Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Inquisitor General

From a Yahoo! News story: “WASHINGTON – IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman says Swiss banking giant UBS will give his agency the details of 4,450 client accounts suspected of holding undeclared assets. The deal to end a contentious international lawsuit between U.S. tax collectors and Swiss bankers was announced Wednesday morning. Shulman said in prepared remarks that the deal will give the IRS thousands of long-sought account names and is expected to provide even more UBS clients who voluntarily disclose their financial details to the agency. The two sides told a federal judge last week they had reached a tentative agreement, but the details were not released until Wednesday.” The most important detail here is the word “suspected.” This is like the Spanish Inquisition. Jews were burned at the stake (after they were tortured into confessing) when they were “suspected” of being fake converts. Their property was confiscated, then the informers shared (with the church) in the confiscated loot. What a nice setup. How many fortunes were made in this way? Hundreds – maybe thousands. All because someone came under suspicion. Nothing more was needed. Sort of like the Salem witch trials, no? Please.