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Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

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Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#31

Post by dmurray »

triceratops wrote: post #26
dmurray wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your New York business sells something to someone in Oklahoma, you don't have to charge NY sales tax. That's not controversial or a grey area (edit: until 2018). I don't know exactly how they structured this transaction, but if it ended up in Oklahoma it seems to be within the spirit of the law.

> If your New York business sells something to someone in Oklahoma, you don't have to charge NY sales tax Are you sure about that? It seems that at least online businesses don't work that way.[1] 1. https://turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tips/self-employment-taxes/s...

I'm not an expert, but that link seems to agree with me (note we are talking about a transaction circa 2014).

> If your business has a physical presence, or “nexus”, in a state, you must collect applicable sales taxes from online customers in that state.

> If you do not have a physical presence, you generally do not have to collect sales tax for online sales. However, in June of 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling that will likely change this exemption to collecting sales tax.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#32

Post by triceratops »

dmurray wrote: post #31
triceratops wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If your New York business sells something to someone in Oklahoma, you don't have to charge NY sales tax Are you sure about that? It seems that at least online businesses don't work that way.[1] 1. https://turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tips/self-employment-taxes/s...

I'm not an expert, but that link seems to agree with me (note we are talking about a transaction circa 2014). > If your business has a physical presence, or “nexus”, in a state, you must collect applicable sales taxes from online customers in that state. > If you do not have a physical presence, you generally do not have to collect sales tax for online sales. However, in June of 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a…

Ah got it. It may have been legal at the time.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#33

Post by deathgrips »

legerdemain wrote: post #8

One of the outcomes of the US-Iraq war was Iraq's national heritage of antiquities getting plundered and sold illegally.[1] The burning of the Library of Alexandria is a potent symbol in Western culture, but the world has repeatedly suffered massive losses of cultural and historical artifacts in the last few decades. The public quickly develops historical amnesia for recent events. Compare, for example, the loss of B…

Another example is shutting down What.cd, which was a digital library that had an unbelievably large collection of music. Many titles couldn't be found anywhere except on What.cd.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#35

Post by deathgrips »

keiferski wrote: post #20
legerdemain wrote: post #8

One of the outcomes of the US-Iraq war was Iraq's national heritage of antiquities getting plundered and sold illegally.[1] The burning of the Library of Alexandria is a potent symbol in Western culture, but the world has repeatedly suffered massive losses of cultural and historical artifacts in the last few decades. The public quickly develops historical amnesia for recent events. Compare, for example, the loss of B…

The destruction of Baghdad itself, including the House of Wisdom (large library), by the Mongols in 1258 is probably a more apt comparison. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Wisdom https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Baghdad_(1258)

What a tragedy. Most westerners don't realize that when Europeans were living in mud huts and emptying their chamber pots into the streets, the Muslim world had plumbing, water filtration, surgery, advanced mathematics, and many more amazing scientific advances which quickly spread throughout Muslim countries due to the cultural exchange at Mecca. I wonder what the world could have been like if the Mongols had never destroyed so much civilization and progress.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#36

Post by slfnflctd »

triceratops wrote: post #7

> Hobby Lobby bought the tablet in a private sale, after a Hobby Lobby representative viewed the tablet in London. The auction house shipped the tablet to its New York office and, from there, hand-carried it to Hobby Lobby's headquarters in Oklahoma City, "so that Hobby Lobby could avoid incurring a New York sales tax," according to prosecutors. Oy vey. I don't know how serious this is but it's not a great look. Is t…

This to me is the most egregious part:

> [...] authorities said it bought thousands of artifacts that had been smuggled out of Iraq. Some of the items on display at the Museum of the Bible had been looted from previously unknown archaeological sites.

Breathtakingly unethical.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#37

Post by elliekelly »

triceratops wrote: post #7

> Hobby Lobby bought the tablet in a private sale, after a Hobby Lobby representative viewed the tablet in London. The auction house shipped the tablet to its New York office and, from there, hand-carried it to Hobby Lobby's headquarters in Oklahoma City, "so that Hobby Lobby could avoid incurring a New York sales tax," according to prosecutors. Oy vey. I don't know how serious this is but it's not a great look. Is t…

There’s an entire industry built around moving very expensive art so that you don’t have to pay any taxes on it. Switzerland and Monaco (and I’m sure others) have “free ports” where expensive art that is bought as an investment can be stored tax free. It’s kind of like storing the painting at the international departures gate in perpetuity.

Since it would be a pity to spend so much on a painting you never get to see there are companies that will create a replica of your beautiful tax liability so that you can enjoy your multi-million dollar investment. Rumor has it these replicas are so good they occasionally get “mistaken” for the real thing and the worthless art ends up in storage while the expensive art ends up hanging in the wealthy collector’s living room tax-free. Oops. Classic mixup.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#38

Post by microtherion »

triceratops wrote: post #7

> Hobby Lobby bought the tablet in a private sale, after a Hobby Lobby representative viewed the tablet in London. The auction house shipped the tablet to its New York office and, from there, hand-carried it to Hobby Lobby's headquarters in Oklahoma City, "so that Hobby Lobby could avoid incurring a New York sales tax," according to prosecutors. Oy vey. I don't know how serious this is but it's not a great look. Is t…

> Is this kind of thing [tax evasion] common in the art world?

Oh yes, it seems so common that it's more or less openly advertised:

https://www.wealthmanagement.com/art-auctions-antiques-repor...

And art collectors are not infrequently involved in shady schemes:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urs_Schwarzenbach#VAT_fraud_an...

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#39

Post by JoeAltmaier »

crazygringo wrote: post #30
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #19

Kind of sad all around. The table was essentially rescued from ignominy. But of course it belongs to Iraq. Then it'll probably just disappear again. Sigh.

> Then it'll probably just disappear again. Sigh. What are you basing that on?

Oh is Iraq's government stable again? Are the people not at risk of hunger? Will the sanctity of museums be observed now and in the future, uninterrupted?

The Elgin marbles are safe in the British Museum. Would they have been safe, left where they were found, for 100 years?

Being PC about antiquities is intellectually interesting. But practically, it means many antiquities will be broken up, lost or hidden.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#40

Post by davidw »

selimthegrim wrote: post #34

This sounds like the beginning of a horror movie you'd find on Lifetime or Hallmark, but where the ancient Mesopotamian evil accepts Christ and sits down for tea and cakes with the children like in Narnia.

"Ned Flanders comes into possession of an ancient evil stone tablet and makes Homer do his bidding"
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