If the world got to vote, Obama would win easily

Forget the silly debate Monday night when Romney and President Obama went down the list of countries that "threaten" us.  If foreign policy means getting other countries to like you, and to like the United States, then President Obama is the winner on foreign policy hands down.

"But being President isn't a popularity contest!" Republicans will whine.  But do we really want to go back to the bad old days when Dubya made the rest of the world despise and distrust the United States?  

The truth is, Obama's foreign policy isn't much different than Dubya's, and Romney already signaled that he won't change much if he is elected.

So what makes the difference is how they perceive our intentions, our human qualities.  And countries mostly perceive the human face of American power and influence through our President.  The world wants Obama to be that face.  

US election: Most countries want to see Barack Obama re-elected

By James Orr

October 22, 2012 | Telegraph

The study, conducted on behalf of the BBC World Service, found that Mr Obama is seen as a stronger candidate by people in 20 of the 21 countries surveyed.

On average, 50 per cent of those questioned said they would prefer to see Mr Obama win the 2012 ticket, compared to just nine per cent who prefer Mr Romney.

France was found to be the most strongly pro-Obama nation, with 72 per cent wanting him to be re-elected and just two per cent preferring Mr Romney. In Britain, 65 per cent wanted to see Mr Obama re-elected, compared to just seven per cent for Mr Romney.

Pakistan was the only nation polled where the current president is not seen as the favoured candidate.  [You know, the country where the Taliban was born with the military's support and where bin Laden received safe haven - J.]  Fourteen per cent of Pakistanis said they wanted to see Mr Romney elected compared with 11 per cent for Mr Obama, although 75 per cent expressed no opinion at all.

Among other countries who strongly favour Mr Obama are Australia (67 per cent), Canada (66 per cent) and Nigeria (66 per cent).

The poll of 21,797 people was conducted by GlobeScan/PIPA between July 3 and September 3, this year.

Romney agrees with Obama; GOP can stay home

Remember, remember the 22nd of October!

That's when Romney said he wouldn't cut welfare.

This was after Romney agreed with Obama's foreign policy, his planned  withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2014, and Obama's auto bailouts.

This was after Romney said in a previous debate how he wants to keep all the popular provisions of Obamacare.

As Glenn Beck tweeted to his GOP minions after hearing how much Romney agreed with Obama : "I am glad to know that mitt agrees with Obama so much. No, really. Why vote?"

Indeed, why?  Republicans should stay home November 8.  Romney says Obama's got it covered.

Mitt Romney Wants To Get People Off Food Stamps ‘Not By Cutting The Program'
By Arthur Delaney
October 23, 2012 | Huffington Post

URL: http://huff.to/WF49cs

Cheater nation: 'The world is going to hell'

But no, it's not going to hell for the reasons people usually cite, like gays getting married, abortion, or Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.  

We know America is going to hell because one eccentric researcher has been keeping track, and counting all the little ways in which we all cheat and steal, from disregarding the 10-item limit in the express checkout lane to rolling through stop signs to taking candles at church without paying.  And we're getting worse, demonstrably so.

He is business professor John Trinkaus and you can find some of his work here.

I have a few ideas about why America is becoming a nation of cheaters and scammers.  I doubt it has to do with our turning away from worshiping God, as many conservatives complain.  Nay, I think it has to do with our increasing worship of wealth and success (often by those very same values-preaching conservatives), and our culture's contempt for "losers."  The absolute worst thing in America is to be labelled a loser.  (But logically, how could everybody possibly be a winner?)  

Meanwhile, how you win isn't important, nobody seems to care, it's only the outcome that matters.  And if cheating is OK when it comes to the big things, then it's doubly permissible when it comes to the small things.  Hence Prof. Trinkaus's noticing our increasingly frequent fibs, fudges and infractions.

Learning From the Things That Annoy Us

By Flora Lichtman

October 19, 2012 | NPR

URL: http://n.pr/T35GC3

Starbucks serves up a lesson on tax dodges

Seattle-based Starbucks is one of those ubiquitous consumer products, like iPhones, that I am just way too savvy, original and discerning to endorse.  In fact I enjoy taking pot shots at these Giants of Cool.

Anyway, I don't know if this story is making news in the U.S., but in Britain, Starbucks' brand name is taking a pounding after a Reuters investigation revealed that the chain has declared zero profit and paid zero corporate tax over the past three years on close to $2 billion in gross sales.  This is despite Starbucks' assurances to investors and analysts over the years that its UK business is indeed profitable, and its main source of revenue to expand into overseas markets!

So how does Starbucks get away with it, legally?  Three accounting gimmicks, according to Reuters.  First, by copying Google and Microsoft:

Like those tech firms, Starbucks makes its UK unit and other overseas operations pay a royalty fee - at Starbucks, of six percent of total sales - for the use of its ‘intellectual property' such as its brand and business processes. These payments reduce taxable income in the UK.

[...]  The fees from Starbucks' European units are paid to Amsterdam-based Starbucks Coffee EMEA BV, described by the company as its European headquarters, although Michelle Gass, the firm's president in Europe, is actually based in London.

Second, like most MNCs, Starbucks by pays "arms length" "transfer prices" to its Starbucks subsidiaries in other countries for its goods like coffee beans and wooden swizzle sticks.  This is basically Starbucks' right hand in a higher-tax country (Britain) paying Starbucks' left hand in a lower-tax country (Netherlands, Switzerland, etc.), and the right hand deducting the payment from its gross profit as a "business expense."

Third, Starbucks uses inter-company loans to its subsidiaries in other countries. Ridiculously, on paper, Starbucks' entire UK operation is funded by borrowed money, and to boot Starbucks UK pays its subsidiaries overseas a curiously high interest rate on that debt.  Starbucks UK (the right hand) gets to deduct the debt and the interest paid from its tax bill; meanwhile Starbucks overseas (the left hand) is based in a country that doesn't tax interest earned on loans.  The money is thus wiped clean.

Meanwhile, mom & pop coffee shops in the UK have no overseas subsidiaries with which to wipe out their tax liability.  Thus they compete with this giant on an uneven playing field. 

So you see, this game of tax avoidance that we all close our eyes to is not just a U.S. problem.  It's everybody's problem.  Governments have to start working together across borders to stop these MNCs from gaming the system at their host countries' expense.  

In the meantime, let's all agree to expand the definition of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) to paying your damn taxes in every country where you operate, at least once in a decade, for crying out loud!

Until they pay their taxes... Boycott Starbucks!

London mayor Boorish Johnson toasting Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz for running such an unprofitable operation in Great Britain and paying no tax.

Barack the Bashful is silent (again)

Again, inexplicably, Obama has failed to take credit for a great achievement: pre-approving 250,000 acres of federal lands for solar energy projects, while Romney's beating him up in the debates for not opening up Yellowstone Park and the Arctic Wildlife Reserve to fracking and strip mining.  

Under Obama, the Interior Department didn't go project-by-project, or site-by-site, it looked at all federal public lands, did a programmatic environmental impact assessment of all of them, narrowed down the choices, got public feedback at several intervals, and then pre-approved any big solar energy projects in six states.

Because the public was involved, there won't be any litigation or protests by environmental groups.  Approval time and risk will be reduced for solar entrepreneurs.  Everybody has had their say and is on board.  That's how public management should be done, not by politicians striking secret deals in backrooms with Big Business!

New Program Spurs Solar Development on Public Land

By Flora Lichtman

October 19, 2012 | NPR

URL: http://n.pr/T35FhA