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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription, which takes about a 15% cut:

 

4. Donate by check. I get whatever you donate. Make the check payable to Robert Zimmerman and mail it to
 
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652

 

You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.


New EU tax law puts thousands out of business

We’re here to help you! A major revision to the VAT tax in the European Union tax has caused the shutdown of thousands of businesses because they cannot afford to meet the complex rules and bureaucracy required.

Designed to prevent large businesses locating themselves in VAT-competitive territories, it had the predictable effect of drowning small businesses under a sea of bureaucracy, forcing them to access the data required to prove the customer’s location, figure out which of more than 80 VAT rates to apply, and issue an invoice in the correct language, currency and layout. Unable to afford the costly software required to deal with the regulation, thousands of small business and sole traders have closed or abandoned their enterprises. Most of those who have continued to trade have either moved to third party platforms, losing up to 70 percent of their total revenue (not just non-domestic sales) in commission, or spent thousands on software.

“The human cost to these businesses is vast”, Clare Josa is co-founder of EU VAT Action commented for EU Observer. “The only reason the Digital Single Market is still functioning is because awareness levels are below 5 percent, so most businesses are continuing to trade under the former system. As awareness rises, the damage will soar.”

Read the whole article. The quote above only gives a small taste of the problem caused entirely by government bureaucrats and elected officials who seem divorced from reality. And though this is a European governmental disaster, it is instructive for Americans to learn about it. Like Obamacare, the new VAT tax rules were imposed with the best of intentions, but completely ignored the reality of meeting those intentions. The result is financial ruin for thousands of businesses and individuals.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

2 comments

  • ted

    I do not agree that Obamacare was imposed with the best of intentions. It was designed to create chaos and frustration so that the bureaucrats could later ‘fix’ it with a single payer system.

  • hondo

    Ted – same here.

    “government bureaucrats and elected officials who seem divorced from reality”

    Sorry. Not divorced – they just have their own sense of desired reality. EU socialists (as their Communist cousins) always have big problems with “small businesses”. To difficult to control and supervise. They would just as well like the neighborhood butcher shop (or anything else) to be gov’t run and staffed with gov’t employees.

    If it doesn’t work – so what! If people complain – ha ha ha – oh boy! Waiting for Madera to solve his country’s problems with mass arrests and disappearances.

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