Utterly Ridiculous Corruption

January 3, 2024 by Karl Denninger

In the middle of the holiday when you were not paying attention Sam Bankman-Fried (remember him?) had the charges on his second trial dismissed.

These charges were all related to an utterly-ridiculous amount of stolen money that was donated to politicians on both sides of the aisle, and as a direct consequence of the funds being illegally-obtained the donations were illegal.  While the politicians who received them are not criminally culpable the list of who they are, and how much they got, would implicate what amounts to influence peddling writ large on both sides of the aisle.

“These contributions were disguised to look like they were coming from wealthy co-conspirators, when in fact the contributions were funded by Alameda Research with stolen customer money,” said Damian Williams, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, at a press conference on Tuesday. “All of this dirty money was used in service of Bankman-Fried’s desire to buy bipartisan influence and impact the direction of public policy in Washington.”

Not my words folks, those of Damian Williams, a SDNY US Attorney.

Many of these donations were flatly illegal because they were made "as from persons" when they were not which is a black-letter violation of the law.  Having been Treasurer for a Congressional campaign (Libertarian Party) I'm well-versed in the rules involved -- and since I was the Treasurer and had to sign the reports if I lied I could have been imprisoned for it.  Needless to say I didn't allow anything through the books that looked questionable, but then again as a Libertarian candidate we weren't taking in tens of thousands of donations.  Most main-line candidates are and thus while a reasonable inquiry is required I can't necessarily hold the campaigns accountable unless, of course, someone can show that due care was not taken (or worse, it was known and deliberately ignored.)  There's no evidence of that at this point but by dismissing these charges that will not be developed, and it is rather clear that's intentional.

But whether a campaign is criminally culpable or not isn't the only issue.  The public "stain" of having taken these funds whether directly or through various PACs (which is legal IF the source of the funds is legit) and having it paraded out in the public view through criminal procedure against the person who did it is not only appropriate it is necessary.  Influence-peddling of this sort is the most-pervasive form of corruption within politics and Bankman-Fried, it appears, was perhaps one of the most-prolific persons to do so in history.  Not only that, it wasn't just him -- all this was funneled through family members of his which implicates not just a person but the possibility of an entire criminal organization.

The entire reason we have a Department of Justice and federal law when it comes to financial matters such as this, which involved what appears to be somewhere around $100 million, is to not just prosecute but to bring electoral accountability to those who effectively sell their office to those in the so-called "private money sphere" who would influence policy to suit their will.

The Biden DOJ has decided that we, as the public, do not have a right to that information vetted through a public trial.

They're wrong.