It's not bad luck that results in two senior US presidential advisers being either found, or pleading, guilty to corruption charges in a single day. Nor is it coincidence. It's lies that did that, and the belief that they could get away with those lies so long as the web of deceipt that their behavioiur involved would not be discovered.
And we know why they believed that those lies would not be found out. Offshore secrecy did for Manafort: he presumed that the money trails that led to him could be covered by the simple artifice of using the offshore secrecy that so many co-called professional people sell from tax havens.
Michael Cohen fell for the belief that the US's own ability to hide the details of the affairs of companies - which has made that country the number one secrecy jurisidiction in the world in the Tax Justice Network Financial Secrecy Index - would deliver the same outcome.
But the world of secrecy is changing. And with that the lies came out.
And it's always the lies that undo the likes of Manafort and Cohen. And maybe others in due course.
That's why I have for years been involved in campaigning for transparency. The world can do without corrupt politicians, corrupted advisers and corrupted democracy. All are the inevitable consequence of offshore. Which is yet another reason why we can do without the deliberate corruption that offshore sets out to sell to those seeking to hide their nefarious activities from view.
Manafort and Cohn have fallen. Others take note. Transparency will do for you too. And the world will be all the better for that.
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They shoot themselves in the foot (or head) by accepting the delusion that money is worth having for its own sake.
These people have totally lost the plot and the damage they do spreads like ripples across the entire globe causing misery to millions.
Well done Tax Justice rottweiler. Maybe the tide just turned …(?) have we reached the high tide of filth and financial corruption? Maybe….
I couldn’t put it better myself Andy.
Hi,
sure, if you bother to look closely enough at any of these wealthy figures you’ll find stuff like this,
but the only reason they were placed under such scrutiny was an attempt to prove their theory that Russia had interfered in some way in the US election,
this wasn’t motivated by a desire to clean up the byzantine Western financial system,
will Bill Browder, justification for the Magnitsky Act, be placed under similar scrutiny?
I suspect not,
I find your work admirable Richard, but it is very specialised and focused on taxation and accounting,
I try to stand back and see the widest picture possible whilst also appreciating the finer details you point out,
Michael Hudson is on the verge of releasing his next book which pierces the veil of the true relationship between Christianity, finance and it’s evolution during the birth of human civilisation,
I imagine you’d find this fascinating:
https://michael-hudson.com/2018/08/and-forgive-them-their-debts/
if Mr Hudson is correct then you find yourself in the company of another well known campaigner for financial reform,
my only concern is what they did to the earlier campaigner to shut him up.
I am aware of Michael’s book and his work
I approve of it
And if you think I am focussed on accounting and tax, where have you been? I’m not even a professor of either
I’m very pleased to see some UK side appreciation of Hudson’s work and I am intent on getting his latest book some of which he has released as a paper previously. I think that we are in for treat if his book ‘Super Imperialism’ is anything to go by which was very controversial.
Hudson has never shut up – the first time I saw him was in the documentary film ‘The Four Horseman’ and then another called ‘Obama: Lifting the Veil’ where I also came across Bernie Sanders (who also puts a appearance in Michael Moor’s ‘Capitalism: A Love Story’). So I had to check Hudson out.
The joy I had in finding him was (1) he is American (they are not all rabid Ayn Rand worshippers over there) and (2) our Richard is not the only bloke putting neo-lib bullshit to the sword. That’s why I like Bill Mitchell too and others because THERE are alternatives to the really bad way we are living out there and they are everywhere. And that is good.
Agreed!
Matt says:
“….but the only reason they were placed under such scrutiny was an attempt to prove their theory that Russia had interfered in some way in the US election,….”
And Al Capone did his time for tax evasion.
Those who lie and cheat get it in the end, but not necessarily for their core crimes.
The wages of sin is death. Literal or ‘spiritual’; who cares ?