TallGuyJohninBKK

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OP's source Epoch Times, formerly not even allowed as a credible source here on the forum: The Epoch Times – Bias and Credibility QUESTIONABLE SOURCE Overall, we rate The Epoch Times Right Biased and Questionable based on the publication of pseudoscience and the promotion of propaganda and conspiracy theories, as well as numerous failed fact checks. "the Epoch Times frequently publishes pseudoscience news, such as Supernormal Abilities Developed Through Meditation: Dr. Dean Radin Discusses. They also publish false claims from Pseudoscience and anti-vaccination activist Joeseph Mercola who has a long track record of publishing misinformation. Finally, the above referenced NBC News report states, “In addition to claims that alien abductions are real and the “deep state engineered the drug epidemic,” the channel pushes the QAnon conspiracy theory, which falsely posits that the same “Spygate” cabal is a front for a global pedophile ring being taken down by Trump.” https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-epoch-times/

I believe I found and just watched the YT video on Carden's hour-long Thai tax presentation to the PCEC in January 2025. In his talk, he did briefly mention regular U.S. IRAs. But he made absolutely no mention whatsover of where Roth IRAs would stand under the recent Thai tax moves. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XScNGwqXQm8

Another recent ploy of the anti-vax movement has been to sponsor petitions signed by bunches of people with large sounding numbers, but when you delve into the details, the signees tend to be a bunch of anti-vaxers, misinformation peddlers, and to the extent actual scientists are on the list, they tend to be from obscure institutions and/or in large part people from disciplines totally unrelated to COVID and infectious diseases, like geologists, radiologists, gynecologists, podiatrists, etc etc... Great folks to be getting your COVID and COVID vaccine advice from... Here's a more reputable source, among many -- the Infectious Disease Society of America: "The Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) is a community of over 13,000 physicians, scientists and public health experts who specialize in infectious diseases. Our mission is to improve the health of individuals, communities, and society by promoting excellence in patient care, education, research, public health, and prevention relating to infectious diseases." https://www.idsociety.org/about-idsa/about-idsa/ "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is recommending that all eligibles age groups get vaccinated. “In my opinion, everyone should get one of the new vaccines,” says Dr. George Diaz, chief of medicine at Providence Regional Medical Center Everett and a spokesperson for the Infectious Disease Society of America. [emphasis added] That said, it’s most important for those at high risk of becoming seriously ill from COVID-19, namely those over the age of 65 or who have other underlying health problems like a weakened immune system." NPR August 30, 2024 https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2024/08/22/nx-s1-5082372/updated-covid-vaccines-fda-approved

"Take-home message: - Dr. Peter McCullough, who has made a significant number of false statements about the COVID-19 pandemic, is the Chief Scientific Officer of the Wellness Company - The Wellness Company is part of the libertarian medical movement which seeks to divorce the practice of medicine from any government or industry influence - The solution proposed by the Wellness Company is to get rid of your medical prescriptions and replace them with unproven and disproven dietary supplements" Office for Science and Society (Separating Sense from Nonsense) McGill University https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/covid-19-medical-critical-thinking/dr-peter-mcculloughs-libertarian-medical-train-makes-pit-stop-east-palestine

McCullough and his minions are anti-vax quacks, and McCullough specifically has a long history of spouting COVID misinformation, all the while promoting unproven and/or discredited COVID and vaccine "cures" for profit. He's probably rivaled only by RFK Jr. in terms of the volume of Covid misinformation nonsense he's been responsible for during the course of the COVID pandemic.... even to the point that he had his medical specialty certifications revoked because of his pervasive misinformation peddling. [McCullough] Paper claiming ‘extensive’ harms of COVID-19 vaccines to be retracted February 19, 2024 "A journal is retracting a paper on the purported harms of vaccines against COVID-19 written in part by authors who have had similar work retracted before. ... The senior author on the work was Peter McCullough, a cardiologist at the Institute of Pure and Applied Knowledge who lost his board certification after the American Board of Internal Medicine found he had “provided false or inaccurate medical information to the public.” Indeed, McCullough had already lost one paper, in Current Problems in Cardiology, from Elsevier, when he and his colleagues submitted their latest opus to Cureus. And SSRN, which hosts preprints for The Lancet, another Elsevier journal, had removed work by him and colleagues claiming large numbers of deaths from COVID-19 vaccines. https://retractionwatch.com/2024/02/19/paper-claiming-extensive-harms-of-covid-19-vaccines-to-be-retracted/ https://www.abim.org/verify-physician?type=name&ln=McCullough&fn=Peter And below is a partial list of McCullough's many many debunked claims relating to COVID and COVID vaccines: https://science.feedback.org/reviewed-content-author/peter-mccullough/

In that Pattaya session you mentioned, did Carden say he now believes Roth IRA remittances ARE Thai taxable, or he didn't specifically mention Roths?

Here's a link to the YT video I mentioned above regarding U.S tax-exempt Roth IRAs, time keyed to that specific comment from Carden that begins at the 26 minutes, 45 seconds point and continues thru about the 27 minutes, 40 seconds point: https://youtu.be/K-2sAgFNgVE?t=1604 I'm not claiming Carden's comment from last fall is accurate or that it's the Thai RD's current position on the matter. I have no idea on either front. I'm mentioning and reposting the comment here, solely because it's the first time I've ever heard that kind of interpretation being discussed. As best as I understand it, Roth IRAs only came into being AFTER the adoption of the current Thai-U.S. tax treaty. My document shows the Thai-U.S. tax treaty was signed by the parties in November 1996, whereas Roth IRAs were only created by U.S. law in 1997 and first became available in 1998.

Jing, this whole mess keeps getting stranger and stranger... Yes, the US-Thai DTA seemingly does not give any Thai tax protection for U.S. IRA and Roth IRA accounts if funds from those are remitted into Thailand by someone who's become a Thai tax resident. However -- and this is the first I've heard of this -- I saw a YT video the other day from last fall during which the American tax consultant guy here in BKK (Thomas Carden) said they had been told by someone in the TRD at some point that their general policy was going to be that they would treat tax-exempt instruments from the U.S. as tax exempt in Thailand... which would apply to remittances from a U.S. Roth account -- if the TRD actually sticks to what Carden claimed they were saying at one point. That's a notion I don't think I've ever heard anyone say before in this whole mess... And who knows whether in fact that's still, or ever was, the TRD's interpretation.

Turbo cancer is not a thing Katelyn Jetelina and Kristen Panthagani, MD, PhD Mar 28, 2024 ... Bottom line "The pandemic caused a significant disruption in cancer screenings, and tragically, that meant many people’s cancer diagnoses were delayed, only to be found when they were late-stage. This started well before Covid-19 vaccines were rolled out, and there is no evidence to suggest Covid-19 vaccines are causing a surge in cancer. Even among younger people like Kate Middleton, who unfortunately, are increasingly being diagnosed with cancer." [emphasis added] Kristen Panthagani, MD, PhD, is a resident physician and Yale Emergency Scholar, completing a combined Emergency Medicine residency and research fellowship focusing on health literacy and communication. “Your Local Epidemiologist (YLE)” is written by Dr. Katelyn Jetelina, M.P.H. Ph.D.—an epidemiologist, wife, and mom of two little girls. During the day, she is a senior scientific consultant to several organizations, including CDC. https://yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com/p/turbo-cancer-is-not-a-thing

American Cancer Society: Can COVID-19 vaccines cause cancer or make cancer grow? There is no information that suggests that COVID-19 vaccines cause cancer. There is also no information that suggests these vaccines can make cancer grow or recur (come back). [emphasis added] https://www.cancer.org/cancer/managing-cancer/coronavirus-covid-19-and-cancer/covid-19-vaccines-in-people-with-cancer.html#:~:text=Can COVID-19 vaccines cause cancer or make cancer grow%3F Last Revised: September 9, 2024

U.S. NIH - National Cancer Institute: COVID-19 Vaccines and People with Cancer ... Can COVID-19 vaccines cause cancer? Can the vaccines cause cancer to recur or make it more aggressive? There is no evidence that COVID-19 vaccines cause cancer, lead to recurrence, or lead to disease progression. Furthermore, COVID-19 vaccines do not change your DNA (i.e., your genetic code). [emphasis added] https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/coronavirus/covid-19-vaccines-people-with-cancer#:~:text=Can COVID-19,your genetic code). Updated: October 10, 2023

Maybe Immigration needs to add English-language proofreaders an acceptable category for DTV applicants! 🙂

I thought I recalled reading some time back that Vietnam was planning to offer some kind of longer stay/term visa just for Americans.... But then after that, I don't think I ever saw anything more about it.... Dunno if it ever came to pass, or was just internet nonsense....

I got an automated email reminder last week from Immigration that my upcoming filing was coming due. That's been standard at least for me in BKK in recent months. Also, did my online filing to BKK CW last Friday around dinner-time. Got the confirmation email/next reporting due date back from Immigration today/Monday early afternoon. IMHO, it's a stupid requirement for long-term expats residing here on annual extensions of stay. But at least, for the present, the online reporting system is working.

And AFAICT, the OP article doesnt even make any mention of agricultural burning as the main cause of this annual, seasonal air pollution debacle in Thailand. That kinda tells you everything anyone needs to know about how keen the authorities here are to AVOID addressing the true main cause of what's going on, year after year after year!

I'm trying to calculate, just how many times I've read here over many years and many seasons that the authorities are / were inspecting all the public buses to ensure that they're not violating pollution standards???? I think, I can't count that high without the aid of a calculator... And yet....

Curiously, there were no queues at the ticket counters today at either end of our BTS Green Line trip. Both at BTS stations that normally are very busy with queues in part because they do a lot of tourist trade. Probably because, no one today, unlike usual, was having to pay any money, make change, get receipts, top-up Rabbit cards at the counter etc etc... Just walk up and they hand you a generic single-use ticket, and you're gone! PS - I wasn't disputing what you reported about using your Rabbit card... Just saying for the record, we used a different method, which worked equally well. Especially as not everyone has or uses Rabbit cards.

I'm all in favor of public transit for many reasons, so I can't quibble with this one-week promotion. But as others have pointed out above, this latest measure -- like most of the rest of the recent anti-air pollution measures the Thai government has undertaken or talked about undertaking -- will do little to nothing to lessen the current choking levels of PM2.5 that are occurring. While internal combustion vehicles certainly do create pollution, they do so year-round. What's making the situation drastically worse now is a combination of the weather conditions and, most importantly, the illegal seasonal agricultural burning both in Thailand and adjoining countries... Illegal burning that Thailand's authorities simply ignore most of the time. And when they rarely do talk about combating it as a cause, it's only when air pollution conditions get really bad... But in reality, on the ground, they pretty much do next to nothing meaningful.

The wife and I rode BTS Green Line this afternoon, and it was far more rammed than usual. Sardine can like inside. For those wondering.... at least the process we encountered on the BTS Line ... patrons wanting to take advantage of this deal also can just walk up to the ticket counter and the staff there will give you a single use ticket.... You don't need to tell them where you're going, as the ones they're handing out apparently are generic. Worked just fine outbound and then returning on our trip this afternoon. FWIW, the wife and I both have Rabbit cards that we normally use, but we didn't try using them as we normally would today. Used the free tickets instead. So I can't confirm yes or no whether tapping the Rabbit card this week will or won't result in the normal charge.

I think I recognize the guy shown in the OP photo... I wanna say he took a Shakespeare class with me back in my English Lit studying days! Back then, I think, he just went by Abdi!

FYI... 1. the domestic wire transfer method thru BKKB NY was, AFAIK, never documented on BKKB's website, either before or after BKKB NY stopped accepting traditional ACH transfers. But the New York branch still accepted and forwarded onward domestic wires to BKKB TH.... as my own personal experience using that method confirmed. 2. And, on top of #1 above, all of my successful trials/tests doing domestic wires thru the BKKB NY branch occurred AFTER BKKB NY had stopped accepting traditional ACH transfers. So I have no reason to think anything has changed with their handling of domestic wires since then... However, as I've mentioned above, anyone wishing to pursue that course these days should definitely call and check/confirm with the NY branch directly. In my experience, BKKB customer service in Thailand were relatively useless and uninformed on the details of what the NY branch was doing with domestic wires. But the staff at the NY branch, once you reach the right person there, were great to deal with and very informative.

From doing some quick searching, it seems that Vanguard doesn't make domestic wires especially easy or visible for their customers, but apparently they can be done... See the following thread and discussion by Vanguard account holders on the subject: https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=280847

I don't have a Vanguard account, so I can't speak to their particulars. But both of my other U.S. brokerages offer online access to both domestic and international wire transfers from within their online banking setups. I have done the BKKB NY domestic wire onward to BKKB TH with one of those brokerages in the past, and it was exceptionally easy and uncomplicated. As I mentioned above, for the recipient info, you enter BKKB NY's 9-digit routing number (the same as you would for a regular ACH transfer) and then your BKKB TH account number as the recipient account. When BKKB NY receives a domestic wire like that, they see and can recognize the recipient account number is associated with whatever of their branches in Thailand, and send the funds onward accordingly. There's no need to provide any written instructions to accomplish that.... and frankly, it's probably better to NOT write any such thing. As domestic wires are meant to be DOMESTIC, BKKB NY's workaround notwithstanding. As far as BKKB's fees for that, they were small. I don't remember the exact amounts off-hand, but my general recollection was BKKB NY charges a relatively small handling fee for their end of things, and then BKKB TH charges their typical amount-based wire transfer funds handling fee, as best as I recall, 0.25% capped at 500 baht, AFAIR. https://www.bangkokbank.com/en/Personal/Other-Services/Transfers/Transferring-Into-Thailand/Transfer-money-from-US-to-Thailand-via-Bangkok-Bank-NewYork-branch But again, as I mentioned above, it's been a couple of years since I last checked on the domestic wire transfer method, and anyone wanting to pursue it would be well-served to give BKKB NY a phone call and inquire. There used to be one staff lady there who handled all those kinds of transactions and her English was perfectly fine. I don't see any mention of the domestic wire transfer method via BKKB NY on BKKB TH's website -- only IAT or foreign remittance. But that was the case in the past as well, back when I did my domestic wires, shortly after BKKB discontinued their original ACH service via the NY branch.

I don't know what $55 fee you're referencing above. If someone sends a domestic wire to BKKB NY and they then forward it onward to the accountholder's BKKB account in Thailand, there's no $55 BKKB fee involved. You're talking about the "foreign remittances" method, which is an entirely different deal from sending a domestic wire. When I looked at it originally, their "foreign remittance method was ridiculously complicated and onerous, so I never pursued it or even tried it. Frankly, I've never known anyone who actually used that particular "foreign remittance" method with BKKB NY. And why would they, given that the old domestic ACH method and the still available domestic wire method involving BKKB NY were/are exceptionally inexpensive and easy.