Posted on 08/21/2008 9:16:36 PM PDT by Sammy67
Senate Housing Bill Requires eBay, Amazon, Google, and All Credit Card Companies to Report Transactions to the Government Broad, invasive provision touches nearly every aspect of American commerce.
Washington, D.C. -
Update: Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Charles Grassley is pushing the bill.
Hidden deep in Senator Christopher Dodd's 630-page Senate housing legislation is a sweeping provision that affects the privacy and operation of nearly all of America's small businesses. The provision, which was added by the bill's managers without debate this week, would require the nation's payment systems to track, aggregate, and report information on nearly every electronic transaction to the federal government. Call Congress and Tell Them to Oppose The eBay Reporting Provision in the Housing Bill: 1-866-928-3035 FreedomWorks Chairman Dick Armey commented: "This is a provision with astonishing reach, and it was slipped into the bill just this week. Not only does it affect nearly every credit card transaction in America, such as Visa, MasterCard, Discover, and American Express, but the bill specifically targets payment systems like eBay's PayPal, Amazon, and Google Checkout that are used by many small online businesses. The privacy implications for America's small businesses are breathtaking."
"Privacy groups like the Center for Democracy and Technology and small business organizations like the NFIB sharply criticized this idea when it first appeared earlier this year. What is the federal government's purpose with this kind of detailed data? How will this database be secured, and who will have access? Many small proprietors use their Social Security number as
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The horse has already fled the barn. The government doesn’t need to implant chips...we have done that by making our credt card purchases trackable.
Wonder what will be next? IRS garage sale trackers?
But, in the back of my mind, I keep thinking what a logistical nightmare this will be.
90 per cent of US citizenery use credit cards. The flood of information will be overwhelming.
I want the job of reviewing these records. It will be a life time gig that will be unsupportable in most cases.
Thank you..good info.
Sounds like a fourth amendment violation to me.
i work on mainframe computers - the story goes that if you worked for something government related, you would be working with very old, outdated equipment - i seem to recall that the irs was given a gazillion tax dollars to overhaul their computer systems - with the result being that it was all thrown out because it could not function
so if tomorrow, visa was ready to transmit all the data the congress wants to get their hands on - where would uncle sam store it? maybe the nsa could handle it - not sure how they would get the info from a covert agency to something like the irs
it would take lots of computer horsepower to sort or search the data for information that you needed - even to set up a datacenter capable of housing the equipment would cost a big chunk of change (but hey - its just our tax dollars) - i wonder if congress funded all that
maybe the data will all be sent to the irs info tech nerds that can't get anything right - that would make the first query performed on it scheduled for about 20 years away
FU
Secularism is the first step. Under secularism you dare not make reference to the religious underpinnings that made America a great place. The predominant superstition is that that stuff is just too dangerous to talk about — a poisonous axiomatic belief inculcated by government schooling. So people who are serious about their religion are perpetually on the defensive, and those who think transcendent rules dont’t apply to them are on the rampage.
More taxation fun.
Thes control freaks never stop. We must get rid of the taxation of income and the IRS one way or another.
Self-ping for later use on my rep and two hapless senators.
No it's typical one party pretending to be two parties tyranny. The one horned liberal subsidy loving Pink RINOELEPHANT from Iowa is leading the herd. I wonder what kind of deal he cut with Christie Dodd for his support of this? Grassley needs to be booted out of office every bit as much as Christie Dodd does. A tyrant is a tyrant no matter what party name they claim. In the mean time the United States needs a powerful & organized Conservative Party to oppose the two in power now that aren't. Let the Liberal GOP join the Democratic Party and be done with it. Voters need to stop pretending -R makes it all A-O-K. Bills like this would never pass if Dirtbag Republicans would stop supporting them as well.
Excellent post. We desperately need a conservative party.
So this garbage is now law?
Where is the ACLU!
Where are all those Dems who thought President Bush was invading privacy by being able to monitor phone calls of potential terrorists?
Not a peep.
surprised / not
There is no Federal Sales Tax, therefore no issue - yet. But you can bet your bottom dollar that this would be standard under the so-called "fair tax" system. How else would they audit you than to get into each and every transaction.
This is FAR more invasive than any phone call monitoring system GWB instituted and the libs aren't even batting an eyelash. McCain could have a field day with this.
Dead on.The two party system now only uses one side of voters to battle another side,while the one’s in the middle(politicians)lie,steal,cheat,etc.,,etc.,,It’s a perfect magicians trick.Distract the audience with one hand while the other hand is performing tricks.
Correct -- I just got the notice from Screwbay yesterday.
Also, in recent months, ebay has disallowed blocking of "e-check payments" -- which are Paypal payments but because they are taking the money from the buyer's checking account, it takes a full week for the funds to clear into the seller's account. I used to block e-checks, due to the delay, and the fact that customers who paid with e-check continually whined to me about a delay that they caused. I also had one of those e-check payments from a deadbeat e-check paying buyer, never clear. Fortunately, I do not ship until I actually receive the funds.
ebay, aka FeeBay, Screwbay, etc., seems to be doing everything they can to run off small sellers. Apparently they just want very large enterprise sellers.
Not yet. It's an income tax issue. If someone makes a dime on e-bay the feds want 3¢ of it.
Next step is to make it palatable to the states by collecting each state's "fair share" for sales tax through the federal IRS, and forwarding the sales taxes so extracted (minus a "reasonable" collection fee, of course!) to the state's coffers.
Assuming he wins, of course.
Naturally, if a democrat wins, they won't abuse it, will they? < /high Richter scale bitterness>
No, as a means to win. Narrator: “Sen. Christopher Dodd was outraged that the government was monitoring overseas phone calls to terrorists. But there’s no outrage coming from the Senator who wants the Federal government to monitor YOUR online spending on eBay, Amazon.com, etc. In fact, he filed legislation in the dead of night to do just that! When you vote in November, remember which party ...”
An Obamamaniac told me that paper money will be discontinued in the near future. If all transactions become electronic, the government will know all, and worse, control all.
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