EoD quick hits

The last week has been a blur and next week won’t be much different as we keep up with daily demands and prepare for our trip to Nashville for Danny Tate’s benefit concert and hearing.

Meanwhile, we’ve posted a few stories in the past days and want to call attention to miscellaneous “why” scenarios for some of them.  First, the Houston Chronicle recently posted a story about a lawsuit over civil asset forfeitures.  Property rights is a major issue for us here at EstateofDenial.com.  Though probate abuse which includes estate looting is our focus area, we’ve long maintained that both government and private individuals are always looking to develop new revenue streams via other people’s efforts.  Civil asset forfeitures.  It’s an issue worth watching.

This week, Thomas Sowell, one of the most prolific writer’s of our time, wrote a column entitled A “Duty to Die”? In it, he says this:

Make no mistake about it, letting old people die is a lot cheaper than spending the kind of money required to keep them alive and well. If a government-run medical system is going to save any serious amount of money, it is almost certain to do so by sacrificing the elderly.

We’ve long espoused our views that not only Obamacare will be harmful most Americans as well as be a destructive economic force, but that government-sanctioned doping of the elderly will do much to open the door for estate looting of what wealth survives our country’s financial implosion.  Seems like Thomas Sowell agrees that this legislation will negatively impact older folks with a streamlined death sentence.

And a tragic case out of California shows the fragility of property rights and the overrated status of estate planning documents.  While we would never advocate not having these documents, people should understand that they routinely are used in a manner contrary to a person’s wishes or, as in this case, completely disregarded.

Our friend Ray Fernandez aptly said this of the case:

“Although Clay and Harold had wills, powers of attorney, and medical directives, all naming each other as their responsible persons, the County even obtained court orders preventing Clay and Harold from seeing each other.” We realized that Wills, Trusts, Medical Directives give a false sense of security as this case clearly proves it means nothing. These legal papers costs thousands to produce, yet they often are not worth the paper the are written on as the courts do not recognize or respect them, just ask Clay Greene or ask me, my mother Clara G. Fernandez spent thousands drawing up Trusts, Directives, Addendums, POA’s  yet it meant nothing.  Probate courts and guardians do not pay a whole lot of attention to these papers and they do what they please free of any legal constraints.”