From the Publisher's Desk
February 1st, 2005

"Liberty is always dangerous - but it is the safest thing we have."

- Harry Emerson Fosdick

What is the difference between the above mandatory ID and today's mandatory ID below?

Conclusion of Part II - Doctor Seymour Samson January 2005 interview.

PT Shamrock = PTS
Doctor Seymour Samson = DSS

PTS - What kind of business do you recommend?

DSS - I don't want to get into that because that has nothing to do with our topic. That said, just make sure it's a business you can operate from a laptop anywhere you can get an Internet connection, and today that's most anywhere. It should be something you personally enjoy doing and if you can help others doing it, then you'll have a winner.

PTS - Why do you detest America so much?

DSS - I don't detest America. Rather I disagree with much of their leaders unfair and unjust policies and those of other countries as well.

In the case of America, they have forced billions of non Americans around the world to become unwilling participants in their 'war on terrorism.' I bitterly resent that.

On the other hand you have the wealthiest nation on earth, perhaps even the most generous nation the world has ever seen, and its leaders have to be embarrassed into coughing up more money for the horrific tsunami disaster that struck much of South Asia last week. Why?

Even with a billion dollars in total aid, of which the US has pledged $350mil so far, there are 5 million homeless persons. That's $200 per person in aid. That's nowhere near what's required to help them is it?

As the world's only super power, the US should lead by example. But what examples has America shown to the world? Having to be embarrassed into helping more during the tsunami disaster? Breaking international laws on prisoner abuse in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib? Breaking the law to enforce the law domestically? Disregarding UN and international laws when they run contrary to US interests? Not very good examples America is setting are they?

The US had a golden opportunity to lead the world and they've blown it by piss poor leadership and unjust laws and policies.

So in a nutshell I believe that both domestic and international laws must be upheld, within reason, by citizens and governments alike.

The United States was build on and as a nation of laws. What happened? There's a fine line that separates right from wrong and it's my opinion that the United States crossed that line sometime back and irreversibly.

While all of the above is not any reflection on the American public, it is a rather sad commentary on America's leadership for the past few decades.

PTS - What was the biggest influence on you that guided you towards offshore consulting and you're now guru status?

DSS - The tax people killing my father and destroying my mother's mental health 100 percent for sure. That was the turning point in my life as a wee lad. I swore at that time that I would dedicate my life to helping people avoid going through what happened to my parents, siblings and myself.

So for the few thousand my father owed in taxes that he just couldn't pay, I figured I've helped people legally save ten of thousands of times that amount that otherwise would have been paid to the tax authorities. So how smart are they?

PTS - Not very.

DSS - Government's just don't care, because it isn't their money. They are just 'following the law'. I say f**k the law and the bureaucrats that go along with it when its unjust.

You know it's one thing if someone owes tax and doesn't pay. It's quite another thing if they owe tax and CAN'T pay, isn't it?

PTS - Indeed it is. What other events or persons influenced your thinking?

DSS - My mother first and foremost of all. Then my father and older brother and two aunts. They were all positive influences in my life.

PTS - How so?

DSS - My mother because I saw how at the age of 55, widowed and not having worked at a nine to five job for more than twenty years, she got herself together for her children and went back to work. This was at age 55 mind you. She fibbed about her age and told all job interviewers that she was 10 years younger than she really was. She did that because she was smart enough to realize no one would have hired her at age 55. So she was hired at age '45'. I never knew her real age until she travelled overseas to meet me one Christmas and I had to get her passport for a visa somewhere. I said "Mom, you're 66 years old. I thought you were 56?"

I admired my father because he was a businessman and entrepreneur, though granted not a very successful one. I never knew him to ever work for anyone but himself. I suppose deep down inside myself subconsciously, I wanted to be a successful businessman because my father wasn't.

I loved and admired my brother, may he rest in peace. We made a lot of money together. In all the years I knew my brother, I never once knew him to lie or cheat anyone, even if he/we got the short end of the stick in a business transaction.

PTS - What about writers and books? Have any had any influence on you?

DSS - Of course they have. I believe reading Dale Carnegie's "How to Win Friends and Influence People" more than 45 years ago pointed me in the right direction business wise. I applied his simple rules and methods and they really worked.

I also enjoyed W. Clement Stone's wealth series books, especially his 17 Principles of Success. They work like gangbusters if you work them. W. Clement Stone's died a couple of years back at 100 years of age. Can't beat that can you?

I still remember W. Clement Stone's motto: "Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve with PMA," (Positive mental attitude.)

Napoleon Hill was another great motivator and I always enjoyed reading his books, all of them.

Of course, though I am not the most religious person in the world, the Bible offers a lot of great stories and wisdom.

PTS - What about the PT variety books and authors?

DSS - How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World by the author Harry Browne, the original version written way back in the early 1970's, I think 1972, made for a wonderful read. I believe it was updated a few years back, but read the original if you can get your hands on a copy.

I was doing many of the things that Browne wrote about and was able to articulate and I didn't realize it until the book made me confront the things Browne wrote.

I also enjoyed the old Harry Schultz newsletters. Harry is even older than I am if you can believe that! I'm certain that since Harry is 300 years old now, he has someone writing his not so great newsletter nowadays. Some consider him the grandfather of PT and that may be so.
He's certainly a solid gold bug, but I sure wouldn't pay for his investment advice today.

Schultz was ranting and raving for years that gold would hit $4,000 per ounce before the end of 2004. Well 2004 was here and gone and gold sure as hell isn't anywhere near 4,000, though it has hit 16 year highs recently!

PTS - What do you see as the single biggest problem in the world today, privacy wise?

DSS - Now that's a tuff one. I'm not sure if this is the single biggest problem, but it would certainly be right up there near the top.

Probably at or near the top of that list would be opening a secure bank account whilst maintaining your anonymity. Someplace to hide your mother load that is secret, where you don't have to be subject to providing utility bills, a bank reference and have the bank's proctologist look up your backside to see where you got your money in order to open a decent bank account.

PTS - Interesting, go on.

DSS- Look, the US and UK have hundreds of millions of dollars and pounds being laundered through New York and London every week. Those governments know that fact and anyone with half a brain knows that as well. Since 1994 both the US and the UK governments gave the late
Yasser Arafat more than 2.3 billion dollars in 'funding' after Arafat signed the so called Oslo accord. Some reward for doing that, wasn't it?

PTS - Indeed!

DSS - Today no one knows where Yasser Arafat's money is, i.e. where he hide that money. Now Arafat was a murderer and a full blown terrorist, no one can deny that. He most certainly used the US' and the UK's money to help train and arm terrorist that killed thousands worldwide. You mean to tell me the US and UK didn't know that at the time and still doesn't know where that money is or went? I say bull shit! The CIA and MI6 aren't that incompetent.

Now you take some honest businessman that's made some dough in the stock market, in real estate or sold his business or home. That poor bastard is subject to all kinds of regulations, filling returns, due diligence requirements ad nauseam. Worse, if he happens to be an American, he'll has to swear under penalty (if he places his loot offshore, i.e. out of harms way,) on his tax reports and who knows how many other forms, about his wealth, how much and where it is.

If he doesn't, he's looking at having his lifetime capital being confiscated by any one of thousands of arcane laws and worse, never seeing the light of day for the next 15 to 20 years getting time in the pokey for trying to protect his wealth.

Remember an American can still have an offshore bank account, IF they report it. But if you do, there goes your privacy. If you are ever in any lawsuit, criminal or otherwise, even if you are involved in civil litigation , especially in the US, your offshore account can and most likely, will be exposed, if you comply with all US regulations.

Go figure.

PTS - What can Americans do about this?

DSS - Don't be an American!

[Laughter.]

[DSS - continuing.] Seriously either an American should tow the line, pay all the taxes the IRS says they owe and without playing games, plus abide by all the laws if they want to remain in the USA without problems. Because if you start playing games, there is a very likely chance you'll have a problem.

Alternatively just leave. Don't break any laws and you'll be able to return as often as you like. An American can earn a very decent income offshore with a tax deferral, up to nearly US$80,000 per year. $80,000 per year tax free is decent money, especially if you live in a
place where the standard of living is high, but the cost of living is reasonable.

PTS - What if you're not an American. What if you're an Australian or a European national?

DSS - Then life becomes a whole lot easier. You have the best of all worlds. You can live and travel most anywhere and everywhere for three to six months per year and can easily make a darn good living with a laptop business as I call it and without the hassles of visas, etc.

A decent country, say anywhere in the Western European Union, with a legal residency should fit the bill for most Yankees. Why would anyone go for a residency in Panama and such places for 5 years ending up with an inferior passport that certainly raises eyebrows and most assuredly is NOT low profile, instead of within the European Union is beyond me? I mean, come on, a blue eyed blond haired gringo with a Panama passport travelling the world?

PTS - Why do you dislike America and Americans so much?

DSS - It's not that I dislike America, and I certainly like most Americans. I just don't care for the direction America's taken, especially when it affects non Americans and everybody's civil
liberties and privacy. I mean just take a look at America today and then think about what it use to be.

PTS - For example?

DSS - For example, what kind of place is it where the government tracks you in order to arrest you or have you pay unpaid fines when you call on the telephone to order pizza for home delivery? That's happening in the US today!

What the hell kind of place it is where the police in Florida just last November, used a 50,000 volt stun gun to zap a six year old child, who in first grade who was 'threatening' the principle with a tiny piece of glass?

And that's not an isolated example either. Police, again in Florida, used a Taser gun on an unarmed 12 year old girl who was playing hooky from school only TWO weeks after the 6 year old child incident.

Those are the kind of incidents that one use to read about in the days of American backed Chilean dictator, Augusto Pinochet.

What kind of a country is it that children have to be tagged and pass through a metal detector in order to get into elementary school, let alone high school?

I'll answer those questions. Not the America I knew and use to respect. Not any place where I'd want my children or my grandchildren to grow up and go to school, that's for sure.

There has to be, should be a fine line, a balance with reason and fairness in dealing with the public and public matters. I'm afraid America crossed that line long ago and most now recognize that fact. It's simply too late for the authorities to turn back, or be turned back. America has become a police state and that my friend, is a very sad state of affairs indeed.

I could go on and on, but I believe you get my point.

PTS - Yes we certainly do get your point. Thank you.

In closing doctor, can you sum up what actions our readers can and should take in order to maintain what's left of their privacy and to live a sovereign life? That is, the top ten things they should or shouldn't do?

DSS - What actions your readers take or should take is entirely at their discretion. However I will have to generalize answering what options they have, because everyone is different, so here goes;

1. If you haven't already, don't break any laws unless it is absolutely necessary to do so. If you're so inclined, leave where you currently live, and do so in such a manner that you can return to visit friends and love ones at any time legally.

2. Be fair in your business dealings and with partners, employees, co-workers and especially your spouse. In other words always leave something on the table for others, as those others could become your worse enemy and turn against you!

3. Keep your dealings private and financial wise, to yourself. By all means have a way in the event of your demise, to leave your estate when, how and where you elect, but keep your affairs private. Remember what your loved ones don't know can't hurt them!

4. A decent portion of your capital should be outside the jurisdiction of your home country and where you currently reside. That mother load, as I like to call it, should be in a safe haven for a rainy day or for your heirs, growing tax free until required. Switzerland is still the best place for your mother load, though it's certainly not what it once was.

5. As far as privacy products are concerned, a banking passport has it use in today's world for many persons, particularly your readers. So if you can afford one, and for the small cost involved, it is money well invested.

Also a mail drop in an offshore location is essential. Try to get one that will tip you off if there are any unusual queries regarding your mails.

An anonymous ATM is also a must as is a good anonymous mobile phone, especially if you're located in the states.

6. If you can afford one, acquire a second passport. If not ...

7. Start a legal residency in a desirable country that will lead to naturalization and a new passport in a few years. The years come and go very fast indeed, so the sooner you get started, the sooner you'll have your new citizenship.

8. Start a business that can be operated from a laptop computer from anywhere in the world where you can get an Internet connection. Start a business that you like. The more you like something, the more likely you'll help others and profit from it. Just remember Rome wasn't built in a day, so get started now and in a few years time, you'll laptop business will generate enough income to surpass your current after tax income. When that happens, leave!

In the meantime start saving thirty, twenty, even as little as ten percent of your current income. Pay tax on that income, but get it offshore and start saving for a rainy day or to acquire a second home elsewhere, etc.

9. Keep your big mouth shut. You'd be surprised to hear what people talk about, the most intimate private matters on an elevator or in a restaurant. Loose lips sink BIG ships!

10. And most of all be happy, stay healthy and be free. Because without you're health and freedom you have nothing!

PTS - Doctor, on behalf of our readers and me, thank you for this extensive interview. We deeply appreciate your time, thoughts and input.

DSS - No problem. It's been a pleasure seeing you again and doing this interview. Happy New Year!

End of Interview.

Click here to read Part I of this interview.

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