Le Show; 2011-08-14

From deep inside your radio. Ladies and gentlemen, sometime this week, I crossed a line, a line which one could have seen coming in the distance or one approaching the line, actually, could have seen it, seen me to get nearer when one was, you know what I mean. Anyway, it's a line that defines a new era in the digital wonderland. I've been staying in a rented house here in Edinburgh Scotland. Think of it. And it's one of several rented houses I've had occasion to stay in over the past year or so as, you know, you just, you just get so parapetetic, you have to lay your, lay your weary frame down every once in a while. And I've noticed as I've been in these rented houses, lovely dwellings all that the once simple task, ladies and gentlemen,

sort of turning on a television set has now become fraught. You know, it was a big technological innovation in the 1970s when Sony swept the American TV marketplace with a little thing called instant on. You no longer had to wait for your TV to warm up before you could get the, the jolt of video satisfaction. It was instant on. How could we ever turn our back on that? We have. And so much more. So I, I'm in this rented house in Edinburgh, lovely dwelling, as I say. And pick up the two remotes, two of the three, one is clearly for the DVD. But then there's, then there's a set top box and a TV, each of course has their own remote. And my wife and I are trying to figure out, you know, how to watch some TV. I know we

should be ashamed of our, there we were, couldn't help it. And there's a list, a sheet of instructions. You see, this is, this is new. I don't think when you went into a rented house 20 years ago, you needed a sheet of instructions to tell you how to turn on the TV. But there, there it is. And we tried, you know, we tried following the sheet of instructions. Long story short, many, many, many, many clicks of many, many buttons on both remotes. Finally get to a point where we can watch a little, a little, a sprinkling of a selection of channels. Because something, the box is not working. And so I can only say, and then in those channels now start, and then I walk over to my laptop and utilizing a website that a friend had introduced me to just last week, as if setting up, setting the up for this, this rant. I did four clicks

on the laptop. And was watching any one of hundreds of channels live on British television, which is to say, ladies and gentlemen, the line we've crossed is it's now easier to watch TV on your computer. Then on your TV, hello, welcome to the show. Shaq, a love last, your hand raised, your hand chopped, your hand me hanging on your own, When I found out your were of fake, your ran up and bit me like a snake, and I wasn't ready

To let go, to let all my feelings show Tell me why you want to be so cold Why you want to be so mean You're gonna let your true color show You're a perpetual blue machine We could have been just fine If you'd have only been all mine I was for you, but you did not know That you were stepping on my heart As you were walking out to don't I know Just who you are And it's a damn good thing We didn't get too far, I'm not the one That's right for you You need a man to do your own

And like you want him to do, baby Why you want to be so cold Why you want to be so mean You're gonna let your true color show You're a perpetual blue machine Now you've gone and I'm glad That we didn't let it get too bad You know I tried to make it go But that was just no way to tell yourself Baby why you want to be so cold Why you want to be so mean You're gonna let your true color show

You're a perpetual blue machine Tell me why you want to be so cold Why you want to be so mean You're gonna let your true color show You're a perpetual blue machine A perpetual blue machine From right near the castle in Edinburgh, Scotland I'm Harry Shira, welcoming you to this edition of La Show. Ladies and gentlemen, the new F-Bomb foreclosure. GMAC is one of the nation's largest mortgage servicers. It wanted to foreclose on a New York City homeowner last year, but lacked the crucial paperwork necessary to seize the property. GMAC normally has a solution which is to create and sign documents in the name of companies that made the original loans. Have its employees do that.

This was trickier because the lender, AmeriQuest, had gone out of business in 2007. So GMAC, which was bailed up by taxpayers three years ago, looked for a way to craft a document that would pass legal muster. Do we not have a signing authority? Are there any other options? Says the head of GMAC's document execution team. Well, GMAC now had an answer three months later. It filed a document with New York authority, said that said the delinquent AmeriQuest loan had been assigned to an effective of August 2005. The document was dated July 7, 2010, three years after AmeriQuest ceased to exist. An examination by the ProPublica website suggests this transaction was not unique. Thousands of similar assignment documents filed in New York in the name of AmeriQuest after 2008 by GMAC and other services. But if that doesn't stink enough for you,

MERS, remember MERS, the electronic registry of mortgage documents and assignments that the financial industry set up to avoid registering mortgage sales with local and county officials. Well, in rule changes announced late July, the company now forbids members to file any more foreclosure actions in MERS's name and it requires mortgage servicers to obtain mortgage assignments and record them with county clerks before beginning foreclosures. That is to say, they're going legal. The new F-bomb ladies and gentlemen, and there is no shelter. And now it's time for me to read the trades for you. As if this program weren't informative enough. This is from Ad Week. Talking vagina ads aren't racist, says ad agency.

Oh, yes, I'll read it for you. Bank, take that to the bank. Oh, sorry, the bank's closed. Summers Eve released three videos, recently featuring talking hand puppet vaginas as part of its new Hail to the V campaign. It's meant to be about empowering women and rejuvenating the brand. That's following last year's disastrous print ad, which told women to douche before asking for a raise. I'm reading this. These three new ads have created new controversy with some saying the voice work and the African-American and Latina versions promotes racial stereotypes. The black woman is Pam Greer and Lil Kim, all wrapped in one. Rights one, critic. While the Latina woman vagina opens with the cry, Iyayay! The larger problem for Summers Eve writes, ad week is that many women see duching products themselves

any marketing of them as anti-woman, i.e. creating a feeling of shame around the issue of cleanliness than selling the antidote to the shame. Casting the process as female empowerment is particularly galling. For its part the Richards group is defending the ad agency founder Stan Richards says to add week we have a wonderful client that recognizes no matter what they do marketing in the feminine hygiene category is going to provoke a reaction. After listening to thousands of women say they want straight talk and lighthearted communication on an historically uncomfortable topic, Summers Eve gave us license to be bold, irreverent and celebratory across a multitude of mediums. I'm quoting and to different audiences. We are surprised that some have found the online videos racially stereotypical. We never intended anything other than to make the videos relatable and our in-house multicultural experts confirmed the approach.

The more important mission is to get women talking about taboo topics and we hope these negative sentiments don't overshadow that effort on quote Stan Richards from the agency. I think the more important mission is to sell Summers Eve Stan. Check your contract. The talking vagina ads are not racist ladies and gentlemen. You heard it here last. As always when I read the trades for you a copyrighted feature of this broadcast. This is Lesho and it's not tax season but on the other hand it's always tax season and I can imagine that that has several people reaching for their their dials but don't do that. A gentleman who has been making taxes and the games played with them comprehensible to mortals like me for many years going back to his days as the tax

writer. He didn't write the tax law. He wrote about it for The New York Times is now unveiled as a columnist for Reuters and I wanted to catch up with him because he's an expert on something that's been catching my eye more and more. David K. Johnston, welcome to the show. Well thank you for having me on. My pleasure and the subject that I wanted to tackle with you and it's complex but you're good at making the complex comprehensible is this whole idea of offshoring which you've written about. Can you explain in less than half an hour what offshoring is? It's actually quite simple conceptually. What you do if you're a business is you take your expenses here in the United States and then you arrange to collect your profits in a place like the Cayman Islands Panama, Bermuda where you will not be taxed on them. A simple example of that is

the Viagra tablet. They sell for about $18 each now and there's a huge profit in that. Well, when the researchers at Pfizer were working on what became Viagra, it was intended to be a heart drug, cardiovascular drug and some of the male researchers noticed an unusual property. The Pfizer Corporation immediately packaged up the information it had at the time which wasn't worth very much because it was still experimental and Pfizer America sold it to Pfizer Switzerland which in turn licensed it to Pfizer Lichtenstein and every time somebody buys one of these $18 tablets now the cost of manufacturing them is a tax deduction in the United States and the royalty paid on it for the ownership of the intellectual property is tax-free collected by Pfizer in its Lichtenstein pocket. The result is they pay very little tax, they build up all

this money offshore and you and I have a heavier tax burden. I've grasped that sort of basic scenario but then does that money forever live in Lichtenstein? Well, seven years ago, Congress passed something called the American Jobs Creation Act. Well, what could be wrong with that? Right, with a name like that, how could you not be in favor of it? Right, and right now there is a proposed new American Jobs Creation Act and it said if you have offshore profits you may repatriate them to the United States and instead of paying the 35% corporate tax, you only have to pay five and a quarter percent. The biggest beneficiary of this law back then was Pfizer and Pfizer saved $11 billion in taxes and what happened the day after they repatriated this money for very little tax? They started firing people and they kept firing people until they fired 40,000 people.

I'm not sure that they're through firing people at Pfizer. Now, not all companies did this but they got one third of the benefits and it was clearly an American Jobs Destruction Program. So the new bill, like the old one, actually doesn't require you to create jobs despite its title. You can do all sorts of things with the money. You can use it to finance buybacks of your company's stock and executive, of course, like that because if there's less stock out there and the company's buying it, it tends to push up the price of the stock and that means their stock options are worth more money. All thanks to the generosity of you and I as taxpayers. Now, about a year ago, there was a piece I think in the Washington post that went into some detail on this and I gather this is related to what we're talking about. The double Irish with a Dutch sandwich. There's a, Harry, there's an enormous number of devices out there.

I wrote about ones many years ago, Peter Warrisky at the Washington Post wrote about some of these, but there's a couple of simple basic concepts. You take advantage of tax treaties. So you give you one example. An American corporation, I hope I can remember the name of it that I wrote about years ago, legally moved its headquarters to Bermuda. All they did was rent a mailbox in Bermuda and they pay the Bermuda government $26,000 a year for the privilege of on paper being a Bermuda company. Nobody works there. They have a mailbox and they pay some local lawyers very nicely. In order to get money to Bermuda, they take advantage of a tax treaty in Barbados. Another British island down in the Caribbean. And lo and behold, to take advantage of that tax treaty once a year, the directors of the company must fly to Barbados and hold a meeting. On the poor thing.

As we all know, that's one of the worst possible places in the world to want to go say in the middle of January when your company's headquartered in the Northeast. And they pay effectively a 1% tax on their profits. Wow. But now this double Irish with a Dutch sandwich. Google and a lot of companies who are heavy with intellectual property were domiciling their IP property in Ireland. And then somehow moving it, paying an affiliate in the Netherlands and then it went back to Ireland and it ended up in one of the Caribbean islands. Was that sort of the... Correct. And the Dutch and Dutch banks and German banks like Deutsche Bank and Swiss banks are all very big players. Here's the fundamental difference between now and when you and I were little children in terms of taxing businesses. When you and I were born, America was a country of big manufacturing enterprises. There were automobile factories and television factories and in Southern California where you and

I grew up, big, huge agricultural organizations that had oranges and whatnot. And aerospace factories. Oh yes, aerospace. LA was for forever and maybe still is the real center of the American war business. And when a company has a big factory, you can tax that company. It can't get up and move. That's when we made things like that. But today in America what we principally manufacture are numbers. That's what a software is. It's an algorithm. It's a series of numbers. CDs. All sorts of things are numbers. The other thing we manufacture are molecules. That's what the drugs we get are. Well, the ownership of those things and in the case of the numbers, the representation of them, you can move outside of the US with a push of a button. And so our tax system still operates as if we lived in a national industrial wage economy. When we now live in a global digital services world. And we need to have a fundamental reform

of our tax system. You mean like the kinds of meetings that we've been watching in recent weeks between Democrats and Republicans to craft a fundamental reform of our tax system? First of all, there's no way to fundamental reform the tax system the way they're doing that. It's an enormous project that will take the number of years to work out. That's a game of chicken. Well, chickens got to eat too. I will be back with more of our interview with David K. Johnston Moments from now. Here on the show. But first news of the Olympic movement. I think many of you have seen by now the the jocular re-rendering of the Olympic logo. In light of this week's events in London. But this is true from the Telegraph in London.

A London 2012 Olympics ambassador who has met London Mayor Boris Johnson and Lord Sebastian Coe, head of the Olympic Committee, has been revealed to be a riot suspect. After she was reported to the police by her own mother. 18-year-old Chelsea ives allegedly threw bricks at a police car during the violence and infield. This week she even boasted she'd had, quote, the best day ever, unquote. According to what was testified to and magistrates court and Westminster. The teenager was caught after her mother Adrienne saw her on a television news report and called the police. Mrs. ives said her decision was gut-wrenching, but it's just that she only did what any honest parent could. I could not believe we saw a daughter among the crowds for a minute. We did not know what to do. But then what could normal honest parents do? I could just sit there and say that, see that and say

that's okay. As parents we had to say she can't get away with that. Unquote ives has met the mayor of London as well as the London Olympics chief Sebastian Coe as part of her role as a 2012 ambassador. Appearing at Westminster magistrates court during an all-night session, she denied two counts of burglary violent disorder and attacking a police car in the early hours. She was in 2009 invited into the House of Commons to celebrate the success of a football project run by a community sport program. But the prosecutor now said she led she ives led the attack on a cell phone store quote she was the first to pick up masonry and hurl it at the window. She was also involved in a mob attack on another phone store. She also allegedly hurled masonry at a marked police BMW the police drive BMWs in London no wonder. In a quote frenzied attack that forced officers to flee. In their Mercedes I hope she

was refused bail until August 17th. She was described by her lawyer as a talented sportswoman. But more character building from the Olympics. Right here the survivors of the Bhopal gas tragedy in India as well as those who support their cause worldwide are protesting Dow chemical sponsorship of the 2012 London Olympics. They've threatened to hold a parallel Olympics of those rendered disabled due to toxins from Dow's factories. It's a managing committee of the London Olympics does not reconsider its decision. The non-governmental organizations fighting the 1984 union car by disaster case along with the counterparts of other parts of the world say they will hold that parallel Olympics. More than 25,000 people were killed over 5 million have been affected from the leak of poisonous gas from that factory in December of 1984. By sponsoring London Olympics Dow chemicals wants to show the human its human face to the world

but the entire world knows its devil face already says a leading activist fighting for the Bhopal gas survivors. It's the Olympics ladies and gentlemen it's a movement and we all need one. Every day. Well I feel like my character has been built just just saying those things. Now it is gentlemen what's up with the Army Corps of Engineers well after years of fighting the government. Bunneteen bunny greenhouse a whistleblower who was demoted after exposing problems with a sole source contract related to the invasion of Iraq has won an almost one million dollar settlement. That's the decision of a U.S. District Court in Washington. This was lost wages. Don't do the joke. Compensatory damages and attorney fees. Beyond the particulars of her

situation greenhouse says her case makes it loud and clear that federal employees need better laws to protect them if they engage in whistle blowing. Greenhouse was a high profile government whistleblower inside the Army Corps of Engineers. It involved a Halliburton subsidiary. Now the liberals are taking listen. Kelo Brown and Root the Pentagon did not respond for a request for comment. Greenhouse was the civilian procurement executive for the Corps. She objected to KBR using its own cost projections for a multi-year no bid no competition contract. She initially objected within the Corps. Later spoke to Congress about the contract after she complained to Congress she was kicked out of the senior executive service and stripped of her top secret clearance. Legislation that would enhance current whistle blowing protections has been considered by Congress for years without ever gaining final approval. That's because Congress doesn't need it. They got their own protection. If the whistleblowers could vote on Congress then see now you have a thing. Greenhouse has been a strong advocate for greater protections.

And the president of the National Whistleblower Center called her an American hero. But more about the Corps. Yeah. Army Corps of Engineers spent how much time? Do you think discussing whether designs for pump stations and three New Orleans canals could withstand storm surge pressure? How long do you think the officials spent considering whether those designs were up to the job? Less time than the jury took to a quit OJ Simpson. Specifically less than five minutes. Even though that element was a key aspect of the project needed to prevent another flood of New Orleans like the one that the Corps caused in 2005 for complete information see the big uneasy. Instead of evaluating the proposal on their own officials trusted claims by the contractor which won the contract for the project that the pumps foundations would hold up claims that were disputed by another firm that was competing for the contract.

The lack of a proper evaluation of a critical aspect of the proposal to build so-called permanent pump stations for the three canals is just one of several technical and procedural problems detailed in the findings of the government accountability office requiring the Corps to re-evaluate the bids for the three quarters of a billion dollar project. The decision also chronicles the Corps's failure to properly compensate for the advantage the winning bidder gained by hiring a former Corps official who helped design the bid. And it raised questions about whether any design for the London Avenue pump one of the three pumps in question will perform up to the agencies specifications says the GAO's managing associate general counsel for procurement law at the end of the day there are some disturbing findings in this decision. The GAO found the Corps barely evaluated major technical issues like the depths of the piles used in the project oh that wasn't a problem before no problem

the manner they connected to the rest of the structure and other issues the Corps barely evaluated such issues based largely on testimony from the head of the committee that reviewed the technical aspect of the bids that official was not named in the GAO's decision noted if the design did not meet the requirements quote New Orleans could be inundated with water as it was during Hurricane Katrina. Unquote but the official said he didn't think about whether the bidder the successful bidders proposal was adequate until he learned it was being challenged when asked how long the committee discussed that aspect of the project he replied I don't remember it being very long it was more does it look reasonable when a GAO official asked if the discussion took five minutes the Corps official replied maybe and I'm not even sure it was that long. The Corps official defended that lack of evaluation by saying the Corps would review the specifics of the plan later in the process you know like after it's too late no after the contract was awarded he said that such an

approach was common when a single contractor is responsible though decision by GAO noted that the Corps's own criteria required that it actually evaluate the design it's your Corps of Engineers ladies and gentlemen unfortunately it's mine too and now I thought I'd never lived to see this atty the atom are you are you wearing a kilt well it feels like all right what's anything underneath yeah proton okay that's what I thought ladies gentlemen the energy department handing out research grants and all kinds of energy fields that are low in carbon dioxide

emissions announces this week it'll give thirty nine million dollars to universities around the country to try to solve various nuclear problems I didn't think we had any two researchers at Clemson will get a million dollars to study the behavior of particles of nuclear waste when buried in clay in metal canisters that have rested that couldn't happen one open question is how high a temperature which would be generated by the waste itself affects the interactions these are important to understand how the waste would spread over time the goal is to quote reduce uncertainty unquote about the life expectancy of atomic particles huh I'm not an oh you're uncertain really okay then with the cancellation of the Yucca Mountain waste dump many nuclear operators are loading older fuel into sealed metal casks filled with inert gas MIT will get a grant to study how such dry casks perform in salt environments storage casks are stored mostly in coastal or lakeside regions where assault air environment exists cracking related to corrosion could occur

in thirty years or less and the NRC is studying whether the casks can be used for a hundred years as some hope and another important concern in the nuclear power field is the aging of reactors researchers at Penn State will get almost half a million to plan a system that will use ultrasonic waves to look for cracks and other defects in hot metal parts hmm I got excited for a minute I'm sorry reported levels of radioactive contamination in Japanese beef are above international safety guidelines but not enough to pose a significant health threat to people eating the beef according to UK experts who've been working with colleagues in Japan so to threat to people watching the people eating the beef no I would not see it as a significant public health risk says Jim Smith a radio ecologist at the University of Portsmouth if you eat a kilogram of meat with that level of contamination you are not going to be significantly at risk unless you know how much a kilogram is no he didn't say that because of the difficulty of monitoring over such a wide area I'm surprised we have not seen

more incidents like this I expect that something like this will happen again today 25 years after Chernobyl some parts of northern europe still have levels of cesium 137 high enough to justify restrictions on moving and selling livestock I would not be surprised if there were control on foodstuffs in Japan for many years to come says one of the visiting experts tea has so far been the most affected vegetable in areas well away from fuk that is mystifying as all at the moment says one of the visiting experts from England get a grant babe the nuclear regulatory commission is undertaking a study to ensure that spent fuel pools at peach bottom atomic power station can maintain safety guidelines despite the degradation of a material used to control the waste it issue is boraflex which based on the name I guess contains boron so aren't they just use boraxo I don't know the spent fuel is still highly radioactive when it's placed in the cooling pool the temperature of the waste drops dramatically within a few months conditions must be

controlled to make sure it doesn't start fish into this and boraflex plant panels are installed but gamma rays the strongest form of radiation have caused shrinkage in the boraflex so NRZ inspectors will examine whether the existing material is safe for use until 2014 when the owner of the plant excellent plans to replace it failure of the system could cause boiling of water in the fuel sorry in the fuel pool or the release of radioactivity there are 19 reactors nationwide that use boraflex and problems have also been noted at other facilities so no it's fine don't you worry about a thing excellent is known since 1996 that there was degradation to the material that's 10 years after the material was approved for peach bottom it's been in there since the mid 80s and had not held up the way they envisioned says a spokesperson for the NRZ yeah it's that vision thing that'll get you and Florida utility regulators are considering an expansion of nuclear power in

the state and how much of the bill will be shoulder by ratepayers really but it's cheap the Florida Public Service Commission this week began considering proposals from Florida power and light that would allow them to pass on about 365 million in nuclear energy related costs to customers Florida power and light is asking for about almost 200 million next year to help upgrade nuclear plants and to move forward on a plan to build two new reactors at turkey point I didn't choose the name why are you looking at me I'm not looking at you I wasn't talking to you that would amount to about two dollars a month for a thousand kilowatt hours of residential electron electricity use up from the thirty three cents a month authorized just last year but it's cheap because it's safe Florida power and light estimates the total cost and the improvements and new reactors will be between 13 and 19 billion dollars I got that on me and they say regulators must consider whether the possibility of another U.S. recession and the fallout from fuk might

make the price tag even more expensive for projects that may never be built oh come on now Addy I build them yeah but you're wearing a kilt clean cheap two safe to meter our friend the atom now let's return to our conversation with tax expert David Kay Johnston let's get back to offshoring if the repatriation bills didn't pass and I'm not enough of a naive to think they won't pass this time as well as the did last time but if I if if the companies can't repatriate their profits from you know poor old bermuda or or a Cayman islands are they able to assert operational use of the money even though it's never been repatriated in the United States a little complicated if you have a hundred billion dollars in your offshore count you can't go to your bankers in America and say loan us a hundred billion here and we'll pledge

that as collateral that's what you do when you buy your house right let me live in this house and I'll pledge the house as collateral through a mortgage but you when you go to your banker and you say look we need to borrow some money and by the way you know perfectly well we have a hundred billion dollars sitting over there in this tax haven and we need to borrow fifty billion dollars to do x or y you can get the loan on pretty good terms so they certainly have access to this money well let me let me just pursue that for a second if it if it's so simple to just rent a a mailbox and and have a subsidiary in bermuda if you had the telephone number or the email address of a bermuda and lawyer why couldn't you know a Jim's drug store do that well because in order to do that you've got to have first of all enough scale to afford the cost of it many of the tax shelter devices that I've exposed over the years and they literally have totaled many hundreds of billions of dollars on a ten-year basis in theory you and I could go do but to do it you really have to have a huge amount of money I mean some of them come with for example a million dollar

upfront fee just for an opinion letter from a lawyer that will keep you from going to prison if the government finds out about it that's an expensive get out of jail free card in other words that's right exactly so the the table stakes are high is what you're saying absolutely this is not the two-dollar table at billions in Vegas this is the five thousand dollar or fifty thousand dollar private room at win yeah this is the back or at table upstairs at win yes um so do do companies get any other benefits from this offshore apparatus that that extends around the world other than tax benefits is that is it just basically uh done for tax dodging it's it is basically a tax benefit and the real problem these companies face hairy is this they can't use that money to buy back their stock and that's what they want to do one of the the big stories in America that's very important to understand about why your investments are what they are and what's happening to wealth and income is that many many companies are using most

of their profits to buy back their stock and then they issue two executives an amount of stock equal to what they bought back and it's a way to pump up executive pay and it damages all the rest of the investors over a long period of time in case in the case of Pfizer where they spent their tax savings and their repatriated money almost exclusively to buy back their stock it didn't work the price of Pfizer has continued to fall and i think now it's about half what it was when that jobs creation act that i call the jobs destruction act was past seven years ago you're saying Pfizer needs Viagra for its stock price it's exactly it's very good i wish i thought of that hairy so i you're a comedian um and i'm an investigator reporter uh they need Viagra for their stock but do they get do they get any kind of regulatory benefit from from uh offshoreing not really i mean the the one of the challenges i think we face is that corporations in the modern world have become so incredibly complex what you see as the New York times

or cbs or uh general motors a company with that brand name in fact internally is uh that hundreds and in some cases thousands of separate little companies uh every corporate jet is its own corporation and all of this is on board with its own board of directors that's uh well technically yes uh that they're internal executives and uh uh so these structures are which are all designed to limit liability and limit taxes and and are a full employment program for corporate lawyers regulators really i believe you can't expect government grade regulators to truly understand these things and the IRS actually admitted i don't know in response to some story i wrote when i was at the New York times that that n-ron was so complicated just that company n-ron that they really didn't understand what was going on inside n-ron well that's the same thing we heard

and during the financial crisis that regulators uh just couldn't keep up with the complexity of derivatives and of cdOs and cds and the pyramid of debt that was being built isn't that sort of exactly and the few people who did get it like Berksley Bourne of course were immediately slapped down by politicians uh and told you know stay out of this this isn't your business when in fact that's exactly the point of regulation yeah so it is a it is a jobs creation act for corporate lawyers oh yes uh in fact all of the tax law changes we're making you know for the last 30 years we've had this incredible growing remake of the tax code every year uh you may only hear about a few stories in the news there are thousands of changes being made in the tax law uh often to benefit one individual or handful or a small industry or to gain an advantage for one industry against another and many of them uh they don't have a label on them if you read the thing you would never know what it means unless somebody tips you tip somebody like me off to what it is

and shows you how to walk through it and so that's why we have this just terrible indefensible mess of a tax code and whom did you anger when you were in school that you inherited the job of reading all this stuff and trying to figure it out I actually asked for this Harry I was uh you know 30 years ago I was the guy at the LA Times who remade the reputation of the LAPD and revealed the worldwide spying they were doing and the the brutality and the failure to solve a lot of crimes and um but I started to become interested in wealthy people in taxes because of two scandals in California one of them was the Hilton's Conrad Hilton left his fortune to the starving children of the earth and I exposed how his son baron arranged to divert the money to himself and he ultimately got about two thirds of it and then the Keck brothers as in the Keck telescope uh made this deal with then candidate for governor Duke Majin who was attorney general and who was supposed to be the guardian of charitable trusts to get a million dollars a year in what I

called anti-popper insurance and I poverty insurance from their father's charitable fund and that's when my eyes sort of opened up to you know there's more to this tax system than what you what I've been hearing then more the taxes than the form 1040 and yeah and what comes out of your paycheck and I begin to realize that you know there are people who are getting rich off this and what is it it's taken me 20 years and then I assure you there's no small number of detractors out there who will tell you I have no idea what I'm doing but you do have a pool of surprise to show for it right I do and and I also have an unusual distinction I am not a lawyer in fact I'm not a college graduate though I have a college education including graduate school but I am a professor of law and a professor of graduate accounting at Syracuse University Wow without ever having graduate from college yeah I have a college education I understand the University of Chicago graduate school but they've never got a diploma because I never stayed in one college long enough you and Sarah Palin yep not somebody particularly identified with that you're not usually lumped

in with her but there you go David anything more we need to know about this this offshoring that I haven't been smart enough to ask you about in terms of how it works or whom it benefits and whom it hurts well here's the other thing I think people should think about it about offshoring the techniques that are used by wealthy Americans and large corporations offshore are the very same techniques that not nice people who want to blow people up and kill people and undertake revolutions and people who are in the drug business as with the incredible explosion epidemic of murder and violence we're seeing right across the border in Mexico they use the same techniques so we should be thinking about international flows of money in terms not just of tax and tax avoidance and tax evasion but in terms of stability in terms of avoiding war and death and conflict and having a regulatory regime that serves the interests of stability democracy and the liberties

of the people thank you so much I've I've read you for years and you've you've done the impossible which is make me understand this stuff and I I wanted to share that gift with the audience today and it's really a treat to talk to you well thank you Harry very much for having me on appreciate it take your baby by the hand I make it do what I has done and take your baby by the hill and do the next thing that you feel we were some in bias and a dance all days we were called you are crazy when I'm with you and everyone with you could believe do a share of what was true I said

that's all days long take your baby by the hand I take your baby by the hand I play up on the dark as well we were some in bias and a dance all days we were called you are crazy when I'm with you and everyone with you could believe do a share of what was true I said that's all days long that's all days that's all days

take your baby by the wrist and then I'm out the mammoth this and then I'm right to sit fast and then I'm right to sit fast and then I'm right to sit fast See if we were some in vise In a dance, home, days

We were cool, um, cries When I, you and everyone were new Do they live? Do And sharing what was true, what I said Dance all day long Dance all day long Dance all day Dance all day long Dance all day long Dance all day long Dance all day long And now it is gentlemen The apologies of the week Oh, let's start with a caddy, shall we?

How about super caddy Steve Williams About his comments, Sunday after the bridge last Sunday after the bridge stone invitationally Was criticized for talking about himself And not the golfer he was working for who won When interviewed by CBS, quote, there's been considerable debate following the comments I made at the conclusion of Sunday's bridge stone invitational It was a complete surprise to have the CBS announcer ask for an interview My emotions following Adam's victory were running very high at the time I felt My emotions poured out and got the better of me I apologize to my fellow caddies and professionals for failing to mention Adam's outstanding performance I would like to thank all of those fans at Firestone who made this victory the most special of my career See, he didn't mention Adam again and he didn't mention bridge stone University of Kansas basketball player Thomas Robinson is sorry The junior forward has apologized for spitting on a bouncer During an altercation at the cave nightclub in Lawrence, Kansas They have nightclubs and Kansas. The Lawrence Journal World reported though the bouncer didn't want to press charges Robinson completed 20 hours of community service and then wrote the letter

Of apology, quote, I hope you can forgive me for this serious lapse of judgment he wrote I'm very embarrassed about my behavior that night I now realize you have a difficult job and I'm sorry for making it tougher that evening Robinson was cited for misdemeanor battery which I believe is a AA offense Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Sari Death And on Dario Gomez, the coach of the Colombian national soccer team apologized to punching a woman who insulted him by criticizing his job performance witnesses said Gomez struck the woman twice at the entrance to a bar on Saturday night See, it's the bars This act shanks me in front of my mother, my wife and each and every one of the women in my country And in my family. Gomez says he realizes he was wrong for punching the woman He being a soccer coach he should have kicked her English celebrity magazine Grazia has admitted to altering a cover photo of Kate Middleton to make her skinnier. The March, sorry May 9, Special Royal Wedding Issue featured a doctored photo of the Duchess or a Duchess photo of the doctor in her Alexander McQueen wedding gown, in which Middleton appeared to have an extremely narrow waist.

The magazine apologized for the incident, which had already sparked a debate over the magazine's practices. This week, Laurie Al was forced to remove two ads from magazines after it was revealed. The photo images have been altered. The ads, both for anti-aging creams, featured actress Julia Roberts and supermodel, Christy Turlington, and redeemed misleading. If you can be a supermodel, you can be a super caddy. That's all I think. No, that's not all I think. More than a month after he was accidentally shot during an Old West gunfight reenactment, Pittsburgh resident John Ellis has been contacted by only one person affiliated with the show. The shooter, the optometrist, remains off the job after it being shot June 17th in the forearm and elbow, while on his vacation with his family in Hill City, South Dakota, in the Black Hills National Forest. It was about, among 100 spectators, as actors began a final battle with five or six guns, which were supposed to be filled with blanks. Somehow the gun used by one reenactor had live rounds, he fired four bullets into the crowd

wounding Ellis and two others. Ellis says he got a conversation with the shooter he said he never intended to do anything like that and apologized, and he is the only one that has contacted me so far. No one else from the city or Wild West organization or Chamber of Commerce has contacted me. The arrest in Belarus last week on suspicion of tax evasion of an activist, human rights activist through international condemnation. It has emerged since then the members of the European Union helped the case against him by providing the authorities in Minsk with his banking information or his bank's king information. Lithuania has already apologized to his family, Mr. Bialyatsky, who heads one of the most prominent human rights groups in Belarus. Now Poland, who has been a staunch defender of opposition groups in Belarus, has admitted it also divulged information about bank accounts in his name, Polish foreign minister Radislav Sikorsky, has apologized for the leak, I'm so sorry on behalf of the republic he wrote on Twitter, calling the disclosure a reprehensible mistake, and vowing to redouble efforts to support democracy in Belarus.

Camille Grammer has apologized to ex-husband Kelsey Grammer for insulting the size of his penis. According to gossip website TMZ, she had made a remark, big hands, big feet, big disappointment, her official apology was issued via the same website. Some joking remarks I made got picked up and caused my ex-husband great embarrassment and for that, I sincerely apologize. For more than a decade federal prosecutor say Mark Cheverella perpetrated a profound evil upon juveniles in Lucerne County, that's where Scranton, Pennsylvania is, unjustly incarcerating them as part of a scheme to enrich himself. This week he found himself on the receiving end of a 28 year prison sentence that will assure he probably will spend most of his rest of his life in prison and also ordered to pay nearly 1.2 million in restitution. I said restitution, addressing the court, Cheverella acknowledged he illegally accepted money from a builder of juvenile detention centers, he denied he ever jailed a juvenile

in exchange for cash. I blame no one but myself for what has happened, I had an opportunity to say no to taking money, I believe was legal to receive, but I knew that I should not take because it was wrong and unethical for me to do so. He apologized to his family, citizens of the county, his former colleagues on the bench, and probation department employees. He also apologized to juveniles who appeared before him, saying he hoped they could forgive him, quote, for being a hypocrite by not practicing what I preached, unquote. The president of Tokai TV station in Nagoya, Japan publicly apologized this week for a prank that mocked victims of the triple disasters that hit Japan and March. Egypt's Prime Minister apologized to a priest who was forced to take off his robes by a Cairo hotel security official, saying the Ministry of Tourism is investigating the incident. I strongly to announce the offensive search in which father Iwita was subjected at one of Cairo's hotels, the Prime Minister said. The priest was there at the hotel to attend an iftar, not an iftar, an iftar.

The apologies to the weak ladies and gentlemen, a copyrighted feature of this broadcast. Well, ladies and gentlemen, that's going to conclude this week's edition of the show from Edinburgh. The program returns next week at the same time over these same stations over NPR worldwide throughout Europe.

The use in 440 cables in Japan, around the world through the facilities, the American forces network up and down the east coast of North America by the shortwave giant WBCQ, the planet 7.415 MHz shortwave, on the mighty 104 in Berlin, around the world by the internet at two different locations live and archive whenever you want at harryshear.com and kcrw.com available for your smartphone through stitcher.com, available as a free podcast at kcrw.com. And to be just like people not coming up with their tried and true ideological explanations for every single news event that occurs if you'd agree to turn to the end. But you were really already. Thank you very much. A hot tip of the show. Shout out to the San Diego Pittsburgh Chicago and Hawaii desks. Thanks to Andre Croucher at WXX Eye for help with the day's broadcast and thanks as always to Pam Hollister. This broadcast is on Twitter at the harryshear and the big uneasy becomes available this week on digital platforms information at the big uneasy.com. And I'll see you in Brooklyn this week at BAM with the big uneasy at the show comes

to even century progress productions that originates to facilities of KCRW Santa Monica, a community recognized around the world as the home of the homeless so long from Edinburgh.