If the bribe you’re soliciting is $1,000 in a paper bag, the FBI will arrest you. If it’s $1 billion in dark money, does that make it legal?
If the bribe you’re soliciting is $1,000 in a paper bag, the FBI will arrest you. If it’s $1 billion in dark money, does that make it legal?
@JamesGleick constitutionally protected free speech, according to the corrupt Roberts Court.
At least one judge on that court had already accepted "loans" and gifts from one of the plaintiffs.
@JamesGleick That’s ‘cause you can seize little bribes like that.
What’re you gonna do, seize money from the rich? Sounds like class warfare to me!
Sell $100 of addictive drugs on the street corner and you go to jail ..... Sell $1B of addictive pain killers and you go to the C-suite of a pharmaceutical company
Steal a loaf of bread to feed your family and you're a criminal ..... Steal intellectual property to feed your AI bot and you're an innovator
Crime has always been relative to how much money you can allocate to your "Get out of jail free card" expenses.
Steal millions and just pay $100K fine. It's not a penalty or justice, it's just the transaction and permit fees on the balance sheet.
@NJWookie @JamesGleick Except that AI thing is not true...
‘Leave in in small bills in a paper bag in the phone booth’
Watergate is a hiccup to this mass crime.
@JamesGleick To be clear, I despise Trump.
What makes him dangerous is that, based on his behavior, people think he’s a clown. But he has one enormous talent and that is knowing what he can get away with. And he’s spent a lifetime doing it. It’s why he gets up in the morning. The man is an artist of fraudulent behavior.
I hope to god he doesn’t win the next election, but the smallest possibility that he might scares the hell out of me.
I don't understand why the executives were "stunned".
Was anybody reading this "stunned"?
How come we're better informed than a bunch of CEOs?
Or...just a thought...was a journalist being nice to CEOs? Does that happen?
@JamesGleick No.
And not just because of what the comments said it's because everyone wants in on that sweet sweet money scheme. 🤑
The SC is obviously for sale like this, businesses like it because it is easier to get things done this way, other gov officials get a slice of the pie... everyone wins!
Except... you know... the country.
With smaller amounts, less people can share and it is probably poor people business anyways... 🤔
@JamesGleick Contributing to a political campaign because you want the stated policies is not bribery. Neither is meeting large donors to discuss your successful campaign and what those large donors are looking forward to, according to SCOTUS.
These are the joys of privately funded political campaigns.
@JamesGleick That's because #Corruption is legal in #America...
Learn more at http://Represent.Us/TheProblem, and go to https://represent.us/TheSolution to see our plan and join the Anti-Corruption Movement. Click on "sho...
https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674659988
Well worth a read on how we got here and how the courts kept narrowing the legal meaning of corruption since the early days of the Republic.
If you owe the bank $100, that's your problem.
If you owe the bank $1 billion, that's the bank's problem.
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