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Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

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Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#61

Post by magduf »

squarefoot wrote: post #23
thomasll wrote: post #2

Uncover the theft of hundreds of thousands will get you a bonus. Uncover the theft of millions will get you a big promotion. Uncover the theft of billions by corrupt state actors and international crime syndicates is only ever going to get you dead. Perhaps I have a different mindset, but if I had been looking into this, I think I would have stopped digging as soon as I got a hint of how deep this rabbit hole actuall…

"I think I would have stopped digging as soon as I got a hint of how deep this rabbit hole actually was" Or maybe find a way of making the news public under anonimity, which brings us to the importance of being able/allowed to do so when necessary.

Maybe. The problem with a lot of stuff like that is that it's really hard to release information anonymously. The nature of the information is such that not many people would have had access to it, so for the assassins, the number of suspects is very low, and it's not that hard for them to figure out who did it.

Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#62

Post by [deleted] »

squarefoot wrote: post #23
thomasll wrote: post #2

Uncover the theft of hundreds of thousands will get you a bonus. Uncover the theft of millions will get you a big promotion. Uncover the theft of billions by corrupt state actors and international crime syndicates is only ever going to get you dead. Perhaps I have a different mindset, but if I had been looking into this, I think I would have stopped digging as soon as I got a hint of how deep this rabbit hole actuall…

"I think I would have stopped digging as soon as I got a hint of how deep this rabbit hole actually was" Or maybe find a way of making the news public under anonimity, which brings us to the importance of being able/allowed to do so when necessary.

[deleted]

Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#63

Post by refurb »

skinpop wrote: post #24
9c8675a8 wrote: post #14

All tax money in Russia and elsewhere is stolen and therefore dirty and corrupt to begin with anyway. Try not paying taxes and you'll get jailed -- and if you refuse this you'll get gunned down. I think doing anything you can to avoid paying taxes without getting yourself into trouble is a moral obligation.

I like paying taxes. I get "free" healthcare and education and so many other things here in Sweden that wouldn't be possible without taxes. Simply not having to ever think about the financials of those things is worth a good 5% taxes if you ask me. I wouldn't want to pay any less in taxes if it meant taking any of that away, but I would happily pitch in more if each additional krona would do as much or more than the…

The OP is talking about a scenario where the tax money you pay is stolen.

Would you feel the same way in that case?

Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#64

Post by magduf »

learc83 wrote: post #48
wayoutthere wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's no different than a peasant (or even a lesser lord) challenging a king in the feudal era. You spoke out against the king, you lost your head. Billionaires are our kings. Jeff Bezos' wealth is 3 times the GDP of North Kora, which has a standing army of over a million people. They are more wealthy than a number of independent states. Do you think he couldn't fund and equip 100,000 mercenaries if his monopoly were…

No Jeff Bezos doesn't have the liquid assets to recruit and equip 100,000 mercenaries. Not even close. We've seen billionaires go to jail before btw (without raising a private army to protect them). The comparison of his total net worth to the North Korea's yearly GDP and army size is irrelevant. If he even tried to raise an army to resist the will of the US government, they would seize his assets so fast his head wo…

This is a good point. "Net worth" frequently isn't even liquid, but moreover, it's also completely subject to the whims of the government that controls that currency. That government is able to enforce its whims using sheer force, through its military.

NK may not have that much worth in USD, but it occupies territory and has military force to back its claim, and that military is motivated by things other than USD numbers on computers somewhere.

Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#65

Post by ajross »

magduf wrote: post #61
squarefoot wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I think I would have stopped digging as soon as I got a hint of how deep this rabbit hole actually was" Or maybe find a way of making the news public under anonimity, which brings us to the importance of being able/allowed to do so when necessary.

Maybe. The problem with a lot of stuff like that is that it's really hard to release information anonymously. The nature of the information is such that not many people would have had access to it, so for the assassins, the number of suspects is very low, and it's not that hard for them to figure out who did it.

I think the comment was making an analogy to a more contemporary issue.

As far as whether they could figure out how to target Koslov personally, that requires more info than we have. The nature of any complicated scheme is that, while yes, information is compartmentalized, doing it at all requires a lot more "regular people" than you expect. Leaders alone can't effect a criminal conspiracy.

At the end of the day, someone like, say, a mid-level foreign affairs analyst probably saw this stuff and could have blown the whistle too.

Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#66

Post by magduf »

chance_state wrote: post #49
tclancy wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that relevant here and not just meaningless whataboutism?

Is there a name for the phenomenon (eg. Poe's Law) where people leave comments on random world politics topics that basically consist of "but America..."? You can count on it on every single negative geopolitical story on most sites. Sad to see it on HN.

>Is there a name for the phenomenon (eg. Poe's Law) where people leave comments on random world politics topics that basically consist of "but America..."?

Yeah, isn't it called "pot... kettle"?

Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#67

Post by Fnoord »

mola wrote: post #6
mola wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why humanity invented the Hero. We recognize that irrational selflessness can be extremely beneficial for society. The more heroes we have, the less corrupt the system, the stakes of corruption would be lower and the price of heroism should decrease, thus society at large and these selfless heros will probably benefit together.

So we could call this guy stupid, or hail him as a hero. In which society would you like you and your children to live in, the one where heroes are acknowledged or the one they are dismissed as dumb and irrational? Mind you, calling someone a hero cost you next to nothing in utility so I think the choice is a no brainier.

> Mind you, calling someone a hero cost you next to nothing in utility so I think the choice is a no brainier.

People who express their homosexuality in Russia face repercussions. Someone who opposes racism such as black face in The Netherlands gets repercussions. Someone who leaks a video of war crimes faces repercussions. Expressing your support for these people likely has repercussions as well. They might not be opaque, but think about something as being put on a list (hello Tor Tails) or being bullied as two examples of repercussions.

I mean, murder is just one. There's one thing worse than murdering me, btw. Murdering my offspring, my child. In North Korea they got that one covered. Your whole family will suffer if/when you (attempted to) fled/flee. In our more civilized societies the repercussions are (much) less severe, but I don't believe there are none.

Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#68

Post by Consultant32452 »

greggman2 wrote: post #47
wayoutthere wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's no different than a peasant (or even a lesser lord) challenging a king in the feudal era. You spoke out against the king, you lost your head. Billionaires are our kings. Jeff Bezos' wealth is 3 times the GDP of North Kora, which has a standing army of over a million people. They are more wealthy than a number of independent states. Do you think he couldn't fund and equip 100,000 mercenaries if his monopoly were…

If Jeff Bezos was to commit murder tomorrow and be caught I suspect the police would chase him, catch him, throw him in jail, he'd make bail and it would turn into a scene like OJ. I don't expect he'd be able to raise an army to break him out or defend is home. He might be able to flee the country but even that might be hard even with all his money. If he had covertly planned ahead and already had his mercenary army…

Recently a Mexican cartel outgunned the Mexican police and forced the release of El Chapo's son. It's hard to imagine something like that happening in a wealthy country, but it's not unheard of in the real world.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/31/americas/el-chapo-son-operati...

Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#69

Post by keymone »

alexro wrote: post #40
krn wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_laundering > Money laundering is the illegal process of concealing the origins of money obtained illegally by passing it through a complex sequence of banking transfers or commercial transactions. The overall scheme of this process returns the money to the launderer in an obscure and indirect way.

How this proves that the money 1) has been moved 'illegally' (which authority is responsible) 2) linked to Putin's family personally 3) linked to the 'uncovered' scheme This is what I call jumping between the facts

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrIsXKdjZdo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvAdZigHlhk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXYQbgvzxdM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrwlk7_GF9g

there's plenty more if you want to know how these crooks use shady schemes to steal from russian citizens and move it semi-legally out of russia to have nice places to retire to

of course if the only evidence you will accept is putin himself bringing you incriminating documents with his signatures - i got nothing to offer.

Re: Russian whistleblower was assassinated after uncovering $200B scandal (2018)

#70

Post by MrBuddyCasino »

c72a7fd0 wrote: post #34
skinpop wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like paying taxes. I get "free" healthcare and education and so many other things here in Sweden that wouldn't be possible without taxes. Simply not having to ever think about the financials of those things is worth a good 5% taxes if you ask me. I wouldn't want to pay any less in taxes if it meant taking any of that away, but I would happily pitch in more if each additional krona would do as much or more than the…

[ NOTE: It takes hours and days to communicate here because people do not like my opinions -- so "Hacker News" (lol) throttles me so I cannot really respond to you or anyone in reasonable time. ] Lol. No you do not like paying taxes; that's your Stockholm syndrome or sunk cost fallacy (variant of it) talking. It's not free; it's crazy expensive and goes to a lot of crazy and/or evil b.s. you have no interest in or co…

IDK why this got downvoted. State spending and economic growth are inversely proportional. The bigger the government, the less economic growth there is.
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