newnative

Thanks for your interesting post. I'm curious regarding the $61,750 tax-free figure you mentioned, which I am not familiar with. Is that for higher income levels? (Which I am also not familiar with, more's the pity!) In 2023, I had Social Security, Virginia state pension, and dividend income for a total of around $50,000 in income for the year. I ran my taxes with both Turbo Tax and Tax Act on-line tax preparers and they both came up with around $1,500 in federal tax still owed, on top of what I had already paid. To add insult to injury, I had to also pay a small penalty as I didn't have enough tax taken out during the year, which I have, hopefully, remedied for 2024.

Terrific debate performance for Harris. Trump was demented horrible--yaa!

Wish that were true regarding the good 'ol US of A. No tax expert but I do know I have been paying federal tax for the last 50 years on income that has never reached $60,000. My 2023 tax owed was around $1500.

No, not a lot, in my opinion. Certainly nobody I know would fit that description. They might be more noticeable than other ex-pats going about their business in less visible areas but that is perception, not reality. My Thai spouse and I live in a new housing estate on the Darkside of Pattaya, one of a very large number of housing estates that have sprung up, and are continuing to be built here in booming Pattaya. Of the 30 homes in my housing project, in the 10MB range, almost all have at least one ex-pat in residence. It was the same in the two previous housing projects that we lived at before this one. Are we visible, on display? Nope. Nobody sees or notices us. Only those down-and-out sad sack ex-pats seem to get noticed and commented on. But, for every one of those, there are dozens more living in out-of-sight housing estates or in one of the numerous high-end condo projects that have been built, and, like the housing projects, are also still being built, to handle the demand.

This is not news. We've had this same story periodically for years. News is reporting something new; hence, the word 'news'. Something new would be reporting that the high speed rail project is on schedule or, dare I say it, ahead of schedule. Odds of those two news stories are slim and none.

Sounds like you have some things already lined up. A few others, A boat ride to one of the nearby small islands with snorkeling from the boat is fun. As already mentioned, Nong Nooch Gardens is very nice and there are several shows. I liked Sanctuary of Truth and Underwater World. Terminal 21 can be fun and there are a lot of different restaurants, including a number of new ones.

Yes, I did.

College degree, worked my career in the library of a community college in northern Virginia.

1. To avoid jail. 2. Grifter opportunities galore.

I hope they take just as long to enact this as they are taking for gay marriage.

Zero hours. If it isn't permanent press I don't buy it.

Be aware, though, that Centara Grand is currently undergoing an extensive renovation. It's still open but some of the attractions are closed during the renovation work and some of the property has been walled off to screen the work being done. I do know the gym is still open.

He was actually correct in calling the 2000 election for Gore. Unfortunately, due to a number of factors beyond his control, including several instances of very poorly designed ballots, voter confusion, suppression of the vote due to improper deletion of largely Democratic voter registrations, etc., even though the majority of the Florida voters thought they were voting for Gore, the voter tally ended up too close to call, with Gore ultimately declared the winner when the Supreme Court ordered the recount halted. It's interesting that the tv networks, using voter exit polling, were correct in initially calling Florida for Gore. As I said, the majority of the Florida voters in 2000 thought they were casting their ballots for Gore, and that was reflected in the exit polling. However, once so many votes for Gore were not counted due to some of the above factors, Florida became too close to call later in the evening. Lichtman and Gore were both victims of a combination of things that should not have happened in the Florida presidential election that year. But, I count him technically correct with his 2000 prediction.

As always, a mighty and likely thankless task to explain what is obvious and true to a Trump supporter.

Thanks for the information.

I have been following the discussion regarding SS and spouse benefits. I wonder if anybody knows the answer to my situation. I am an American citizen, age 72, legally married, in the US, to a Thai citizen, age 58, since 2016. We live in Thailand full-time. Thai spouse has a SS number but no SS work credits. Would he qualify for spouse benefits when he turns 62 and survival benefits after I pass away? We do not plan to live in the US for 5 years. Thanks in advance if anyone has any information on this type of marriage situation.

Far more likely.

Scary delusional.

And the answer is . . . yes! Who could blame her.

All an act. And, it doesn't mean the Georgia voters have forgotten how Trump trashed Kemp.

Or, could be that idiot Trump hugely insulted the Republican governor of Georgia. Thank you, Donald, for being such an idiot. Now, on to all the other swing states and let's insult the Republicans there.

Typical Trump. He's far too lazy to actually do any thinking on any of the important issues so he does what he always does, takes the easy way and just insults. Which, actually is probably smart on his part because he has done so many flip flops and told so many lies that he can't keep anything straight at this point. In the horrible event that he wins, he'll likely need a new cabinet position, Department of Trump Lies, to manage and maintain all of them in some sort of order. Meanwhile, I find it insane that any woman with a functioning brain would vote for Trump.

Maybe because he died in a plane crash years ago. But, you're right-- wacko RFK Jr. just appealed to the same wackos that already support Trump so no lift.

My Thai spouse and I bought a new house that had just started construction last year from a local construction company here in Pattaya. While the builder/owner was Thai, and the construction manager, most of the construction workers were not, with the exception of the electricians and maybe a few others doing specialized work, and the company that built the pool. What I would call the yucky work--doing the steel girders, the tile roof, the concrete block walls, digging holes and installing water piping, foundation work, drywall, painting, etc., was done by non-Thai workers. They arrived each day on the back of a pick-up truck, 10 or 12 all crammed in together. We see pick up trucks full of these workers all the time and I don't know how they get around the labor law--perhaps they can get an exception if no Thai workers can be found to do the work.

As dear old Dad used to say, 'too rich!'. If anybody has treated Pence horribly it's super nasty Trump, himself.