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United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

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Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#91

Post by wcarron »

pydry wrote: post #36
titzer wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It'd be great if the government more regularly caught, prosecuted, and convicted people at this level of criminality. Otherwise the entire society collapses under the weight of abject corruption, because prosecution is a selective enforcement tool used at the whim of corrupt politicians, rather than an automatic mechanism that operates independently.

He was prosecuted because his ego meant he alienated the fuck out of everybody, including what should have been his allies. If he'd been just a bit less outspoken theyd probably have left him alone.

Same reason Lance Armstrong eventually went down.

Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#92

Post by happytoexplain »

rchaud wrote: post #44
titzer wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It'd be great if the government more regularly caught, prosecuted, and convicted people at this level of criminality. Otherwise the entire society collapses under the weight of abject corruption, because prosecution is a selective enforcement tool used at the whim of corrupt politicians, rather than an automatic mechanism that operates independently.

There is no automatic mechanism that operates independently. The prosecution, defense and judiciary are not GPT-3 robots that can mine through centuries of case law in 2 seconds to achieve a perfectly balanced decision. If you want regular prosecution of white-collar crimes, you may want to support better funding for these agencies, so they can actually put resources behind investigating and trying cases where crimin…

The point is that it should behave like an automatic mechanism. This is a metaphor for reducing bias as much as possible.

Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#93

Post by defaultname »

kgantchev wrote: post #88
defaultname wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The "financial crimes" seem to have no victims since none of his investors actually sued him They were overt, literal, indisputable financial crimes. Not sure why you decided to scare-quote that. Making someone you defrauded whole again doesn't erase the crime. The notion that it would is ludicrous. >I guess in this Cancel Culture era Give it a rest. There is a truth that if you are a criminal you probably shouldn't…

> Making someone you defrauded whole again doesn't erase the crime. The notion that it would is ludicrous. He didn't just make them whole, he made them a profit. That's between the two parties that engaged in the contract, isn't it? They signed contracts that they're receiving shares of his other company and they're not going to sue him for the losses from his previous company. The end result is that they made a prof…

[flagged]

Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#94

Post by ValentineC »

ggrelet wrote: post #87
Y_Y wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I miss What and Oink. I didn't even bother finding out what the next incarnation was and trying to get an invite, I just gave up and got Spotify. There's still tons of good music that I only ever found on those trackers. The quality of recommendations was also peerless. Have any of the successors rebuilt that?

There’s RED: https://interviewfor.red/

Also Orpheus, which IMO has a better usage/retention policy, awarding bonus points (which can be used to purchase freeleech tokens) for one's seeding torrents: https://interview.orpheus.network/

Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#95

Post by rchaud »

ketzo wrote: post #60
rchaud wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no automatic mechanism that operates independently. The prosecution, defense and judiciary are not GPT-3 robots that can mine through centuries of case law in 2 seconds to achieve a perfectly balanced decision. If you want regular prosecution of white-collar crimes, you may want to support better funding for these agencies, so they can actually put resources behind investigating and trying cases where crimin…

> automatic mechanism that operates independently Yes, but I think this is more metaphorical than literal. Of course there aren't literal automatic robots doing the work of rooting out corruption; it's a goal. I would argue that a high-functioning justice system should appear as close to automatic as possible, in order to most effectively create a sense of "if I do wrong, I know that I will be punished" rather than "…

Should or would aside, it's not an automatic system. Even if it were, the trials themselves would be adjudicated by federal district court judges, who are political appointees. If you've ever watched a Senate judiciary hearing, the questions posed to the candidate are often ideological in nature rather than legal.

I probably seem pedantic, but I think it's important to reiterate the scale of human involvement and imperfection underpinning the entire system in which we exist. The solution to that is not "take the humans out of it", but to iterate that system with incremental improvements and fund it to the level commensurate with its importance to our society.

Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#96

Post by salawat »

defaultname wrote: post #41
philwelch wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's surprisingly easy to commit a federal offense: https://twitter.com/CrimeADay

There's always a logical fallacy in this sort of argument- a) There are loads of extremely specific laws for various very specific problems. e.g. Taking obsidian from an obsidian flow federal park, for instance. b) Ergo everyone commits crimes! . We're all criminals, they just selectively choose what to enforce! b) doesn't follow at all. The vast majority of people will never even be in a situation where it was possi…

>FWIW, criminals think everyone is a criminal. Tax evaders think it's just normal. Thieves think everyone steals. Etc...

...and law abiding folk think they never break the law.

Ever lent someone money at 0% interest? Did you report it on your taxes? If not, you may technically be guilty of tax evasion.

Ever binned someone else's junk mail? Welcome to mail tampering.

There is a big difference between the law as written and the law as enforced. I guarantee you, if you go looking hard enough, there are some downright stupid laws on the books.

Hell look at mask laws! It was a huge controversy in some places last year because minorities in jurisdictions with historical anti-face covering statutes we're damned if they did, damned if they didn't.

Look at San Fran. The DA won't prosecute shoplifters, yet people walk out stores without paying under the statutory threshold. You going to try to say that the law makes even a lick of sense when you get degenerate circumstances?

Or are you going to take refuge in "Well, only the laws that matter?" If we go down that road it only gets worse.

How about... Mmmm. Jaywalking? Loitering? Noise violations that never got reported? Driving overweight vehicles down a road designed with weight capacity 1 ton less? Using an aerosol not perfectly in accordance with the instructions? Test driven an vehicle you didn't have registered on a public road? Improperly disposed of medication? Thrown a lithium ion battery in the garbage? Travelled with something in a trailer that qualifies as hazmat without getting a placard? Speeding? Had livestock escape, damage something, with no real dramatic outcome? Still infractions. Even if charges aren't pressed.

Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#97

Post by philwelch »

defaultname wrote: post #41
philwelch wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's surprisingly easy to commit a federal offense: https://twitter.com/CrimeADay

There's always a logical fallacy in this sort of argument- a) There are loads of extremely specific laws for various very specific problems. e.g. Taking obsidian from an obsidian flow federal park, for instance. b) Ergo everyone commits crimes! . We're all criminals, they just selectively choose what to enforce! b) doesn't follow at all. The vast majority of people will never even be in a situation where it was possi…

Do people who make ad hominem comments on the internet think that everyone makes ad hominem comments on the internet?

Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#98

Post by defaultname »

salawat wrote: post #96
defaultname wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's always a logical fallacy in this sort of argument- a) There are loads of extremely specific laws for various very specific problems. e.g. Taking obsidian from an obsidian flow federal park, for instance. b) Ergo everyone commits crimes! . We're all criminals, they just selectively choose what to enforce! b) doesn't follow at all. The vast majority of people will never even be in a situation where it was possi…

>FWIW, criminals think everyone is a criminal. Tax evaders think it's just normal. Thieves think everyone steals. Etc... ...and law abiding folk think they never break the law. Ever lent someone money at 0% interest? Did you report it on your taxes? If not, you may technically be guilty of tax evasion. Ever binned someone else's junk mail? Welcome to mail tampering. There is a big difference between the law as writte…

"Look at San Fran. The DA won't prosecute shoplifters, yet people walk out stores without paying under the statutory threshold. You going to try to say that the law makes even a lick of sense when you get degenerate circumstances?"

Let's just focus on this nugget-

-the DA made no such claim

-the threshold in San Francisco is actually LOWER than Texas. So much was made about that when people were truly clueless about what they claimed

-in reality there are almost no prosecutions because the activist police force simply doesn't bother responding

Police nationwide tend to be pretty far to the right (see the NYPD having a barely above 40% vaccination level right now as a good benchmark of that, which as an aside vaccination should absolutely be a requirement for their job), and they like to intentionally do a really shit job if it achieves their talking points.

The guys rushing into stores and filling garbage bags? Yup, the police should be arresting them. That they don't has nothing to do with the DA.

Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#99

Post by defaultname »

philwelch wrote: post #97
defaultname wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's always a logical fallacy in this sort of argument- a) There are loads of extremely specific laws for various very specific problems. e.g. Taking obsidian from an obsidian flow federal park, for instance. b) Ergo everyone commits crimes! . We're all criminals, they just selectively choose what to enforce! b) doesn't follow at all. The vast majority of people will never even be in a situation where it was possi…

Do people who make ad hominem comments on the internet think that everyone makes ad hominem comments on the internet?

Not only was my comment in no way an ad hominem, it's pretty ironic that you attempt one to denigrate.

Re: United States sells Wu-Tang album forfeited by Martin Shkreli

#100

Post by [deleted] »

gota wrote: post #51
nprz wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is getting downvotes, but it is true Shkreli got his bail revoked for offering $5000 for every strand of hair collected from HRC.

If putting a bounty to harass a person is not a crime it absolutely should be IMHO The day he started that he should be put in jail regardless of being on bail

[deleted]
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