myself, and I try to avoid doing
it now.)
 
Personally, I don't feel taht Rane provided a very good argument. Jamie's
point, as far as I could tell, was that it's illegal for US citizens to not
pay US federal taxes on money earned while abroad (and that he disagrees with
this). Rane's refutation is the obvious, and obviously non sequitorial,
comment that, since extradiction treaties generally don't include tax evasion,
it's impossible for the United States to extradict. He implicitly accepts the
claim that, if such citizens step foot on US soil, they become vulnerable to
arrest for evasion, thus accepting Jamie's original thesis that such failure
to pay taxes is, in fact, illegal. The Federal Government's impotency to
prosecute people not on their soil does not mitigate the legality of the act,
it merely renders it moot until such time that such person attempts to enter
the country.
 
My vote is in favor of Jamie, only hesitatntly, because the case in question
is irrelevant to his ORIGINAL claim, that citizens who make money *Abroad*
while residing *abroad* are vulnerable to US tax code, because the case (as
Jamie himself has admitted) involves someone who committed the evasion while
in this country. My preference would be for an example of someone who actually
matched Jamie's original claim.
 
Jamie has done a better job with the topic, but neither combatant has
demonstrated their point.

response 66 of 106:

May 8 17:14 UTC 2002

My original thesis was NOT that evading paying taxes on money earned
in foreign countries was NOT illegal under US law. It was that US law
could not force the person to pay US taxes on those earning while the
person was livingh abroad. It seems to me that everyone is agreeing
with this. It is important to read each "combatant's" statements as
they were written, and not misinterpet them. 

response 68 of 106:

May 8 17:55 UTC 2002

#66> The US can't force someone to pay taxes while in the US, either, Rane.
I don'thave to pay income taxes. If I don't, I'll likely go to jail, but
that's my choice. You're acting as if Rich was just vacationing in
SWitzerland, lala. He wasn't, he was a fugitive.
 
Your point persists in being that US can't arrest someone for violating US
law if the country where they're currently residing refuses to let the US do
so. That has nothing to do with tax law, that has to do with extradiction
treaties. You're technically correct, but arguing a non sequitor, seeing as
your original point came up in response to Jamie, not vice versa.

response 70 of 106:

May 8 18:39 UTC 2002

  > Your point persists in being that US can't arrest someone for violating
  > US law if the country where they're currently residing refuses to let the
  > US do so

  Actually, even *that's* not completely correct -- just ask Manuel Noriega..

  The bottom line here seems to be that Rane picked a pretty poor position
  to defend but couldn't seem to admit that Jamie was right.  Now he's
  backpedaling and claiming he meant something else but it's still not clear
  to me what he might have meant that would have been totally true..

response 72 of 106:

May 8 19:30 UTC 2002

Granted, but your original argument was "all", not "many".

response 74 of 106:

May 8 20:46 UTC 2002

#71> Your point -- that we can't arrest people if the country they're residing
in doesn't want us to -- is not in real dispute (Noriega is an extreme case).
Prove it all you want, because nobody's arguing with you. The point that Jamie
originally made, to which you responded, was that people living abroad and
working abroad but maintaining US citizenship are still potentially subject
to US tax code. You have accepted that point, and yet you still act as if
you've proven Jamie wrong.
 
I suppose the expectation that posts be read only apply to people who you feel
are misunderstanding you, not to you when you're misunderstanding someone
else.