How Russiagate could literally save our democracy
You never know where a criminal investigation might end up.
In 1993, Republicans using the laughable claim that Hillary Clinton killed Vince Foster, started a series of investigations that ended with President Clinton being impeached for lying about oral sex.
In 1972, a third-rate break-in at Watergate led to the downfall of a presidency.
In 2014, Brazil started investigating money laundering at a little-known car wash. Three years later most of the federal government was either under indictment or in jail.
No one could have predicted these outcomes.
Today the investigation that started with the laughable claim that President Trump was being controlled by Russia, has shifted to the much more believable claim that president Trump is corrupt to the bone.
More than 1,300 Trump condominiums selling for a total of $1.5 billion since the 1980s were bought by secretive shell companies in all-cash transactions, according to a new, exhaustive BuzzFeed report on President Donald Trump’s real estate dealings.
While such transactions can be made as part of tax strategies or to protect the privacy of buyers, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a division of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, issued a brief in August warning that all-cash real estate transactions made by secretive shell companies are a red flag for money laundering.
The claim that Donald is guilty of using real estate for money laundering shouldn't come as a shock. Steve Bannon said as much just a month ago.
"This is all about money laundering," Wolff quotes Bannon saying. "Their path to [expletive] Trump goes right through Paul Manafort, Don Jr. and Jared Kushner." For good measure he added, "It's as plain as a hair on your face."
Bannon then roasts the Trump White House for how ill-prepared it is to take on Mueller's team: "They're sitting on a beach trying to stop a Category Five."
One thing that was quickly forgotten in all the Scary Russia hysteria came right after the election: Donald Trump was named in the Panama Papers.
This appears to be the obvious weak spot for Trump, and if he gets impeached this will be the way that it's done. But like the investigations into Vince Foster and an obscure Brazilian car wash, this investigation could easily spread far beyond its original target.
The reason is because laundering money with real estate is not just widespread in the United States, its a common practice.
America's role in money-laundering is well-documented; the ease of incorporating anonymous shell companies has been key to making fortunes disappear -- and they also constitute the wide end of the funnel for dark money in US politics.
Just how common is it to hide real estate ownership information? Consider this:
The use of anonymized real estate ownership can have national security ramifications: earlier this year, the General Accounting Office was unable to identify the ownership information for about a third of the high-security buildings leased by the U.S. government due to a lack of beneficial ownership information.
Think about that for a moment.
We are talking about high-security buildings that the federal government uses, and even the government can't tell you who owns them.
Now imagine how common it must be with commercial real estate that is less likely to be scrutinized by federal investigators.
For example, a U.S.-led investigation [PDF] found that American taxpayer money—at least $3.3 million of a $2.16 billion contract—was funneled to the Taliban and a variety of warlords through networks of subcontractors and shell companies.
In 2012, a story found that U.S.-based corporate service providers had the fewest requirements, providing the easiest way to establish an untraceable company. The reason being is that the United States is out of compliance with existing international standards to combat money laundering and terrorist financing set by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).
We forced other nations to sign the FATF, and then refused to do so ourselves.
In addition, the 2002 USA Patriot Act grants a temporary exemption to “persons involved in real estate closings and settlements” a waiver from conducting anti–money laundering due diligence of their customers.
I'm not sure how that fights terrorism.
If that wasn't enough, just a few months ago the White House withdrew the U.S. from the the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), an international effort to fight corruption in managing revenues from oil, gas and mineral extraction.
The Treasury Department was already involved in a money-laundering/real estate crackdown last year.
Some things are pretty easy to guess.
First, that our government is extremely corrupt. It's not just the White House. It's everywhere.
Secondly, laundering money through real estate is a common conduit for corruption.
The old saying goes "if you see one cockroach, there are a thousand more".
When investigators turn over that rock of corruption, there's no telling what they might find.
Like that Brazilian car wash, the more widespread the corruption, the harder it is to hide, and the more connected it is.
The corruption scandal could get so bad (after enough of them were given prison stripes) that politicians would have to run on anti-corruption platforms, like during the Progressive Era.
The odds are against this just stopping at Trump.
Maybe I'm just looking for a silver-lining, but extensive corruption leads directly to incompetence and unintended consequences.
And those greedy bastards have no loyalty.
Granted, much of our government corruption is legal, but that never stopped the truly greedy.
Comments
It's hard to imagine an end to corruption
if the corrupt are to be employed to investigate the corrupt.
The ruling classes need an extra party to make the rest of us feel as if we participate in democracy. That's what the Democrats are for. They make the US more durable than the Soviet Union was.
The odds.
Precisely the reason I believe this investigation will not proceed.
Which is not to say that I haven't found myself hoping beyond hope that the Clinton Foundation would be caught in the snare of the Oxfam Haiti scandal.
bing. exactly. Hell, I'm surprised
it's gone on this long, this far.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
Looks like it's possible
corrupt oligarch in his last breathing moment...
https://www.euronews.com/live
Wish I shared your optimism
You could be right. I hope you are. But as far reaching as things could be, I don't know who moves things forward and risks being caught up themselves. It's hard to recognize the "good guys" or at least any that are in a position or have the motivation to push this forward.
While there's no loyalty, what worries me is they may have a common enemy: Trump. I don't find it beyond the pale that things could move in a bipartisan (yech) manner to root out that one bad apple and deflect attention from the rot infecting the whole harvest. I wouldn't anticipate the media looking any further if Trump's blood is in the water and probably a lot of the public would go along with it. As much as I'd like to see Trump taken down, not at the expense of everyone else being cleared and business as usual continuing.
Again, I'd love to be wrong...
Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.
I agree
and I would argue that trump is the only means of exposing the corruption. Once he is neutralized it will all go back to the way it was, although this time they will be absolutely certain that no one like trump ever gets elected again. They are living with the risk today and will be sure to protect against it in the future. The ace in the hole with trump is the knowledge that if they come after him, he will go down swinging. I think this is the only reason they haven't neutralized him yet.
Excellent point:
This really seems right to me. That fact is almost his insurance against really being called to task. Maybe it is Moore’s Molotov cocktail theory.
Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.
I agree,
.
I'd like you to be wrong also. But I agree with the description by Michael Moore that a lot of people voted for Trump, not because they liked him, but because he was a human Molotov cocktail that could be used to blow the system up.
And maybe this is one way to see the exposure of corruption. Trump has exposed the real face of our leadership. He's replaced the Nice Guy, Mr. Obama, who made the bombing of children look acceptable because it was done by a Nice Guy, and made it look like the work of a lunatic moron jackass narcissist, which is suddenly unacceptable.
It's as if we had an infected wound on our arm that was getting worse and more swollen and ugly, but that wasn't responding to happy thoughts. Eventually we were going to have to rip the scab off and expose the ugly, putrid reality of it, which is highly painful, but which is sadly necessary to clean it out.
@mimi @Dr. John Carpenter The whole purpose of
The whole purpose of targeting Trump is to allow business as usual to continue.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
I agree
and I would argue that trump is the only means of exposing the corruption. Once he is neutralized it will all go back to the way it was, although this time they will be absolutely certain that no one like trump ever gets elected again. They are living with the risk today and will be sure to protect against it in the future. The ace in the hole with trump is the knowledge that if they come after him, he will go down swinging. I think this is the only reason they haven't neutralized him yet.
Not that laughable. Is
very likely that Foster was "offed" by an "associate" of the Clinton Cartel.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
This is now that was then.
The big difference between this scandal and previous ones is that the Congress used to have many more or less honorable men and women in it. I don't think this is true any longer. Venemous partisan politics, venality, and mentally deranged Senators and, especially, Congressmen are not favorable to an impartial investigation of a sitting President. I suspect it will all die silently, smothered by money and greed and fear of more exposures. One thing Trump and the Democrats have done to me is turn me into a cynic. I won't forgive any of them for that.
-Greed is not a virtue.
-Socialism: the radical idea of sharing.
-Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
John F. Kennedy, In a speech at the White House, 1962
For me it was Obama
Oh yeah I was all full of some hope for change. Then he hired Citigroup for his cabinet, not only bailed out but protected Wall Street, and went on a war spree that made Bush look like a piker. The fact that Democrats worship him as a hero clearly tells me that they and I are not on the same side. I have liberal values. They have neoliberal.... well... what passes for "values" among neolibs. What do they value exactly? As near as I can tell it's greed and token gestures. Oh yeah, and they value slaughtering foreigners in job lots.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
Obama did me in too
and when Clinton cheated in the primaries, I was done with the Democratic party. Trump is a product of the Democratic party. Trump was the logical end product of how the Democrats shafted their constituencies.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
In my dreams....
.
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
@divineorder Is DC going to pass a
Is DC going to pass a law against shell companies? That would be nice. Or maybe these law enforcement officials could try busting the ones that are already operating illegally, including, but not limited to, any of Trump's that are currently on the wrong side of the law. That would be nice too.
Or is everybody just going to try to take down Trump?
If it's the latter, then, no, it's not about the rule of law, nor about the fact that repulsive behavior that ought to be illegal currently isn't.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
TBTJ
I hope they get Obama and Hillary along with that horse's ass Trump. Oh hell, let's throw in Sessions, Ryan, McConnell, Pence and Pelosi. In reality, it doesn't matter what they find. No one will even resign, let alone go to jail. This is the .001 percent. When's the last time one of them went to jail?
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
Martha Stewart obviously didn’t kowtow to the right people. n/t
@lotlizard Not sure why she ended
Not sure why she ended up in jail. I can't remember the name of the one rich guy to go to jail in the 2008 dust-up, but I remember that he ripped off rich people, instead of us. That was a mistake.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Aren't some of our largest banks
guilty of money laundering for people like, say, the Cartel?
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Yes, the banks are proven guilty
Of course if you're a banker then there's no repercussions for that sort of thing. There's no way any investigation is going to be allowed to stray into these sorts of waters.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
I can't tell
whether to laugh or cry when reading this post on C99. Now people are going to be hyperventilating about Trump and his 'money laundering,' when what he has done has been an accepted way of business for years. (see footnote 1)
Maybe people should read the entire article. It will repeatedly note that the transactions are red flags for money laundering, not that money laundering actually occurred. The article also notes that the Treasury department decided to investigate these transactions by selecting several cities with a lot of Trump properties. The article further notes that Treasury's interest in investigating these transactions began in 2016.
Gee, what a coincidence.
I think people are missing the larger issue behind Russia and this story about money laundering. The fact is that federal power is being used in an illegitimate way to overthrow a president.
IMO, the Mueller investigation is simply trying to figure out how to take out Trump without implicating all of the other people, like big developers, who did business like Trump. If the Mueller team had anything to support the accusations about Russia, they would have already disclosed the information. Further, I think the Mueller team is likely trying to help people/businesses it does not want to implicate when it finally gets around to its kangaroo court with Trump. (call me crazy - I don't care).
If these entities like Mueller's team, Treasury, CIA, etc., manage to get Trump impeached, we'll definitely know what little of the republic we thought existed no longer exists.
And I wish people would quit belly-aching about Trump's taxes. The IRS has very likely been auditing his businesses for years. (but I suppose he could have bought off some IRS agents).
(1) I have no idea why cash transactions of the sort described are legal now, but they are. I have no idea why people can hide transactions behind LLCs, either. Part of it may be due to people wanting confidentiality for their family trusts, etc. I think the laws should be changed to force LLCs and other businesses to disclose all of the owners/managers of the LLC (and other similar entities)- at least for real property transactions.
dfarrah
^^ This ^^
This can not be overstated. Those who see corruption through a partisan lens aren't seeing the corruption in our government clearly. If either Republicans or Democrats come out ahead in the battle to both expose and conceal corruption based on party line interests then clearly we all lose. If the burgeoning Awan spy scandal results in the complete collapse of the Democratic Party, then we will have an ascendant Republican Party free to continue their corruption without fear of unpleasant consequences. If the Republicans take it on the chin, Democrats will continue their illicit profiteering with even less restraint.
The ouster of Trump on trumped up charges (soft coup) would be a disaster, as would be a complete draining of only the Democratic Party members off the corruption "Swamp". If we want a return to a functional representative democracy corrupt members of BOTH parties need to "Cut it out!"
“ …and when we destroy nature, we diminish our capacity to sense the divine,and understand who God is, and what our own potential is and duties are as human beings.- RFK jr. 8/26/2024
@dfarrah The fact is that
The fact is that federal power is being used in an illegitimate way to overthrow a president.
Well, of course it is. I think the Deep State has Trump pretty well in hand by now--as Assange said, "Now we know how long it takes the Deep State to digest a President"--but they'd still rather have someone vetted and, well, more predictable. Plus, they're still pissed that for the first time since 1976, they haven't been in control of who sits in that chair.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not glad Trump's in that chair. I just don't see the situation quite the way many do.
One side doesn't have to be good. In this case, we've got a man that I think is a bigoted shithead, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, we have a well-organized fascist secret police with deep ties to the richest financiers and industrialists.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Sadly, here's the key phrase in your essay:
That's why the Clintons got away with what they did and why Trump will get away with what he does. They write the laws. They won't let anything that will end corruption and hold them and their cronies accountable get written into law. If something is accidentally written into law, it won't be enforced when it comes to them. The entire system is rotten to the core.
Take a breath & calm down. BuzzFeed is not a reliable
source and even they didn't allege any proof of corruption. Regardless, you can be sure Mueller will check it carefully.
You can be certain that a lot of dirty money finds its way into commercial real estate and no doubt Trump got his share. But as BuzzFeed mentions, the U.S. makes it easy. (Thanks in no small part to politicians like the Senator from Citibank Joe Biden.)
Even if there is something there, would the R's impeach/remove Trumo? And would you rather have Pres. Pence. IMO the answers are No & No, but YMMV
chuck utzman
TULSI 2020
@chuckutzman Is this the Democratic
Is this the Democratic version of the Whitewater investigation?
As a Southerner, I generally assume there's always dirty money and filthy behavior in real estate--at least when there's enough profit at stake. And I generally assume that some politicians will be involved at some point.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
The banks own the place.
Dick Durbin once said "the banks own the place". Anything that threatens to get close to banks will be shut down like the Hillary investigation.
Maybe if they give immunity deals to banks to catch Trump? But giving immunity deals to banks could be worse than keeping Trump.
I have this sneakin' suspicion that it will never get to money laundering. The 'owners' wouldn't like that.
Mike Taylor
Of course it won't. And even if Dipshit is indicted...
...You can bet your ass he'll just continue his life of crime in the private sector once this is all said and done. Just like all the rest. Meanwhile, the willing dupes won't question the very system that led to this shit to begin with.
Capitalism must die.
Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.
Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.