The Democrat Establishment Turns on Sam Bankman-Fried... While Protecting the Democrat Establishment From any Blowback, Of Course

George Stephanopolous pretends that this guy wasn't part of the Democrat Financial Complex and actually treats him like the criminal he is.

I really recommend the interview, if you like watching psychopathic leftwing liars squirm.

Skip to 2:15 in the interview, at which point Stephanopolous ask SBF if he knew that money from FTX's depositors was being funneled to his other company, Alemda, for investing. (Or: "investing.")

Stick with it -- SBF offers an evasive answer talking about general market malaise, but Stephanopolous pulls him back and says, correctly, "You didn't answer my question," and ask the question again: Did you know that money that people had on deposit was being taken to gamble in the markets? Did you authorize that?

SBF then attempts to claim that there are different circumstances in which this is allowed, but Stephanopolous objects: "But not here," he says, pointing out that FTX's contractual terms of service with depositors guarantees that their money will not be lent out for any purpose. He continues evading answering these questions.

But it's clear he's lying. Of course he knew, and of course he personally authorized the illegal transfers, which is a nice way of saying "theft of money from depositors for his own benefit."

When finally confronted with the testimony of his weird-looking Harry Potter Fan Club f***-buddy Carolyn Ellison that Bankman-Fried knew all about the illegal transfers, he drops the claim that he didn't know about the transfers at all, and narrows his denial to, "I didn't know about any illegal transfers," implying that the transfers he knew about were legal.

Apparently Bankman-Fried is going to be relying on this "I didn't knowingly know what I doingly did" Hillary Clinton style defense. Because he offered up a version of it at a New York Times event in which people were permitted to submit their own questions.

Andrew Ross Sorkin -- the journalist hosting the summit -- shared the email "from a gentleman who said he lost his life savings." It had the subject line: "Sam Bankman-Fried stole $2 million from me."

The user wrote: "Andrew, can you please ask SBF why he decided to steal my life savings and the $10 billion more from customers to give to his hedge fund, Alameda?"

"Please ask him if he thinks what happened was fraud."

Sorkin added that he had gotten several similar letters, before asking Bankman-Fried: "What do you tell this man?"

"I am deeply sorry about what happened," he replied.

Bankman-Fried added that the FTX.US platform was still "fully funded" and he believed withdrawals "could be opened up today."

He then went on a long explanation of Alameda's risky trade positions, before blaming an "all-out PR assault, which led to a total market collapse in a pretty short period of time."

But Sorkin then raised the question of money being mixed between Alameda and FTX.

On November 11, The Wall Street Journal reported that FTX lent $10 billion of customer assets to Alameda for its high-risk bets.

The customer had also referenced the FTX terms of service in his email, which said: "None of the digital assets in your account are the property of, or shall or may be loaned to, FTX Trading."

Under further questioning from Sorkin about the close-ties between his companies, Bankman-Fried eventually said: "I didn't knowingly commingle funds."

He also denies intent when he claims "I didn't want to commit fraud."

"I didn't ever want to commit fraud on anyone. I was shocked at what happened this month," Bankman-Fried said Wednesday during a video interview with Andrew Ross Sorkin at a conference put on by The New York Times.

He was shocked when the scheme all fell to pieces, of course. But anyone who misappropriates other people's money is shocked when that happens. A lawyer or stockbroker who steals a client's money, temporarily, to invest in the stock market, making a short-term play, hopes and expects he'll win his gamble, and then be able to pocket his profit and return the money to the accounts he "borrowed" it from without anyone being the wiser.

This is, of course, still theft, whether the money is returned or not. A stolen car is still stolen even if the owner gets it back.

And of course everyone doing this is "surprised" when their can't-miss stock market bet goes disastrously wrong and they lose their clients' money and have no way to pay it back.

But they still intended to commit the embezzlement and/or fraud and/or theft (as the case may be).

Note that for all of these charges, some guilty mental state -- mens rea -- is required, such as intent. (Intent to deceive, intent to misappropriate funds, intent to steal, intent to defraud.) Bankman-Fried isn't denying he took the actions that resulted in the theft and fraud; he's just denying he had the culpable mental state when he did these things that would wind him up in prison.

He may have committed "theft" -- but if he did, he was innocent in spirit and pure of heart in committing it.

Where did Sam Bankman-Fried get his psychopath-level evasion of responsibility for his crimes from?

From the radical wing of the Democrat Party's "intellectual" set, by which I mean, from his own mother, radical "Poverty & Inequality" professor Barbara H. Fried:

Barbara H. Fried's scholarly interests lie at the intersection of law, economics, and philosophy. She has written extensively on questions of distributive justice, in the areas of tax policy, property theory and political theory.

She wrote in 2013 that we must stop assigning criminal responsibility based on the antiquated notions of guilt and blame.

The mother of Sam Bankman-Fried, the beleaguered founder and former CEO of the now-bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, is a Stanford Law professor who penned a 2013 essay arguing that it is time for Americans to ditch the "philosophy of personal responsibility."

Barbara Fried, who just resigned from the Democratic super PAC Mind the Gap as the board of directors chairperson, penned a 2013 essay in the Boston Review titled, "Beyond Blame," which argued in favor of harm-reduction policies like rehabilitation over incarceration.

"The philosophy of personal responsibility has ruined criminal justice and economic policy," Fried wrote at the time. "It's time to move past blame."

"Public reactions to wrongdoing have been studied most extensively in the context of crime," she wrote. "Researchers have found that peoples' evaluations of serious wrongfulness vary significantly across social conditions and individuals. Tellingly, the more information people have about the context of the crime, the person who committed it, and the circumstances he or she came from, the more nuanced are their views of moral responsibility."

...

Fried concluded that "we have gotten nothing from our 40-year blame fest except the guilty pleasure of reproaching others for acts that, but for the grace of God, or luck, or social or biological forces, we might well have committed ourselves."

Might as well be a confession.

Michael Shellenberger @ShellenbergerMD

Nine years ago, when crypto-fraudster @SBF_FTX was 19, his mother, a Stanford professor, wrote a very long article making the case that free will is a myth and that we should not blame people for committing crimes.

I guess her son took that lesson to heart.

Barbara Fried is a big time hustler for big-time money for the Democrat Party, of course, getting Silicon Valley millionaires and billionaires to donate to her electioneering operation, "Mind the Gap."

Mind the Gap Type: Democratic Super PAC

Mind the Gap (MTG) is a left-wing super PAC dedicated to helping Democratic political candidates win elections. The PAC earns millions of dollars in donations primarily from Silicon Valley executives "who are keen on quietly funneling massive political donations into the Democratic Party"[1][2]. The mission of MTG is to "empower private political donors to strengthen our democracy by providing them with evidence-based guidance on the electoral strategies, tactics, and programs that are likely to achieve the greatest impact in a given election". [3]

In 2018, the PAC created a statistical model which attempted to score the impact each dollar donated would have on Democrats winning back control of the House of Representatives. The group ultimately raised more than 20 million dollars in its successful attempt to win back control of the House for Democrats.

MTG is known for its secretive operations where it attempts to quickly gather and coordinate donations over a short time to prevent Republicans from mobilizing donors in response. The PAC was founded in 2018 by Stanford Law professors Barbara Fried, Paul Brest, and researcher Graham Gottlieb. Of the three, only Gottlieb has political experience, having served former President Barack Obama as a staffer during his 2012 re-election campaign and in the White House. [4]

Leaked Memo

In a leaked 2019 memo, Mind the Gap refers to themselves as a collection of "pro bono donor advisors" but the group and their donors are much more powerful and influential than they let on. [5] according to the memo MTG won 10 of the 20 of races that they picked in 2018, despite most races initially being predicted as "lean" or "likely R".

Brest, Fried, and Gottlieb established their donor network and started receiving donations leading up to the midterm elections in 2018. The PAC created a statistical model which attempted to score the marginal impact each dollar donated would have on Democrats winning back control of the House of Representatives. According to the memo, MTG was able to construct a "donor network of over 800 individuals..., [raising] a total of $20 million... [for] 20 undervalued and underfunded House races... and... [for] get-out-the-vote (GOTV) efforts in the 100 most competitive House races". Their attempt to win back control of the House for Democrats was successful, they argue, due to their fundraising efforts.

And it just so happens that her son scammed money in a tech field, and gave $40 million (that we know about) to Democrats and Democrat groups.

Although there will be more clip from the interview released, I think Ed Morrissey is on solid ground with this speculation:

For now, though, it looks as if Stephanopoulos never asked about SBF's political connections, mainly to Democrats, and his efforts to work those for his own political benefits. Axios reported last month that SBF poured $37 million into Democrats' campaigns this election cycle alone...

Sure, why would you ask about a silly little thing like that? It's not as if you tied Bernie Maddoff, a man who had given millions and millions to Democrat Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, as connected inextricably to Republicans and Republicans only.

But with Sam Bankman-Fried, the question of which party benefited from political bribery is just like so déclassée, man.

We need a new headline type: Leftwing Media Fails to Pounce...

posted by Ace at 03:03 PM

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