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Center for Freedom and Prosperity's Weekly Update 1) Three Additional Influential US Lawmakers Send letters to Secretary O'Neill:
1) Three additional influential US lawmakers ask Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill to reject the OECD's so-called "harmful tax competition" project. Colorado Senator Wayne Allard, who serves on the Budget Committee and the Banking Committee, asks the Treasury
Secretary to reject the OECD's initiative. Full text of letter below: Oklahoma Representative Steve Largent, one of the top conservative voices in Congress and member of the powerful
House Commerce Committee, urges rejection of the OECD tax cartel. Full text of letter below: Wisconsin Representative Paul Ryan of the House tax-writing committee expresses his dissatisfaction with the OECD's tax competition project. Full text of letter below:http://www.freedomandprosperity.org/ltr/ryan/ryan.shtml
2) Jack Kemp Asks Treasury to Dump OECD Project Jack Kemp, former Republican Vice Presidential candidate and leading tax reform advocate, asks Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill to put US taxpayers first and dump the OECD's misguided tax competition
project. Full text of letter below (pdf format).
3) America's leading business publication denounces the OECD's project Wall Street Journal editorial page published the same editorial its sister European paper ran earlier in the week.
This is the first time that the US's leading business opinion journal has come out against the OECD "harmful tax competition" project. The WSJ adds its voice to a fast growing list of Americans against the EU driven OECD project. Complete article below:
4) Free Market Leaders Reject the OECD Tax Cartel (letters in PDF format) Pro-taxpayer groups from all over America have come out against the OECD "harmful tax competition" project. These groups work with the Bush Administration on a daily basis and represent more than 3 million activists and 800 additional affiliated groups. Links to their letters and webpages are below: Americans for Tax Reform -- Grover Norquist webpage: www.atr.org
CapitolWatch -- Robb Watters webpage: www.capitolwatch.org
Citizens Against Government Waste -- Tom Schatz webpage: www.cagw.org Club For Growth -- Steve Moore webpage: www.clubforgrowth.org
Competitive Enterprise Institute – Fred Smith & Richard Rahn webpage: www.cei.org Empower America -- Jack Kemp webpage: www.empoweramerica.org
Free Congress Foundation -- Paul Weyrich webpage: www.freecongress.org
National Taxpayers Union -- Eric Schlecht webpage: www.ntu.org
CFP just returned late last night from a four-day trip to the British Virgin Islands. The delegation included David Burton of the Argus Group, two senior Capitol Hill staff members on a fact-finding trip and me. The delegation had the opportunity to brief BVI's Chief Minister, the Honorable Ralph T. O'Neal, and his Cabinet. We also had several other meetings including a forum before the Association of Registered Agents. CFP's message was simple. As we have told other governments being persecuted by the OECD, we explained that there is growing sentiment in the U.S. to reverse the Clinton policy of support for the OECD. If that happens, of course, the OECD's proposed tax cartel will collapse because the threat of financial protectionism effectively will vanish once the world's largest economy pulls out of the scheme. Moreover, we also walked through a "worst case" scenario to point out that there is nothing to be gained by capitulation before July. In other words, even if the Bush Administration makes the wrong choice (which we think is very unlikely), countries can avoid the blacklist by giving up in June or July. With this in mind, we are strongly urging all affected nations to hold firm at least until after the OECD's ministerial meeting in mid-May. News story on the BVI trip:
6) Become one of the many voices speaking out against the OECD's misguided "harmful tax competition" project. Contact the Treasury at taxpolicy@do.treas.gov. More information below and on our webpage at http://www.freedomandprosperity.org/update/oecd/oecd.shtml: Your assistance is desperately needed to thwart another ill-conceived legacy of Bill Clinton. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), an international bureaucracy based in Paris, launched a so-called "harmful tax competition" initiative with the support of the previous administration. According to the bureaucrats, it is bad when low-tax countries lure jobs and capital away from high-tax countries. As such, the OECD wants to undermine the sovereign right of nations to maintain free-market tax policies. Instead, they are calling for a global network of tax police to help prop up Europe's welfare states. This initiative combines bad tax policy with bad privacy policy with bad sovereignty policy. That's the bad news. The good news is that the Bush Administration can scuttle this misguided project. Simply stated, the OECD's proposed tax cartel will unravel if the world's largest economy - America - refuses to participate. But for this to happen, we need to contact Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and let him know that career bureaucrats in his department and at the IRS are trying to retain Clinton's policy. That's why we need you to contact the Treasury Department comment line. Just e-mail your comments to taxpolicy@do.treas.gov. For those who want more information on this critical issue, House Majority Leader Dick Armey has sent a strongly-worded letter to Secretary O'Neill. This letter, along with a large amount of supporting information, can be found on the Center for Freedom and Prosperity website (www.freedomandprosperity.org). Armey's letter highlights the key points that you may want to include in your e-mail to the Treasury Department. Your e-mails in support of tax competition, financial privacy, and fiscal sovereignty will make a difference. Remember, register your opposition at taxpolicy@do.treas.gov, and please don't hesitate to forward this alert to friends
and colleagues. Thank you for helping in the fight for individual liberty. Visit our webpage linked below:
7) Legendary funny man Dave Barry takes a few shots at the Internal Revenue Service Miami Herald: A few nice words about the IRS on the way to Leavenworth
8) Guest Speech: Ambassador Dr. Hubert Büchel, Vadez, Liechtenstein Last November, Ambassador Dr. Hubert Büchel, Director of the Office of National Economy, Vaduz, Liechtenstein, gave a speech before the Economic Freedom Network Conference . Ambassador Büchel has allowed us to share his views with you. I am sure that you will find it very interesting. Liechtenstein - A Special Example of Economic Freedom and a Free Market Economy? Complete speech linked below:
Kind regards, Andrew Quinlan
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