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China sentences official to death for taking $325M in bribes

bbc.com

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Re: China sentences official to death for taking $325M in bribes

#321

Post by insane_dreamer »

tyre wrote: post #78
TrackerFF wrote: post #8

I sometimes see people "celebrate" this, with the rationale that China is cracking down on white-collar crimes and handing out sentences unheard of in the west. But, are these sort of things just examples of selective prosecution? Would the inner circle members of CCP leadership realistically face the same prosecution and sentencing, if they were to be caught doing the same?

Xi has shown repeatedly that he’s serious about corruption. As others have noted, some of the highest civilian and military officials have been removed for it. Some sentenced to death. He sees it as a challenge to his legitimacy and China’s power, which, as you’d expect are the most important things to him; even if you take the most cynical view. Another timely example, because it is the World Cup, is the Chinese foo…

> Xi has shown repeatedly that he’s serious about corruption.

that's BS

cracking down on corruption has been a common tactic for decades to get rid of people who are a threat to the top dog at the CCP, and Xi has employed this perhaps better than anyone since Mao

are those people being purged corrupt? probably most are. but plenty of people who are corrupt aren't purged, it's a highly selective process.

Xi started this a few years after coming into power -- and it was obviously to the educated class was it was (I was living in Beijing at the time), but "mei banfa" (or emigrate, as many people with the $/ability to do so, did).

Re: China sentences official to death for taking $325M in bribes

#324

Post by reinitctxoffset »

Danox wrote: post #115

The antifreeze toothpaste people didn’t get away with it, nor did the 3000 pigs in the river people, and nor did that one group of executives who were in charge of a fertilizer/chemical plant that was one of the largest industrial catastrophes in the world let alone China. If you get caught in China, Vietnam, or Singapore the penalties for white collar criminals is zero tolerance. You can’t buy your way out if you do…

In the 90s and 00s when I was a kid, being a crook had real consequences here too. Not the death penalty per second, but the die in prison penalty left and right.

When John Meriweather and the rest of LTCM nearly blew up the market they didn't get a bailout, and the taxpayer didn't fund the hole in the balance sheet. The New York Fed organized private money and leaned on all their counterparties to get it done, but they didn't backstop it. Meriweather and the Sheik and Scholes and the rest were wiped out, they worked it off for a couple of years for salary and then skunk away in shame (we had shame back then). Took it like men near as I can tell. I admire John Meriweather a great deal in spite of the scandal.

President Clinton was impeached and very nearly removed from office for (ultimately) consenting but untoward involvement with a young woman (they got him on lying about it technically, but the political will was there because the country was furious about the skirt chasing.

Enron. Accounting that went from aggressive to sketchy to fraudulent (most of it would pass with flying colors today). Hard time. Skilling, Fastow I think just got out like five years ago (don't take my word for the date). Ken Lay IIRC died before they locked him up which saved him dying inside.

Madoff, died in prison. Ebbers, I think he died in prison too.

When Microsoft was gearing up to strangle the web in its crib the Justice Department pulled guys off of terrorists and human traffickers to go take a pipe to Gates until he backed off, he was allowed to keep Microsoft intact by letting the web happen, the Feds weren't asking, he decided to not fuck around and find out.

Consequences for serious fucking bad shit for people who are our leaders work. A people gets exactly what it demands from it's leaders and that's exactly what a people deserves.

Right now we're choosing to settle for a lot less, China is demanding more. Which is why we're getting our asses kicked.

Re: China sentences official to death for taking $325M in bribes

#325

Post by copper-float »

guywithahat wrote: post #179
vkou wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In an authoritarian government basic liberties we take for granted in the West are considered corruption Could you list some of those basic liberties? Are they the sort of liberties whose exercise involves taking half a billion in bribes? --- Generally, basic liberties like showing up to a protest aren't considered corruption, they get called terrorism, or somesuch. A Texas judge just sentenced a dozen people to 30…

For anyone else curious as to what OP is talking about, I had to look this up: > The protest was a late-night/noise demonstration (involving fireworks) against immigration detention policies. It turned violent when a shooting injured a police officer. Prosecutors described it as an "act of terrorism" linked to an alleged antifa cell; defendants and supporters denied organized antifa ties and framed it as protected pr…

Bringing guns to shoot people you disagree with, then shooting them and injuring them for doing their job is not a harmless demonstration. It's terrorism, and they deserve what they got.

Re: China sentences official to death for taking $325M in bribes

#326

Post by Jblx2 »

vkou wrote: post #150
nonethewiser wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>He sees it as a challenge to his legitimacy and China’s power This right here is why “corruption” should be looked on with great skepticism. In an authoritarian government basic liberties we take for granted in the West are considered corruption. You know, like having a say in how people are governed. This is a high crime in a state with 1 party that cannot be replaced. In that way, “corruption” can mean “not being…

> In an authoritarian government basic liberties we take for granted in the West are considered corruption Could you list some of those basic liberties? Are they the sort of liberties whose exercise involves taking half a billion in bribes? --- Generally, basic liberties like showing up to a protest aren't considered corruption, they get called terrorism, or somesuch. A Texas judge just sentenced a dozen people to 30…

>Some of the people given 30 weren't even at the protest.

That by itself isn't a convincing argument. You can't plan a bank heist and be waiting at your safe house and say, "I'm not guilty of anything, because I wasn't in the bank!". The mafia guy doesn't get to say, "I didn't actually whack the victim, I just nodded to Joey, and he did the whacking".

You might be interested in:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_conspiracy

...maybe this is mostly a thing in common law jurisdictions? Maybe there is a lawyer here who can point us to a interesting history of conspiracy in common law vs civil law jurisdictions? Also of interest might be things like:

https://www.justia.com/criminal/offenses/homicide/felony-mur...

Re: China sentences official to death for taking $325M in bribes

#327

Post by isr »

throw10920 wrote: post #289
Revanche1367 wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, the old “only western people have morals, everyone else just cares about how it looks” argument. And where did you get this super objective assessment that eastern peoples only care about “saving face”? Couldn’t be a stereotype popularized by western people to feel better about themselves could it? The racists always come out in full force under any post showing an eastern country doing something better than the…

> Ah, the old “only western people have morals, everyone else just cares about how it looks” argument. That's not even remotely close to what I said. You should read the comment you're responding before responding with ignorant and blatantly manipulative falsehoods. > And where did you get this super objective assessment that eastern peoples only care about “saving face”? Again - never said anything like that. Learn…

I'm not the guy who responded to you, but “only western people have morals, everyone else just cares about how it looks” is pretty much what you tried to imply.

And before you start on me, yes - I'm able to "think", and no, I'm not a "troll"

If its not what you wanted to imply, then perhaps you'd be better served at owning up & clarifying, rather than insulting others who merely pointed out what you originally wrote.

And on a general note (not specifically or only you), I'm somewhat amused (in a morbid sense) at the sheer predictability of some of the "oh no, don't you dare try to impugn any moral superiority to that lot over there, vs us westerners" reactions.

Refreshing to see how even after a multi year ongoing genocide, kidnappings other countries presidents, and triple-tap bombing little girls elementary schools, westerners still feel they own the "moral high ground" (wherever that is anymore ...)

Re: China sentences official to death for taking $325M in bribes

#328

Post by nkmnz »

Danox wrote: post #115

The antifreeze toothpaste people didn’t get away with it, nor did the 3000 pigs in the river people, and nor did that one group of executives who were in charge of a fertilizer/chemical plant that was one of the largest industrial catastrophes in the world let alone China. If you get caught in China, Vietnam, or Singapore the penalties for white collar criminals is zero tolerance. You can’t buy your way out if you do…

> You can’t buy your way out if you do something so spectacular that you cause the government to lose face.

You don't have to buy your way out as long as you are the government, i.e. the chairman.

Re: China sentences official to death for taking $325M in bribes

#329

Post by mmooss »

threatofrain wrote: post #307
warumdarum wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

? Everyone in the party is incolved in similar crimes. The only thing they are guilty off in addition is a lack of loyalty to emperor xi. Incompetence and criminal corruption, that you can edit out of history, but intrigue is unforgivable.

You're assuming that this guy was actually being prosecuted for crimes or that this guy lacked loyalty to Xi Jinping. A tremendous number of top generals and leadership has been wiped out in a short time and not necessarily refilled, and it's not because China has a huge disloyalty problem.

> it's not because China has a huge disloyalty problem.

Why not? Dictators often purge anyone who is a threat, often because they form a possibly competitive power structure (regardless of their intent), and often because of paranoid perceived disloyalty, and for actual disloyalty.

And corruption is the cover story they commonly use - it's vague, general, the public sees enough gov't corruption to believe it and to hate it. Trials are not needed. Off the top of my head, Putin in Russia, Mohammed bin Salman in Saudi Arabia, ...

Re: China sentences official to death for taking $325M in bribes

#330

Post by nixon_why69 »

dnautics wrote: post #266
throwawalien wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't heard of many of these but the ones I have were state actors covering up things the state itself did or enabled. that's a different category from private executives getting punished when they embarrass Beijing.

i looked it up and at least the evergrande ceo seems to have bern fined to the point where he had to declare bankruptcy (as of a few months ago, my information is old), so i guess he did find some justice (i think hes not very bright and was likely lied to by his underlings -- many such cases, so it is nice that the buck stopped there but the root cause was not fixed afaict)

Evergrande was a credit crunch similar to Silicon Valley Bank, they were funding development of projects by selling the units before they're built, they got ahead of themselves and then a pullback in housing prices exposed them.

It sucks extra bad for the people who took out a mortgage for a home that didn't get finished, but it does seem like more of a screwup than corruption.

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