5 ms·

Neither deserves any scrutiny. So long as influential people exist, there will exist opportunities to profit off that influence. Forbidding this fully is imposs

Neither deserves any scrutiny. So long as influential people exist, there will exist opportunities to profit off that influence. Forbidding this fully is impossible, which means that criminalizing it just makes unfair selective enforcement possible. This isn't justice, it's getting caught with your hand in the communal rich-influencer cookie jar. Legalize insider trading, legalize pump and dumps, let the chips fall where they may. It's happening either way, so lets just be honest about it.

metalliqaz 6y ago
just throw the sheep to the wolves, got it
berniemadoff69 6y ago
If what you are looking for is a kind of wild west (legalize white collar crime), you honestly may as well legalize murder, and let victims of white collar crime practice vigilantism
Grustaf 6y ago
When you say it’s impossible to “forbid”, you probably mean “prevent” as it’s most definitely possible to forbid it. Either way, the situation is the same with any crime. Obviously that is not a reason to legalize anything in particular.
- abfan1127 6y ago
  The first rule of governance is only make laws which can be enforced without bias. If you can't enforce the law without bias, it shouldn't be a law. Put another way, the government shouldn't pick winners and losers.
  - foerbert 6y ago
    I don't see how this can hold, without some severe restrictions on what you actually mean by 'bias.' As a kind of silly example, I posit that muggings closer to police stations are more likely to result in an arrest. Now we have bias in enforcement based on police station location. Do we need to build floating police stations equidistant from every place a mugging could take place? And this is generously assuming muggings in police stations are discounted from this analysis. If you don't, perhaps muggings in police stations are legal? I strongly suspect you're somehow only applying this particular standard to (potential) white collar crime, which seems absurd.
    - abfan1127 6y ago
      I agree its a challenge many laws don't meet, and perhaps I wasn't clear, so lets take another chance to clarify. Lets take your example. Muggings have a clear victim. A mugger clearly used violence or threat of violence to forcibly remove someone else's property against their will. Now, if the Law said only its only illegal to mug citizens (tourists, illegal aliens, etc), then clearly the law is picking winners and losers here. If the law says its illegal to mug anyone, but reports of muggings to tourists went categorically uninvestigated, then the government is choosing winners and losers, not via legislation, but by implementation, which is also wrong. In this case, the fix isn't the mugging law, but the implementation. I'm a baseball fan. Everyone knows that everyone cheats in the game of baseball. Whether its hiding small things like pine tar, or like the Astros using electronic devices relaying signals. When there's marginal enforcement, and marginal discipline, then its not really a law, and its only used against the current regime's enemies so to speak. So, why keep it as a law? Further, if we make all electronic communication devices legal, then pitchers and catchers can have an ear piece, and this concept of signs and sign stealing is moot. The same applies to all governance. If you can't apply the same laws uniformly, then they become the tool of the state to suppress its enemies, i.e. choosing winners and losers. [1] - https://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/news/astros-scandal-timeline-sign-stealing-punishment/zbe6j4yoi1g21ia0say31zv3n https://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/news/astros-scandal-time...
      - Grustaf 6y ago
        Both examples are very bad. Surely the “bias” in the rule referred to the person committing the crime, not the target. And the rules in baseball are neither laws, nor apparently enforced with bias. Seems like they’re not enforced at all. Of course it would be nice with bias free laws in some abstract sense. But I’ve never heard anyone say it was an absolute precondition. Then we’d have no laws.
  - worik 6y ago
    Why is that the first rule of governance? When, where, has there ever been a law that is not enforced with bias?
  - Grustaf 6y ago
    According to whom?
ralph84 6y ago
Indeed. EVERYONE involved in finance, from Warren Buffett on down, talks their book. EVERY transaction in finance involves asymmetric information. Might as well stop pretending these facts aren't true.
- PragmaticPulp 6y ago
  They aren't accused of talking their book. They're accused of fraudulent statements. Warren Buffet saying that he's confident in Coca Cola's business model while holding a stake in Coca Cola is fine. Warren Buffer saying he's going to buy a lot of Coca Cola stock because he loves it (driving the price up) but then secretly unloading his Coca Cola position amid the resulting price bump would be a fraudulent pump and dump scheme. Let's be clear here: The accused perpetrators were using their platforms to endorse coins for the purpose of selling those coins to unsuspecting victims.
- worik 6y ago
  Warren Buffet on down through the layers of non-criminal financial managers (that set is not as big as it should be) do not lie about their holdings. They do not pretend that a investment is good simply so other people will want it, drive up the price, then sell. That is what John McAfee is accused of doing. A big difference.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
worik 6y ago
Really? Let the lies fly? So long as influential people exist, and opportunities exist to profit off that influence then there will be a need for state agencies to police them (the influential people). As Elon Musk found when he was investigated following his promise to take Tesla private at $4.20 a share (I hope my memory has got that right). He had all sorts of sanctions made against him, and it was just stoned tweeting. One of the justifications for a state is to protect the weak from the strong. It is imaginable that it could be done away with (the rule of law protecting the ignorant from the insiders) but if you are going to imagine, imagine what that world would look like.
eli_gottlieb 6y ago
>Legalize insider trading, legalize pump and dumps, let the chips fall where they may. It's happening either way, so lets just be honest about it. Fuck that. That kind of thing will give us another Great Depression faster than we can blink.
wpietri 6y ago
"Forbidding this fully is impossible" applies to all crime. The correct inference isn't, "so fuck it", it's, "We need enforcement sufficient to keep the crime in check." The reason not to legalize this specifically is that the more people perceive a market as rigged, the less they'll invest. Our capital markets, for all their flaws, make it much easier for people to create economic value. If you legalize scams, etc, not only do you harm honest participants, you harm the economy as a whole.

metalliqaz 6y ago

just throw the sheep to the wolves, got it

berniemadoff69 6y ago

If what you are looking for is a kind of wild west (legalize white collar crime), you honestly may as well legalize murder, and let victims of white collar crime practice vigilantism

Grustaf 6y ago

When you say it’s impossible to “forbid”, you probably mean “prevent” as it’s most definitely possible to forbid it. Either way, the situation is the same with any crime. Obviously that is not a reason to legalize anything in particular.

abfan1127 6y ago
The first rule of governance is only make laws which can be enforced without bias. If you can't enforce the law without bias, it shouldn't be a law. Put another way, the government shouldn't pick winners and losers.
- foerbert 6y ago
  I don't see how this can hold, without some severe restrictions on what you actually mean by 'bias.' As a kind of silly example, I posit that muggings closer to police stations are more likely to result in an arrest. Now we have bias in enforcement based on police station location. Do we need to build floating police stations equidistant from every place a mugging could take place? And this is generously assuming muggings in police stations are discounted from this analysis. If you don't, perhaps muggings in police stations are legal? I strongly suspect you're somehow only applying this particular standard to (potential) white collar crime, which seems absurd.
  - abfan1127 6y ago
    I agree its a challenge many laws don't meet, and perhaps I wasn't clear, so lets take another chance to clarify. Lets take your example. Muggings have a clear victim. A mugger clearly used violence or threat of violence to forcibly remove someone else's property against their will. Now, if the Law said only its only illegal to mug citizens (tourists, illegal aliens, etc), then clearly the law is picking winners and losers here. If the law says its illegal to mug anyone, but reports of muggings to tourists went categorically uninvestigated, then the government is choosing winners and losers, not via legislation, but by implementation, which is also wrong. In this case, the fix isn't the mugging law, but the implementation. I'm a baseball fan. Everyone knows that everyone cheats in the game of baseball. Whether its hiding small things like pine tar, or like the Astros using electronic devices relaying signals. When there's marginal enforcement, and marginal discipline, then its not really a law, and its only used against the current regime's enemies so to speak. So, why keep it as a law? Further, if we make all electronic communication devices legal, then pitchers and catchers can have an ear piece, and this concept of signs and sign stealing is moot. The same applies to all governance. If you can't apply the same laws uniformly, then they become the tool of the state to suppress its enemies, i.e. choosing winners and losers. [1] - https://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/news/astros-scandal-timeline-sign-stealing-punishment/zbe6j4yoi1g21ia0say31zv3n https://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/news/astros-scandal-time...
    - Grustaf 6y ago
      Both examples are very bad. Surely the “bias” in the rule referred to the person committing the crime, not the target. And the rules in baseball are neither laws, nor apparently enforced with bias. Seems like they’re not enforced at all. Of course it would be nice with bias free laws in some abstract sense. But I’ve never heard anyone say it was an absolute precondition. Then we’d have no laws.
- worik 6y ago
  Why is that the first rule of governance? When, where, has there ever been a law that is not enforced with bias?
- Grustaf 6y ago
  According to whom?

ralph84 6y ago

Indeed. EVERYONE involved in finance, from Warren Buffett on down, talks their book. EVERY transaction in finance involves asymmetric information. Might as well stop pretending these facts aren't true.

PragmaticPulp 6y ago
They aren't accused of talking their book. They're accused of fraudulent statements. Warren Buffet saying that he's confident in Coca Cola's business model while holding a stake in Coca Cola is fine. Warren Buffer saying he's going to buy a lot of Coca Cola stock because he loves it (driving the price up) but then secretly unloading his Coca Cola position amid the resulting price bump would be a fraudulent pump and dump scheme. Let's be clear here: The accused perpetrators were using their platforms to endorse coins for the purpose of selling those coins to unsuspecting victims.
worik 6y ago
Warren Buffet on down through the layers of non-criminal financial managers (that set is not as big as it should be) do not lie about their holdings. They do not pretend that a investment is good simply so other people will want it, drive up the price, then sell. That is what John McAfee is accused of doing. A big difference.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

worik 6y ago

Really? Let the lies fly? So long as influential people exist, and opportunities exist to profit off that influence then there will be a need for state agencies to police them (the influential people). As Elon Musk found when he was investigated following his promise to take Tesla private at $4.20 a share (I hope my memory has got that right). He had all sorts of sanctions made against him, and it was just stoned tweeting. One of the justifications for a state is to protect the weak from the strong. It is imaginable that it could be done away with (the rule of law protecting the ignorant from the insiders) but if you are going to imagine, imagine what that world would look like.

eli_gottlieb 6y ago

>Legalize insider trading, legalize pump and dumps, let the chips fall where they may. It's happening either way, so lets just be honest about it. Fuck that. That kind of thing will give us another Great Depression faster than we can blink.

wpietri 6y ago

"Forbidding this fully is impossible" applies to all crime. The correct inference isn't, "so fuck it", it's, "We need enforcement sufficient to keep the crime in check." The reason not to legalize this specifically is that the more people perceive a market as rigged, the less they'll invest. Our capital markets, for all their flaws, make it much easier for people to create economic value. If you legalize scams, etc, not only do you harm honest participants, you harm the economy as a whole.