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John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

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Re: John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

#521

Post by mrtksn »

mrosett wrote: post #262
mrtksn wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are rich enough you are eccentric and colorful.

The obvious point you're making is about a double standard -- rich people are unfairly given more slack than others. But an alternative framing amounts to evaluating a method by its results -- basically saying "I don't know why you're behaving that way, but for reasons I don't understand it seems to work for you." That obviously falls apart if you can cleanly separate their wealth/financial success from their behavio…

I was actually referring to the slack given to him for apparent murder and putting the police force on a payroll.

“killing your neighbor, bribing the police and never serving a single day for it? What an eccentric person you are”

Re: John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

#522

Post by G3rn0ti »

freddie_mercury wrote: post #453
G3rn0ti wrote: post #418

30 years for tax evasion? No wonder he preferred to die. I mean, you’ll get jail time for severe cases of tax evasion in Germany, too, but it’s a couple of years at max and most of the time it’s on probation. How do you justify your draconic punishments in the US which is supposed to be a free country?

Germany has more draconic laws than the US in this situation, so I'm not sure what you're talking about. "Under German law, the maximum term for one count of aggravated tax evasion is 10 years. If an accused is convicted of more than one count, the court can increase the maximum to 15 years." The US is 5 years for each count, half of Germany's. Macafee was under accused of multiple crimes, which added up to the headl…

Also jail times do not add up in Germany like in the US it seems. If you are guilty of violating several laws you still receive only a single punishment („Tateinheit“). If McAfee has not declared his income tax correctly in three consecutive years this would count as a single violation of the law.

Re: John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

#523

Post by rcurry »

jasonl99 wrote: post #505
rcurry wrote: post #470

The sad thing is that our government seems to make a point of screwing with kooks. I don’t care if McAffee owed some taxes - leave the guy alone, he’s obviously unstable, has major problems with drug and alcohol addiction and all they can do is try to bring him even lower. Poor guy had major problems even before the “heroes” of the FBI or the IRS or whatever started screwing with him. Let the poor guy ride off into t…

“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” ― George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman I've always used this as an excuse for what might be considered being weird (at least that's what my family tells me).

As Hunter Thompson would say, when the going gets weird the weird turn pro.

Re: John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

#524

Post by DynamicStatic »

xadhominemx wrote: post #275
sva_ wrote: post #23

What a strange life he lived. I'm not going to make a value judgement about whether or not he was a 'good' person, but I do applaud the fact that he dared to deviate from the norm. "There he goes. One of God's own prototypes. A high-powered mutant of some kind never even considered for mass production. Too weird to live, and too rare to die." -- Hunter S Thompson RIP

He’s a murderer and fraudster. You do not in fact have to applaud him for anything.

Guilty until proven innocent?

Re: John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

#525

Post by ahartmetz »

InitialLastName wrote: post #447
Trias11 wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

US Citizenship in reality is an IRS trap. Now Biden wants to hire 87,000 more IRS workers to harass americans. This used to be a great country. Times long gone.

> This used to be a great country. When?

Seen from over the pond in Germany:

It seems like the US were (compared to the rest of the world) at their best from 1860ish to 1970ish. When they had great education for he masses, public health, technological and economic progress, a certain naive idealism, and the most comfortable middle class in the world. Things were, if not already good, pointing in the right direction. After that, selfish and cynical elites took over and society stagnated and fragmented.

Re: John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

#526

Post by octopoc »

rcurry wrote: post #470

The sad thing is that our government seems to make a point of screwing with kooks. I don’t care if McAffee owed some taxes - leave the guy alone, he’s obviously unstable, has major problems with drug and alcohol addiction and all they can do is try to bring him even lower. Poor guy had major problems even before the “heroes” of the FBI or the IRS or whatever started screwing with him. Let the poor guy ride off into t…

Reminds me of the movie American Hustle. The government has a choice of going after criminals who badly hurt a lot of people or going after the easily-demonized bit players. Guess which is good for their careers.

Re: John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

#527

Post by rurp »

Barrin92 wrote: post #141
jfrunyon wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you miss the "Tesla buys billions of USD in bitcoin" headlines? Along with the "will accept payment in BTC" pump and "never mind, selling" dump?

did they actually dump their bitcoin? If yes I'd agree that it deserves attention but I don't think that's the case. Probably for that reason Elon actually posted in May or whatever that they have not sold their coins. Unless you can show that he actually mislead users for financial gain I don't think you're going to get authorities involved.

Well technically Musk said "Tesla will not be selling any Bitcoin" when the policy change was announced. I haven't seen anything where he claims he didn't sell _before_ the change was announced.

I have no idea if he dumped his Bitcoin before announcing the change at Tesla, but misleading a bunch of people while leaving himself a technicality escape hatch would be extremely on brand for him.

Re: John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

#529

Post by hugi »

to1y wrote: post #519
gizdan wrote: post #489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don’t care if McAffee owed some taxes - leave the guy alone, he's obviously unstable This is ridiculous. Okay so let's leave all the rich people alone who claim they are unstable. McAfee made millions, from what I understand, he paid little taxes on that. That's stupid. I don't care how unstable you are, or how good you are donating your "fair share". You're still not excused from paying your taxes.

Parent poster meant let's not make him look like a loon and hound him relentlessly because of it.

But he was a loon and a thief/tax cheat

Re: John McAfee found dead in Spanish jail after court approves extradition to US

#530

Post by not2b »

smitty1110 wrote: post #468
G3rn0ti wrote: post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How high is the US income tax? And is it progressive?

Top end, which kicks in at a bit shy of $520k is 37%. Top end Long-term Capital Gains max rate is 20% at about $440k. These are numbers for individuals, they differ for married couples and households filing collectively.

The very wealthy can usually avoid paying anywhere near these amounts, though. Corporate owners can pay themselves a nominal salary and let the corporation grow. Capital gains are only due when stock is sold. So they avoid selling and borrow using their stock as collateral.
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