[Authors note: to make the following passage clear I should point out that every friend I've had in Florida who registered a vehicle here or registered to vote here became the victim of some unpopular process in the system. A good example was a guy who registered to vote and didn't realize he was also registering for the draft. JP registered his truck and got a notice for jury duty. My position is not that the draft or jury duty or wrong, but that tricking people into signing up for these things is not right. I did later find out that you cannot register a vehicle in Florida unless you have Florida ID. So that sucks, in that I don't believe anybody has a right to dictate what an American is allowed to own if the property itself is a legal entity.]
I suspect I may have to register the station wagon in Florida. This is not good, because they may require a driver’s license to do so. I notice thirty years ago the police leave you alone the further away your license plates read. That is so long, that I would probably continue to do this no matter what the fine for not complying. I have just seen too many people put through the gears for no good reason.
It also doesn't take a genius to spot that the police here don't bother tourists. Therefore, to be left alone, one should pretend to be a tourist for as long as possible. I have always maintained that in this day and age privacy is a very valuable asset. When you give people a choice between protecting their assets or obeying the law, you can’t complain when they choose the former. For the self-righteous among you, Washington State has a very good system. You can be a legal resident of the state and not live there. A residence can be “the place from which you apply for any government license.”
[Authors note: at the point the next paragraph was written I had begun to accumulate tens of thousands of dollars in investments and insurances. This tends to happen when I stay too long at one job. I've also seen how people who get themselves into that situation too deeply often become the natural first target for shysters, con artists, and government inspectors. All of us know people who been sued simply because somebody found out they were rich. In the end, I lost my job and decided not to replace it. This happened before I had the incentive to place assets overseas.]
Thus, I am really anxious to get that phone number in Belize. The final step to asset protection is always offshore incorporation. Panama is a real haven, but somehow it is just too far away for me, and I don’t know anyone there. It’s also a long drive. Belize has all the plusses. Even if some major corporation didn’t buy up the very piece of land I had my eye on. [Long Caye]
[Author’s note: in the end I did not choose Belize, but I may travel there for a look. I was getting too many conflicted messages about the lifestyle there.]
I finished reading “Churchill, the Struggle for Survival”. It wasn’t about the war, it was a book by his doctor. Cute. A curious work, as the author was a doctor who originally wanted to write, became a doctor and eventually had to write because he needed the money. Only in England. Maybe I shouldn’t say that because look at all the American lawyers to become authors. You’ve been warned, it is about Churchill’s survival, not the Free World.
This picture was added in 2023 to give some color to this post. It may be a repeat, but it was taken in 2003 on a trip to the Everglades.
