[HN Gopher] Ross Ulbricht granted a full pardon
___________________________________________________________________
Ross Ulbricht granted a full pardon
Author : Ozarkian
Score : 1760 points
Date : 2025-01-22 00:10 UTC (22 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (twitter.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (twitter.com)
| mbStavola wrote:
| Without any snark, why? What's the motivation?
| lostmikeys wrote:
| There's probably still some SR btc they wanted the keys to.
| mannerheim wrote:
| Possibly a deal with the Libertarian Party, which chose not to
| run their candidate in several states to help Trump:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhDKYYdD2vY
| qqqult wrote:
| It was one of the promises he made at a Bitcoin conference he
| attended a few months ago. It has been a popular issue in
| crypto circles
| foogazi wrote:
| Just feels all around
| mythrwy wrote:
| Two life sentences was a bit harsh. 11 years seems about right
| to me.
|
| I suspect the idea beyond "Free Ross" in some circles was that
| his conviction wasn't so much about drug dealing, but rather it
| was more a political prosecution for popularizing real uses of
| cryptocurrencies.
| anotherhue wrote:
| Paraphrasing an aphorism I saw elsewhere: "Crime is legal now".
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| "If a law is unjust a man is not only right to disobey it, he
| is obligated to do so" - Thomas Jefferson
| mmcwilliams wrote:
| Thomas Jefferson was a slave owner.
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| So were most aristocrats of the time. Applying presentism
| doesn't invalidate the idea.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| It is just hypocritical: even his time most people knew
| slavery was unjust.
| mmcwilliams wrote:
| But there were also abolitionists at the time, even
| amongst that class. Jefferson not being among them does,
| actually, diminish his standing and his views on justice.
| This quote, for example, does not acknowledge that there
| are also laws which are unjust to obey; such as the
| owning of human beings in chattel slavery.
| pizza wrote:
| I don't think suggesting that his quote would imply his
| slaves would be justified in violating their own
| enslavement is any kind of presentism.
| DannyBee wrote:
| He never actually said it, either.
| arrowsmith wrote:
| ... in a society where slavery was legal, widespread, and
| rarely questioned.
|
| Murder has never been legal.
| mmcwilliams wrote:
| The legality of it is not in question (the purpose of
| this quote). It was as unjust then as it is now.
| clueless wrote:
| so we all individually can just decide a law is unjust?
| that'll be fun
| DannyBee wrote:
| Don't worry - jefferson never actually said this because he
| wasn't a complete idiot.
|
| Don't take my word for it though, the monticello folks
| looked into it too - https://www.monticello.org/research-
| education/thomas-jeffers...
|
| It is a fun quote though, because it's one of those quotes
| that people want to use to justify their own dumb behavior.
|
| "If you don't like the law, feel free to ignore it" -
| Albert Einstein
| jojobas wrote:
| If you come to disagree with the justice of a law, your
| options are to conform or, yes, decide that the law is
| unjust.
| XorNot wrote:
| I mean strictly speaking the people voted for Trump, so
| collectively they're all okay with this.
|
| Of course Trump's platform was enormously based on law &
| order and combatting the drug trade, which he seems to
| think should still be actually illegal and is not ending
| the war on drugs so, I don't know - make of that what you
| will.
| adriand wrote:
| Is it unjust to prohibit the sale of illegal drugs, weapons,
| etc.? Society has good reasons for regulating certain goods.
| I regularly see people in my community who are enslaved by
| fentanyl and I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy. The
| society I live in decided to make selling it illegal. What is
| unjust about that?
| ndriscoll wrote:
| There are healthier middle grounds we could explore where
| e.g. advertisements are banned and individuals could
| register themselves as being banned from participating in
| certain addictive vices because they don't consistently
| have the willpower to quit or don't want to tempt fate
| trying it (and make it a crime to sell to an individual who
| has voluntarily banned themselves), but it's hard to argue
| that The War on Drugs has been in any way just.
|
| I expect in such a society, certain groups (e.g. Mormons)
| would normalize banning yourself from vices the day you
| turn 18.
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| As I recall weapons weren't permitted on the platform.
|
| The society didn't decide, the ruling class decided to use
| drug policy to attack their own citizens.
|
| History shows that prohibition is an abject failure. The
| fent epidemic is symptomatic of this failed policy.
|
| If they actually cared about the epidemic, addicts would
| have access to regulated, pharmaceutical grade heroin
| whilst also having ready access to treatment.
|
| But then we'd have empty prisons and the police would be
| free to solve real crimes so we can't have that.
| jsheard wrote:
| Is Trump pushing for broad drug decriminalisation? I feel
| like that would be necessary for this pardon to make
| sense on the basis of current drug laws being unjust.
|
| Last I heard he was promising to make drug dealers
| eligible for the death penalty:
| https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/trump-
| wants-e...
| NekkoDroid wrote:
| Wasn't he also continuously complaining about how
| mexicans are importing all the drugs to the US (whether
| or not that statement is even factually correct)? He also
| recently designated drug cartels as terrorists. So all in
| all I wouldn't say he is for the decriminalisation of
| drugs.
| 0dayz wrote:
| Not exactly, fentanyl epidemic was specifically started
| by one family seek profit and ousted doctors to over
| prescribe it while claiming it was mildly addictive.
|
| The war on drugs have caused immeasurable harm due to
| failure to understand most people use drugs either as
| escapism or as a tendency.
|
| That's why it has failed.
| tayo42 wrote:
| I think you have fentanyl and oxycodone mixed up
| 0dayz wrote:
| Yes, sorry about that.
| foogazi wrote:
| So we like drug markets now ?
|
| How are cartels terrorist organizations?
| hellojesus wrote:
| I like free markets.
| adriand wrote:
| > addicts would have access to regulated, pharmaceutical
| grade heroin
|
| We tried that, it was called the opioid epidemic and
| Purdue was the pharmacist. We had readily available,
| doctor-prescribed, high quality narcotics available to
| anyone who wanted them and the result was an epic
| disaster that cost thousands of lives.
|
| > weapons weren't permitted on the platform
|
| My mistake.
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| >We tried that, it was called the opioid epidemic and
| Purdue was the pharmacist.
|
| Not really, this was a case of a private company
| deliberately pushing narcotics for profit without
| oversight or any associated increase in access to
| treatment options.
|
| Now the "opioid epidemic" has been replaced with a
| "fentanyl epidemic" which is objectively a much more
| dangerous drug with absolutely no regulation and
| murderous cartels instead of doctors - and we're still
| throwing people in prison for the crime of being addicts
| rather than treating it as a medical issue.
|
| I don't know the stats (or if it's even possible to
| accurately collect statistics due to prohibition) but I'm
| fairly certain this costs more lives than the short lived
| opioid epidemic.
| mystified5016 wrote:
| What is just is decided both by an individual and the
| society they exist in. "It is one's moral obligation to
| fight injustice" is a pretty common tenent to hold.
| Injustice can be city laws encouraging anti-homeless
| spikes. Injustice can also be genocide in a remote country.
| Those injustices get fought in _very_ different ways. One
| can be handled by individual vigilanteeism and peacefully
| petitioning local governance. The other might require
| global war.
|
| In my personal belief, everyone[0] has the right and moral
| obligation to fight the injustice they care about at the
| level they can manage. If that's handing out water at the
| protest or inventing penicillin, do what you personally can
| do to improve the world.
|
| [0]the average layperson, obvious exceptions for
| power/money apply
| adriand wrote:
| Sure, but the facts matter. Making millions of dollars by
| operating a marketplace for illegal drugs is not even
| close to the same ballpark as protesting a draconian
| anti-homeless law, let alone resisting genocide!
|
| The only reasonable argument for drug legalization, in my
| opinion, is the libertarian one - the idea that you
| should be free to take the drugs you want to take. I am
| sympathetic to this argument. I am someone who is able to
| make wise decisions about the drugs I take. But I also
| recognize that millions of my fellow citizens are not.
| The harm to society from drug addiction and overdoses
| outweighs the benefit to me getting high whenever I want.
| Aloisius wrote:
| He tried to have multiple people murdered.
| lupusreal wrote:
| Jefferson did, certainly. He was instrumental in starting a
| war from what I understand.
|
| Ross though? The government alleged it but never bothered
| to prove it. Furthermore the government agents involved
| were laughably corrupt, so anything they alleged needs to
| be taken with a massive grain of salt. For all anybody here
| know, they fabricated the entire assassination story to
| distract the public from their plot to loot Ross's money
| (which unlike the assassination stuff, _has_ been proven in
| court.)
| bdangubic wrote:
| lol
| DannyBee wrote:
| 1. There is no evidence jefferson ever said this
|
| 2. There is no evidence anyone else ever said this, either
|
| The closest you get is MLK.
|
| See https://www.monticello.org/research-education/thomas-
| jeffers...
|
| But MLK also talks about moral obligation and not other forms
| of obligation.
|
| He was not trying to create a free for all where everyone
| gets to decide which laws are okay or not, because he (and
| jefferson) were not complete morons.
| scythe wrote:
| MLK was himself referencing Saint Augustine:
|
| >Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey
| unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that "an
| unjust law is no law at all."
|
| Considering that his rhetoric was very much based on
| Christianity, it's clear what standard of "unjust" he was
| applying.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Considering that his rhetoric was very much based on
| Christianity, it's clear what standard of "unjust" he was
| applying.
|
| Considering the diversity of standards of justice within
| the history of Christianity (which, in just the US,
| includes--relevant to this topic--MLK, sure, but also the
| Southern Baptist Convention, founded explicitly in
| support of slavery), I don't know that having rhetoric
| grounded in Christian theology tells much of substance
| about the standard of justice one is appealing to.
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| Touche, however there is plenty of evidence of people
| throughout history making this assertion, including MLK.
|
| He was trying to create a more just, egalitarian society. I
| don't understand how you can consider acting in accordance
| with leading research on successful drug policy "moronic"?
| nateglims wrote:
| Successful drug policy meaning what here?
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| Least amount of harm to both the individual and society
| as a whole whilst recognizing people's fundamental right
| to bodily autonomy.
| lq9AJ8yrfs wrote:
| Maybe Thoreau? That's more authentic and gets at similar
| themes. On more than one level considering his circumstances
| and run-ins with law enforcement.
|
| "Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true
| place for a just man is also a prison."
| silverquiet wrote:
| I wonder how this sentiment is going to play out in Luigi
| Mangione's trial.
| rhabarba wrote:
| Providing online forums is legal now.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| Hiring a hitman is legal now.
| 1oooqooq wrote:
| blatant entrapment and gaslighting for more than a year by
| law enforcement dedicating 24h to it.
|
| the real criminals for that prank were never even tried.
| lolcatzlulz wrote:
| Looks like the "real criminal" was charged.
|
| https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/silk-road-drug-
| vendor-w...
| kyleyeats wrote:
| The seven offenses in question: _distributing narcotics,
| distributing narcotics by means of the Internet, conspiring
| to distribute narcotics, engaging in a continuing criminal
| enterprise, conspiring to commit computer hacking,
| conspiring to traffic in false identity documents, and
| conspiring to commit money laundering_
| ty6853 wrote:
| A judge bypassed the jury and prosecutor and sentenced
| him as if he hired hit men and admitted doing so. The
| sentence upgrade was based on a preponderance of
| evidence, whereas they would have had to proven beyond a
| reasonable doubt had he been charged.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| Framing this as judicial activism is false. Many
| sentencing arrangements include - with the agreement of
| the defendant (since it is their rights in this case) -
| to have other related activities factored in exactly this
| manner.
|
| It happens all the time in pleas and diversion
| agreements, so don't frame it as a reckless lone judge
| going off the reservation.
| zoklet-enjoyer wrote:
| He was never tried for that. Don't believe the
| disinformation.
| DannyBee wrote:
| To be fair - he was not pardoned for that, he could still
| be charged for it. He was only pardoned for crimes related
| to drugs.
| johnneville wrote:
| do you know that is actually the case ? i've been trying
| to find the text of the pardon and haven't been able to
| yet. can only find Trump's description of it as "full and
| unconditional"
|
| edit: i see your other comment with the context
| DannyBee wrote:
| They unfortunately have not released the text yet.
|
| It should eventually pop up here:
| https://www.justice.gov/pardon/clemency-recipients
|
| (among other places)
| DannyBee wrote:
| It is now there, see -
| https://www.justice.gov/pardon/media/1386096/dl
|
| He was not pardoned for any crimes not charged, and
| therefore could still be charged.
| llamaimperative wrote:
| Given there are at least thousands if not millions of people
| who "provide online forums," and pretty much this _single
| one_ is in prison, I have to wonder if there 's something
| unique about this case?
|
| I don't know anything about this guy. Is there really nothing
| unique about his case?
| shadowgovt wrote:
| Silk Road was, at its height, uniquely successful and
| making an absolute mockery of the United States
| government's capacity to regulate drug trafficking. In
| addition, he fashioned himself an anti-establishment
| persona, going by the handle "Dread Pirate Roberts" online.
|
| He was unique in his magnitude of success. Governments can
| successfully magnify their enforcement ability by making an
| example of outliers.
| llamaimperative wrote:
| It was a forum that mocked the government's ability to
| regulate drug trafficking and therefore he was
| prosecuted?
|
| I find that hard to believe.
| velocity3230 wrote:
| > I find that had to believe.
|
| Inconceivable!
| shadowgovt wrote:
| There are multiple examples of federal law enforcement
| making examples of particularly brazen instances of
| flouting federal law that are disproportionate to the
| actual harm caused. Kevin Mitnick is a classic example.
|
| Here's the thing about the US federal law enforcement:
| there aren't actually a lot of them. In a country of 380
| million people, there are 38,000 agents. _Google_ employs
| more people than the FBI. If the US citizenry decided to
| take collective action against them, the federal domestic
| police force alone could not stand against the citizenry.
|
| This shapes where they apply their resources. To be most
| effective, they need to be visible so that people don't
| start to think of them as toothless, because mass-
| resistance to their general police activities would
| actually work. So they pursue cases into the dust to
| generate high-profile images of lawbreakers having a
| _really_ awful time to discourage other lawbreakers.
|
| He was prosecuted because he broke US drug law. But he
| was prosecuted to the extent he was prosecuted because
| Silk Road had made headlines as something untouchable by
| federal authority. That's the kind of Capone energy that
| the federal law enforcement cannot abide and survive as
| an institution.
| llamaimperative wrote:
| Which is all different from "running a forum mocking drug
| enforcement capability" which makes it sound like he was
| a satirist.
| bdhcuidbebe wrote:
| Dread Pirate Roberts is legend, look up the silk road
| marketplace.
|
| Theres probably a movie or two about it too
| llamaimperative wrote:
| Oh so it was a marketplace, not a forum. Like one that
| allowed people to openly transact illegal goods? That
| makes more sense.
|
| It's weird that GP seemed to purposely obscure that.
| bdhcuidbebe wrote:
| Yes, it was the biggest drug market on the dark web at
| that time, and the 50,676 bitcoins seized by the feds
| from then is today worth 5,3 billion dollars to give you
| an idea.
|
| Also there was a long side story with disappeared
| bitcoins, presumably stolen by federal investigators.
| opesorry wrote:
| American Kingpin by Nick Bilton is an excellent book
| covering Silk Road and what makes this unique
| daveguy wrote:
| Running an elicit drug and whatever else you want to sell
| market is legal now.
| chillingeffect wrote:
| This was a pandering to get Libertarians' votes. It has
| nothing to do with the crime itself. I wouldn't commit any
| crimes and expect to get away with them unless I
| anticipated becoming the pawn in someone's scheme to get
| elected.
| gitaarik wrote:
| Crime has always been legal for the ones with money and the
| right connections.
|
| Biden pardonning his son and other criminals also made this
| clear.
|
| Most people are becoming aware most politicians are actually
| criminals in suits.
| maplant wrote:
| I had no idea this was a campaign promise. Why? I don't
| understand.
| acegopher wrote:
| because the crypto bros love him
| 1oooqooq wrote:
| who else will buy new treasury DOGE coins?
| defrost wrote:
| * Ulbricht's conviction became a cause celebre in American
| libertarian circles.
|
| * In May 2024, candidate Donald Trump said that if re-elected
| President, he would commute Ulbricht's sentence on his first
| day in office
|
| ~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Ulbricht
|
| I doubt Trump cares about Ulbricht as much as he cares (for
| whatever reason) about the continued support of various
| American libertarians (Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and various crypto
| elites).
|
| While he has made _many_ promises this is significant for being
| one that he has kept.
| apsec112 wrote:
| RFK Jr is definitely not a libertarian (even compared to
| someone mainstream like Gary Johnson or Jared Polis), he
| supports strong state intervention in many areas of the
| economy and society
| monero-xmr wrote:
| I am active in libertarian circles and Ulbricht was a cause
| celebre. The 2024 election was a game of inches, and many
| libertarians I know voted Trump purely on this issue. It is
| possible this was a key way Trump eked out a victory.
| dralley wrote:
| Libertarians are very hard to take seriously because of shit
| like this. Nothing about Donald Trump is Libertarian.
| defrost wrote:
| However both Libertarians _and_ Trump are transactional.
| ty6853 wrote:
| I don't judge anyone too hard when they're willing to
| bend a bit to get someone out of jail after the key has
| been thrown away. I didn't vote Trump but I will admit
| the possibility of Ross being released made me pause when
| I marked my ballot, even his mom's image flashed in my
| mind and I felt guilty for not helping.
| sirbutters wrote:
| Of all the issues in this country that really has impact
| on millions of people, I am baffled when I hear people
| only caring about 1 person and not care about the common
| good of society and the hundreds of millions of people in
| the US who live in it. Fascinating and depressing.
| mannerheim wrote:
| Biden could have taken the wind out of Trump's sails by
| commuting Ulbricht's sentence when he was in office. If you
| don't think a group's interests are worth listening to,
| don't be surprised when that group votes for someone who
| does.
| mindslight wrote:
| Very little about the Libertarian party is libertarian. Yet
| another party carrying water for authoritarianism, with the
| difference being that the implementation is through
| corporations.
| monero-xmr wrote:
| Libertarians are a self selecting bunch. Very few were
| raised into this philosophy. You can appreciate that my
| self identification as a libertarian is a careful,
| reasoned decision and not one that was flippantly made.
| It is the philosophy that is the most accurate and
| truthful to me.
| mindslight wrote:
| Read my comment again. I self-identify as a libertarian
| as I see individual freedom as paramount. But I kept
| going with the analysis to realize that the Libertarian
| Party does very little to represent that ideal.
| monero-xmr wrote:
| My apologies, I thought you were accusing libertarians of
| authoritarianism (the irony!).
|
| I find the Mises Caucus at least useful in pushing to do
| more than simply be an affinity group for people
| pretending to play politics. I find partying with LP
| officials to be very hilarious, what a group of odd
| balls. But the party itself has no hope of electoral
| victory, which is why everyone should vote Republican in
| the current iteration of two-party politics from the
| libertarian lens.
| mindslight wrote:
| My point is that even if there were an electoral victory,
| the Libertarian Party would not bring individual freedom.
| They are operating from an assertion that starting with a
| list of moral axioms, every implication will be morally
| right by construction. By itself this is terribly
| mistaken (see Godel), but it goes askew even sooner when
| a few poor axioms are allowed to remain through
| "pragmatism", regulatory capture, etc.
|
| As for the current political environment, I'd say that
| bureaucratic authoritarianism is at least the devil we
| know and can be routed around by individuals, whereas
| autocratic authoritarianism is at best a wildcard that
| stands to destroy a good chunk of the laws that have
| actually been restraining naked power.
| Cornbilly wrote:
| Libertarians are a joke because they refuse to realize
| that allowing corporations unlimited freedom means that
| the individual has less freedom. Their entire ideology
| just removes the boot of the state and replaces it with
| the boot of the corporation.
| monero-xmr wrote:
| Libertarians are not a joke. Some of the most powerful
| people on earth are libertarians. The people who write
| off libertarians are blind.
|
| I prefer corporations because I can voluntarily choose to
| take my business elsewhere, or even better, create my own
| competitor. Why I dislike the government is that it's the
| ultimate monopoly, with guns, and operated mostly by
| power-hungry sociopaths who will use that power to
| destroy innocent lives.
|
| Given the corporation or the state, I take the
| corporation every time.
| mindslight wrote:
| Don't be fooled by powerful people who claim to be
| libertarian, but are actually only interested in
| promoting freedom for themselves while denying the same
| to others.
|
| Your second paragraph is setting up a false dichotomy.
| It's not the corporation xor the state. Fundamentally,
| corporations as we know them _are creatures of the state_
| - government chartered legal entities, running on the
| government 's legal system, with government granted
| liability shields. But the main point is that where the
| nominal state disappears, the corporation(s) step into
| the power vacuum and become the inescapable government.
| To be able to take your business elsewhere or create your
| own competitor, you need _individual rights_. While the
| underlying physics supports this directly for some
| abilities, for others you need coordinated collective
| action. This often takes place _through_ the state,
| meaning that blanket calls to dismantle parts of the
| current government can often serve as cover for enabling
| newer less-constrained government. Think yin-yang and NP
| /Turing completeness circular reductions, not towering
| software builds.
| dralley wrote:
| The boot of the state is very much going to remain intact
| in this administration.
| Cornbilly wrote:
| It's pretty obvious that both boots are in play at this
| point and have been for a while.
| zo1 wrote:
| Speaking of jokes, it's always funny to us libertarians
| when we see government proponents talk about "freedom"
| being lost to the corporations under a libertarian system
| of (non) government.
|
| The government as it is the world over pretty much
| controls your entire life; It dictates what you can and
| can't do with your own body, it forces you into various
| forms of indentured servitude, it marks you and keeps
| track of you like an inventory item, it controls what you
| can say (where and with whom even), it takes your
| children from you and puts them into essentially
| indoctrination camps for "education", it comes up with
| arbitrary rules that you have to jump through hoops to
| abide by, and it can even take your children away if you
| don't teach them the approved things, it can take
| arbitrary control over any and all of your possessions
| for whatever reason, it orders you to harm your fellow
| man, etc... And most of all, it gaslights and forces you
| to go against your own morals or things you consider
| wrong, whatever that may be. And just to rub it all in?
| It says you have to do and abide by all these things
| whilst still loving government because it's "Democracy"
| and "Democracy" is pure and noble and fair.
| beeflet wrote:
| yeah but freeing ross was a key campaign promise made by
| trump to sway libertarian voters
| robocat wrote:
| They just won something they cared about: perhaps you
| should be taking them even more seriously than you did.
|
| And even if you are not a fan of a political group, you are
| the one being judgemental here on a factor that is very
| unlikely to be universal within the group.
|
| Treating anyone according to political labels is divisive.
| rafram wrote:
| They got a single guy out of prison, but pretty much
| everything else in Trump's platform is diametrically
| opposed to libertarianism. It's hard to think of anything
| less libertarian than tariff-funded big government!
| monero-xmr wrote:
| Tariffs are not good for free market diehards. However
| the nuance is that foreign countries like China do not
| operate on a fair playing field, they want free access to
| our markets but prevent our champions from entering
| their's. Something must be done here. I'm not convinced
| tariffs are the best tool, but at least it's something.
|
| In terms of small government, there is news about the
| Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) every single
| day. There will be a massive downsizing in the federal
| workforce and the regulatory state over the next 4 years.
| This move towards _small_ government is the thing that
| excites me most.
| dralley wrote:
| Trump has is proposing a 10% tariff on China, and a 25%
| tariff on Mexico.
|
| Also he's handing out tariff exemptions to his political
| allies like candy.
|
| There's not some high minded principal or strategy here.
| It's graft and spite. Trump even seems to be holding out
| the tariff threat as leverage to force the sale of
| TikTok.
|
| Look you can agree with this stuff if you want but none
| of it is remotely aligned with libertarian principles.
| Even squishy ones.
| NekkoDroid wrote:
| > Trump has is proposing a 10% tariff on China, and a 25%
| tariff on Mexico.
|
| Wasn't it 60% for China, 25% for Canada and Mexico and
| 10% for the rest of the planet?
| dralley wrote:
| He's said it a dozen different ways but as of yesterday
| it was 10% on China. Maybe tomorrow it will be 100%, it's
| not like the narrative is consistent apart from that
| there will be some level of tariffs.
| moogly wrote:
| > our champions
|
| Wait, what?
| rafram wrote:
| > In terms of small government, there is news about the
| Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) every single
| day.
|
| Just to be clear, all they did is rename the US Digital
| Service to the US DOGE Service. The Digital Service
| already existed; it hires tech workers from industry on
| short-term rotations to work on government projects. Now
| that thing that already existed is called DOGE, and it
| will continue to do nothing more than bring in industry
| engineers to make websites for the government. If there's
| a "massive downsizing in the federal workforce," it won't
| be because of "DOGE."
| floydnoel wrote:
| and what would voting for Harris have gotten them
| exactly?
| chromatin wrote:
| > Nothing about Donald Trump is Libertarian.
|
| so what? Coalition-building is common in the rest of the
| democratic world. This is, in my view, a similar thing.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| Trump went around to a huge number of niche communities and
| promised to fix their core concerns in exchange for their
| support. The crypto and libertarian communities are obsessed
| with freeing Ulbricht. It was honestly a brilliant strategy,
| and probably the reason he won. Ironic that an authoritarian
| fascist was able to get elected by enlisting the help of anti-
| authoritarian communities with a single issue promise.
| llamaimperative wrote:
| > Ironic that an authoritarian fascist was able to get
| elected by enlisting the help of anti-authoritarian
| communities with a single issue promise.
|
| Ironic? It's the oldest trick in the book bro
| exoverito wrote:
| Unfortunately you could level the same type of name calling
| towards Democrats. It's now public record they colluded with
| all the major media outlets, coerced big tech to censor and
| debank opponents, imprisoned whistleblowers, violated bodily
| autonomy with unconstitutional mandates, weaponized the
| courts to conduct lawfare, and now issued an unprecedented
| number of pre-emptive pardons for unspecified crimes
| committed by Fauci, Hunter Biden, et al.
|
| I remember when the Democrats were the anti-war party, but
| Biden was escalating the Ukraine war in the final days of his
| presidency, and celebrated Dick Cheney's endorsement of
| Kamala Harris. Crazy how things have changed so much. The
| left unanimously viewed Bush and Cheney as obviously
| psychopathic war criminals, and now almost all the Neocons
| have jumped over to the Democrats. The left used to be
| extremely skeptical of globalization as evident by the
| Seattle WTO Protests, mass immigration as evident by Bernie
| Sanders' comments on its effect on workers' wages, and Big
| Pharma's perverse incentives to keep people sick and
| regularly consuming drugs. Yet the media has utterly psyop'd
| the progressives... it's kinda disturbing.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| Authoritarianism is also popular with the democrats right
| now, but I don't see how anything I said is name calling: I
| used terms with a specific meaning appropriate for the
| context- the only reason they have a negative connotation
| is because of what they actually mean. Do you know of other
| terms with the same meaning and more neutral connotations?
| exoverito wrote:
| If you go by Trump's actions in his first term he was a
| pretty standard Republican, and mostly just cut taxes,
| with a lot of wild rhetoric which is part of his deal
| making shtick. In real terms I don't see Trump as
| uniquely authoritarian, probably less so than Biden,
| Obama and Bush. He seems to support free speech far more,
| which is the foundation for all other freedoms. He makes
| his money from the leisure industry, so his interests are
| aligned with Americans doing well and having disposable
| income. And he supports decentralization, so liberal
| states can adopt liberal policies, and so forth.
|
| It seems people forget about the insane infringements of
| civil rights through the Patriot Act, NDAA, mass
| surveillance, lockdowns, firing people over vaccine
| mandates, etc. A poll showed about half of Democrats
| supported putting Americans into camps if they didn't
| take the vaccine, and a third supported seizing custody
| of their children. Democrats supported mass censorship
| and state control over media, which is far more
| authoritarian and fascist than anything the Republicans
| were doing.
| reciprocity wrote:
| I'll leave the authoritarianism aspect to someone else
| but I'll point out that the part of your comment where
| "he makes his money from the leisure industry, so his
| interests are aligned with Americans doing well and
| having disposable income" is not representative of his
| ability let alone judgement in planning/making decisions
| that reflect those interests. You can be in favor of
| something and completely botch the execution.
|
| The PATRIOT Act was introduced by a Republican and signed
| into law by a Republican and had wide support from both
| parties. 62 Democrats and 3 Republicans voted against it
| in the House (there was only a single senate vote against
| it), and you can't have a discussion about the Patriot
| Act's introduction without bringing up the fact that it
| was enacted at the height of the post-9/11 fear. It has
| always been a controversial and flawed bill.
|
| Most of today's social issues aren't about left versus
| right, they are about class.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| People in power in this era do that.
|
| The democrats are broken. They keep running women, and not
| getting messages out that appeal to the average voter. They
| lost their core reliable voters (old people, Catholics,
| unions) and are alienating more traditional voting blocs
| like African Americans and some Hispanic populations with
| the constant drama over trans issues. Nobody heard about
| anything this election cycle other than abortion and
| transgender issues. It's a big tent party, but when
| progressives steal all the oxygen, the wheels fall off the
| train.
|
| They need to run a tall white dude with good hair who talks
| about economic opportunity, fair play and protecting the
| future.
|
| My parents live in the country. A farmer (whose father was
| the county Democratic Party chair) has a massive sign
| "Trump. I don't like him, but we need him". That's the 2024
| election unfortunately.
| dralley wrote:
| Old people actually leaned bluer this year relative to
| past elections.
| exoverito wrote:
| True, much of that is because old people are the only
| ones still watching legacy media like cable news, which
| have repeatedly torched their credibility. Young people
| tend to get their news from podcasts and social media,
| which tends to not be as blatantly controlled.
| dralley wrote:
| >Young people tend to get their news from podcasts and
| social media, which tends to not be as blatantly
| controlled.
|
| This is a bad joke.
| NekkoDroid wrote:
| > Nobody heard about anything this election cycle other
| than abortion and transgender issues.
|
| The only place I've seen anything about "transgender
| issues" is from the Republicans saying that that is the
| only thing Democrats are running on.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| Ask the swing voters. The republicans seized the
| narrative.
|
| I bet you 100% of democratic voters could accurately
| describe the maga platform. The number who could describe
| the democratic platform would be far less.
| exoverito wrote:
| That's because the Democrats are corrupt and have no
| platform beyond managed decline. We just had sickly king
| Theoden in office with a coven of Grima Wormtongues
| controlling the executive. Kamala Harris is an empty suit
| devoid of original thought, and quite obviously only
| selected for her identity. When asked how she would be
| any different, she said Biden was an old white man and
| she was not. She couldn't speak even in the most
| favorable venues like Oprah, and refused to go on Joe
| Rogan's podcast because she would have obviously imploded
| and humiliated herself.
|
| It's stunning how far the Democrats have fallen. They've
| been completely co-opted by the PMC class and simply use
| identity politics to distract from their utter inability
| to deliver on anything. One need only look at the sad
| state of California, its massively delayed and over-
| budget high speed rail to nowhere, homelessness and
| decay, over-regulation inhibiting everything including
| the beloved green energy projects, etc. Texas literally
| has more green energy and cheaper electricity than
| California because they let people build, which can even
| be seen in their falling rents. Progressives can't allow
| that because it might 'change the character of a
| neighborhood', which is ironically one of the most
| conservative and anti-progress positions you could take.
| tombert wrote:
| Trump has said he might take Greenland "by force". That
| doesn't sound "anti-war" to me.
|
| I think the Ukraine stuff is more complicated than you're
| making it out.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| It's not ironic at all. The MAGA movement is really similar
| to how Mussolini came to power.
|
| The campaign against barbarians (Steve Miller's) crusade,
| Elons "not enough white babies" stuff, sucking up to the
| church (Vatican City is a Mussolini scheme), aspirations for
| conquest of Greenland and Panama, etc are all analogous to
| the maga playbook.
|
| Most people are clueless. There are idiots who think they are
| getting $1 eggs next week. Riling up weirdos like
| libertarians lets the movement punch above their weight.
| popcalc wrote:
| >$1 eggs next week
|
| Should just move to Belarus and you can have that today.
| 2024user wrote:
| Why are libertarians weridos?
| Spooky23 wrote:
| Go talk to one.
| 2024user wrote:
| I don't think I know one or will come across one.
| npteljes wrote:
| >Trump went around to a huge number of niche communities and
| promised to fix their core concerns in exchange for their
| support
|
| Very interesting insight, thank you for sharing it. Do you
| happen to know other examples as well?
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| There were a few articles on this in the media a day or two
| after the election that had lists in them, but I can't find
| them anymore because this new news overwhelmed the search
| terms I remember.
|
| Many of the promises were directly conflicting, and/or
| upsetting to other groups that also had promises made to
| them. One example would be he promised some groups to push
| for the death penalty for anyone involved in selling drugs,
| in conflict with his pardon of Ulbricht here.
| duxup wrote:
| It's a trite thing to say, but when it comes to Trump it fits
| the pattern of inside dealing ... I'm guessing he personally
| will profit from this somehow / someone promised a donation /
| money.
| hilux wrote:
| To the libertarians.
| heavyset_go wrote:
| Wouldn't be surprised if he is sitting on a billion dollars of
| hidden crypto somewhere.
| stevenwoo wrote:
| If you meant Trump, it's not hidden, they released a Trump
| meme coin and the rug pull was after the inauguration timed
| with the release of the Melania meme coin, though entirely
| speculatively makes more sense for the investors to be
| foreign governments buying influence less obviously than the
| last Trump administration like Saudi Arabia hiring his son in
| law.
| beeflet wrote:
| It would have to be bitcoin, which isn't very hidden
| bigiain wrote:
| So "parked" rather than "hidden" then.
|
| I also suspect Ulbricht quite likely has keys for wallets
| the FBI didn't find out about (and it's corrupt agents
| didn't steal).
| TeaBrain wrote:
| Crypto currency proponents benefit from the existence of dark
| net marketplaces because they are some of the main places for
| the non-speculative use of crypto currencies. I think Ross and
| his pardon represent a sort-of metaphor in crypto-currency
| proponents' eyes for the government's toleration of these dark
| net crypto marketplaces.
| yuppiepuppie wrote:
| Wasn't he in jail for hiring a contract killer?
|
| I'm all for the freeing him of his crimes when it comes to his
| crypto anarchic philosophy. But I find it hard to pardon someone
| for contract killing essentially. Also I'm not an apologist for
| the FBIs handling of this case either.
| mannerheim wrote:
| He was in jail for running a darknet drug marketplace. Hiring a
| contract killer was a crime he was neither charged with nor
| convicted of.
| Aloisius wrote:
| Ulbricht was indicted in federal court in Maryland on a
| single murder-for-hire charge.
|
| The case was dropped after NY conviction since he was
| sentencing to life, so there was little point in continuing.
|
| Clearly that was a mistake if a lack of an attempted murder
| conviction helped him get a pardon.
| lupire wrote:
| What would give you a hint that attempted murder conviction
| would prevent his pardon? Trump pardoned over a thousand
| attempted murdered already this week.
| meowface wrote:
| The judge factored it into the sentencing, though. He likely
| did actually try to hire a contract killer - twice. In both
| cases he sincerely believed the murders were successfully
| committed, and he sent a lot of money to the assassins after
| being sent (doctored) "proof" of their killings.
|
| I think it's fair to say judges shouldn't factor non-charged
| allegations into sentencing, but I think he's at least
| morally culpable, here, and should at the very least be
| expected to now show public contrition for repeatedly trying
| to murder people drug kingpin-style.
|
| I doubt he will ever admit it, but now that he's free I still
| would like it. I don't care about people enabling drug sales
| but I do care about people with a God complex who feel
| entitled to end the lives of those they oppose (in one case
| because he thought someone stole from him, and another
| because he thought they would dox him).
| busymom0 wrote:
| A judge and system who would give him 2 life sentences for
| this should not be trusted when he also factored in things
| which he wasn't charged and convicted of.
| bb88 wrote:
| There are only mandatory minimums -- not mandatory
| maximums in sentencing.
|
| I feel like me might disagree on Ulbricht, but overall
| mandatory maximums make a lot of sense.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| It is common that several outcomes are subject - with the
| defendants specific agreement - to be evaluated by a
| court on preponderance, not a jury. This was not judicial
| malpractice.
| busymom0 wrote:
| I am sorry but there's no way giving him more than 2 life
| sentences has any justification whatsoever. Even the
| people who actually sold drugs on his site got out in 2
| years. And the person who hired someone for hitman also
| only got 6 years. This is exactly the type of case where
| pardon makes 100% sense.
|
| Ps. El Chapo got shorter sentence than Ross.
| ac29 wrote:
| > Ps. El Chapo got shorter sentence than Ross.
|
| They both had greater-than-life sentences, which in
| practice is the same thing.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| > Even the people who actually sold drugs on his site got
| out in 2 years.
|
| And Ross made _millions_ from those people selling drugs
| on his site. Quite possibly more than any person selling
| drugs on his site.
|
| And attempted to hire hitmen to prevent anyone stopping
| it. Not even as a potential "crime of passion", but
| solely to protect his money train.
|
| And there's this whole false narrative of "youthful
| indiscretions". He didn't _start_ building the site til
| he was 28 and was mostly running it in his early 30s.
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| I haven't reviewed the info for a while but it was pretty
| clearly entrapment as I recall.
| macinjosh wrote:
| Yes the FBI had root or admin access to the Silk Road system
| and could have very easily changed or otherwise affected
| logs/record IDs that the technical case rested on. Two of the
| FBI agents on the case were later punished for corruption on
| the case.
| mmooss wrote:
| Didn't Ulbricht actually run the Silk Road? Did someone from
| the FBI persuade Ulbricht to do it?
| jxi wrote:
| I think they're talking about just the murder-for-hire. It
| may have just been undercover agents the whole time and no
| murders actually occurred.
| verteu wrote:
| Attempting to hire a hitman who turns out to be an FBI
| agent is still a crime, and likely not entrapment in the
| legal sense.
| px43 wrote:
| It was entrapment because federal agents posing as crime
| bosses were threatening Ross that if he didn't hire the
| hitman there would be serious consequences. He was
| manipulated and forced into the position he was in.
| ttyprintk wrote:
| What you see as manipulation, someone else might see as a
| user of the DPR account revealing his true nature
|
| > "I need his real-world identity, so I can threaten him
| with violence," DPR told RealLucyDrop.
|
| > "I don't know how I feel about that solution," said
| RealLucyDrop
| verteu wrote:
| What about when his (non-FBI, now-convicted) right-hand-
| man Roger Thomas Clark convinced him to hire someone for
| murder?
|
| Surely that can't be entrapment.
|
| "Clark didn't comment on that murder-for-hire
| conversation--which he at one point claimed had been
| fabricated by Ulbricht but later conceded was real"
|
| https://www.wired.com/story/silk-road-variety-jones-
| sentenci...
| cratermoon wrote:
| By accepting the pardon the accused concedes to guilt in the
| crime.
| ImJamal wrote:
| This is not necessarily true. In Burdick v. United States
| it does say "an imputation of guilt and acceptance of a
| confession of it" but there is debate about whether it is
| binding of not.
|
| Apparently, there is something in Lorance v. Commandant,
| U.S. Disciplinary Barracks that indicates that accepting a
| pardon does not imply guilt, but I am not very knowledge on
| that.
| cbg0 wrote:
| It was not entrapment. There is mention of undercover
| purchases and a controlled delivery by law enforcement, but
| these are not entrapment. Most of the evidence came from his
| own laptop.
| hypeatei wrote:
| No, that charge was dropped. IIRC, it was on shaky ground and
| they were just trying to throw the book at him.
| tzs wrote:
| The charge was dropped, but the court did hold a hearing on
| it when deciding on sentencing. They heard the evidence for
| and against and ruled by a preponderance of the evidence that
| he did in fact do it.
| UncleOxidant wrote:
| Then why would they drop the charge if they thought the
| evidence pointed to the fact he did it.
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| 'preponderance' is the clue, criminal is 'beyond all
| reasonable doubt', civil is preponderance. Ross was being
| charged under criminal law.
| qingcharles wrote:
| This. Evidence that isn't strong enough to criminally
| convict can be used for other purposes (e.g. sentencing,
| knowledge/intent, civil forfeiture, civil damages etc).
|
| (see OJ Simpson paying money damages for a crime he was
| acquitted of)
| rsanek wrote:
| this would be a criminal charge preponderance of the
| evidence wouldn't be enough to convict
| selimthegrim wrote:
| Sentencing phase
| tzs wrote:
| Separate courts. He was indicted and tried for all the
| non-murder stuff in a New York federal court. He was
| indicted separately in a Maryland federal court on a
| murder-for-hire charge.
|
| The New York court convicted him, and then considered the
| murder-for-hire allegations when determining his
| sentence. They found them true by a preponderance of the
| evidence and and that was a factor in his sentence to
| life without parole. He appealed, and the Second Circuit
| upheld the sentence.
|
| The prosecutors in Maryland then dropped the murder-for-
| hire charge because there was no point. They said this
| would allow them to direct their resources to other other
| cases where justice had not yet been served.
| shadowgovt wrote:
| Fascinating. It is news to me that a federal court can
| consider the evidence for crimes not proven beyond a
| reasonable doubt in a criminal sentencing. Learn
| something new every day.
|
| Since he was sentenced federally, he'd be under the
| federal sentencing guidelines, but I imagine those are
| pretty harsh around the money laundering and drug
| trafficking (since they're tuned to provide a hammer to
| wield against mostly narco-enterprises). I suppose the
| additional preponderance of evidence gave the judge
| justification to push the sentence to the maximum allowed
| in the category?
| FireBeyond wrote:
| It's extremely common in for example diversion cases and
| others, where the defendant has to stipulate that they
| are agreeable to things being presented as in charging
| documents and evaluated based on preponderance by a
| court, not by a jury and not subject to principles of
| reasonable doubt.
| DannyBee wrote:
| Ironically, he was only pardoned for drug related crimes,
| so he could still be charged with murder related ones if
| they were not dropped with prejudice (i didn't look)
|
| This is all AFAIK, they haven't released the text broadly
| yet, but his lawyers/etc say he was pardoned for crimes
| related to drugs.
|
| Even what people call a 'full and unconditional' pardon
| is usually targeted at something specific, not like "a
| pardon for anything you may have ever done, anywhere,
| anytime' which people seem to think it means sometimes.
|
| It's more of a legal term of art to describe pardons that
| erase convictions, restore rights, etc.
|
| Rather than clemency which, say, commutes your sentence
| but leaves your conviction intact.
| ty6853 wrote:
| The judge wrote at sentencing the murder for hire
| 'counted' as an element of the criminal enterprise. So if
| he was pardoned for his crimes that includes the murder
| for hire per the judgement of his case.
| DannyBee wrote:
| Even if correct, he would still be chargeable at the
| state level in any related state.
|
| The only thing it would protect him against would be the
| federal murder for hire statute (18 USC 1958).
|
| I doubt the pardon will be considered to cover that, but
| we'll have to wait to see the text.
| DannyBee wrote:
| The text is now up -
| https://www.justice.gov/pardon/media/1386096/dl
|
| There is nothing here that would prevent him from being
| charged with murder for hire, or even other drug crimes.
|
| He was only pardoned as to his existing convictions.
| mmooss wrote:
| Murder is usually state-level jurisdiction, and the
| President can only pardon federal jurisdiction.
| DannyBee wrote:
| Yes, i'm aware - there are federal murder statutes, but
| they are mostly about murder of federal police officers,
| hate crime murders, etc.
|
| However, murder for hire is also federal crime - see 18
| USC 1958 and the DOJ CRM on this:
| https://www.justice.gov/archives/jm/criminal-resource-
| manual...
|
| So depending on the pardon text and interpretation, he
| may or may not be chargeable with this statute still
| federally.
|
| I agree this has zero effect on charging him at the state
| level, and most states do not have statute of limitations
| on these types of crimes (or they are very long)
| mannerheim wrote:
| One issue with any potential trial for murder-for-hire is
| that the allegation as presented in the Maryland
| indictment has two problematic witnesses: DEA agent Carl
| Force who acted as the hitman, now in prison for
| embezzling cryptocurrency from the Silk Road case, and
| Curtis Green, the would-be victim in this case, who has
| previously insisted that Ulbricht was innocent of
| plotting his murder (and was also recently imprisoned for
| cocaine distribution last year, although I don't think
| that would be too relevant). Maybe the other allegations
| might have more meat on the bone, but they didn't make it
| on to any indictment.
| comex wrote:
| Just to nitpick...
|
| Most recent pardons have been announced in documents
| labeled "Executive Grant of Clemency", so I don't think
| "clemency" and "pardons" are as distinct as you're
| saying.
|
| And while I know you said "usually", I can't help but
| note that Hunter Biden was pardoned for any federal thing
| he may have done, anywhere, anytime in the last 10 years.
| Some of the last-minute pardons were pretty broad as
| well.
| DannyBee wrote:
| Why nitpick? Do you think you've added something to the
| discussion here?
| DannyBee wrote:
| and now that the text is there-
| https://www.justice.gov/pardon/media/1386096/dl
|
| You can see, this was simply a pardon for his existing
| convictions, no uncharged crimes, not even things related
| to these crimes.
|
| As a result, he could still be charged with anything they
| chose not to charge.
|
| As such, your nitpicking was pointless.
| busymom0 wrote:
| > so he could still be charged with murder related ones
| if they were not dropped with prejudice
|
| They were dismissed with prejudice.
|
| > "We are pleased that the prosecutors in the District of
| Maryland, after almost five years, have dismissed their
| indictment against Ross. Holding this over Ross' head,
| without taking it to trial where he could defend himself,
| has been very damaging to Ross and his case, especially
| because it contained the only charge of murder-for-hire.
| Of course, this charge was never proven or convicted, but
| was very effective in smearing Ross's reputation and
| hurting him in the legal process".
|
| > She said, "We had some good news recently. The
| indictment and superseding indictment against Ross in the
| District of Maryland were dismissed 'with prejudice,'
| meaning they can never be re-filed. This is especially
| good because those indictments contained the only charge
| ever made that Ross engaged in murder-for-hire. This was
| a serious allegation that Ross denies. It was never
| prosecuted or ruled on by a jury but was trumpeted by the
| government and the media as if it were proven fact".
|
| https://perspectivesmatter.com/2018/08/silk-road-drugs-
| the-i...
|
| https://www.humanrightsdefensecenter.org/action/news/2020
| /dy...
|
| > Following his arrest in 2013, prosecutors also alleged
| that he planned murder-for-hire although, curiously, he
| was never charged or prosecuted for it at trial (and the
| allegations were dismissed with prejudice by a U.S.
| District Judge in 2018).
|
| > The allegations were never charged at trial, never
| proven, never submitted to, or ruled on by, a jury, and
| eventually dismissed with prejudice. Ross consistently
| denied the allegations (which relied on anonymous online
| chats never proven to have been authored by him) and
| those who know him never believed them. The only alleged
| victim ever identified, Curtis Green, is a fervent
| supporter of Ross's clemency.
|
| https://freeross.org
| DannyBee wrote:
| "They were dismissed with prejudice."
|
| Lucky him, as his pardon doesn't cover them. But he could
| still be charged at the state level, and at the federal
| level with any other crime.
| busymom0 wrote:
| Wouldn't statutes of limitation have run out by now? Plus
| what crime would even be state level?
| busymom0 wrote:
| > The New York court convicted him, and then considered
| the murder-for-hire allegations when determining his
| sentence. They found them true by a preponderance of the
| evidence and and that was a factor in his sentence to
| life without parole.
|
| How is that not a massive violation of due process?
| Imagine you are at trial for something and get convicted.
| Then during the sentencing, some other unrelated case's
| evidence gets used by the Judge which was never
| introduced during trial and defendant never had any
| opportunity to defend or cross-examine. Judge uses that
| to sentence you to 2+ life sentences. After that, the
| other unrelated case gets dismissed WITH prejudice.
| Huh??? So the evidence which got used to sentence you was
| never ever cross-examined or tested in court.
| "preponderance of the evidence" is not what's used in
| criminal trials but just because it was introduced in
| sentencing, it's somehow okay?
| mmooss wrote:
| Possibly because he was already facing a long sentence
| and it wasn't worth pursuing that charge.
| beezle wrote:
| Wonder if he can be charged with that now? Was there
| anything in the pardon related to this? AFAIK there is no
| time limit on bringing charges related to murder?
| cbsmith wrote:
| It had a lot to do with the fact that they already had him
| for more than long enough on other charges, such that it
| would have been a waste of time.
| UberFly wrote:
| Some info from a previous thread:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33045520
| adrianmonk wrote:
| According to Wikipedia[1], he was convicted of charges related
| to hacking, narcotics, money laundering, and more.
|
| But during the trial, evidence was presented that he made
| murder-for-hire payments, the court found that he did by a
| preponderance of evidence, and the court took this into account
| when sentencing him.
|
| So, he wasn't convicted of it, but it is part of the reason he
| was sent to jail for a very long time.
|
| ---
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Ulbricht
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| Absolute no brainer, he should be celebrated. Countless lives
| were saved via the harm reduction effect of a peer reviewed,
| reputation based platform. Of course if we had less draconian
| drug policy, it wouldn't be necessary but here we are.
| maplant wrote:
| There is absolutely no way harm reduction was the reason Trump
| pardoned him.
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| It's absolutely one of the reasons why it was politically
| beneficial for him to enact the pardon.
| Devasta wrote:
| He tried to hire multiple hitmen.
| bdndndndbve wrote:
| Does trump also support needle exchanges and safe consumption
| sites?
| vkou wrote:
| As well as online drug marketplaces? Or would running one
| without legal trouble require a campaign-contribution booster
| pack?
|
| What a beautiful political anschluss between people who just
| want to ban contraceptives and abortifacients, and people who
| just want to shoot up heroin. Not sure how you square that
| circle[1], but it's 2025, and here we are.
|
| It's very telling about libertarian priorities when a
| cryptobro running an online drug marketplace who tried to
| hire a hitman gets amnesty, while hundreds of thousands of
| people who have been convicted of drug possession[1] do not.
| Likewise, somehow reproductive rights are just not a
| libertarian issue, either. It's not a party of freedom, it's
| a party of freedom for wealthy men.
|
| [1] Biden gave a blanket pardon for people convicted of
| marijuana posession, but that's _far_ less important for
| libertarians than Ulbricht.
| hellojesus wrote:
| I think most libertarians are against the war on drugs and
| would happily pardon or commute the sentences of non
| violent drug offenders, but the DPR probably takes priority
| for them because of the free trade issue compounded with
| the popularization of a non state-backed currency.
|
| He has both drugs + crypto vs just drugs. *Ignoring the
| accusations of hit ordering, which I would imagine all
| librarians cannot excuse.
| vkou wrote:
| If they are actually trying to maximize any kind of
| public welfare utility function, surely commutations and
| pardons and decriminalization and harm reduction for
| hundreds of thousands and millions of people, and body
| autonomy for hundreds of millions more should mean a wee
| bit more than this entirely transactional act.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| > a cryptobro running an online drug marketplace who tried
| to hire a hitman gets amnesty
|
| Would you call this amnesty? He was already in jail for a
| decade, I thought.
| vkou wrote:
| I misspoke. The correct term is clemency.
| woodruffw wrote:
| > Countless lives were saved via the harm reduction effect of a
| peer reviewed, reputation based platform.
|
| The basic immorality/pointlessness of the war on drugs aside, I
| don't know how you can assert this: it's not like there's a
| chain of provenance, and there's no particular guarantee that
| whatever grade of pure drugs was sold on Silk Road is the same
| purity that ended up in peoples' bodies.
|
| My understanding of the Silk Road case is that, at its peak, it
| was servicing a significant portion of the international drug
| market. The dimensions of that market include adulteration;
| Silk Road almost certainly didn't change that.
| Devasta wrote:
| No no no, he is right. Its safe because if you receive a bad
| batch of drugs you can leave a negative review on the page of
| the drug cartel that has your name and address, no chance of
| that having any repercussions for you at all.
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| I haven't seen anything to suggest that anyone was harmed
| for leaving a bad review.
| Devasta wrote:
| Do you know many people who'd be willing to risk their
| life to give the Sinaloa cartel a bad yelp review?
| tayo42 wrote:
| Sinaola cartel sells lsd, dmt and mushrooms in personal
| quantities?
| ziddoap wrote:
| As far as I remember, those weren't the only drugs sold
| there, nor was there any rule enforced regarding
| "personal quantities".
|
| Not that it matters, as it was an illustrative example.
| tayo42 wrote:
| even if its not perfect for every situation it was a lot
| better then what existed.
|
| negative reviews aren't the only review, absence of
| positive reviews is a signal, along with a lot of other
| positive reviews. later markets at least had reviews
| outside the markets too
|
| if you are in the bulk and resale drug market you
| probably aren't getting package with your name on it to
| your home.
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| The overwhelming majority of listings on the site were for
| personal use quantities.
| woodruffw wrote:
| The overwhelming majority of drug sales are for personal
| use. That doesn't mean that large sales weren't made, or
| that those weren't in fact a significant portion of the
| site's revenue.
| l0ng1nu5 wrote:
| >it's not like there's a chain of provenance, and there's
| no particular guarantee that whatever grade of pure drugs
| was sold on Silk Road is the same purity that ended up in
| peoples' bodies.
|
| The fact that the majority of listings on the site were
| for personal use quantities suggests that the majority of
| sales were to end users rather than traffickers.
|
| It's hard to dispute that this saved lives and I would
| speculate that it saved many lives.
|
| >That doesn't mean that large sales weren't made, or that
| those weren't in fact a significant portion of the site's
| revenue.
|
| Nobody made any claim that large sales weren't made, of
| course they were.
| woodruffw wrote:
| > It's hard to dispute that this saved lives and I would
| speculate that it saved many lives.
|
| See below; the observation is that the people who were
| buying individual quantities of drugs from SR were not at
| serious risk of harm in the first place, relative to
| typical at-risk populations. Anecdotally, the people I
| know who bought drugs from SR during its heydey were very
| much test-everything-twice types.
|
| By contrast, the _large_ sales that SR facilitated almost
| certainly ended up in street drug markets, where harm
| reduction _would_ have made a difference. But those
| people didn 't benefit from SR's community standards,
| insofar as they existed: they got whatever adulterated
| product made it to them.
|
| This is the basic error in saying "most sales were
| small": the big sales are what matter, socially speaking.
| shadowgovt wrote:
| Anecdotally, Planet Money looked into this years ago and
| their reporting was that as far as they could tell, drugs on
| Silk Road weren't less safe than street drugs. Most of them
| were likely "fell off the truck" samples from the original
| manufacturers being sold by people with an in on the supply,
| but no otherwise-easy access to an out on the demand.
|
| Their observation was that reputation mattered on SR _a lot_
| and a well-kept reputation was valuable at scale in a way
| that it isn 't for being a street-corner pusher looking to
| stretch your buck by cutting your supply with adulterants.
| The smart play was to provide a high-quality product at a
| reasonable price (the latter being the easiest part since
| they were bypassing the obscene markup of official channels).
| woodruffw wrote:
| > Anecdotally, Planet Money looked into this years ago and
| their reporting was that as far as they could tell, drugs
| on Silk Road weren't less safe than street drugs.
|
| Yeah, I'm not saying they're less safe. In fact, on
| average, I'm willing to bet that the drugs _sold_ on Silk
| Road were much safer than their street equivalents.
|
| My point was about large sales: Silk Road moved not just
| personal drug sales, but also industrial quantities of
| drugs that were almost certainly re-sold. Those latter
| sales are impossible to track and (by volume) almost
| certainly represent the majority of "doses" sold through
| SR. Given that, I doubt the OP's assertion that SR _itself_
| represents a particularly effective form of harm reduction.
|
| Or as another framing: SR gave tech dorks a way to buy
| cheap, clean drugs. But those aren't the people who really
| need harm reduction techniques; the ones who do are still
| buying adulterated drugs, which are derived _from_ the
| cheap, clean drugs on SR.
| timewizard wrote:
| You shouldn't assume that all "street transfers" of drugs
| are peaceful or have a positive outcome for those
| involved. Harm reduction comes in many forms.
| woodruffw wrote:
| I'm pretty sure my comment says the exact opposite. I'm
| saying that SR was a massive operation that fueled street
| traffic, which in turn lacked any of the harm reduction
| virtues that SR is being assigned.
| timewizard wrote:
| I'm pointing to the transaction layer. When you get
| thousands of dollars and product in a room with people
| you don't know things can get extremely unprofessional
| very quickly. It's really fun when you discover that most
| of the currency is counterfeit which happens more than
| you think.
|
| What you say is also true. So there is a trade here. I'm
| not claiming it's "worth it," but the alternative without
| SR at all does seem to be more negative.
| potato3732842 wrote:
| Yup. Drugs and the accompanying business disputes (there's a
| reason street dealers are armed or have armed people around)
| that would be normal in any other industry are sooo many
| people's (who would other wise not be violent criminals) entry
| point to violence. Letting parties remain at arms length yet
| transact successfully is such a huge step forward compared the
| prior status quo. Anything that gets buyers and sellers (either
| at the retail or distribution level) in illegal industries
| farther from each other is a win as far as I care.
| s1mon wrote:
| I really wonder who benefits from this. Trump only does things
| that are good for him, or those close to him. I realize he's been
| making connections to the crypto world, and has his own meme
| coins. Does pardoning Ross somehow make crypto more valuable?
| tonymet wrote:
| Trump made the deal at the Libertarian National Convention to
| garner their support.
| SV_BubbleTime wrote:
| It's almost a scandal that politician followed through on a
| campaign promise.
| mannerheim wrote:
| A video from Reason magazine a few days ago[0] mentioned a deal
| between the Libertarian Party leadership and Trump in which
| they selectively didn't run their candidate in several states
| in order to help Trump. If this is true, Trump could have
| reneged, but evidently decided whatever political blowback for
| pardoning Ulbricht (which is probably small potatoes at this
| rate) wasn't worth the credibility cost.
|
| [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhDKYYdD2vY
| orionsbelt wrote:
| It's also just good politics. There are a vocal group of voters
| that are in favor of this, so it gets those people on his side.
| And no reason not to (politically), as most people just don't
| care about this topic, or if they do and disagree with the
| decision, this isn't going to be the action that moves the
| needle for them on how they feel about Trump or the Republican
| Party.
| drak0n1c wrote:
| Partisan caricature is not a reliable starting point for
| logical inference or deduction. To answer your question - on
| the campaign trail he attended a convention of libertarian
| organizers and promised them that if he won he would free Ross,
| and has followed through on that promise today.
| qdhazEWT wrote:
| Trump refused to pardon Assange and Snowden. I suppose he has
| priorities.
|
| In 2021, presumably during SBF's (big Democrat donor) FTX scam,
| Trump thought that Bitcoin was a scam:
|
| https://www.bbc.com/news/business-57392734
|
| Now he is best friends with the "crypto", AI, and H1B bros.
| llamaimperative wrote:
| > "All my Republican donations were dark," [SBF] said,
| referring to political donations that are not publicly
| disclosed in FEC filings. "The reason was not for regulatory
| reasons, it's because reporters freak the f--k out if you
| donate to Republicans. They're all super liberal, and I didn't
| want to have that fight."
|
| > Given that he donated nearly $40 million to Democrats in the
| 2022 election cycle--and he admitted to giving an equal amount
| to Republicans--his total political contributions may have
| actually been around $80 million.
|
| https://time.com/6241262/sam-bankman-fried-political-donatio...
| sidibe wrote:
| Among other things this guy was trying to have people murdered.
| UncleOxidant wrote:
| I guess this is why he was upset about Mexico sending drug
| dealers and murderers - he didn't want competition for our
| homegrown drug dealers and murderers.
| johnneville wrote:
| I would find this easier to celebrate if it was a commutation and
| not a pardon, or if it was a pardon that went hand in hand with a
| change in the laws he broke.
| ktallett wrote:
| Because their isn't a change in law doesn't mean the
| convictions were secure and bound by law before.
| umanwizard wrote:
| > a pardon that went hand in hand with a change in the laws he
| broke
|
| Trump doesn't have the power to unilaterally change laws
| (fortunately!)
| hypeatei wrote:
| This is a rare Trump win. There are many things to criticize him
| for, but this pardon isn't one of them. I don't think anyone,
| after researching this case, would be okay with the life sentence
| handed down to Ross.
| wkat4242 wrote:
| Life no but probably more than he did in the end. He was really
| turning into a syndicate boss. The deep ars technica article
| was pretty depressing.
| latentcall wrote:
| Most people in real life don't even know who this guy is. This
| is a guy that online people know. I will agree it's a win, he
| was unfairly sentenced. I just wish I would have been able to
| buy from SR. I did get to browse it before it was seized.
| kevinsync wrote:
| I have nothing in particular to say about the dead comments in
| this very young thread, but they're sort-of-interesting comments
| to have been killed so quickly!
|
| Is it due to HN policy? I guess they're subjective and
| ideological, and prone to starting arguments rather than debates.
|
| Maybe "Please don't use Hacker News for political or ideological
| battle. That tramples curiosity." or "Please don't pick the most
| provocative thing in an article or post to complain about in the
| thread. Find something interesting to respond to instead."?
|
| I'm honestly just curious as a conscientious internet citizen lol
| Jtsummers wrote:
| > I have nothing in particular to say about the dead comments
| in this very young thread, but they're sort-of-interesting
| comments to have been killed so quickly!
|
| [dead] is different than [flagged][dead]. [dead]-only (no
| [flagged]) means they're auto-dead, they aren't killed by
| someone reviewing the comments (moderator or users flagging).
| One of the two commenters was shadow banned years ago but still
| gets vouched for occasionally (including by me at times). The
| other one was shadow banned (looked through their history) 11
| days ago, with a comment from dang at the time stating as much.
| They also get vouched for on occasion, based on their comment
| history.
|
| > Maybe "Please don't use Hacker News for political or
| ideological battle. That tramples curiosity." or "Please don't
| pick the most provocative thing in an article or post to
| complain about in the thread. Find something interesting to
| respond to instead."?
|
| dang does usually respond to people with something like that
| first, then for people who get repeatedly flagged or repeatedly
| engage in certain kinds of behavior, he bans them.
| qqqult wrote:
| Nothing wrong with HN in particular. Every polarising
| discussion on a platform with moderation or up/down voting
| system ends up this way. This structure is fantastic for
| technical discussions just not amazing for politics
|
| Removing moderation or voting systems (simple chronological
| comment sorting) creates another set of issues so this problem
| can't be solved without entirely changing discussion formats
| potato3732842 wrote:
| > This structure is fantastic for technical discussions just
| not amazing for politics
|
| No, it's not. Because the same magnification effect causes
| the causal, simple and correct sounding to float to the top
| and the nuanced "<signs deeply> so I dealt with this for 20yr
| and here's the deal" takes that nobody wants to hear because
| they're not simple and easy wind up at the bottom but above
| the flagrantly wrong crap and the trolls.
|
| There's a reason that nothing with real stakes adopts this
| format and technical discussions that matter still mostly
| happen in some sort of threaded format that doesn't allow
| voting or any sort of drive-by low effort interaction to
| effect much.
|
| Format like this is good for driving interaction, which is
| why public facing websites use it for their comment sections.
| bbor wrote:
| Interesting -- what other system could you possibly have,
| other than votes...? I'm not sure I understand what you're
| suggesting. I guess traditional forum threads (sometimes
| with votes, a-la GitHub) are nice, but ultimately that's
| just trading "correct sounding" for "early commenter".
|
| Otherwise, the only thing that comes to mind is
| StackOverflow functionality where OP can mark a single
| answer as "accepted" and push it to the top instantly
| (which obv. wouldn't translate well to general
| discussions).
| fragmede wrote:
| A more complicated system is too complicated, but if you
| could emoji react to a comment (from a very limited set
| of emoji), and then allow people to assign weights to
| each emoji, so someone who likes jokes could say
| :laughing-face: comments rank high up in the list but
| someone who was more dour could set their default view to
| be negative for them, then you'd have something a bit
| better than merely up or down. you could then set the
| default view to be heavily in favor of what you want the
| site's culture to be.
|
| the four disagreements apply to a comment section as
| well: the comment is factually wrong, the comment lacks
| information, the comment. draws a different conclusion
| from the same set of information, or the comment is
| philosophically opposed to my viewpoint. For an online
| comment system, spam is another category.
| bbor wrote:
| Wow, that's a really solid idea. I promise I'll credit
| you in the footer of my Reddit clone someday ;)
| dang wrote:
| Jtsummers is correct.
|
| Just to add one point, flagged comments are mostly flagged by
| users (as opposed to mods). We can only guess why users flag
| things, but from looking at a sample in the current thread it's
| probably because they're mostly flamewar-style comments and/or
| political-battle style comments (or both). Those aren't good
| for HN because what we want here is curious, thoughtful
| conversation.
| steve_avery wrote:
| Well, I think that justice has been served. The feds' prosecution
| of Ulbricht was the epitome of throwing the book at someone to
| make an example, when the government's case was pretty flawed, in
| my opinion. 10 years is enough time to pay the debt of running
| the silk road.
|
| I am glad that Ulbricht has been pardoned and I feel like a small
| iota of justice has been returned to the world with this action.
| fsckboy wrote:
| wasn't there evidence of hiring a hitman to commit a murder in
| furtherance of the Silk Road? that's not part of "the debt of
| running the silk road"
| alt187 wrote:
| The hitman was a conman for a murder on a fictitious person.
| While he fully believed he was committing a real
| assassination, you can't convict people for killing imaginary
| people.
| croes wrote:
| This doesn't sound like an imaginary person
|
| https://www.vice.com/en/article/murdered-silk-road-
| employee-...
| px43 wrote:
| I'm not convinced that you looked at the article you
| linked.
|
| > That's because he was the Silk Road employee implicated
| in an elaborate, and fake, murder-for-hire scheme,
| created in part by a corrupt Drug Enforcement
| Administration (DEA) agent.
| croes wrote:
| The murder was fake not the murder order.
|
| >DPR contacted one of his trusted drug dealer contacts,
| Nob, and asked him to kill Green for $40,000. Shortly
| after, Nob sent DPR photos of Green covered in Campbell's
| Chicken & Stars soup and victim of an apparent
| asphyxiation, to prove the murder had been carried out.
|
| > Unbeknown to DPR, Nob was no drug dealer. In fact, Nob
| was Carl Mark Force IV, the very same DEA agent who had
| arrested Green.
| alt187 wrote:
| There weee two murder for hire. Look up the story wirh
| FriendlyChemist.
| croes wrote:
| But does it matter if he ordered a real murder?
|
| The trial for the real one was scrapped because of his
| other convictions.
| alt187 wrote:
| Both were fake. One was a con by the DEA and the other
| one a con by a single guy posing as executioner, victim
| and a slew of other colorful characters.
| croes wrote:
| The DEA murder was fake but not his order of the murder.
|
| The man just didn't die because the killer was a DEA
| agent in reality.
|
| That's still a felony.
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| You can convict for murder for hire in that circumstance.
| lionkor wrote:
| Yes but he did get scammed as that wasn't a real hitman
| philomath_mn wrote:
| Intent matters!! For all he knew, Ulbricht had killed those
| guys and he was fine with that
| butlike wrote:
| If intent matters, why can't people be tried for crimes
| before they commit them?
| zik wrote:
| There wasn't any evidence that actually happened. It appears
| that it may have been fabricated by the same investigators
| that later robbed him of some millions of dollars worth of
| bitcoin. Then when it went to trial the murder-for-hire
| charges were completely dropped due to lack of evidence.
|
| He was convicted of: 1. Conspiracy to traffic
| narcotics 2. Continuing Criminal Enterprise (CCE)
| (sometimes referred to as the "kingpin" charge) 3.
| Computer Hacking Conspiracy 4. Conspiracy to Traffic in
| Fraudulent Identity Documents 5. Money Laundering
| Conspiracy
| sebzim4500 wrote:
| Wasn't that charge dropped though?
| zanek wrote:
| I feel like I'm taking crazy pills reading the comments on this
| thread. Multiple teenagers (one in Australia) died from the
| drugs distributed on Silk Road. Ross was ok with selling
| grenades, body parts, etc on there. But everyone is saying he
| served his time ???
| buckle8017 wrote:
| Body parts? huh
| golly_ned wrote:
| He wasn't dealing them. He's not exactly culpable for the
| effects of his platform any more than Zuckerberg is
| responsible for mass hate speech coordinated by third-world
| dictators or Evan Spiegel for facilitating millions of nude
| images of children and teenagers.
| dbspin wrote:
| Hard disagree - Zuckerberg absolutely is responsible for
| inadequately policing calls for genocide on his platform.
| Just as every social network is responsible for policing
| child abuse materials. Should they be punished for such
| content being uploaded? Of course not. They should face
| punishment where their wilful failure to police such
| content results in active harm. Facebook's utterly
| irresponsible behaviour in Myanmar is a great example -
| https://systemicjustice.org/article/facebook-and-genocide-
| ho...
|
| In the case of the Silk Road of course, it's much worse,
| since the platform specifically existed to facilitate
| illegal behaviour. I couldn't care less about the drug
| dealing aspect per say, but absolutely facilitating sale in
| these quantities with no protection from outright poisoning
| from contaminants is immoral. But he also sold weapons via
| 'the armory' https://bitcoinmagazine.com/culture/not-ready-
| silk-roads-the...
|
| He also directly attempted to have someone murdered, which
| is a very serious crime in any country. The guy is not a
| hero. - https://www.wired.com/2015/02/read-transcript-silk-
| roads-bos...
| cortesoft wrote:
| People have died from things bought on Amazon, too
|
| Also, Ross wasn't selling those things. He was just operating
| a market where other people sold things.
| loeg wrote:
| People regularly die from drinking alcohol. Should liquor
| store owners be doing life in prison? (And why are
| Australians special?)
| mrcwinn wrote:
| The law recognizes that a bottle of beer generally cannot
| be used to murder someone else.
| rpmisms wrote:
| But it easily can. Break the end off and poke.
| karles wrote:
| No more shoelaces - they are weapons.
|
| Next up - THOUGHTPOLICING!
| rpmisms wrote:
| You joke, but the ATF museum has within it a shoelace
| that is registered as a machine gun.
| beowulfey wrote:
| and if a store was selling broken bottles as weapons that
| would probably face some legal action
| rpmisms wrote:
| Maybe. That would probably legally qualify as a knife.
| echoangle wrote:
| And stores are not allowed to sell knifes due to the
| danger to others?
| rpmisms wrote:
| Not in the US.
| cooper_ganglia wrote:
| What store isn't allowed to sell knives??
| echoangle wrote:
| It was a rhetorical question, that was the point.
| realce wrote:
| The comment you replied to referenced "multiple teenagers"
| - the very people that liquor stores cannot sell alcohol to
| since they're not recognized as mature enough to be freely
| allowed to drink.
|
| SR allowed children to buy addictive poison without any
| regulation whatsoever, and Ross profited off of those
| transactions.
|
| These are not comparable institutions.
| loeg wrote:
| Teenagers routinely drink alcohol and sometimes die.
| xmprt wrote:
| And businesses that knowingly sell alcohol to minors are
| charged with a crime.
| echoangle wrote:
| Sure, but the crime isn't murder. And they aren't getting
| life for it.
| Pesthuf wrote:
| If their business sold alcohol to as many teenagers as
| the Silk Road has sold drugs, then yes, they would get
| life.
| butlike wrote:
| Then why isn't the CEO of anheiser-busch given two
| consecutive life sentences plus 40 years?
| krispyfi wrote:
| You're right. Ross should have been granted a drug
| selling license, analogous to a liquor license, and it
| should have been revoked if he failed to check ID before
| allowing people to make purchases on his marketplace.
| Whatarethese wrote:
| Charles Manson never murdered anyone. Should his sentence
| been commuted?
| kybernetyk wrote:
| Obama ordered a drone strike on a wedding killing 500
| people - yet he's walking free.
|
| It's almost as if the state was a highly immoral
| construct.
|
| Read Hoppe.
| the-dude wrote:
| I am trying to find the incident you are referring to. Do
| you have any links/sources?
| gizmo wrote:
| Very off-topic but it's this:
| https://www.hrw.org/report/2014/02/19/wedding-became-
| funeral...
|
| GP misremembered what the 500 casualties number refers to
| (see article).
| mihaaly wrote:
| Why not incarcerate all car makers and doctors then too?
|
| You are hopelessly lost my friend, unable to comprehend the
| concept of illegal activity.
| BriggyDwiggs42 wrote:
| You look lost to me because you equate law and morality
| at a deep level.
| mihaaly wrote:
| Selling drugs vs. selling alcohol, this is beyond
| morality matter but a matter regulated by law, sorry.
|
| There was no equation there actually. Let me unwrap it
| for you, probably this way it will be clear: first line
| was a satire of the parent comment along the line of
| depicting deadly but permitted matters; second line was
| the unpacking the satire higlighting that the fella
| hopelessly confused (now, this was more like the equation
| you sought) a socially permitted activity with an illegal
| one.
| BriggyDwiggs42 wrote:
| Look maybe I'm just stupid, but I still can't tell what
| you're trying to say. If you're not saying what I think
| you're saying, I apologize.
| butlike wrote:
| Nobody cares.
|
| Also alcohol = drug = substance = molecule. IT all
| depends on how you morally frame it.
| aleign wrote:
| Law is based on a common consensus of morality (at least
| in theory) so they are, in fact deeply intertwined.
| fsflover wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42790443
| BriggyDwiggs42 wrote:
| I don't think that's true. Maybe in its infancy law
| really looks like that, but as societies grow their law
| books get more complex and can very easily become
| separated from majority perception of morality. Does
| morality explain zoning laws, or is it more about the
| equilibrium point of a pluralist conflict, everyone
| looking out for their interests, etc.
| loeg wrote:
| Yeah, that also seems plausibly consistent with zanek's
| simplistic argument.
| TrackerFF wrote:
| If the liquor store owner knows that some of those bottles
| might contain pure methanol, and people end up dying from
| drinking said methanol...then, yes, I do think the store
| owner should do some serious jailtime.
|
| Which is what this boils down to. Ross didn't know what
| people were selling. Could be pure high-quality stuff,
| could be contaminated stuff, could be stuff that was cut up
| with fent. He made money either way.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| Ironically silk road had much safer drugs than whatever
| pills you would get on the corner.
| bogota wrote:
| Maybe spend a little less time reading propaganda.
| butterlesstoast wrote:
| Wait... you've clearly never used The Silk Road, have you?
| theodric wrote:
| You don't have to answer that question.
| tomjen3 wrote:
| People die when they take drugs all the time, whether brought
| online or not.
|
| But the war on some drugs are a failure, but also impossible
| to change due to stupid people, so Silk Road and crypto was a
| means to work around this, while lowering crime and turning
| it into an iterated prisoners dilemma so that quality etc
| could stay high.
| Jensson wrote:
| Manslaughter is at most 10 years, he served 12 years, I feel
| its fair to release him now.
| throwawaythekey wrote:
| As an Australian who had friends who bought product on silk
| road my understanding was:
|
| 1) It's safer to buy something online and have it mailed to
| your house than go pick it up from some shady dude.
|
| 2) On the street you would often get duds or spiked product,
| online reputations were built up over time and important to
| be maintained (think uber/ebay stars).
|
| Overall silk road probably increased the amount of drug
| activity but made each incident safer. Not sure what the
| overall impact would be.
| danw1979 wrote:
| An 18 year old lad from my village, who had just started a
| job programming, bought a drug from an online "pharmacy"
| and it turned out to be spiked with a synthetic opioid
| (N-pyrrolidino-etonitazene) and he died in his sleep at
| home, alone.
|
| On your point about spiked products - it's clearly a
| problem for online illegal drugs as well as those bought on
| the street.
|
| The problem is, you don't get to leave a bad review if
| you're dead.
| aleign wrote:
| 1/5 stars. Quick and discreet delivery. Minus 4 stars
| because it killed me.
| kybernetyk wrote:
| Smart people can differentiate between a market place and the
| sellers themselves.
| chrishare wrote:
| He tried to have people murdered for his own benefit.
| kybernetyk wrote:
| Well, he should have get sentenced for that then. And not
| for running a neutral market place.
| tene80i wrote:
| Do these smart people you speak of think things that are
| different are entirely unrelated?
| pjc50 wrote:
| This is why people only blame the DZOQBX brands that sell
| on Amazon for review fraud and not Amazon themselves, who
| are blamelessly hosting all those fraudulent sellers.
| kypro wrote:
| I think there is some difference between running a
| marketplace which you intend for people to sell products
| legally on, and a marketplace which you intend and know
| people will sell products illegally on.
|
| Whether I agree with it or not, the law often recognises
| differences like this. It's not illegal to lie, but it is
| illegal to lie in the aid a murder. The lier themselves
| might not be a murderer, but the lier is knowingly
| facilitating murder.
|
| Ulbricht was knowingly facilitating crime in the case, and
| sometimes this crime would result in the deaths of people.
| And despite knowing all this he took no action to address
| it.
|
| Perhaps your point was he just didn't deserve the sentence
| he receive, which is fair, but he clearly did something
| that most people would consider very wrong.
|
| I also wonder how people would feel if Silkroad was
| associated more with the trading of humans, CSAM,
| biological weapons or more serious things rather than just
| drugs. I doubt the "he's just running a marketplace"
| reasoning would hold in most people's eyes then.
| TrackerFF wrote:
| If you knowingly operate a marketplace where unsafe
| products are being sold, you very much bear some
| responsibility of those injuries.
|
| If Ross let drug dealers sell fentanyl-laced drugs, which
| ended up killing someone, he absolutely should be charged.
|
| Those deals wouldn't have been possible without his
| platform. Sure, maybe the same drug dealer would have sold
| the bad stuff to some other poor user outside silk road,
| but those dealings that ended up happening on silk road are
| his (Ross) to own.
| defrost wrote:
| > If Ross let drug dealers sell fentanyl-laced drugs,
| which ended up killing someone,
|
| This seems unlikely given he's been imprisoned for eleven
| years.
|
| See: https://nida.nih.gov/research-topics/trends-
| statistics/overd...
|
| You can clearly see that "deaths involving synthetic
| opioids other than methadone (primarily illicitly
| manufactured fentanyl)" didn't particularly alter or rise
| until after the 2013 Federal Bureau of Investigation
| (FBI) shut down of the Silk Road website and arrest of
| Ulbricht.
|
| _If_ the Silk Road Marketplace had any influence on
| fentanyl deaths _Then_ some kind of spike would be
| expected during the years of operation, 2011-2013.
| IMTDb wrote:
| So I could bring down eBay by opening a store; selling
| something that I know (but eBay doesn't) is dangerous /
| broken / false. If that sale goes through, should eBay be
| taken down since they operate a marketplace where unsafe
| products are being sold ? eBay cannot reasonably test
| every single item that is sold through their platform.
| Same goes for every second hand marketplace in the world.
| They need to take some measure to address this, but
| cannot reduce the risk to 0.
|
| As far as I know, SilkRoad had a whole reputation system
| in place to allow users to flag untrustworthy sellers;
| that system was inline or even ahead of what many "legal"
| marketplace had put in place. A part of why SilkRoad was
| so successful is precisely because overall that
| reputation system allowed users to identify trustworthy
| sellers.
| echoangle wrote:
| Ebay tries to prevent you from selling illegal stuff
| though. Silk Road didn't. The reputation system was to
| prevent scams and bad quality products, not to prevent
| illegal transactions, right?
| stickfigure wrote:
| A large minority of the population (and in some cases,
| like weed, an overt majority) of the population don't
| think those transactions should be illegal. "The law is
| wrong" is sort of the whole point, and why Ulbricht is a
| quasi-folk hero.
| ValueAddedRS wrote:
| This theory was actually tested last year and...eBay won.
|
| The DOJ filed a lawsuit on behalf of the EPA against eBay
| in 2023, seeking to hold them liable for prohibited
| pesticides and chemicals as well as illegal emissions
| control cheat devices sold through the platform that
| violate multiple federal laws and environmental
| regulations.
|
| There wasn't even really an argument about whether or not
| the items were actually illegal to sell - all parties
| including eBay basically stipulated to that and the judge
| even explicitly acknowledged it in her ruling - the
| entire case came down to whether or not eBay could be
| held liable for the actions of third party sellers on
| their platform who they failed to proactively prevent
| from selling illegal items.
|
| In September 2024, U.S. District Judge Orelia Merchant
| granted eBay's motion to dismiss the case, ruling that
| Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996
| provides eBay immunity for the actions of those third
| party sellers.
|
| DOJ filed an appeal on December 1st so we'll see where
| that goes but as it stands now - no, you couldn't take
| eBay down even by listing stuff eBay _does_ know to be
| illegal, based on current precedent.
|
| Why the courts applied Sec230 that way in one instance
| and not another is the real question and the more
| cynically minded might also wonder how eBay founder
| Pierre Omidyar's various philanthropic and political
| endeavors (including but not limited to being the $
| behind Lina Khan's whole "hipster antitrust" movement)
| could be a factor too. He's no longer an active board
| member but still a major shareholder whose existing
| shares would likely be worth a lot less if a case with a
| potential ~$2 Billion in fines had been allowed to
| proceed.
| indoordin0saur wrote:
| It's a philosophical difference. As someone running a
| market where buyers and sellers meet I think it's valid
| to let the buyers and sellers participate in the exchange
| among themselves at their own risk. The person running
| the market doesn't need to treat the participants like
| children. Plus, if you're on the TOR network and buying
| obscure research chems using crypto in the early 2010s I
| think it's safe to assume you're more sophisticated and
| aware of what you're getting into than the average
| person.
| loeg wrote:
| Silk Road (shut down 2013) more or less entirely predated
| illicit fentanyl's dominance of the opioid market.
| cbsmith wrote:
| Smart people can differentiate between a transparent
| marketplace which provides a net economic benefit to
| society from an obfuscated one which by design enables
| illicit activity.
| aleign wrote:
| Smart people realize that it is not so black and white.
| cbsmith wrote:
| Definitely.
| nurumaik wrote:
| Idk about silk road, but hydra (russian online marketplace)
| was the best thing that happened to russia drug market. It
| had very good reputation system and even labs that did random
| testing of drugs being sold
|
| Existence of big marketplaces definitely lower chances of
| people dying from drugs
| popcalc wrote:
| Russians must have become experts at geocaching with all
| their experience chasing dead-drops.
| nurumaik wrote:
| It really surprises me that it's not widely used in the
| rest of the world
| suddenlybananas wrote:
| You have to understand that half of the people here are
| libertarians who never grew out of their teenage philosophy.
| gosub100 wrote:
| Did you just make a "think of the children" argument? Teens
| are well known to engage in risk taking. Why not prosecute
| the parents?
| shawabawa3 wrote:
| > Multiple teenagers (one in Australia) died from the drugs
| distributed on Silk Road
|
| more or less than those who bought drugs from street dealers?
|
| could it not be possible the silk road saved the lives of
| many more teenagers who would have died from street drugs
| otherwise?
| gizmo wrote:
| I don't think those types of hypotheticals are taken very
| seriously in court rooms. One, they are effectively
| unfalsifiable, because it's a about harm that could have
| happened but didn't. Two, they can be applied universally.
| Any action might have prevented a catastrophe, after all.
| Courts persecute based on laws broken and harm done.
|
| Ironically our justice system _sometimes_ does persecute
| based on hypotheticals. For example persecution for driving
| recklessly, which is inconsistent with the principle above.
| knodi wrote:
| drugs is one part, but silkroad facilitated more than drug,
| guns, fake documents, stolen data, money laundering, fake
| currency, contract killers... the list goes on.
| loeg wrote:
| Are you confusing SR with other darknet markets? SR
| explicitly banned most of these things (guns, fake
| currency, stolen data, contract killers). Yes, fake
| documents were allowed.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| The government should have investigated the people that
| listed and sourced the drugs
|
| this isn't controversial to say, the governments just go for
| the laziest intermediary lately
|
| but there is the choice of doing actual investigations for
| time tested crimes. those dealers just went to other darknet
| markets, which are far far bigger than Silk Road ever was
| cakealert wrote:
| I wonder if he is going to be able to launder and cash out
| whatever crypto he squirreled away. His finances are probably
| going to be closely watched.
|
| Starting a business that accepts crypto payments is going to be a
| tell.
| ktallett wrote:
| He has admitted his wrong doings and made efforts to change
| whilst in prison. I doubt he will go straight back to a life
| even remotely close to before. He was doing good in prison for
| other inmates and I imagine he will continue doing the same now
| he has this second chance.
| notyourwork wrote:
| What the future holds for someone who was pardoned is likely
| decided based on very different rationalization compared to
| how one acts while serving a lifetime prison sentence.
| ktallett wrote:
| Whilst I understand your point of view that the change in
| circumstances can change how someone decides to act, I
| don't believe there is much history to show someone who
| gained a surprising second chance outside of prison has
| gone back to their previous life.
| bdhcuidbebe wrote:
| > I don't believe there is much history to show someone
| who gained a surprising second chance outside of prison
| has gone back to their previous life.
|
| Didnt have to look far, from dec 9:
|
| https://lawandcrime.com/crime/exonerated-man-heading-
| back-to...
| ktallett wrote:
| Of course, there will be an outlier. I didn't state no
| history. One person doing wrong after being released
| shouldn't mean no one gets released.
| bb88 wrote:
| No but recidivism should be factored into such a
| decision.
| bb88 wrote:
| It's vindication of political violence that's the
| problem. If political violence is sanctioned, then there
| is no law.
| johnneville wrote:
| does he even need to launder it ? The pardon may cover any
| proceeds given Trump described it as "a full and unconditional
| pardon"
| notyourwork wrote:
| Pardoned from the crimes convicted of? Or pardoned from any
| crime. I found the Biden pardon to be particular egregious
| because of how vague it was.
| trillic wrote:
| If he's smart he'll go Jordan Belfort style and make money with
| book, speaking, and movie deals.
| threeseed wrote:
| That's the old way of doing things.
|
| Now it's all about podcasts, energy drinks and crypto coin
| rug-pulls.
| guywithahat wrote:
| I'm wondering that too. I think there's three options: he
| either has secret money hidden away, is going to get a cushy
| job in tech by some fan, or he's going to be working as a
| walmart greeter in 3 years.
|
| Honestly I'm hoping he gets an X account so I can follow him
| and see which it is lol
| lupusreal wrote:
| This conversation is presently flagged. Why? When Ross was
| sentenced HN had a discussion about it with more than 600
| comments. His conviction has been discussed numerous additional
| times in other threads throughout the years. His pardon is
| plainly on-topic for HN, and this discussion is a necessary
| followup to those previous discussions.
| dang wrote:
| Of course it's on topic. Why did users flag it? Probably some
| combination of not liking the event itself and fatigue with
| political stories. But that's just a guess.
|
| In any case, we turned the flags off when we saw it.
| foldr wrote:
| Is it more on topic than the Musk Nazi salute thing, which
| you chose not to unflag? The comments are equally predictable
| in both cases.
| tptacek wrote:
| It is much more on-topic than the Musk thing. HN has been
| debating this conviction, in intricate detail, since 2015.
| Meanwhile, you can just go to any news site from CNN to Fox
| to the Guardian to see the Musk thing. There's stuff to
| talk about with the Ulbricht story, and basically nothing
| to talk about with the Musk thing, except for subsets of
| both sides who are just itching to have a flamewar about
| it.
| foldr wrote:
| The Ulbricht story is also in the news. I don't see that
| there's a ton to say about it that hasn't come up in the
| previous (exhaustive) discussions that you mention. The
| people who thought Ulbricht was prosecuted unjustly are
| happy and the people who didn't are less happy (unless
| they thought the sentence was too harsh). I suspect that
| we just disagree about the significance of the Musk
| story.
| tptacek wrote:
| The problem with the Musk story isn't simply that it's a
| news story; it's that it's only a news story. It's
| important to understand that this isn't a question of the
| _significance_ of either story. Important things happen
| around the world every day that aren 't good subjects for
| HN threads.
| foldr wrote:
| I don't agree that the Ulbricht story is more than just a
| news story, but in any case, my issue is not with that
| story being unflagged.
|
| HN is, as you know, chock full of enormous unflagged
| threads about news stories involving Elon Musk that
| amount to little more than "Elon Musk says something on
| Twitter!" It may well be that the mods would happily flag
| all these submissions into oblivion if they had the time.
| But I don't think it's a good look to have all of this
| trivial discussion about Musk on the site and then defer
| to the submission guidelines (reasonable enough in
| themselves, but lightly enforced in Musk's case) now that
| he is in a position of power within the US government.
|
| This isn't about individual moderation decisions
| necessarily being wrong or unjustifiable in isolation
| (though I do think the 'but it might cause a flamewar!'
| excuse is applied with wild inconsistency). The issue is
| that avoiding political flamewars on a tech news site in
| 2025 is a fundamentally different proposition than it was
| in 2010.
| tptacek wrote:
| All of those "Elon Musk says something on Twitter"
| threads are worth flagging. They're insubstantial, and I
| can't be the only one here who would like a lot less of
| that guy in his life.
|
| I'll spare you the detailed argument for why Ulbricht is
| clearly not "just" a news story.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| https://archive.today/FNvkp
| bb88 wrote:
| Genuine question: Of all the people to pardon, why him?
| hilux wrote:
| According to Trump, he is doing this to get libertarian
| support.
| macinjosh wrote:
| Trump promised to do this at the Libertarian Party convention.
| This case is very important to the libertarian crowd. He is a
| martyr for many of their ideals. After Trump was so well
| received at the convention the LP, recently taken over by the
| right faction of the party, put forth a candidate specifically
| chosen to not get votes so that members would vote for Trump.
| Trump seems to be a man of his word.
| bb88 wrote:
| Voters wanted a better economy first, not pardons for drug
| traffickers and violent offenders.
|
| This could have waited until after the midterms.
| macinjosh wrote:
| It was one signature? Doesn't seem like a big time sink.
| Many of these early actions were prepared prior to
| inauguration.
| bb88 wrote:
| In war, you point your biggest gun at the enemy. You
| don't shoot yourself in the foot.
| mattpope wrote:
| It seems like the voters that were being referred to value
| restoring rights. How can something immediately achievable
| be balanced with "the economy", a thing so broad and deeply
| systemic?
| bb88 wrote:
| The people in Pennsylvania who elected him, didn't want
| this.
| mattpope wrote:
| It isn't clear from your original statement that those
| voters aren't from Pennsylvania. I interpret your
| statement as discounting the weight of their vote on
| actions they care about. There are many perspectives, and
| the values of those who did vote in that direction are
| being addressed in some way.
| bb88 wrote:
| A lot of republicans want a "shining city upon the hill".
| Drug free, sin free, tough penalties on crime.
|
| A lot of republicans want a working economy. High paying
| jobs, low taxes.
|
| A lot of republicans believe in a free market economy.
| Freedom to innovate, freedom to hire and fire.
|
| And then we have this.
| mattpope wrote:
| We're talking about Libertarians and not Republicans,
| atleast that is what the parent comment was referring to.
| I don't know what Republicans what or believe vs what
| they say. The action to pardon directly addresses the
| Libertarian ideals.
| bb88 wrote:
| I guess if Trump really wanted to run Libertarian, he
| could have run under the Libertarian ticket.
| mattpope wrote:
| He attended the convention. Is is for all intents and
| purposes representing them.
| floydnoel wrote:
| > sin free
|
| wow, not even god could eliminate sin but apparently the
| republicans can?
|
| how do you envision that being enforced? death penalty
| for any sin? You've never made a sin yourself? If so how
| could you live in sin-free city? sounds sick and
| dystopian.
|
| anyway, the point i wanted to make was that when you vote
| for somebody, you are the one giving that person the
| authority to take actions on your behalf. if you voted
| for T, you shouldn't complain about anything he does,
| because he can only do so because of your vote. learn to
| be wary of politicians, they treat you right during the
| dates (election) but after the wedding the true person
| comes out.
| toyg wrote:
| The people in Pennsylvania knew they were voting for an
| out-of-control, unpredictable, felonious septuagenarian
| with fascist tendencies. Complaining now that he is all
| of those things before he is someone who may or may not
| do other good things, is just silly. Either they knew, or
| they've been had.
| foogazi wrote:
| Eh, lowering the price of eggs is not as easy so
| duxup wrote:
| >This could have waited until after the midterms.
|
| He promised to pardon the rioters during the election and
| it didn't hurt him. I think he decided it wouldn't hurt him
| (and Trump cares bout that first) and if he thought about
| the midterms ... maybe won't hurt then either.
|
| Congress isn't directly involved in any of this anyway.
| bb88 wrote:
| Congress is involved. They have to prove they can govern.
| It's hard to be the party of "law and order" if you need
| only to kiss the ring for your release.
| duxup wrote:
| GOP house could hardly operate last round and ... they
| won more seats.
| bb88 wrote:
| I think this is funny.
|
| People hate congress. Yet each person can vote to only
| change one congressman at a time.
|
| https://news.gallup.com/poll/1600/congress-public.aspx
|
| October of 2001 they were up to 80% approval. Left to
| their own devices by Aug 2002 they were below 50%.
|
| There's an argument to be made that congress doesn't
| really represent the people at large. Some people go on
| to make the argument that through gerrymandering
| politicians choose who's elected, and not the people.
| duxup wrote:
| 2 parties and 2 choices certainly is a recipe for sending
| the wrong message.
|
| I'd like to see some ranked choice voting.
| toyg wrote:
| The GOP doesn't exist anymore, it's simply Trump Party.
| They live or die on his performance, and kiss his ring to
| exist.
| Klonoar wrote:
| _> This could have waited until after the midterms._
|
| On the contrary, he can just bury it in the first 48 hours.
| This will fade into the background soon enough but that
| group is kept happy.
| weberer wrote:
| He also signed this executive order
|
| https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-
| actions/2025/01/deli...
| Bluescreenbuddy wrote:
| The leopards will be feasting the next 4 years.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| > Trump seems to be a man of his word.
|
| when there's political gain, sure
| blindriver wrote:
| You may not like Trump but I remember he fulfilled or
| attempted to fulfill a lot of his campaign promises back in
| 2016 as well. Biden, the career politician, talked a lot
| about many things before election and then forgot about
| them after he was elected. For example, universal health
| care. Obama promised to enshrine a woman's right to
| abortion as law, and then when he had the House and Senate
| after he was elected, he said "it's not a priority for me."
| Then we lost Roe V Wade.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| Trump did just about what every president does - makes
| promises and then does some of them, tries to some others
| (successful unless thwarted by Congress), and ignores
| others.
|
| Obama didn't have the votes in the Senate (to overcome
| the filibuster, also not as many Dems congressmen
| supported it as you might think). Neither did Clinton
| (people thought it would happen then)
| bb88 wrote:
| I'm privately predicting the senate will remove the
| filibuster this term.
| mmooss wrote:
| He also lies all the time about many things. People are
| are sometimes honest are called 'liars'.
|
| > when he had the House and Senate after he was elected,
| he said "it's not a priority for me."
|
| How could he get it through the Senate without a
| filibuster-proof majority?
| Nimitz14 wrote:
| When did Biden talk about universal healthcare?
|
| Let's go through Trump's campaign promises:
| Infrastructure, Border wall, increased US manufacturing,
| repealing ACA, "drain the swamp". He achieved zero of
| those.
|
| Biden in contrast followed up on his campaign promises:
| Infrastructure, increased US manufacturing, expanding ACA
| plus lowering costs. Among others.
| duxup wrote:
| >or attempted
|
| That's a really low bar with that bit added. "I didn't
| say it would be easy" was his line about his token
| tariffs the first term ... then he never tried again for
| the rest of that term.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| > universal health care
|
| that was Obama - Biden never promised that
|
| Biden delivered on the IRA and climate change bill.
|
| Trump promised to "drain the swamp" and filled it
| instead. I can't think of any major campaign promise that
| he fulfilled - he didn't even build the wall (probably
| his main promise).
| WillPostForFood wrote:
| _that was Obama - Biden never promised that_
|
| https://jacobin.com/2022/08/joe-biden-public-option-
| health-c...
|
| _I can 't think of any major campaign promise that he
| fulfilled_
|
| Renegotiate NAFTA
|
| Lower Taxes
|
| Move the US Embassy to Jerusalem
|
| Nominate to the Supreme Court from the list he shared
|
| Kill TPP
|
| No Social Security Cuts
|
| Take No Salary
|
| Where he failed, it generally wasn't for trying, but
| because he was getting blocked by Congress, the courts,
| and the general bureaucracy. You only have to look at the
| last 48 hours to see a better prepared Trump committed to
| his promises.
| tzs wrote:
| I'm not sure "No Social Security Cuts" should count,
| because (1) he did try to cut it in his proposed 2020
| budget, (2) he did nothing to try to address the
| shortfall that is expected in the social security trust
| fund around 2033, and (3) he said that if he was
| reelected in 2020 he would get rid of the payroll tax,
| which would have moved the depletion of the trust fund up
| to around 2026.
| ttyprintk wrote:
| He took 3/4 of his salary
| jdjdjfhfkeksnc wrote:
| This is 100% true. I am posting from an anon account
| (obviously), but I was heavily involved in this. I worked
| with members of the party to push part of their strategy -
| mainly the coalition with trump and an effort to get vivek
| and elon involved. We spoke about this in 2023. I didn't care
| about Ross, had my own motivations, but I wrote some of their
| playback with AI and it worked. I didn't know about certain
| things (like the losing candidate for example). I wrote
| strategy that seems to have made its way all the way to
| Trump's team.
| batch12 wrote:
| Without proof this is just a bedtime story.
| ttyprintk wrote:
| So, when Trump said that some of the same FBI agents
| involved in busting DPR also worked on Trump's cases, how
| precise was that?
| Dalewyn wrote:
| >Trump seems to be a man of his word.
|
| One of the big reasons I voted for him. He actually keeps the
| promises he made as far reality will allow.
|
| What's really stupid is that keeping promises made isn't the
| norm for politicians, of all kinds.
| orblivion wrote:
| The LP candidate was nominated due to some
| fluke/shenanigans/dealings between candidates. Based on the
| right-leaning demographics you would not expect him to win.
| It just happened to work out perfectly to get the people who
| would never vote for him anyway to vote for Trump. (Meanwhile
| the chairwoman encouraged Biden supporters to vote for the LP
| candidate).
|
| Also, Trump actually got a mixed reception at the convention
| at best.
| RockyMcNuts wrote:
| man of his word, ok. https://www.azquotes.com/quote/660639
| IncreasePosts wrote:
| Presumably musk pushed for it. Not sure who else in/near the
| administration would even have him on their radar
| Havoc wrote:
| Musk is definitely a fan recreationally chemistry
| xigency wrote:
| The clips of him rolling his eyes and head around in
| boredom at the inauguration definitely looked like he was
| suffering from some kind of withdrawal symptoms.
| tomhoward wrote:
| It's been a campaign of Mike Cernovich's for a long time.
| arrowsmith wrote:
| And Trump cares what Mike Cernovich thinks because.... ?
| mplewis wrote:
| [flagged]
| freddi333 wrote:
| Trump promised it when he attended the libertarian convention
| silisili wrote:
| Whether or not he was the sole or even primary reason, he
| knew about it beforehand as seen by his tweet last night
| saying it was coming soon. Love him or hate him, it's a bit
| concerning that he has that level of access IMO.
|
| The tweet:
|
| https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1881524296386031892
| ty6853 wrote:
| What do you mean? Trump just pardoned or commuted pretty much
| all of the J6 crowd. One guy convicted of crimes that don't
| require proving violence beyond a reasonable doubt is pretty
| tame in comparison. He is one of thousands.
| bb88 wrote:
| What? All crimes were proved beyond a reasonable doubt
| according to a jury of our peers. (Or they plead guilty).
| ty6853 wrote:
| The violent element was not proven for Ross. The judge
| decided on preponderance of evidence he hired the hit man,
| and sentenced him as if he did.
| bb88 wrote:
| Ulbricht _was_ convicted of crimes by a jury of his peers
| though.
|
| There are no mandatory maximums in sentencing guidelines.
| Just mandatory minimums.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| Trump know the Jan 6 rioters and supported them. Pardoning is
| important to justify his claim that nobody did anything wrong
| as that the election was "stolen by the Dems".
|
| I can't imagine he would have known Ross Ulbricht's case.
| beeflet wrote:
| because it was a promise he made to the libertarian camp
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8ofi6U0eWE
| orblivion wrote:
| He upgraded from commutation to pardon, I wonder about what
| happened there.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| They seem to be pandering to the more libertarian tech
| community. This guy appeals to that and to the more radical
| maga types who want a revolution. I'm sure we'll see more.
|
| The Biden DOJs bungling of the insurrection, turning a jail
| into a martyrs club, slow rolling prosecutions, etc is
| ultimately worse than the insurrection for democracy.
| cbsmith wrote:
| > The Biden DOJs bungling of the insurrection, turning a jail
| into a martyrs club, slow rolling prosecutions, etc is
| ultimately worse than the insurrection for democracy.
|
| I'd argue promoting that narrative was ultimately worse than
| the insurrection for democracy.
| drawkward wrote:
| What narrative?
| ttyprintk wrote:
| That the Federal government has no obligation to
| prosecute an armed mob breaking into Congress.
| drawkward wrote:
| Agreed!
| SamPatt wrote:
| It's because of his mother Lyn.
|
| She was a tireless advocate for his release from the start, and
| it became a part of the libertarian cause to see him released.
|
| It worked. Trump courted the libertarian vote, and this was his
| most popular promise to them.
|
| She's an inspiring woman. I'm so glad she lived to see this.
| y0ssar1an wrote:
| Yay the drug trafficker and hitman hirer is free! What a
| happy ending! /s
| dools wrote:
| Don't forget all the zombie drones who attacked the capitol
| on his behalf
| ttyprintk wrote:
| Someone with that dedication can now move on to remedying the
| damage done by a free-for-all gun marketplace.
| xwolfi wrote:
| Trump explains it eloquently:
|
| "The scum that worked to convict him were some of the same
| lunatics who were involved in the modern day weaponization of
| government against me," Trump said in his post online on
| Tuesday evening. "He was given two life sentences, plus 40
| years. Ridiculous!"
| macinjosh wrote:
| I am happy to see that Trump is a man of his word. I voted for
| him just because of this campaign promise. I would have voted for
| almost anyone who promised this.
| llamaimperative wrote:
| What were your number 2 and 3 issues, out of curiosity?
|
| Were there any accompanying policies that you would say,
| "despite promising to free Ross Ulbricht, I don't think
| accompanying Policy X would be worth it?"
| dimator wrote:
| This one act was more important than the Paris agreement?
| macinjosh wrote:
| Immensely more important than an ineffective agreement on an
| overblown problem.
| lom wrote:
| Wow, I couldn't disagree more
| tomjen3 wrote:
| Not OP, but yes, immensely. Two different galaxies.
|
| The Paris Agreement is a joke; it has done nothing. It's just
| a bunch of big-ass politicians and a few celebrities
| bloviating about not solving the problem.
|
| Look, I'm not disputing at all that global warming is an
| issue, or that we need to solve it, or that humans cause it,
| or whatever. But the Paris Agreement and those all other
| agreements are all about big idiots pretending to do stuff.
|
| Probably the most effective thing we have done globally to
| combat warming is changing to electric cars, and that's NOT
| the Paris Agreement. Not even close.
|
| The Paris Agreement is the ultimate politician's move. Global
| warming is a technical problem and must be solved by
| technical means.
|
| Ironically, the one person who is doing more than all the
| politicians combined to solve this is backing the current
| administration. Twitter is nuts over if he did a Nazi salute,
| while doing nothing to focus on solving what they believe is
| the biggest issue in our lifetimes.
| ragazzina wrote:
| >Probably the most effective thing we have done globally to
| combat warming is changing to electric cars, and that's NOT
| the Paris Agreement.
|
| What do you think about Trump's actions on electric cars
| then?
| tomjen3 wrote:
| Despite being pissed off with the previous comment, I
| don't generally think about Trump if I can avoid it.
|
| So I don't know his specific policies here. I do know
| those of Elon Musk.
| ernst_klim wrote:
| If Paris agreements cannot prevent tariffs on Chinese EV and
| Chinese solar panels, which are basically battling climate
| change on Chinese money, these agreements don't justify the
| cost of paper they are written on.
| thfuran wrote:
| How could that possibly be the most important political issue?
| shadowgovt wrote:
| Unless it's your day job: never try to unpack the priorities
| of a voter. You'll just get sad.
|
| (For consideration on this topic: https://press.princeton.edu
| /books/paperback/9780691138732/th...)
| plsbenice34 wrote:
| I am very sympathetic to the idea of voting just for Ross. It
| is unclear to me which candidate would be better, since
| neither of them are close to my political beliefs at all. It
| is a deadlock and I seem completely unrepresented. The
| consequences of voting based on any big issues I care about
| seems completely unpredictable; politics is a game of lies,
| smoke and mirrors. So I would perhaps rather vote for the
| candidate that would definitely save one person's life that
| is important to me.
| thrance wrote:
| How do you feel about him backing down on H1B visas, price of
| groceries, peace in Ukraine...
| npteljes wrote:
| >Trump is a man of his word.
|
| Trump's history contradicts this.
| subsection1h wrote:
| > _I voted for him just because of this campaign promise._
|
| LOL. You're a conservative Christian[1] who thinks climate
| change is a hoax[2].
|
| [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29187368
|
| [2]
| https://hn.algolia.com/?type=comment&query=author:macinjosh+...
| FergusArgyll wrote:
| This thread is a great lesson in "Politics is a mind virus"
|
| I recommend you read the HN thread when Ulbricht was sentenced
| [0] first, then come here and read all the "Honest, genuine
| question, why?"s
|
| Then start practicing not letting politics influence your thought
| process
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9626985
| rcpt wrote:
| The main thing I notice is that back then we were writing
| paragraphs.
| zoklet-enjoyer wrote:
| I mostly stopped typing in paragraphs because I use a smart
| phone for most of my internetting. It's a lot easier to write
| your thoughts on a keyboard
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Using a touchscreen halves my IQ.
|
| (I'm challenged enough to start with.)
| pizza wrote:
| The value of the <EOS> token has gone up since then.
| JHonaker wrote:
| Wow. I thought you were being glib, but the average comment
| length is noticeably higher in the linked discussion. While
| length isn't necessarily a valid proxy for meaningful
| conversation, this was definitely an eye-opening contrast to
| the current thread.
| Trasmatta wrote:
| Or it could be different people commenting than on that
| original thread? And people might have changed their minds? HN
| is not a monolith. Humans are not static. You don't need to
| blame it on "politics being a mind virus".
| ktallett wrote:
| Based on the sheer number of posts that have misrepresented
| the charges or misunderstood why he was actually in prison,
| it appears to partially be a lack of knowledge on the case,
| likely due to time hazing some of the memories. Of course
| someone will change their mind, and some may have their view
| influenced by who happens to support him.
| latexr wrote:
| Exactly. If anything, the one thing that's guaranteed in
| these types of threads is that someone will make this same
| tired argument of "aha, but HN back then said differently" as
| if it's some kind of gotcha. I used to always look, and not
| only was it never the same people but the threads are largely
| more balanced than the original poster let on. It's like the
| contrarian dynamic, which dang has to explain over and over
| and over and over and over again.
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu.
| ..
| brookst wrote:
| But "mind virus" is such a cool phrase, and it implies that
| people who disagree with you are not just wrong, but
| diseased. Great bit of rhetoric.
| kurisufag wrote:
| i prefer 'mind-killer', myself.
|
| https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/9weLK2AJ9JEt2Tt8f/politics-
| i...
| slg wrote:
| Talk like this is never apolitical. No political change can
| occur without discussion first and therefore preemptively
| dismissing political discussion is inherently an
| endorsement of the current power structures.
|
| There is no way to actually discuss this specific story
| without discussing politics. A president pardoning someone
| is an inherently political act and that is only emphasized
| when it was done on his first day in office and with a
| statement that includes lines like "The scum that worked to
| convict him were some of the same lunatics who were
| involved in the modern day weaponization of government
| against me." That is all part of the story of what happened
| here and it involves politics whether you like it or not.
| cies wrote:
| Yes let's use word that need massive essays to explain what
| one person believes they mean... Like "woke". And not just
| stick to words we know the meaning of. That surely aid the
| discussion. /s
| brookst wrote:
| Not sure what you're trying to say, and the (attempted?)
| sarcasm doesn't help.
|
| But yes, coining pejoratives like "woke" or "fascist" or
| "communist" and then going to war with the imaginary
| beliefs attributed to the enemies who themselves don't
| even use the term is indeed not helpful. It's just
| childish.
| bko wrote:
| I don't know. I personally know people that lost their
| minds because of an election. Completely well off people,
| whose lives are not affected at all by national politics,
| apart from slight changes in tax rates. They live in a
| state and city that shares their politics. They're isolated
| from everything on the national level.
|
| Yet some of these people have rearranged their entire lives
| around a singular politician. Ended relationships, moved,
| started therapy or medication.
|
| It happens on both sides and its pretty sad.
|
| What else would you call that?
| slg wrote:
| >Completely well off people, whose lives are not affected
| at all by national politics, apart from slight changes in
| tax rates. They live in a state and city that shares
| their politics. They're isolated from everything on the
| national level...
|
| >What else would you call that?
|
| This is one of those comments that accidentally reveals
| more than intended because I would call that "empathy".
| You are revealing that the only reason you think people
| should be concerned about politics is when it directly
| effects them. Some people actually genuinely care about
| other people and seeing someone elected who has promised
| to hurt people is a disturbing and troubling turn of
| events even if they themselves are likely to be safe.
| liontwist wrote:
| So you're saying people are making a rational estimation
| of the various harms caused to their fellowmen,
| determining that political actions in Washington are the
| primary component, and feeling bad about the harm?
|
| I don't buy it. Citing empathy is moral language to
| justify bad actions.
| slg wrote:
| >So you're saying people are making a rational estimation
| of the various harms caused to their fellowmen,
| determining that political actions in Washington are the
| primary component, and feeling bad about the harm?
|
| Trump released an executive order yesterday that said
| some of my friends are no longer considered citizens of
| this country. Yes, sometimes it is incredibly obvious
| when Washington is to blame for people's suffering.
| liontwist wrote:
| This thread is about people whose well being and ability
| to enjoy life is ruined by politics (Enemy centered
| mindset).
|
| It's normal to feel bad for someone you know impacted by
| bad a policy. Ruining your life on their behalf is not
| empathetic.
| slg wrote:
| >This thread is about people whose well being and ability
| to enjoy life is ruined by politics
|
| Another facet of empathy is being able to understand
| other perspectives besides your own. Maybe this was your
| interpretation of the bounds of the conversation. It
| doesn't mean that is the only interpretation.
|
| Here are the exact words from the comment I replied to:
| "Ended relationships, moved, started therapy or
| medication." I don't think those are signs someone whose
| "ability to enjoy life is ruined". In fact, I see those
| as signs of someone enjoying life more by removing or
| addressing things that sap the joy out of life.
| liontwist wrote:
| Yes. Needing medication because your friend has visa
| problems is crazy. They themselves are probably less
| anxious.
|
| > another facet of empathy
|
| Do you really think political obsession is just a sign of
| superior morals and humanity?
|
| Empathy should make you less pessimistic about politics
| because you understand other groups values and
| incentives. (I don't claim this description is me)
| slg wrote:
| >Yes. Needing medication because your friend has visa
| problems is crazy.
|
| There was an "or" in that list of possible reactions. I
| was not giving an example of a situation in which someone
| would or should have every one of those reactions. I was
| directly replying to you by giving you an example of a
| situation in which it was clear that "political actions
| in Washington are the primary component" of inflicting
| harm on people.
|
| >Do you really think political obsession is just a sign
| of superior morals and humanity?
|
| I never said anything about superiority. That is
| something you brought to the conversation. Is there a
| reason you view someone exhibiting more empathy than you
| as an insult?
|
| >Empathy should make you less pessimistic about politics
| because you understand other groups values and
| incentives.
|
| Understanding a person's perspective isn't necessarily
| paired with the ability to change that perspective. Does
| knowing a racist might be motivated by fear make their
| racism less dangerous?
| brailsafe wrote:
| > Some people actually genuinely care about other people
| and seeing someone elected who has promised to hurt
| people is a disturbing and troubling turn of events even
| if they themselves are likely to be safe.
|
| Ya but, it's all a bit silly isn't it? Realistically
| those people wouldn't be doing any of that unless they
| were addicted to media and perhaps by consequence
| emotionally volatile. If I chose not to be chronically
| keeping up with stuff on a moment to moment basis that
| only has vague intangible impacts on my life or those
| around me, specifically online, does that make me less
| empathetic or less tolerant of having all my time,
| energy, and attention stolen from me? That's not always
| the case, but it often is, and if it's actually relevant,
| you're opting into poor mental health despite having zero
| control over anything even if you care, so you might as
| well not be so tuned in; which part is the good part
| again?
|
| It's a bit fatalistic perhaps, but I feel like the
| greatest trick social media (and Trump) ever pulled was
| convincing us we'd be pariahs if we opted out. If not for
| chronically keeping up with nearly literally every word
| the new batch of chronies has to say, they might not be
| saying it.
| slg wrote:
| >If I chose not to be chronically keeping up with stuff
| on a moment to moment basis that only has vague
| intangible impacts on my life or those around me,
| specifically online, does that make me less empathetic or
| less tolerant of having all my time, energy, and
| attention stolen from me?
|
| Some people view empathy as an active ability to "put
| yourself in someone else's shoes". Other people view it
| as a passive feeling along the lines of "it hurts to see
| other people hurt". If you can just stop being empathic
| by not thinking about it, you are in the first group.
| Some of us are in the second group and can't just decide
| to ignore it.
| bko wrote:
| I think you should manage your health and safety first
| and those closest to you.
|
| You're not helping by inflicting harm on yourself and
| those around you. If you want to canvas for the other
| side, donate, volunteer, great. But these people are
| obsessed and inflict a lot of damage on themselves for no
| good purpose.
|
| Most people empathize to those that are infected with a
| virus. It's often out of their control. You can only
| offer them help and suggest they touch grass once in a
| while. But you shouldn't feed into their self delusions
| that self harm and obsession with things out of their
| control is healthy and a good way to live their life
| slg wrote:
| The empathy you are showing in this comment would feel a
| lot more genuine if you didn't reveal with your prior
| comment how little empathy plays into your overall
| worldview. I'm personally fine, you don't have to waste
| your time telling me how to live a better life. I was
| just trying to explain to you what you were seemingly
| misunderstanding about your fellow humans.
| stonogo wrote:
| Integrity?
| adfm wrote:
| Belief.
|
| Belief short circuits reason.
| hsuduebc2 wrote:
| Weird part is that these two groups generally belive are
| not that different in the general. Most of the fight on
| the ideological side is on marginal differences.
|
| This all is mostly idiotic tribal fight when you hate
| each other because you just must to hate someone.
|
| I profoundly hope for star trek like civilisation in the
| future
| rayiner wrote:
| It's religious conflict. Nobody cares really about
| differences in tax rates. But differences in foundational
| beliefs about the world and humanity will do that.
| incrudible wrote:
| People generally do not come up with absurd beliefs all on
| their own, those do spread like a virus and as a
| consequence of all that social contagion, they do not seem
| all that absurd anymore to the person who contracts them.
| wisty wrote:
| This is often a bit of a cop-out.
|
| Any time a criminal is caught, people want them to do hard
| time, but people believe we're too hard on crime if you don't
| use examples. People think the government should spend less,
| but are far less likely too agree to any specific cut. People
| thought Musk was a genius until they realised he is also a
| jerk.
|
| And while it's sometimes different people, it's suspiciously
| reliably consistent in what you see said and upvoted.
| amrocha wrote:
| It's different people commenting on each post. There's no "mind
| virus".
| tayo42 wrote:
| It was pretty out of left field and seemingly uncharacteristic
| for the him to do this. It's fair to ask why. I think Trump is
| terrible in every way, think the pardon is fine, but can't help
| but wonder why and other questions about it
| smallmancontrov wrote:
| "Politics" is a dismissive word for crypto's evolution over the
| last decade. North Korea ransoming our hospitals, industrial
| scale gambling and scam enablement, wealthy kingpins buying
| self-serving policy. Crypto grew up. So did our opinions.
|
| That doesn't change what Ross Ulbricht did, but we can now see
| him as continuous with a great evil that we couldn't see at the
| time. With more information, our opinions changed, and they
| were right to change.
| throw124121276 wrote:
| I don't see anything special about that thread. There are in
| fact more people there who believe the contract killing
| allegations than now.
| steele wrote:
| Donald literally cites Mommy Ulbricht's political
| inclinations...
| Terr_ wrote:
| Could you post the literal text? I don't really want to make
| a Doubleplustruth Social account, and it doesn't seem to be
| in other news excerpts.
| PKop wrote:
| His posts are public:
|
| https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/113869112741
| 6...
|
| "I just called the mother of Ross William Ulbricht to let
| her know that in honor of her and the Libertarian Movement,
| which supported me so strongly, it was my pleasure to have
| just signed a full and unconditional pardon of her son,
| Ross. The scum that worked to convict him were some of the
| same lunatics who were involved in the modern day
| weaponization of government against me. He was given two
| life sentences, plus 40 years. Ridiculous!"
| Terr_ wrote:
| Thanks, I tried their front-page but it seemed to demand
| an account before any browsing or searching.
| LeafItAlone wrote:
| Well, that thread is almost a decade old. HN a decade ago was a
| very different vibe than today.
|
| You are insinuating one thing, but perhaps it is also possible
| reason is that the same people with those old views of the
| crimes have grown and their views changed. I know mine
| certainly have gone that way. I'd have to imagine other users
| have grown with me.
| santoshalper wrote:
| Man, that shit is so old. Even if you're right, which I don't
| think you are, you are adding nothing to the conversation but
| cynicism.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| At the time of sentencing, did we already know that the murder
| for hire plots were created by corrupt Secret Service and DEA
| agents on trial next door? and all of that was withheld from
| the defense and the jury?
|
| because that's where the story really jumps the shark. I'm all
| for _some_ accountability - such as the 12 years in prison
| already - but that particular case should have been dropped for
| several reasons, I 've seen cases dropped for way less.
| andrewmutz wrote:
| Nah social media is just about engagement. People who are happy
| with the article don't bother to comment. Those who are
| outraged comment. It's just two different groups of people
| commenting
| swat535 wrote:
| What exactly are you trying to say here?
|
| That people can't change their minds? That HN is a hivemind ?
| (news flash: it's not , it's more diverse than you actually
| think) or that everything is attributed to "Politics is a mind
| virus" ? if so, what do you mind by this term specifically?
|
| I personally, find little substance in such comments. If you
| have an opinion on the matter (which seemingly you do), then
| please share it so that we can have a discussion about it.
|
| So.. care to elaborate?
| entropyneur wrote:
| I believe they are implying that people are disapproving the
| pardon because it was done by Trump.
| lom wrote:
| The craziest part about that thread is how much the attitude
| around drugs has changed in the past years. 10 years ago the
| comments felt a lot more optimistic about drugs and
| liberalization.
|
| I guess since then, the fentanyl crisis has happened and shown
| that drugs also have more negative impacts
| BurningFrog wrote:
| Keep in mind that he spent 11 years locked up.
|
| He's not getting off lightly!
| bb88 wrote:
| It's still not enough.
| mplewis wrote:
| What do you mean "lightly?" He ran an illegal drug market and
| tried to assassinate a competitor. We gave him the punishment
| that society has determined one should receive for this.
| Revoking his punishment is "light."
| TheAmazingRace wrote:
| Hence why, if DPR was going to get off somehow, a sentence
| commutation would have been better rather than an
| unconditional pardon. The latter implies he did absolutely
| nothing wrong, which hilariously runs counter to Trump's
| supposed tough on drugs and crime shtick he has.
| timewizard wrote:
| The judge issued the punishment at their sole discretion. The
| legislature sets the laws often without any input from the
| constituency.
|
| Meanwhile a sizable campaign has materialized around this
| case and many people do feel he has done enough time and
| should be free without any restrictions
| talldayo wrote:
| > many people do feel he has done enough time and should be
| free without any restrictions
|
| This could be said for any number of people rightfully
| detained by the US for crimes of incredible magnitude.
| timewizard wrote:
| Which is why "jury nullification" still exists. Just
| because a law exists does not mean the public good is
| automatically improved by blithely enforcing it with zero
| tolerance.
| WrongAssumption wrote:
| Jury nullification isn't granted existence. It's not an
| express power, it's just a natural consequence of the
| jury system.
|
| It's not possible to make it not exist.
| cbsmith wrote:
| That almost sounds like what commutation is for.
|
| It's certainly not what pardons are for.
| tdb7893 wrote:
| I'm just shocked it was a full pardon instead of a commutation
| or something. I don't think the US is gaining a ton from
| keeping him locked up but he still did run an organization he
| knew was used for selling drugs and other illegal things and a
| full pardon for that seems weird. I feel like I mainly heard
| people talking about commuting his sentence
| timewizard wrote:
| Is there some reason he should not be allowed to vote, own a
| firearm, or receive federal benefits?
| nateglims wrote:
| He was convicted and the party of law and order typically
| views these punitive post release measures to be part of
| the punishment.
| sophacles wrote:
| Yes. He was convicted of several crimes.
| lokar wrote:
| Why should he be treated differently then people who
| committed similar crimes?
| arp242 wrote:
| No one said anything about voting or benefits? That's an
| entire different discussion.
|
| It's just that, in layman's terms, a pardon means "you did
| nothing wrong", whereas a commutation means "you did
| something wrong but were sentenced too harshly". As far as
| I know that's also what it more or less means legally (with
| some nuance).
|
| I'm absolutely not a fan of "tough on crime" sentencing,
| but he absolutely did do something wrong, even if we ignore
| the contended "murder for hire" claims he should have been
| sent to prison for a number of years (personally, I'd say
| about 5-10 years). This is also by Ulbricht's own admission
| by the way.
| liquidify wrote:
| He built a website. He didn't dictate how people used it.
| That was the point. He was charged as a drug kingpin with
| mobster era consequences. His sentence didn't fit whatever
| crimes he did or didn't commit.
| ecocentrik wrote:
| Trump killed Net Neutrality during his first term and you
| think he would use it to justify the actions of someone
| running an internet black market that trafficked in drugs,
| prostitution and murder?
| ttyprintk wrote:
| The difference between Obama's ideal Section 230 and
| Trump's is a good point. Even though the President
| doesn't enact legislation, Trump issued a formal paper
| calling for changes to Section 230. Looks to me like DPR
| was more innocent under Obama.
| les_diabolique wrote:
| If someone facilitated a transaction of goods that were
| illegal between two people and received a cut of the sale,
| do you think they deserve some culpability?
| BurningFrog wrote:
| I agree that a commutation would have made much more sense.
|
| But "always make sense" doesn't seem to be in Trumps OKRs...
|
| That's mostly a symbolic difference though. The practical end
| result is the same
| ggm wrote:
| I don't see how this benefits the American economy, jobs, or
| national security. I do see that for a cohort of people in the
| Libertarian community this was held to be a central Tenet:
| Ulbricht was their "hostage" just as the Proud Boys thought their
| leader was.
|
| But, I can't see how this becomes net beneficial in Congress, or
| in the wider economy. At best it's providing lower friction
| movement of goods and services. They tend not to go to Federal
| Tax collecting exchanges, so I cannot for the life of me see how
| this helps the exchequer, but maybe thats the point?
| jsphweid wrote:
| From wikipedia:
|
| > "full and unconditional pardon for any crimes related to
| drugs".
|
| Does "any crimes related to drugs" include the murder for hire
| allegations? Does this mean new charges related to that could be
| brought against him?
| zeroonetwothree wrote:
| Seems like it.
| hsuduebc2 wrote:
| Wasn't charges about paying a hitmen dropped?
| jmkni wrote:
| IIRC it was to do with the conduct of the FBI agents posing
| as hitmen? I think they ended up in prison too, so a
| prosecution would be hard.
| jMyles wrote:
| Given the farcical nature of those allegations and all that we
| now know, including that others with access to the Dread Pirate
| Roberts account assert that the DEA agent making the
| allegations (who is himself now in prison for attempting to
| steal some of the silk road bitcoin) had access as well, it
| will be wonderful if DoJ attempts to bring charges, just to
| further clear Ross' name.
|
| There are not a shred of evidence that Ross ever had the
| slightest thing to do with those conversations, and it seems
| much more likely that the DEA used the DPR account to frame
| him.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| At the same time he is threatening to tariff China 10% due to
| their responsibility for fentanyl, lol
| zoklet-enjoyer wrote:
| Fentanyl wasn't big yet when Silk Road was around. And besides,
| people were buying straight from China off the clearnet
| asveikau wrote:
| I think they're pointing out the hypocrisy of wanting to
| crack down on drugs while doing this.
|
| I see so many Trump adjacent folks demanding we lock up drug
| dealers, deport them, whatever. But they want to let this one
| go.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| Orange man is a classic tough-on-crime guy, very selective
| what crimes and what demographics of criminals he is tough
| on.
| ethagnawl wrote:
| I see those people in my personal life, too. Ironically,
| they're also the ones who regularly drive drunk and do a
| little cocaine now and again because _it doesn't really
| count_.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| I think serious jail for running an illegal drug marketplace
| is good, even if he used lots of neat tech to do so..
| nozzlegear wrote:
| Mr. Trump isn't exactly known for making distinctions like
| that.
| ethagnawl wrote:
| I knew people who were wringing it out of medicated patches
| and sniffing it out of Afrin bottles during high school in
| the 90s. I also knew someone who ODd and died from
| tainted/fake pills they bought from one of The Silk Road's
| (immediate) successors.
|
| Some number of people also OD on "traditional" street drugs
| every day. So, this is really not a sound argument.
| ics wrote:
| Where's the paper bag that holds the liquor? Just
| in case I feel the need to puke If we'd known what
| it'd take to get here Would we have chosen to?
| So you wanna build an altar on a summer night You
| wanna smoke the gel off a fentanyl patch Aintcha
| heard the news? Adam and Eve were Jews And I always
| loved you to the max
|
| David Berman, from _Punks in the Beerlight_
| bdhcuidbebe wrote:
| Will he get his possesions back then?
|
| 50,676 bitcoins, today valued at 5,3 billion USD.
|
| https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/us-attorney-announces-h...
| ktallett wrote:
| I am not sure of the legality around his possessions but they
| are long gone. Even the ones stolen by FBI officers during the
| course of the investigation.
| mmooss wrote:
| I think that requires convincing evidence. Also, how is it
| relevant to the question?
| ktallett wrote:
| Well the American Government auctioned the bitcoin, and the
| two FBI agents were tried and sentenced for theft. I don't
| need evidence.
|
| I am curious how the American government can reimburse
| those pardoned.
| 1123581321 wrote:
| It is easy to look up the cases against the agents.
| https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-federal-agents-
| charged...
|
| Both served time.
| mmooss wrote:
| Thanks, that links to the charges.
|
| "Two former federal agents have been charged with wire
| fraud, money laundering and related offenses for stealing
| digital currency during their investigation of the Silk
| Road ..."
| ktallett wrote:
| I'm more than happy to have the discussion with you but I
| have no requirement to provide all of the information
| that is widely available in the public domain.
| mmooss wrote:
| Are you replying to the wrong comment? :)
| 1123581321 wrote:
| I'll let you Google the pleas and sentences. Stop with
| the asinine recalcitrance.
| misiti3780 wrote:
| Hey may have other wallets...
| konfusinomicon wrote:
| with a name like DPR id have to assume its buried treasure
| bigiain wrote:
| I suspect there'll be a lot of people very carefully watching
| for transactions from wallets with some sort of links to Silk
| Road that have been dormant for 12 years or so.
| bb88 wrote:
| If they were from the commission of a crime, then no.
| idlewords wrote:
| It's a full pardon; there is no crime.
| georgeplusplus wrote:
| I don't believe that's true. A pardon does not excuse a
| crime.
| bb88 wrote:
| Hard to agree here. A jury of his peers convicted him of
| the crime.
| qingcharles wrote:
| That's not how it works. The money can still be guilty of a
| crime outside of the Defendant's acquittal in civil cases
| like this.
|
| source: hundreds of hours in forfeiture court
| idlewords wrote:
| Pardon the money!
| tptacek wrote:
| He can't. The President doesn't have civil pardon power.
| cryptonector wrote:
| Civil asset forfeiture should not be considered
| constitutional, and some day a test case will make it to
| the SCOTUS. As for this case though... the pardon does
| not make Ulbritch innocent! On the contrary, accepting
| the pardon implies guilt. So the pardon need not and
| might not extend to forfeitures. Though it's also
| possible that the presidential pardon could extend to the
| forfeitures, but I suspect that's a constitutional grey
| area.
| tptacek wrote:
| Cases have made it to the Supreme Court --- recently! ---
| and it held up just fine. This is another message board
| fixation. I'm sure it's abused all over the place. It
| wasn't in this case.
| bb88 wrote:
| If the cases start with: "US v $200,000", that probably
| needs to go away.
|
| I doubt I would be able to get away with "bb88 v $2B". It
| should so belong to me.
| cryptonector wrote:
| https://www.law.upenn.edu/live/news/16740-civil-
| forfeiture-d... ?
|
| That's not very conclusive.
| tptacek wrote:
| What part of this makes you thing CAF is on shaky
| constitutional ground? This is a CAF case with reach-y
| fact patterns for the government and they won it handily.
| We didn't even get close to the question of whether CAF
| is itself constitutional; the court simply presumed it.
| cryptonector wrote:
| This was about the timing of a hearing about forfeiture,
| not about whether forfeiture is ok. Though I've not read
| this case yet, but now that I'm aware of it I'm keen to
| read it. I'll comment again later.
| bb88 wrote:
| Civil asset forfeiture connected to an actual crime
| should be. You should not own the guns you used to murder
| someone else, e.g.
|
| Otherwise it's "your $100,000 in dollars in cash looks
| guilty to me."
| cryptonector wrote:
| Right, if you've been found guilty, the your assets can
| be forfeited.
| TeaBrain wrote:
| A pardon results in the relief from the consequences of a
| crime. There being a pardon doesn't necessarily mean there
| was no crime.
| TrackerFF wrote:
| That would arguably create some of the worst perverse
| incentives, as far as financial crimes go.
|
| Any two-bit governor could team up with some criminal, and
| make enough money to be set up for life against a pardon.
| Even worse if it's a president, as they could likely get
| off scot-free.
|
| Trump could literally scam everyone and everyone, step
| down, receive a pardon from the VP, and happy days.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| That's exactly what it's doing. As long as you misbehave
| in Washington DC or commit a crime not chargeable in a
| state or too complex to prosecute, you're good.
|
| For example, you could defraud suckers into buying a pump
| and dump memecoin. Elon has repeatedly demonstrated that
| nobody will prosecute, and POTUS is above the law for as
| long as he decides to stay in office.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| Pardons are forgiveness. They don't roll back the clock,
| although the Supreme Court ruled in 2021 that acceptance of
| a pardon is not an assumption of guilt.
| ajcp wrote:
| Was acceptance of a pardon an "assumption" by the court?
| Is it not "admission* of guilt", which I believe itself
| was never the case as this was based on a judge's aside
| that people didn't accept pardons because it was
| *percieved* as "an admission of guilt", i.e. the
| "percieved" part was not actually articulated in court
| but rather the judge was completing a thought before it
| was fully articulated.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| My apologies I made a mistake. The Burdick SCOTUS case
| from 1915 said "carries an imputation of guilt and
| acceptance of a confession of it"
|
| In 2021, an appeals court opined that: "not every
| acceptance of a pardon constitutes a confession of
| guilt."
|
| I thought the 2021 case was a Supreme Court case, and I
| was incorrect. I think in the public eye the pardon is
| viewed differently based on however the story is told.
| bb88 wrote:
| What I find interesting is that the 5th amendment no
| longer applies after a pardon. The pardoned can no longer
| claim that protection for the crime he was convicted of.
| WrongAssumption wrote:
| "A pardon is an expression of the president's forgiveness
| and ordinarily is granted in recognition of the applicant's
| acceptance of responsibility for the crime and established
| good conduct for a significant period of time after
| conviction or completion of sentence. It does not signify
| innocence."
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_pardons_in_the_Unit
| e...
| arcticbull wrote:
| No, generally a pardon does not eliminate any civil liability
| or entitle you to refunds once the assets have been transferred
| to Treasury. He would still have to answer Yes to having been
| convicted of a felony and he would still not be entitled to
| vote in states that do not permit felons to vote.
|
| > Where a person has paid a monetary penalty or forfeited
| property, the consequences of a pardon depend in part on when
| it was issued. If a monetary fine or contraband cash has been
| transferred to the Treasury, a pardon conveys no right to a
| refund, nor does the person pardoned have a right to reacquire
| property or the equivalent in cash from a legitimate purchaser
| of his seized assets or from an informant who was rewarded with
| cash taken from the pardoned person before he was pardoned.
|
| https://www.brookings.edu/articles/presidential-pardons-sett...
| joering2 wrote:
| This is obviously incorrect. Actually pardon means the
| charges filed has been voided, hence anything happening
| afterwards has had no merits and court decisions made are now
| rendered moot. For example, Roger Stone was charged and found
| guilty of multiple crimes and Trump pardoned him; he still
| brandish guns and was "proudly voting Trump" in 2024 in state
| of Florida. Getting pardon is literally like it never
| happened in the first place.
| arcticbull wrote:
| The pardon can restore certain rights in some cases, I'm
| not entirely familiar with the Stone shenanigans, but
| knowing the parties involved I can't assume that Stone was
| legally entitled to do what he did after the pardon, and
| maybe he was.
|
| That said, the recovery of assets after transfer to
| Treasury is settled law. [1]
|
| > More broadly, the Court ruled in several cases during
| this period that pardons entitled their recipients to
| recover property forfeited or seized on the basis of the
| underlying offenses, so long as vested third-party rights
| would not be affected _and money had not already been paid
| into the Treasury (except as authorized by statute)_.
|
| Was covered in Osborne v. United States, Knote v. United
| States, In re: Armstrong's Foundry, Cent. R.R. v. Bosworth
| and Jenkins v. Collard
|
| Subsequent cases make it clear that the offense is not in
| fact "gone."
|
| > ... the Court in Burdick stated that a pardon "carries an
| imputation of guilt; acceptance a confession of it."
|
| > ... then, in Carlesi v. New York, the Court determined
| that a pardoned offense could still be considered "as a
| circumstance of aggravation" under a state habitual-
| offender law, reflecting that although a pardon may obviate
| the punishment for a federal crime, it does not erase the
| facts associated with the crime or preclude all collateral
| effects arising from those facts.
|
| The court holds that it is not in fact as if it never
| happened.
|
| [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-
| conan/article-2/sec...
| mech422 wrote:
| Part of getting pardoned is admitting guilt - ask joe
| arpaio ...
| duxup wrote:
| Your example doesn't seem to involve restoring property /
| funds due to a pardon that were already confiscated /
| already paid.
|
| Is there some example of someone getting such money back?
| throwaway657656 wrote:
| Until now I oddly never questioned how any government could
| seize someone's bitcoin and how a government keeps the private
| keys of their crypto wallets secure.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| a lot of known best practices were not followed in 2013.
|
| Every advancement in crypto was done after the government
| made a move. And all subsequent moves netted the government
| less.
|
| Now it takes more agencies to seize darknet markets, and most
| merchants and consumers get their money back because it was a
| multisignature transaction and the server stored nothing.
| Even domains have been seized back from the government.
|
| The crypto space calls it "antifragility", as in the idea -
| and now history - that the asset class and infrastructure
| improves under pressure.
| dmix wrote:
| > a lot of known best practices were not followed in 2013.
|
| like Secret Service and DEA agents getting immediately
| caught trying to steal Bitcoin from Silk Road?
|
| https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/03/30/federal-
| agent...
| yieldcrv wrote:
| Yes, like that
|
| I was referring to hot and cold wallet practices, methods
| for unlinking transaction activity from your KYC'd funds,
| and the immaturity of multi-signature at the time
| yapyap wrote:
| obviously not.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| Was that profits or users' deposits?
| notfed wrote:
| I don't think it's crazy to suspect that Ulbricht knows a
| password or two and cut a deal here.
| osrec wrote:
| Yeah, something's a little fishy about the whole thing.
| ttyprintk wrote:
| I expected those would come out sooner, by rubber hose
| technique in prison.
| tayo42 wrote:
| The laws should change too. Legalize and regulate drugs and
| access.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| [flagged]
| zoklet-enjoyer wrote:
| I don't understand how she's not in prison and SBF is
| steveBK123 wrote:
| Pretty sure she is currently in jail.. if not, she's finished
| doing the time she was sentenced.
|
| Her husband took the fall, whatever the facts actually are,
| and got a longer sentence.
|
| SBF - well the scale, number of laws violated, duration,
| number of victims, profile of victims, complete lack of
| contrition, etc would be why he got a much longer sentence.
| vvpan wrote:
| When Snowden, is my question. RFK put a lot of words into "if I
| am in charge that'll be my first thing". Yeah, he's not the
| president but he's also not nobody anymore.
| bbor wrote:
| NGL it would be pretty funny if Snowden gets to return to the
| west but we hadn't actually fixed any of the stuff he brought
| forward in the meantime. Not sure what I would do in his
| shoes... I guess a pardon is pretty impossible for future
| presidents to get around, TBF
| andirk wrote:
| The courage a lot of these whistleblowers have shown is
| admirable. How the American public outrages, though: Facebook
| has targeted ads. How they don't outrage: their government is
| illegally tracking their own citizens' movements and
| communications including overseas.
|
| Not going to say Ulbricht is a hero like some of the others,
| but he trail blazed like none before him! And he deserves his
| freedom years ago.
| mikrotikker wrote:
| I'd be worried about the Russians putting him in jail if the US
| pardoned him.
| sapiogram wrote:
| I don't think Putin would want to taint his relationship with
| Trump on his first week on the White House.
| Maxious wrote:
| That doesn't mean that he would want to be seen to be a
| pushover
| https://thehill.com/policy/international/5098063-donald-
| trum...
| toyg wrote:
| Why? He did nothing to deserve punishment in Russia. If
| anything, if Snowden left, I think Putin would be relieved he
| doesn't have to treat a potential nuisance with utmost care
| anymore. At the moment he can't really disappear him and has
| to waste resources monitoring him.
| mimerme wrote:
| private intelligence still has a few ways to go before
| whistleblowers don't have all their rights stripped by the
| state
| dylan604 wrote:
| For someone that likes to take top secret documents and share
| them with unauthorized people, Snowden sounds perfect for this
| guy to pardon
| Cornbilly wrote:
| Oh that's going to be good if it happens.
|
| Everyone will celebrate Trump's good deed while he funnels more
| government money to companies like Palantir to do things
| similar to PRISM.
| toyg wrote:
| The right gets to power and the first thing it does is to
| pardon its friends and allies.
|
| The left goes into power and does basically nothing.
|
| And then we wonder why one side is winning.
| popcalc wrote:
| The elite are winning. This isn't football.
| scudsworth wrote:
| In one message, Ulbricht informed ELLINGSON that "[the murder
| target] is a liability and I wouldn't mind if he was executed."
| In another message, Ulbricht stated: "[the murder target] is
| causing me problems . . . I would like to put a bounty on his
| head if it's not too much trouble for you. What would be an
| adequate amount to motivate you to find him?" ELLINGSON
| responded, "[the p]rice for clean is 300k+ USD," and the "[p]rice
| for non-clean is 150-200k USD depending on how you want it done."
| ELLINGSON further explained, in part, that "[t]hese prices pay
| for 2 professional hitters including their travel expenses and
| work they put in."
|
| Ulbricht later sent ELLINGSON $150,000 worth of Bitcoin to pay
| for the purported murder. ELLINGSON and Ulbricht agreed on a code
| to be included with a photograph to prove that the murder had
| been carried out. In April 2013, ELLINGSON and Ulbricht exchanged
| messages reflecting that ELLINGSON had sent Ulbricht photographic
| proof of the murder. A thumbnail of a deleted photograph
| purporting to depict a man lying on a floor in a pool of blood
| with tape over his mouth was recovered from Ulbricht's laptop
| after his arrest. A piece of paper with the agreed-upon code
| written on it is shown in the photograph next to the head of the
| purportedly dead individual.
|
| Later in April 2013, ELLINGSON and Ulbricht exchanged additional
| messages regarding a plot to kill four additional people in
| Canada. Ulbricht sent ELLINGSON an additional $500,000 worth of
| Bitcoin for the murders. ELLINGSON claimed to Ulbricht in online
| messages that the murders had in fact been committed.
| brcmthrowaway wrote:
| That is table stakes for Trump
| holuponemoment wrote:
| James Ellingson is a convicted federal criminal charged with
| numerous crimes related to this case.
|
| Tasked with investigating Silk Road he ended up in jail
| himself, along with his co-workers.
|
| There's a very good reason none of this stuff ever went to
| trial, it would be incredibly embarrassing for the agencies
| involved to see the light of day.
| scudsworth wrote:
| im familiar with the case. ross still attempted to hire a
| killer multiple times.
| loeg wrote:
| Any non-twitter reporting on this?
|
| Edit: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-pardons-silk-road-
| fou...
| par wrote:
| it's in nytimes
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Guardian: <https://www.theguardian.com/us-
| news/2025/jan/21/ross-ulbrich...>
|
| CNN: <https://lite.cnn.com/2025/01/21/politics/silk-road-ross-
| ulbr...>
|
| NPR: <https://www.npr.org/2025/01/21/nx-s1-5270051/trump-
| pardons-d...>
|
| MSN: <https://www.msn.com/en-us/politics/government/trump-
| pardons-...>
|
| Reuters: <https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-pardons-silk-
| road-fou...>
|
| AP: <https://www.msn.com/en-us/politics/government/trump-
| pardons-...>
| yieldcrv wrote:
| and Truth Social
|
| honestly guys, its time to download Truth Social so you can
| see what the President and the right is really saying
|
| by the time it hits your feeds elsewhere, it is often times
| altered just to inflame you and whatever segment of the
| algorithm's tree you are already pigeonholed in
| Cub3 wrote:
| It seems a lot of reddit communities are starting to block
| xitter as it's painful to use now without an account. Should HN
| do the same?
| loeg wrote:
| Nah. I just wanted to see a source I trusted to be legitimate
| before sharing a sensational story.
| frinxor wrote:
| if its on front page of HN already w/ hundreds of votes, i
| think its fair to assume its legitimate regardless of the
| source.
| loeg wrote:
| True looking nonsense floats to the top of HN semi-
| regularly; it's not a good enough metric.
| kernal wrote:
| What far left sources do you consider "trusted"?
| loeg wrote:
| I don't think this is responsive to my comment. I'm happy
| to trust reporting from NYT, Reuters, AP, WSJ, Wapo,
| Bloomberg, major regional newspapers... it's not a super
| high or politicized bar. Just something other than "a
| single twitter account."
| psygn89 wrote:
| No. Let us decide how we want to handle it. Most of us could
| handle it ourselves through scripts and extensions if it
| really bothered us anyway.
| hbbio wrote:
| Of course not, the tweet here is _the_ original source for
| that news
| easterncalculus wrote:
| The main reason all the subs made this change today is
| because of the elon nazi salute, not the fact that twitter is
| hostile to unauthenticated user agents.
| dmix wrote:
| > not the fact that twitter is hostile to unauthenticated
| user agents.
|
| Yep, Twitter has had aggressive authentication gating for
| almost 2yrs now and HN frequently has Twitter links
| bigmattystyles wrote:
| Am I remembering correctly that when Elon first took
| over, he took that gate down because of his whole free
| speech thing. I'm guessing they re-instated it as soon as
| it hit the bottom line. Makes me wonder if government
| should still rely on it for comms.
| dmix wrote:
| One of the first things Twitter did post Elon was remove
| sign in gating then I guess the bankers pressed Elon and
| it went back up. Can't always do everything you want in
| business, I guess. Bills come first.
| petters wrote:
| Wasn't it because of extensive scraping?
| Geee wrote:
| I think it was removed by geohot when he was in the
| house, but then reinstated after a while. I remember him
| railing against it.
| thih9 wrote:
| HN often has twitter links when this is the primary
| source; in that case in comments there are usually links
| to mirrors or threadreader.
|
| Here twitter is not the main source, there are better
| ones (both better quality and more user friendly).
|
| I would like a rule to avoid submissions that are login
| walled unless this is the primary source and an open
| mirror is available.
| kernal wrote:
| > The main reason all the subs made this change today is
| because of the elon nazi salute
|
| You need to be a radical far leftist to even believe that.
| But then this is Reddit.
| SettembreNero wrote:
| If doing a nazi salute isn't sad enough, failing to
| reclaim it is even sadder
| jeffhuys wrote:
| It's an interesting thing to see happen. In seconds,
| people snapped it and flooded the internet with it. But
| nothing will happen, because doing a "nazi salute" on
| accident means nothing.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Yeah, I thought it was interesting that nobody really
| questioned the relevance of intent over appearance.
| ImJamal wrote:
| Pretty much every politician has done the same "nazi"
| salute. If that is actually the reason that is ridiculous.
| ImJamal wrote:
| Obama, Warren, Hillary Clinton and Harris have all made
| the same salute. If Musk is a Nazi because of that, then
| where does leave all these politicians many of us votes
| for...
| weberer wrote:
| >it's painful to use now without an account.
|
| Now??? Its been just as painful to use without an account for
| around 10 years now.
| tombert wrote:
| No, it's worse now.
|
| Back in 2017, I could still read public profiles, their
| tweets, _and_ look at the replies, all without logging in.
|
| Now I can't even look at an account page without logging
| in.
| dschuetz wrote:
| Thanks.
| nikolay wrote:
| Trump freed him because libertarians voted for him - he openly
| said so. Meanwhile, he's waging a war on fentanyl! He should've
| freed Snowden instead.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| Interesting. I wonder who pushed Trump to do this. Gotta be Musk.
| Who else?
| zeroonetwothree wrote:
| The LP presumably
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| Obligatory "This is good for bitcoin"
| rappatic wrote:
| I think his original sentence was absolutely deserved--even
| though the charge of hiring a contract killer to assassinate his
| business competition may have been dropped, I think it's clear he
| did many things in the same vein. Even if you support his
| original pursuit of a free and open online marketplace, I think
| most people would agree he took it a bridge too far in the end.
|
| That said, I do think he absolutely deserved to be released, not
| because he didn't deserve to be locked up in the first place, but
| because he's clearly been rehabilitated and has done great work
| during his time in prison. All that considered, ten years seems
| like a not unreasonable prison sentence for what he did. I hope
| he'll continue to do good when he's released.
| nadermx wrote:
| What has always sat odd with me regarding this, is we don't
| truly know the extent of the fbi's corruption in this. They
| stole, so it's not hard to imagine they planted evidence too.
| mplewis wrote:
| What evidence would you have even needed to plant? He ran the
| largest internet drug market and openly tried to assassinate
| a competitor.
| TheAmazingRace wrote:
| Agreed. He willingly engaged with the alleged hitman (which
| ended up being the FBI contact). He didn't need to do
| anything or not have the thought to murder others cross his
| mind.
| andirk wrote:
| Allegedly. The 2 rules of his Fight Club were no underage
| sex stuff and no physical harm. That hitman claim was not
| part of his charges or sentencing. The heavy sentencing
| was to like "send a message" the judge said.
| TheAmazingRace wrote:
| They weren't part of his sentencing because a different
| court entirely was pursuing the hit for hire attempt
| charge, but because another court in NY got the book
| thrown at him for running the site, they decided to drop
| it because it didn't seem necessary anymore.
|
| In hindsight, the prosecution probably wished they didn't
| do that, since they are said to have had overwhelming
| evidence and proof, and there is even a Wired article
| about chat logs pertaining to DPR seeking services, but
| those are the breaks! If you don't do your due diligence,
| criminals can be let off on a technicality too!
| andirk wrote:
| I haven't looked into the case(s) for years, but
| prosecutors don't often just drop charges because other
| charges were found guilty. People get charged even after
| life sentences have been handed down.
| TheAmazingRace wrote:
| Perhaps. I can't think of why they ultimately decided not
| to move forward with it, but here we are.
| buckle8017 wrote:
| They dropped the murder for hire charges because
| discovery would have.. discovered the FBI doing very very
| bad things.
| TheAmazingRace wrote:
| I doubt that's the reason. It could simply be bandwidth
| reasons as another commenter in the thread implied.
| WrongAssumption wrote:
| Prosecutors do not work for the FBI, and the FBI has no
| say in who gets prosecuted nor for which charges.
| echoangle wrote:
| And you don't think the prosecutors consider the
| interests of the FBI when deciding what to prosecute? In
| cases where they want to use FBI evidence and probably
| want ongoing cooperation of the FBI for future cases?
| lupusreal wrote:
| Prosecutors work _with_ , not for, law enforcement and
| generally do what they reasonably can to maintain a good
| "working relationship".
| cyberax wrote:
| > I haven't looked into the case(s) for years, but
| prosecutors don't often just drop charges because other
| charges were found guilty.
|
| They absolutely do that all the freaking time. Especially
| when other convictions already result in a long sentence.
|
| Prosecutors have limited bandwidth, and just wasting time
| adding one more life imprisonment on top of a life
| imprisonment is not helpful.
| nadermx wrote:
| He never admitted to the attempted murder. So it's not a
| leap to assume that might of been tainted
| mplewis wrote:
| Tainted how?
| seanw444 wrote:
| But the feds would never attempt shading means of solving
| a problem that they're being heavily pressured to solve
| in a timely manner! Don't be a hecking conspiracy
| theorist.
| jMyles wrote:
| > openly tried to assassinate a competitor.
|
| Unmitigated nonsense. The evidence that he was involved in
| this is somewhere between unreliable and nonexistent, and
| he (and the supposed victim) have disputed it since day
| one. WTF do you mean "openly"?
| cbg0 wrote:
| Is this between unreliable and non-existent ?
|
| - Log files found on Ulbricht's laptop with entries
| corresponding to the murder-for-hire events
|
| - Bitcoin transaction records showing payments
|
| - Messages between DPR and vendors/users about the
| situations
|
| The court found this evidence admissible as:
|
| - Direct evidence of the charged offenses
|
| - Proof of Ulbricht's role as site administrator
|
| - Evidence of Ulbricht's identity as DPR
|
| - Demonstration of his willingness to use violence to
| protect the criminal enterprise
|
| The court determined that while prejudicial, the
| probative value of this evidence outweighed any unfair
| prejudice, particularly since the government would
| stipulate no murders actually occurred.
|
| The above is summarized from
| https://casetext.com/case/united-states-v-ulbricht-10
| 39x9 wrote:
| Except the government blocked a codefendant from
| testifying that Ross wasn't the current DPR. The person
| who set up the fake murder was a Secret Service agent who
| went to federal prison. The target, Curtis Green, said
| the alleged diary was suspect. The court also kept out
| the role of the two convicted federal agents, not to
| mention 8+ other federal employees who committed crimes
| or unethical behavior.
|
| And an indictment is not proof that the allegations are
| real or not manipulated. US Attorneys are a deeply amoral
| group, they don't care about truth or justice, just
| winning at any cost.
| cbg0 wrote:
| > Except the government blocked a codefendant from
| testifying that Ross wasn't the current DPR.
|
| What is this based on? Can't find this on Google.
|
| Also, which fake murder are you talking about? There were
| 6 alleged murder-for-hire solicitations.
| plsbenice34 wrote:
| Many people, including myself, do not believe that he
| really did any of the activity related to the assassination
| attempts. Demonstrably corrupt law enforcement agents had
| the opportunity to do it all themselves and it would be
| typical behaviour for those agencies. He is (and was)
| politically passionate about non-violence and it would go
| against everything he stood for. I cannot believe he would
| do it. What do you mean "openly"?
| mikeyouse wrote:
| He wrote about them extensively in his journals -
| journals he could have disclaimed if they were faked but
| were obviously not.
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| Ross Ulbricht was not a good person. Full stop.
|
| He organized and operated a global criminal drug ring and
| conspired to have people killed. The only difference between
| DPR and Pabla Escobar is that DPR was running his drug
| business in the 2010s instead of the 1980s.
| dogmatism wrote:
| wait what? Escobar was responsible for conservatively
| _4,000_ people killed, some at his own hand
|
| DPR _conspired_ but didn 't actually directly kill _anyone_
|
| Not saying DPR was a good person, but a little perspective
| is in order
| adastra22 wrote:
| He did order (and pay for) at least one murder. It just
| happens that both the victim and the would-be hit man
| were both informants so they staged the murder. Ross'
| argument is that he knew it was fake, but that makes no
| sense in context.
|
| It was right that they dropped the charge because it was
| quite obviously entrapment. But none of it reflects well
| on Ross Ulbricht's character.
| echoangle wrote:
| There's still a difference between ordering a hit and
| killing 4000 people, some of them yourself.
| adastra22 wrote:
| A difference in scale. I really don't see a meaningful
| moral difference between murder for hire and doing it
| yourself.
| echoangle wrote:
| Ok, but the difference between 4 and 4000 murders is
| still not insignificant in my opinion.
| rajamaka wrote:
| Was he ever convicted on conspiracy to murder?
|
| Because in my opinion the ethics of operating a drug ring
| is not as black as white as you state.
|
| The existence of drug rings is an inevitable outcome from
| the war on drugs and I would argue the blame lands on the
| politicians who maintain the status quo that incentivises
| the creation of the black market for drugs.
| ekianjo wrote:
| > The only difference between DPR and Pabla Escobar
|
| The only difference?
| mrandish wrote:
| > The only difference between DPR and Pabla Escobar is that
| DPR was running his drug business in the 2010s instead of
| the 1980s.
|
| Asserting moral equivalence between someone who ordered
| dozens of innocent women and children not just killed but
| dismembered - solely as a lesson for others. Orders which
| were actually carried out multiple times and DPR who was
| never charged, tried or convicted of conspiring with a
| supposed online hitman to kill a competitor (who both were
| actually FBI informants - clearly making it entrapment).
| Yeah, that's quite a reach.
|
| Sure, DPR was no saint but why push for the absolute
| maximally extreme interpretation? Even asserting he
| "organized and operated a global criminal drug ring" is a
| stretch. My understanding is he ran an online marketplace
| which drug dealers used to sell to their customers. I'm not
| aware that Ross ever bought or sold drugs as a business or
| hired others to do so. There is more than a little nuance
| between 1) buying drugs from distributors, delivering drugs
| to buyers and collecting the money, and 2) running online
| forums and messaging for people who do those things. At
| most, #2 is being an accessory to #1.
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| > My understanding is he ran an online marketplace which
| drug dealers used to sell to their customers. I'm not
| aware that Ross ever bought or sold drugs as a business
| or hired others to do so.
|
| Ah yes, he accumulated over $5 billion in Bitcoins by
| entirely legal means. He didn't facilitate the wholesale
| distribution of illegal (and dangerous) drugs at all. He
| never contributed to the massive distribution of
| Fentanyle-laced dopes to the United States, Europe, and
| elsewhere. He was just the online guy!
| mrandish wrote:
| You've mischaracterized what I said.
|
| > he accumulated over $5 billion in Bitcoins by entirely
| legal means.
|
| I never claimed he didn't break the law. I said the
| opposite, that he's guilty of being an accessory to drug
| dealing.
|
| > He didn't facilitate the wholesale distribution of
| illegal (and dangerous) drugs at all.
|
| I said "he ran an online marketplace which drug dealers
| used to sell to their customers."
|
| > He was just the online guy!
|
| I said he's "no saint" and in an earlier post in this
| thread I also said he deserved a jail sentence and that
| "ten years was enough" for what he was charged with and
| convicted of as a first-time offender.
|
| I challenged your assertion of "no difference" between
| DPR and Pablo Escobar as extreme and your response is to
| mischaracterize my position as DPR committing no crime
| instead of responding to my actual position that he's a
| criminal who is guilty and deserved ten years in jail but
| not two life sentences plus 40 years without parole.
| There is a middle ground between "completely innocent of
| anything" and "no different than Pablo Escobar." I don't
| understand why you can't acknowledge such a middle ground
| might exist - and that it is my position.
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| Well in any case, Ross Ulbricht got what he deserved. Now
| he'll spend the rest of his life wearing an ankle
| bracelet.
| defrost wrote:
| Are you sure this is the right forum for you?
|
| Regardless of Ross Ulbricht's crimes, the pro's and con's
| of the pardon deserve considered discussion.
|
| Are you bringing thoughtful and interesting
| considerations to this thread?
|
| For example; will he _actually_ wear an ankle bracelet
| for the rest of his life under the terms of a full and
| unconditional pardon?
| mrandish wrote:
| You appear to be confused about the difference between a
| pardon and parole (and even parole doesn't entail
| monitoring "for life").
|
| Also, your response didn't respond to what I said (which
| was about previously only responding to a straw man I
| didn't say). I like to think we strive in good faith for
| a little higher level of discourse here on HN. Try to do
| better.
| antisol wrote:
| Bravo to you - I don't think I could have been as mature
| and respectful as you in the face of these repeated
| refusals to respond to what you actually said.
| tayo42 wrote:
| Tbh you probably don't know what your talking about. Silk
| road and fentanyl in drugs didn't over lap. Fent really
| showed up a couple years after the market was shut down.
| WrongAssumption wrote:
| Are you for real using today's value of the Silk Road
| bitcoins to say he amassed $5 billion dollars.
|
| Sorry, that's just dishonest. Those coins were worth less
| than 30 million at the time of his arrest.
|
| https://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/10/25/fbi
| -sa...
| vunderba wrote:
| I don't think anyone in here is making the case that
| Ulbricht is a "good person", but comparing Escobar to
| Ulbricht is next-level delusional.
|
| One of these people attempted to place hits on 3-4
| individuals, the other one planted a bomb on a passenger
| plane that resulted in the deaths of over a hundred people.
|
| Get some perspective _and /or_ learn your history.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avianca_Flight_203
| jMyles wrote:
| > I don't think anyone in here is making the case that
| Ulbricht is a "good person",
|
| I am.
|
| He built a tool that allowed people to circumvent a
| wantonly unjust legal framework by an aging, decreasingly
| relevant state.
|
| We need more of that.
| K0balt wrote:
| DPR dabbled with the idea of violence.
|
| Pablo Escobar revelled in it.
|
| PE put bombed newspapers and killed hundreds, if not
| thousands of people unrelated to any criminal enterprise or
| to arresting him. I mean, actual innocent, minding their
| own business civilians. Over 4000 murders have been
| directly attributed to the actions and orders of Escobar.
| Estimates to the actual count range closer to 8000.
|
| DPR went over to the dark side a bit in that entrapment
| racket, or at least it seems so.
|
| Thinking that someone needs to be murdered isn't
| necessarily a character flaw, imho.
|
| It depends on what DPR was led to believe about this
| fictional person. It is reasonable to imagine that the FBI
| took every possible measure to make their fake victim seem
| as murder worthy as possible. It's not too much of a
| stretch to imagine that the "victim" may have been painted
| as a purveyor of child trafficking, CSAM, or other things
| repugnant. My point is we don't know. And if we don't know,
| we should reserve judgment.
| thruway516 wrote:
| >DPR went over to the dark side a bit in that entrapment
| racket
|
| It has to start somewhere
| K0balt wrote:
| True enough, but if every first step taken meant
| committing to that path, the world would be a much, much
| darker place, I would think. I know at least for me, it
| would.
| potato3732842 wrote:
| I assume that the feds corruption is as bad as it is in every
| other high profile case case involving fed informants and
| politically charged topics. Randy Weaver, all the muslims
| they radicalized and then goaded into doing terrorist things
| post 9/11, the Michigan Fednapping. It seems like every time
| these people have a chance to entrap someone they do, but
| they do it in a "haha, jokes on you we run the system so
| while this probably would be entrapment if some beat cops did
| it the court won't find it that way" sort of way. They just
| can't touch anything without getting it dirty this way and
| the fact that that is a 30yr pattern at this point depending
| on how you count speaks volumes IMO. While I'm sure they can
| solve an interstate murder or interstate fraud or whatever
| just fine I just don't trust them to handle these sorts of
| cases.
|
| It seems like all of these people they wind up charging
| probably are questionable people who wanted to do the thing
| and probably did some other lesser things but they probably
| would have given up on the big thing if there wasn't a
| federal agency running around doing all the "the informant
| says the guy is lamenting not having explosives, quick
| someone get him some explosives" things in the background.
| GolfPopper wrote:
| It took a bit of tracking down, but I finally found an
| apparently egregious example of this sort of thing I had
| vaguely remembered: Iraqi citizen and legal US resident
| Shihab Ahmed Shihab Shihab was sentenced last February to
| 14 years in prison for his role in an alleged plot to
| murder George W. Bush, and his involvement in smuggling
| terrorists into the United States. [1] But his sentencing
| (after his guilty plea) contains an interesting caveat:
| _lifetime supervised release_.
|
| Why is a terrorist and would-be assassin of a former
| President getting lifetime supervised release? _None_ of
| the media coverage of the case, going back years, makes
| that clear. However, a footnote in the original criminal
| complaint against[2] him offers a likely explanation:
|
| "In or around the end of March 2022, United States
| immigration officials conducted an asylum interview with
| SHIHAB. After the interview was conducted United States
| immigration officials advised the FBI that SHIHAB may have
| information regarding an ISIS member that was recently
| smuggled into the United States."
|
| With a little reading between the lines of the criminal
| complaint, a very different story emerges: Shihab never
| dealt with any terrorists. He was a paid middleman between
| two government informants or agents pretending to be
| terrorists. He took their money, played along, and ratted
| them out to INS during an asylum interview. After that,
| once they realized the jig was up, the FBI arrested and
| charged him at its earliest opportunity - for the plot they
| had created and paid him to participate in, and which he in
| turn had informed the government about.
|
| 1. https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdoh/pr/columbus-man-
| sentenced-...
|
| 2. https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2022/06/Shihab-
| complaint.pd...
| lettergram wrote:
| As part of the FBI conviction they were accused of tampering
| user logs and taking over accounts. So... literally none of
| it can be used as evidence imo.
| trhway wrote:
| >we don't truly know the extent of the fbi's corruption in
| this
|
| the corruption what we do know about already tainted the case
| to the point that it should have been thrown out.
|
| I don't care about Ulbricht, and whether he is guilty of all
| or some of the charges or innocent. What bothers me in this
| case is that the government can get away and in particular
| can get its way in court even with such severe criminal
| behavior by the government.
|
| Rare case when i agree with Trump:
|
| https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cz7e0jve875o
|
| "The scum that worked to convict him were some of the same
| lunatics who were involved in the modern day weaponization of
| government against me," Trump said in his post online on
| Tuesday evening."
|
| Trump even personally called Ulbricht mother. I start to
| wonder whether i have been all that time in blind denial
| about Trump.
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| > A heartbreaking story is currently unfolding that's sure
| to have devastating ramifications for years to come. Just
| moments ago, without any warning, the worst person you know
| just made a great point.
|
| https://clickhole.com/heartbreaking-the-worst-person-you-
| kno...
|
| You shouldn't necessarily change your negative opinion of
| someone, just because they're right about _something_. To
| invoke Godwin 's law: Adolf Hitler was a staunch opponent
| of smoking, in a time when many Allied cultures thought
| smoking was great, but that doesn't mean you're wrong about
| _him_.
| trhway wrote:
| imagine if your physical theory of Universe works
| perfectly for the Universe at all scales, all times, all
| places except for one small star whose behavior
| contradicts your theory - that means that your theory at
| least requires an adjustment and at worst it may be total
| thrash. Your smoking example doesn't have such
| contradiction - whether he was anti- or pro-smoker is
| orthogonal to the rest of the story. On the other hand
| Trump showing empathy and correcting gross injustice
| stemming from the gross government corruption doesn't fit
| well into my perception of Trump and thus seriously
| challenges it.
| daveguy wrote:
| According to Reuters he was found guilty of "charges including
| distributing drugs through the Internet and conspiring to
| commit computer hacking and money laundering." In addition to
| running an illegal market bazaar for 4 years.
| slt2021 wrote:
| - sackler family engineered opioid crisis and went unscathed
| - hacking is a bogus charge applied to everything touching
| PCs - money laundering is another victimless crime that very
| few actual money launderers gets charged with, for some
| reason
| daveguy wrote:
| Yeah, the Sacklers should be in jail too.
|
| And you didn't bother to address that he ran a market for
| illegal goods and services, for some reason.
| slt2021 wrote:
| >Sacklers should be in jail too.
|
| but they didn't, so we can forget about concept of
| justice.
| arcticbull wrote:
| So that means Sackler should be charged, not that Ross
| should get off lol.
| foogazi wrote:
| [flagged]
| andirk wrote:
| Case law obsessively cites other case law. So yeah,
| that's how it works. His trial was a farce and was meant
| to send a message to others to not, um, do drugs online
| or something.
| foogazi wrote:
| Drug Cartels were just categorized as terrorist
| organizations so I'm not sure the current admin is ok
| with drugs
|
| "But he was a libertarian!" Shrugs
| beezle wrote:
| What a travesty. Maybe life was too long a sentence but this
| was far too short.
| Stagnant wrote:
| 10 years is plenty. No point in keeping non-violent
| offenders behind bars for absurd amounts of time.
| sirbutters wrote:
| Yea right. Drugs and violence are never mixed together
| /s. Just because he didn't commit violence himself (let's
| exclude his murder for hire. ahem.) does not mean no
| violence was ever caused because of his market place.
| mrkramer wrote:
| I'm not pro life sentence but the guy who was selling
| literally tons of narcotics online from which people
| overdosed and died and the guy who was ordering murders of
| his narco enemies gets to spend only 10 years in jail is
| indeed ridiculous. Imo he should've spent 10 years more
| because this way it seems like he "just" robbed a bank or
| something and got 10 years and now it's like nothing
| happened.
|
| I'm stressing it out again, multiple people died from
| overdose because of him and multiple people were about to
| get executed because he hired hitman to kill them.
| popcalc wrote:
| They wouldn't get their supply elsewhere? The junkies
| liked it because they didn't have to worry about getting
| robbed. You want to get rid of junkies? Enforce capital
| punishment of possession like Singapore.
| maxlin wrote:
| Silk Road in how it worked removed almost all the
| criminal life exposure from the process. People
| undervalue that, as if it wasn't a thing.
| mrkramer wrote:
| That argument doesn't have any validity taking in
| consideration that it was still illegal to sell drugs
| online. In another words; legally it doesn't mean
| anything that it was safer to sell drugs online than it
| is on the streets, both are illegal. I have no sympathy
| for such "noble" entrepreneurs.
| xyzzy9563 wrote:
| Did he actually sell the drugs, or did he just create a
| communications platform? Should all communications
| platforms be liable for what people do on them?
| mikeyouse wrote:
| He actually sold a ton of drugs too.. you don't need to
| raise these questions as unknowable hypotheticals, it's
| literally a google search away to find out. The first
| sales on the site were trashbags full of mushrooms that
| he grew in a cabin in Texas.
| xyzzy9563 wrote:
| Mushrooms aren't responsible for any deaths as far as I'm
| aware.
| beezle wrote:
| If you drive the get away car in a bank robbery and
| someone inside is murdered, guess what? You get to be
| charged as well.
| LarsDu88 wrote:
| People have served more time for selling less drugs and
| attempting to murder fewer people than Ross Ulbricht did.
|
| Just because he was decent with computers does not mean he
| should be busted out of jail.
| rappatic wrote:
| What makes you think I support those people being locked up
| either? Also, afaik Ulbricht didn't sell drugs himself, he
| simply provided an unmoderated marketplace.
| arcticbull wrote:
| Because attempted murder is bad. I didn't think that would
| be contentious.
| Nezghul wrote:
| If the law is unethical then you may be pushed to do
| "bad" things. For example if you are a Jew living with
| family in a Nazi Germany and someone know your secret and
| he feels he need to disclose it to the authorities then
| you may consider... murdering him. Would you really be a
| bad guy?
| arcticbull wrote:
| The hypothetical is simply a bob and weave. Hiring a
| contract killer to execute a business rival is clear and
| unequivocal.
| tveita wrote:
| > afaik Ulbricht didn't sell drugs himself
|
| FWIW he kickstarted the marketplace by selling shrooms that
| he grew himself.
|
| Hardly the worst he did. Note a certain Trumps position on
| the issue though:
|
| "We're going to be asking everyone who sells drugs, gets
| caught selling drugs, to receive the death penalty for
| their heinous acts,"
|
| https://reason.com/2023/10/24/trump-who-freed-drug-
| offenders...
| scarab92 wrote:
| The attempted murder charge was dropped.
|
| Under our system that means he should be considered innocent
| of it.
|
| This conversation is messy mostly because people are refusing
| to do that, which is akin to vigilantism.
|
| A good faith discussion should only involve the charge he was
| convicted of and pardoned for, which is the narcotics charge.
| muddi900 wrote:
| The prosecution dropped the charges. That does not make
| anyone innocent.
| scarab92 wrote:
| The presumption of innocence is a legal principle that
| every person accused of any crime is considered innocent
| until proven guilty.
|
| Under the presumption of innocence, the legal burden of
| proof is thus on the prosecution, which must present
| compelling evidence to the trier of fact (a judge or a
| jury). If the prosecution does not prove the charges
| true, then the person is acquitted of the charges.
| beezle wrote:
| It is also the case that prosecutors need to decide both
| the probability of conviction, the effort needed to do so
| and whether likely conviction on other serious charges
| are sufficient for the people to feel that justice has
| been done.
| parineum wrote:
| And if the prosecution doesn't like the probability of
| conviction, they doubt their ability to prove, beyond a
| reasonable doubt, guilt.
|
| There can be whatever reason he wasn't convicted, it
| doesn't change the fact that he wasn't and presumed
| innocence is the legal default.
| jcranmer wrote:
| > The presumption of innocence is a legal principle that
| every person accused of any crime is considered innocent
| until proven guilty.
|
| That should be "considered innocent _by the legal system_
| ". People are still free to come to their own conclusions
| --and act on them--even without a jury rendering a
| verdict.
|
| Rather famously, for example, OJ Simpson was acquitted by
| a jury of murdering his wife. But most people these days
| would agree with the statement that he murdered his wife.
| gunian wrote:
| glove didn't fit
| theodric wrote:
| had to acquit
| trosi wrote:
| > That should be "considered innocent by the legal
| system"
|
| Which is what matters when determining sentences.
|
| > People are still free to come to their own conclusions
| --and act on them
|
| People are definitely not free to act on their
| conclusions. That's vigilantism, what the comment above
| was referring to.
| recursive wrote:
| It does. Innocent until proven guilty.
| mrandish wrote:
| My understanding is they never brought the charges in the
| first place. The supposed online hitman and the victim
| were both FBI informants. They never filed any charges
| because it was clearly entrapment and no one was ever in
| any danger.
|
| The prosecutors later used that evidence as support for
| their sentencing request after Ross was convicted of only
| non-violent offenses, which has a much lower standard of
| evidence. The allegations of murder-for-hire were never
| tested at trial. They may have evaporated under cross-
| examination by a competent defense. Our system of justice
| holds that Ross is innocent of those allegations unless
| convicted at trial.
| bjt wrote:
| For purposes of a criminal conviction and locking them
| away (or the death penalty), sure. Proof beyond a
| reasonable doubt.
|
| For purposes of random citizens saying "he tried to
| commit murder", no. We're absolutely not bound by that
| same standard of proof.
| refurb wrote:
| It typically means there isn't enough evidence to
| convict. With the presumption of innocence, it in fact
| does infer he's innocent of the charges.
| ALittleLight wrote:
| He should be considered innocent by the courts - and he was
| (innocent of the murder for hire charges, I mean). In the
| public we aren't obligated to follow the same standards of
| evidence as the courts. I think he almost certainly did pay
| to have those people killed, and that can shape my opinion
| of him.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| That's perfectly reasonable - but I don't think it should
| really have a bearing on whether he should be pardoned.
| That is not exactly a matter of the courts (by
| definition), but I think as an official public act it
| should be subject to the presumption of innocence as
| well.
| cyberax wrote:
| > Under our system that means he should be considered
| innocent of it.
|
| Nope. This doesn't mean anything, and the charges can be
| picked up again.
|
| Oh wait, no. He was pardoned completely.
| theodric wrote:
| No no no, even absent a pardon, because those charges
| were dismissed _with prejudice_. That means they cannot
| be brought again.
| cyberax wrote:
| Ah, thanks. I thought they were dismissed without
| prejudice. Thanks for the correction.
| eviks wrote:
| People also served no time for selling more drugs and
| actually murdering more people.
| bko wrote:
| Ross Ulbricht was not sentenced for murder-for-hire charges.
|
| Those allegations were used to deny him bail and influenced
| public perception, they were not part of his formal conviction
| or sentencing.
|
| He was convicted on non-violent charges related to operating
| the Silk Road website, including drug distribution, computer
| hacking, and money laundering.
|
| Does this change your opinion of sentencing being well-
| deserved?
| karlgkk wrote:
| It does not change my opinion that the sentence was well
| deserved in the eyes of the law. Those are all things, that
| independently, can lead to serious jail time. The scale of
| his operation was also substantial.
| ekianjo wrote:
| There are murderers who hardly do more than a few years in
| prison. He was jailed for much longer than what violent
| criminals get.
| gretch wrote:
| yeah it's a tragedy - those violent criminals should have
| received more time
| ekianjo wrote:
| Yet nobody complaints about that on HN on a daily basis
| cbg0 wrote:
| Calm your whataboutism, folks on HN are not in support of
| violent criminals doing less time.
| listenallyall wrote:
| There are also many murderers who get life. And serve it
| all. So, it's also true he was jailed for a much shorter
| time than what violent criminals get. Your comment is
| negated.
| echoangle wrote:
| How is it negated?
|
| If he did a crime that's strictly less bad than a murder,
| him being sentenced to a longer sentence than even a
| single murderer shows that something is wrong. It doesn't
| matter if 99% of murderers actually get longer sentences.
| listenallyall wrote:
| That's "two wrongs make a right" logic. Because the
| justice system fucked up in the past, even once, that
| should prevent anyone else from receiving a proper
| sentence?
|
| Secondly, Ulbricht was an accessory to thousands of drug
| deals. You think that none of those consumers of those
| drugs died as a result? He could easily be responsible
| for multiple, dozens, hundreds of deaths - far more than
| most anyone locked up for life.
| oneeyedpigeon wrote:
| > You think that none of those consumers of those drugs
| died as a result?
|
| All kinds of products kill consumers every day, and we
| don't consider the person who sold them responsible. And
| the suppliers of those products heavily encourage and
| even manipulate people into buying them; do we know
| whether Ulbricht even advertised his services?
| listenallyall wrote:
| You could debate it forever - some people obviously think
| drugs are relatively harmless and pose no societal
| threat, others think drugs are poison and anyone involved
| in selling or distributing them is a potential murderer.
|
| The OP made a dumb comment about the length of the prison
| sentence in comparison to a murderer, I pointed out a)
| that while the OP thought it was too long, the same exact
| logic could be used to say it was too short and b) his
| original premise about the relative degrees of the
| "badness" of crimes was not an absolute.
|
| You're welcome to disagree, however the comment above is
| unconvincing. Ulbricht dealt in drugs which he knew from
| day 1 were unquestionably illegal in this country.
| InDubioProRubio wrote:
| Cause violence against funds is what really matters
| cmdli wrote:
| He was found during sentencing to be guilty of hiring a hit
| on a competitor using a preponderance of evidence (lower then
| presumption of innocence). While this is a lower standard
| than a conviction, it is still a higher standard than most
| apply in public discourse.
| roenxi wrote:
| That isn't fair, the point of the trial is to test whether
| something is to be acted on. To act on something that
| wasn't directly part of the trial is a bit off. I'm sure
| the judge is acting in the clear legally, but if someone is
| going to be sentenced for attempted murder then that should
| be after a trial that formally accuses them of the crime.
| wahern wrote:
| This cuts both ways as judges often adjust their
| sentencing downward based on mitigating evidence. For
| both aggravating and mitigating circumstances evidence
| does need to be submitted, and there are standards of
| proof to be applied. It's just that the procedural rules
| can be different and, depending on the context and
| jurisdiction, sufficiency can be decided by the judge
| alone. In some jurisdictions, for example, aggravating
| evidence may need to be put to the jury, while mitigating
| evidence need not be.
|
| The U.S. is rather unique in providing a right to jury
| trials for most--in practice almost all, including
| misdemeanor--criminal cases. And this is a major factor
| for why sentencing is so harsh and prosecutions so slow
| in the U.S. In myriad ways the cost of criminal trials
| has induced the system to arrive at its current state
| favoring plea deals, with overlapping crimes and severe
| maximum penalties as cudgels. Be careful about what kind
| of "protections" you want to impose.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > This cuts both ways as judges often adjust their
| sentencing downward based on mitigating evidence.
|
| It isn't supposed to cut both ways. The prosecution is
| supposed to have the higher burden, and admitting
| unproven allegations is excessively prejudicial.
|
| > In myriad ways the cost of criminal trials has induced
| the system to arrive at its current state favoring plea
| deals, with overlapping crimes and severe maximum
| penalties as cudgels. Be careful about what kind of
| "protections" you want to impose.
|
| The lesson from this should be to make the protections
| strong enough that they can't be thwarted like this. For
| example, prohibit plea bargaining so that all convictions
| require a trial and it's forbidden to impose any penalty
| for demanding one.
|
| It's not supposed to be efficient. It's supposed to be
| _rare_.
| wqaatwt wrote:
| So e.g. >90% (or whatever it's now multiplied by several
| times) should be entirely ignored because the
| legal/judicial system won't have enough resources to
| prosecute them?
| kortilla wrote:
| Yes. Scale up the judicial system and cut laws if needed.
|
| Also, there will likely still be some pleas. Some people
| own up to being guilty and want to move on.
|
| There is an absolute dearth of lawyers to support this.
| We just need more courts and more judges for the initial
| surge of a couple of years.
| wqaatwt wrote:
| So most property crimes will not longer be prosecuted?
|
| Also how exactly are jury trials superior to e.g.
| Magistrates Courts in the UK?
|
| Isn't the American legal system already very bloated and
| inefficient? So spending even more money on it might not
| be the best idea?
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > Also how exactly are jury trials superior to e.g.
| Magistrates Courts in the UK?
|
| The purpose of the trial is to separate the innocent from
| the guilty, and there is intended to be a presumption of
| innocence. But because the prosecution has to prove their
| case beyond a reasonable doubt, they'll tend to only
| bring cases when there is a high probability of guilt --
| a good thing -- so then let's say 90% of the defendants
| are probably guilty and 60% are guilty beyond a
| reasonable doubt.
|
| A judge is going to become intimately familiar with that.
| ~90% of the defendants are actually guilty, so the judge
| develops the intuition that a new defendant is very
| likely guilty. That's a presumption of guilt. Soon even
| the innocent ones are getting convicted, when the whole
| point of the process was to prevent that.
|
| A jury is a fresh set of eyes who look at the defendant
| as the only case they're going to be deciding for the
| foreseeable future and haven't been prejudiced by a
| parade of evildoers sitting in the same chair. It's also
| twelve separate people who each individually have to be
| convinced.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| Don't pass laws that wide swaths of the public don't
| respect, which would dramatically reduce the number of
| cases.
|
| When the laws are ones that everyone agrees should be
| crimes, like murder, spend the resources to convict
| anyone who commits the crime.
| wahern wrote:
| And what dictator is going to implement this perfect
| solution?
|
| Here's how things have manifestly played out over the
| past 150 years: procedural rules are strengthened because
| _citizens_ are afraid of unjust prosecution. Some high
| profile bad guys, or parade of run-of-the-mill criminals,
| get off because of said procedural loopholes, after which
| _voters_ demand politicians expand substantive criminal
| law to re-balance the equation. Upon which more unjust
| prosecutions enter the public consciousness. Wash, rinse,
| repeat.
|
| This is what _systemic_ injustice looks like, and the
| cycle continues as unabated as ever. On the one hand, you
| have movements like BLM, which have indeed effected
| change even in the most conservatives jurisdictions,
| largely by changes in procedural rules by courts and in
| policy by prosecutors and municipalities. At the same
| time, you have #MeToo, Harvey Weinstein, etc, which has
| resulted in the expansion of sexual crimes and
| punishments, and elimination of statutes of limitations,
| partly because procedural protections have made it
| extremely difficult to prosecute past behaviors, not
| because they strictly weren 't already cognizable crimes.
|
| Nobody is going to lose sleep over Weinstein, but long-
| term which demographics will bear the brunt of this
| tightening of the screws through the substantive law? You
| see the fundamental contradictory behavior here? There's
| tremendous overlap between the #MeToo groups and the BLM
| groups, and for both their demands are premised on
| empathy and justice, but at the end of the day we're
| going to end up with a harsher system that will further
| disproportionately punish some segments of the population
| over others. _That 's_ what systemic racial injustice
| looks like, yet nowhere can you find ill intentions or a
| desire to oppress anyone.
|
| There's an alternative path, here. Notice how the legal
| screws have taken _centuries_ to slowly but inexorably
| tighten without any concerted effort, yet in less than a
| single generation the normative behaviors of individual
| judges and other legal professionals, both as regards
| defendant rights (BLM) and victims rights (#MeToo) has
| seen a sea change. That suggests that by giving back more
| discretion to the system, not less, it 's _possible_ and,
| IMO, much more likely we could end up with a more fair
| system all around. Not guaranteed, of course, but neither
| is it guaranteed that just throwing more money and
| resources at the existing system would, even assuming we
| could even achieve let alone maintain that degree of
| attention from society. The difference between these two
| approaches, though, is that one requires _trusting_ our
| fellow citizens, while the other holds out the
| (fantastical) prospect of an engineered solution.
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| > _yet nowhere can you find ill intentions or a desire to
| oppress anyone_
|
| Well, you _can_. Its impact is heavily amplified, but
| there certainly are ill intentions and a desire to
| oppress people.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > And what dictator is going to implement this perfect
| solution?
|
| Nothing about it requires a dictator. You vote for
| politicians who repeal laws that don't have widespread
| consensus, when enough people vote for them they get
| repealed. Ideally you then do something that makes it
| more difficult to re-pass them.
|
| > Some high profile bad guys, or parade of run-of-the-
| mill criminals, get off because of said procedural
| loopholes
|
| The procedures aren't loopholes. They're prerequisites
| for a conviction. They by no means make a conviction
| impossible, but you have to do the work.
|
| > At the same time, you have #MeToo, Harvey Weinstein,
| etc, which has resulted in the expansion of sexual crimes
| and punishments, and elimination of statutes of
| limitations, partly because procedural protections have
| made it extremely difficult to prosecute past behaviors,
| not because they strictly weren't already cognizable
| crimes.
|
| The problem here is not procedural rules at all. It's
| evidentiary difficulties. How do you distinguish between
| someone who consents but then has regrets and changes
| their story, or someone who has sex with someone wealthy
| in order to extort them for money, and someone who was
| actually sexually assaulted?
|
| There is no perfect solution to that, but "innocent until
| proven guilty" is the only sane one. What you then need
| is a system that can uphold that standard even when there
| is pressure not to.
|
| > That suggests that by giving back more discretion to
| the system, not less, it's _possible_ and, IMO, much more
| likely we could end up with a more fair system all
| around.
|
| It suggests that when you give more discretion to the
| system and the system favors you at this moment in time,
| you get what you want, for now.
|
| But then there is another election and you may not like
| what someone else does with that discretion.
| wqaatwt wrote:
| So police should ignore all crimes other than murder?
| Because that's what you're going to get...
|
| e.g. nobody will prosecute any property related and
| others low level crimes (e.g. damage is less than
| hundreds or at least tens of thousands). Crime rates will
| increase and the system will collapse at some point.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| If you prosecute property crimes, you don't get a lot of
| property crimes, because prosecutions for that crime act
| as an effective deterrent and then the courts aren't
| overwhelmed with property crime cases even if the few
| cases they do get are full jury trials. You only get
| widespread property crime cases when you _don 't_
| prosecute them.
|
| By contrast, drug use has no theft victim to report the
| crime and then even harsh penalties don't act as a
| deterrent because detection rates are low and addiction
| is a stronger motivator than the spoils of petty theft.
| So you would stop prosecuting recreational drug use
| (compensating by increasing addiction treatment programs
| etc.), and thereby also eliminate all of the associated
| crimes as drug cartels murder over territory and drug
| users commit serious robberies to afford street drug
| prices that otherwise wouldn't cost more than a bottle of
| aspirin, avoiding the need to prosecute those either.
|
| At which point crime goes down and you can spend more
| resources prosecuting the remaining cases.
| antisol wrote:
| > because the legal/judicial system won't have enough
| resources to prosecute them?
|
| If your legal system doesn't have enough resources to
| prosecute 90% of people who are committing
| crimes.................................
|
| .......................................... then maybe the
| state should.............................................
|
| .................... wait for
| it...................................
|
| .....................................give the legal
| system more resources.
|
| (I know right, it's mindblowing, revolutionary,
| difficult-to-conceive stuff - I can see why nobody has
| thought of it before)
| KaiserPro wrote:
| You misunderstand the judge's role in this
|
| In common law, you are found guilty, and then sentenced.
| The judge does the sentencing, the jury finds you guilty
| or not.
|
| Then there is precedent. Guidelines are created based on
| caselaw, so if a simular type of case arrises, that forms
| the "expectation" of what the sentence will be.
|
| This means that you don't need specific levels of a
| crime. For example drug trafficking can be a single gram
| of coke for personal use, vs 15 tonnes for commercial
| exploitation. hence the range in sentences.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| Suppose you're charged with two crimes in two separate
| courts. The first is jaywalking, the second is murder,
| but the judge is given unlimited discretion to determine
| sentencing.
|
| To try to prove their jaywalking allegations, the
| prosecution in the first case claims that you were in a
| hurry to cross the street because you were trying to kill
| someone, and present some evidence of that from a
| questionable source. They also have separate video
| evidence of you crossing the street against the light.
| The jury convicts you of jaywalking.
|
| The judge in the jaywalking case then sentences you to
| life without parole, because jaywalking in order to
| murder someone is much more serious than most other
| instances of jaywalking. The prosecution in the other
| court then drops the murder charges, so the murder
| allegations were never actually proven anywhere.
|
| Is this reasonable? Should we be satisfied with how this
| works and not want to change anything about it?
| wahern wrote:
| That's not possible because jaywalking has a maximum
| penalty, and the judge can't exceed that maximum penalty.
|
| A proper analogy would be something like two crimes, A
| and B, both with the same statutorily defined maximum
| penalty--life imprisonment--but where the _typical_
| sentence for A is much less for B. The defendant is found
| guilty of A, but the judge uses aggravating evidence to
| sentence them as-if it were B. But that highlights the
| fundamental problem: why would we have both A and B with
| the same maximum penalty, both covering the same or
| similar behavior? Often the point of A is to make
| convictions easier because proving B proved too onerous
| in practice.
|
| What we want to get back to, and which almost every other
| jurisdiction implements around the world, including both
| systems thought to be far more fair than ours as well as
| less fair (for different reasons), is to have better
| tailored crimes, including penalties. One of the reasons
| we have so many felonies these days is because sentencing
| someone to jail for a single day on a misdemeanor offense
| for stealing a pack of gum for the 20th time can require
| a jury trial just as onerous as a felony offense with a
| 20 year sentence. Thus, if you want a more fair system,
| we probably may need to make it easier to sentence for
| smaller crimes with lighter sentences. IOW, lower the
| stakes so there isn't an arms race between punishment
| severity and procedural protections.
|
| Most countries don't even require juries or panels for
| serious crimes, let alone light (i.e. misdemeanor)
| offenses. The shift to granting jury trials for any
| offense carrying possible jail time started in the early
| 1900s via Progressive Era reforms. Today only NYC (just
| NYC, not New York state) and, I think, South Carolina are
| the only jurisdictions[1] that don't grant a right to
| jury trials for misdemeanor offenses with jail time as a
| permitted punishment. Some other states nominally only
| provide for juries for 3+ or 6+ months of jail, but
| procedural precedent has resulted in courts _effectively_
| extending the right to any offense carrying jail time.
|
| Note that the city of San Francisco has had for decades a
| public defender's office with equivalent or better
| resources (time, money, expertise) as the prosecutor's
| office, but the city sees the same interminable cycle as
| everywhere else.
|
| [1] Also I think Federal jurisdiction, but purely
| misdemeanor cases without the threat of felony charges at
| the Federal level are pretty rare.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > That's not possible because jaywalking has a maximum
| penalty, and the judge can't exceed that maximum penalty.
|
| That's part of the point. The maximum penalty for many
| nonviolent offenses is absurd.
|
| > One of the reasons we have so many felonies these days
| is because sentencing someone to jail for a single day on
| a misdemeanor offense for stealing a pack of gum for the
| 20th time can require a jury trial just as onerous as a
| felony offense with a 20 year sentence.
|
| But why is this a problem? The purpose of the trial is to
| deter the other million people who would have committed
| petty crimes if they weren't prosecuted. It doesn't
| matter if the trial costs ten thousand times more than
| the value of the stolen goods. Moreover, if the sentence
| would actually be one day then guilty people would just
| plead guilty without coercive plea bargaining because
| it's less trouble to serve one day in jail than to waste
| two weeks of your life going through a trial and then
| serve one day in jail anyway.
|
| Whereas if you're innocent you may very well be willing
| to spend two weeks at trial to clear your name, vs. the
| status quo where if you try to do that you'll be charged
| with a dozen vague offenses that everyone commits in the
| course of an ordinary day but are only charged against
| people who demand their day in court instead of accepting
| a plea for some other offense the prosecution isn't sure
| they can prove, all of which have coercively onerous
| penalties.
| KaiserPro wrote:
| Thats not how it works or what happened.
|
| You can only be given a sentence for the crime you have
| been convicted of, otherwise you could easily appeal.
|
| > Is this reasonable? Should we be satisfied with how
| this works and not want to change anything about it?
|
| It doesn't work like that, and I wouldn't be satisfied by
| a court system that does work like that. It'd fucking
| disastrous. If anyone convinces you that it does work
| like that, they are either a scammer, or want to make the
| law system _very_ scary.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habeas_corpus_in_the_United
| _St... which have been there for _many_ years. Its a
| common law principle that at least twice as old as the
| USA.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > You can only be given a sentence for the crime you have
| been convicted of, otherwise you could easily appeal.
|
| If you're convicted of a crime, let's say selling drugs,
| that carries a penalty of up to life in prison even
| though most people get 5-10 years, and then you're
| sentenced to life in prison after the person doing the
| sentencing is prejudiced by these murder allegations
| you've never been convicted of, what's your basis for
| appeal?
| gizmo wrote:
| > For example, prohibit plea bargaining so that all
| convictions require a trial and it's forbidden to impose
| any penalty for demanding one.
|
| Many in jail awaiting trial are very guilty and the
| outcome of the legal proceeding is effectively a foregone
| conclusion. Exchanging a shorter sentence for a plea
| makes sense for all parties. Prosecutors can then spend
| their court time arguing more important cases, judges
| don't have to patiently direct clown shows where guilt is
| extremely obvious, and the defendant gets a lesser
| sentence. There is plenty of abuse in the plea system,
| and no shortage of outrageous prosecutorial misconduct.
| But that doesn't invalidate the principle of plea
| bargaining. No justice system is perfect and without plea
| bargaining every defendant would have to spend a decade
| in jail, maybe two, before their case makes it in front
| of a judge. That isn't justice. Unless we assign
| everybody chatgpt lawyers, judges and juries giving
| everybody a trial is a practical impossibility.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > Many in jail awaiting trial are very guilty and the
| outcome of the legal proceeding is effectively a foregone
| conclusion. Exchanging a shorter sentence for a plea
| makes sense for all parties.
|
| Suppose we're talking about a case where it's a foregone
| conclusion. 0% chance that the defendant will be
| acquitted, never going to happen. Then the defendant
| should plead guilty and save themselves some time and
| effort regardless of whether it leads to a lesser
| sentence, right? You don't need to coerce them because
| they can't possibly gain anything.
|
| Now suppose that the chance _isn 't_ 0%, it's, say, 10%.
| Should we coerce these people into a guilty plea by
| giving them a 100% chance of six months vs. a 90% chance
| of five years? Out of a million of them, a hundred
| thousand would be found not guilty, so _no_.
|
| > No justice system is perfect and without plea
| bargaining every defendant would have to spend a decade
| in jail, maybe two, before their case makes it in front
| of a judge.
|
| This is why the right to a speedy trial exists, even
| though it has been eroded dramatically by basically
| making it a false choice between "you have your trial
| immediately with no chance to prepare a defense even
| though the prosecution has secretly been investigating
| you for months" and "you waive your right to a speedy
| trial entirely and rot in jail for years awaiting trial".
|
| The way it ought to work is that the defendant has a
| right to set a "not after" date where the prosecution
| either has to proceed or release them from jail and drop
| the charges, which gives them enough time to actually
| prepare a defense without opening the door to being
| detained indefinitely awaiting trial even after they're
| prepared. The prosecution already has this up until the
| statute of limitations has run, because they can already
| wait to file charges until they've prepared their case.
|
| > Unless we assign everybody chatgpt lawyers, judges and
| juries giving everybody a trial is a practical
| impossibility.
|
| Or we could just have fewer laws and then assign the
| resources necessary to prosecute the remaining more
| important ones.
|
| Notice that if you get rid of e.g. drug laws, you also
| get rid of all the murders and other crimes that come
| along with the existence of drug cartels, and the load on
| the courts goes down dramatically.
| hackingonempty wrote:
| He wasn't sentenced for attempted murder, the sentence
| Ulbricht received was within the range provided by
| statute for the crimes he was convicted of. Judges have
| discretion in sentencing and they are allowed to consider
| the character of the defendant. The fact that Ulbricht
| attempted to murder people was demonstrated to the judges
| satisfaction during the trial and influenced her to
| sentence at the higher end of the range allowed for the
| crimes he was duly convicted.
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| The range allowed for those sentences is way too wide.
| Life without parole is nowhere near reasonable for
| hacking, money laundering, and drugs. Being within the
| sentencing range is meaningless when the range
| encompasses any possible sentence.
| Muromec wrote:
| Well, just selling some drugs and laundering the money is
| one thing. Being some much a drug lord that you start a
| war on other drug lords is so much on a different level
| of severity that it could have been it's own article in a
| criminal code
| tveita wrote:
| His sentence was severe in part because he fell under the
| "kingping statute". This is based on the amount of drug
| trade he facilitated, the amount of money he made, and
| the actions he took as an "organizer". The hits didn't
| help.
|
| > For conviction under the statute, the offender must
| have been an organizer, manager, or supervisor of the
| continuing operation and have obtained substantial income
| or resources from the drug violations
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuing_Criminal_Enterpr
| ise...
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| > Being some much a drug lord that you start a war on
| other drug lords is so much on a different level of
| severity
|
| Is this a hypothetical or did I miss a big chunk of this
| story?
|
| If the war involves people being hurt, then conspiracy
| and instruction to injure and murder sound like great
| things to charge the drug lord with. If it doesn't, then
| I don't see the severity.
| mandevil wrote:
| Sentencing is complicated in the US. Generally speaking,
| they have a huge range and a standard for computing where
| one falls in that range, but everything within that range
| is open to judge's discretion. Life without parole was
| within that range for the crimes that Ulbricht was
| convicted of.
|
| This standard is an enormous document,
| https://www.ussc.gov/guidelines which lays out the rules
| for adjustments. Evidence is admissible (by both sides!)
| for sentencing, with a lower standard of evidence and
| burden of proof, to either raise or lower the sentence
| _within the very wide numbers of what the conviction was
| for._ So the Judge in this case found that the lower
| burden of proof was met for additional violent crimes
| being committed (with Ulbricht 's legal team having an
| opportunity to rebut), and that impacts the sentencing
| calculations.
|
| Not a lawyer, but I have listened to US lawyers on
| podcasts.
| jjallen wrote:
| Other acts of those charged are routinely brought up in
| trials. Fir example, criminals being charged with crime A
| that already committed similar crimes in the past are
| used to show that the likelihood of crime A being
| committed this time is higher.
| echoangle wrote:
| Sure, but then you should have to have a conviction on
| those other crimes. It's strange to consider stuff that
| wasn't proven. If the crime was committed and the state
| is sure, they should charge him and then use the first
| conviction in the sentencing for the second, if they want
| to.
| jjallen wrote:
| That's not what happens in practice. The other actions of
| those charged are absolutely brought in as evidence
| whether they were actual crimes or testimony from others
| that knew those charged. This happens all of the time.
| hammock wrote:
| > a higher standard than most apply in public discourse
|
| Is it? Preponderance of the evidence is basically "more
| likely than not"
| noirbot wrote:
| Yea, and most public discourse is at the level of "I saw
| a post online about it once". Most people aren't doing
| deep research before their opinions about things that
| aren't actually that relevant to their day to day lives.
| 95% of the world, at best, still has no idea who Ross
| Ulbricht is even today.
| torstenvl wrote:
| That's one way of phrasing it, and unfortunately some
| jurisdictions have adopted that phrase, but it is not
| correct.
|
| A preponderance of the evidence is the greater weight of
| the evidence after all evidence is considered. Heuristics
| along the lines of "yeah that fits my priors"--which is
| what is actually meant by "more likely than not"--are
| explicitly disallowed.
|
| If Joe Smith in Smalltown, Ohio was hit by a blue bus,
| and hammock owns 51 of the 100 blue buses in Smalltown
| whereas torstenvl owns 49 of the 100 blue buses, that is
| insufficient evidence by itself to prevail by a
| preponderance standard against hammock in a civil suit.
| hammock wrote:
| Thank you for correcting me, and great example
| rappatic wrote:
| Did you read my comment? I said:
|
| > even though the charge of hiring a contract killer to
| assassinate his business competition may have been dropped
|
| Just because the charge was dropped doesn't mean he's
| innocent of it. In fact, reading the chat logs makes his
| guilt pretty clear. Of course, because the whole operation
| was a scam, there's little he could have been convicted of.
| Yet just because the murder was never carried out doesn't
| mean he didn't _intend_ to have someone assassinated. In my
| book, paying someone money to kill another person is
| definitely grounds for imprisonment.
| scarab92 wrote:
| > Just because the charge was dropped doesn't mean he's
| innocent of it
|
| That's exactly what it means under the presumption of
| innocence.
|
| Advocating for the continued imprisonment of someone for
| something they are legally considered innocent of, is quite
| literally vigilantism.
| bko wrote:
| So you think people should be sentenced based on charges
| that were not proven in court?
| anigbrowl wrote:
| So you should apologize for not paying attention to the
| original comment before stamping in to 'correct' it. A
| little manners goes a long way.
| throwaway81523 wrote:
| That happens all the time, when people confess to a
| charge ahead of time, instead of proceeding to a trial.
| Remember that the purpose of the trial is to find out
| whether they are guilty when there is a factual dispute
| about that question. Here, I suppose the existence of a
| factual dispute is itself disputed: does _that_ need to
| go to a jury, or is it enough that the trial judge and
| the appeal court looked at the record and decided there
| wasn 't a dispute?
| ec109685 wrote:
| Confessing under the law is the same as being convicted
| though.
| throwaway81523 wrote:
| Certainly not always. Sometimes a person will confess a
| crime under immunity, and not be charged. Ulbricht didn't
| confess the murder for hire formally, and he wasn't
| charged with it. The controversy is that his role in it
| was used to influence the sentencing decision for a
| different crime.
| rappatic wrote:
| No. I'm talking more from an ethical standpoint. I think
| someone who hires contract killers _deserves_ to go to
| prison. I also think people shouldn 't be convicted for
| charges that were not proven in court. As I said before,
| in Ross' case, the charge was dropped.
| ekianjo wrote:
| > Just because the charge was dropped doesn't mean he's
| innocent of it.
|
| If you had a trial and they can't prove that, then yes it
| means you are innocent of this charge in the eyes of the
| law
| ktallett wrote:
| Ah that's not strictly true. I believe Scotland is the
| only place in the world I am aware of where there is
| Innocent, unproven, and Guilty verdicts. I believe in
| reality a not guilty verdict is, we didn't have the
| evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt this person
| committed the crime. Finding someone not guilty is a
| legal term. Considering whether someone is innocent or
| not is more of a moral/factual term.
| megapolitics wrote:
| > I believe in reality a not guilty verdict is, we didn't
| have the evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt this
| person committed the crime.
|
| That's a description of the Scottish "not proven"
| verdict, not a "not guilty" verdict.
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| That's _also_ a description of the "not guilty" verdict.
| Guilty is "beyond a reasonable doubt", and "not guilty"
| is those circumstances that are not Guilty.
| ktallett wrote:
| Not proven in Scotland and not guilty in almost every
| other country are the equivalent. Innocent is the outlier
| verdict in Scotland that the rest of the world doesn't
| have.
| tptacek wrote:
| The case for this was dropped _because_ he was sentenced
| for it in the other case.
| duxup wrote:
| The other user directly addressed that in his comment.
| nuclearnice3 wrote:
| This opinion [1] from the judge in his case indicates that
| the murder-for-hire evidence was admitted during his trial.
| The document outlines the evidence for all 6 murder for hire
| allegations and explains why, although not charged, the
| evidence is relevant to his case.
|
| [1] https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1
| 391...
| simonsarris wrote:
| This opinion (after appeal) also details how they taken
| into consideration with sentencing. See pages 130-131
|
| https://pbwt2.gjassets.com/content/uploads/2017/05/15-1815_
| o...
| srj wrote:
| It's surprising to me that the prosecutor is allowed to
| essentially insinuate crimes to influence the jury, without
| the need to prove them. That seems to undermine the process
| because it creates a "there's smoke so there must be fire"
| mentality for the jury.
| tveita wrote:
| There was plenty of evidence that he ordered the hits,
| and the defense had the opportunity to address the
| evidence in court. The chat logs go far beyond
| "insinuation"
|
| It's ridiculous that people are pretending there is any
| doubt about his guilt because they like crypto and/or
| drugs.
| echoangle wrote:
| So why not properly charge him then?
|
| Do you not think the optics are a bit weird when you
| sentence someone to life for something relatively small,
| but the reason is another crime you're very sure he did
| but you didn't bother to charge him with?
| tveita wrote:
| Being a drug kingpin is not considered "something
| relatively small" under US law, as you can see from the
| sentencing. Being the leader of a large drug operation
| and ordering hits to protect your business would be
| considered worse than trying to take out a hit for
| whatever "personal reasons".
|
| Obviously the hits are a lot messier to prosecute as well
| with the misconduct of the FBI agents, maybe you could
| hammer that enough to confuse a jury. But people are
| commenting like the evidence outright didn't exist - I
| can only think they have either heard it told second-
| hand, or are employing motivated reasoning.
| olalonde wrote:
| Prosecutors often choose not to pursue additional charges
| against someone already serving a life sentence. This
| approach helps avoid wasting court time and resources on
| cases that are unlikely to change the individual's
| circumstances or contribute meaningfully to justice (none
| of the murders for hire resulted in victims).
|
| I actually wonder if those charges may still be on the
| table now that a pardon has been granted.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosecutorial_discretion
| philjohn wrote:
| AFAIK they were dismissed with prejudice, so can't be
| brought again.
| olalonde wrote:
| If I understand correctly, only one of the "murder-for-
| hire" allegations was dismissed with prejudice[0].
| However, he was suspected of orchestrating a total of six
| "murder-for-hire" plots.
|
| [0] https://freeross.org/false-allegations/
| myko wrote:
| Comically (horrifically sadly?) they were dismissed that
| way because he was already in prison for life with no
| possibility of getting out, so the court did not want to
| waste time on it.
|
| And here we are
| lII1lIlI11ll wrote:
| Of course it is. Throwing in potential evidence of
| unrelated crimes to sway other people's (specifically
| jury's) opinion about the defendant without formally
| charging him is exactly what the word "insinuation"
| means[0]:
|
| the action of suggesting, without being direct, that
| something unpleasant is true
|
| [0]: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/
| insinuat...
| sebzim4500 wrote:
| > There was plenty of evidence that he ordered the hits,
| and the defense had the opportunity to address the
| evidence in court
|
| Clearly not that much evidence if the state didn't bother
| to prosecute those charges. And why would they? The judge
| sentenced him as though he had been found guilty of them.
| RetpolineDrama wrote:
| It's a gross miscarriage of justice.
|
| The gov should have to prove you committed a crime before
| that information is admissible at sentencing.
| smcin wrote:
| The first person in the murder-for-hire allegations
| 'FriendlyChemist' was an undercover DEA agent or informant,
| and it's strongly possible none of the other people
| existed. It's also conjectured the hitman account
| 'Redandwhite' was being operated by the same DEA agent [*].
| Moreover the bitcoin DPR sent the supposed hitman
| 'Redandwhite' sat in the wallet from 3/2013 till 8/2013,
| "which alone should have tipped out DPR about a possible
| scam" ie. that the killing never happened [0]. DPR never
| requested any confirmation pictures of at least 5 of the
| (fictitious) killings, nor was there any Canadian media
| coverage to suggest anyone got assassinated on the supposed
| dates.
|
| The US Attorneys made a lot of publicity out of the murder-
| for-hire conspiracy allegations against Ulbricht in their
| indictments and in pre-trial media ( _" although there is
| no evidence that these murders were actually carried out."_
| as the indictment itself obliquely says).
|
| Ulbricht's defense could have come up with a plausible
| alternative explanations that he knew redandwhite was a
| scammer trying to extort him with a story involving
| nonexistent people, and was just playing along with him for
| whatever reasons.
|
| [*] If the prosecution had not actually dropped those
| charges at trial, it would have been confirmed at trial
| which of the six identities were fictitious/nonexistent and
| whether all the accounts were managed by the same DEA
| agents. Hard to imagine that at least one juror wouldn't
| have formed a skeptical opinion about government agents
| extorting a person to conspire to kill fictitious people
| (why didn't the indictment just focus on nailing him on the
| lesser charges?). If this wasn't a Turing Test on when is
| an alleged conspiracy not a real conspiracy, then someday
| soon we'll see one.
|
| ArsTechnica covered these facts in 2015:
|
| [0]: "The hitman scam: Dread Pirate Roberts' bizarre
| murder-for-hire attempts. On the darkweb, no one is who
| they seem." 2/2015 https://arstechnica.com/tech-
| policy/2015/02/the-hitman-scam-...
|
| [1]: Silk Road's alleged hitman, "redandwhite," arrested in
| Vancouver https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/11/silk-
| roads-alleg...
| stefan_ wrote:
| 99% of paid hitmen were and are just cops. They catch
| plenty of people with real plans all the same.
| smcin wrote:
| You missed that the "victims" did not exist and were
| invented (and Ulbricht's defense could have claimed that
| he was aware of that, and it would only need one juror to
| find that credible). I'm pointedly asking what a "real"
| plan is if it involves fictitious people invented by the
| two govt agents - both of whom (Bridges and Force)
| subsequently went to prison for corruption. If the
| conspiracy-to-commit-murder charges hadn't been dropped,
| cross-examining Bridges and Force likely would have
| destroyed the prosecution case (for conspiracy to commit
| murder).
|
| UPDATE: apparently I'm wrong that "factual impossibility"
| is not a defense [0]. But Bridges and Force's criminal
| behavior tainted the prosecution case on this charge.
| Presumably why the prosecution made sure those two agents
| were not mentioned in the trial.
|
| [0]: https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/62360/can-
| you-charge...
| GTP wrote:
| > You missed that the "victims" did not exist and were
| invented (and Ulbricht's defense could have claimed that
| he was aware of that, and it would only need one juror to
| find that credible).
|
| But now we're playing legal tricks here. The real
| question would be if Ulbricht was willing to have people
| killed or not, regardless of what the defense can claim.
|
| EDIT: just to be clear. Legally, I think it makes a big
| difference if someone decides to have someone else
| killed, tries to hire an hitman and that hitman turns out
| to be a policeman in disguise vs a policeman in disguise
| telling you "there are people doing something that is bad
| for you, should I kill them?". And it is perfectly right
| that the second case is crossing a line. But form a moral
| perspective, if someone answers "yes" in the second case,
| that still tells us a lot about that person, regardless
| of whether those people existed or not. The important
| thing is that those people were real in this person's
| mind.
| formerly_proven wrote:
| " I would like to put a bounty on his head if it's not
| too much trouble for you. What would be an adequate
| amount to motivate you to find him? Necessities like this
| do happen from time to time for a person in my position.
| I have others I can turn to, but it is always good to
| have options and you are close to the case right now.
| [...] As you don't take kindly to thieves, this kind of
| behavior is unforgivable to me. Especially here on Silk
| Road, anonymity is sacrosanct. It doesn't have to be
| clean, and I don't think there are any funds to be
| retrieved [...] Not long ago, I had a clean hit done for
| $80k. Are the prices you quoted the best you can do? I
| would like this done asap [...] I've only ever
| commissioned the one other hit, so I'm still learning
| this market. I have no problem putting my faith in you
| and I am sure you will do a good job. The exchange rate
| is above 90 right now, so at $90/btc, $150k is about 1670
| btc. If the market tanks in the next few days, I will
| send more. Here are some random numbers for a picture:
| 83746102 Here is the transaction # for 1670 btc to 1MwvS1
| idEevZ5gd428TjL3hB2kHaBH9WTL4a0a5b6036c0da84c3eb9c2a884b6
| ad72416d1758470e19fb1d2fa2a145b5601 Good luck"
|
| lmao
|
| If that isn't conspiracy to murder, I'm not sure there is
| anything that would qualify.
| GTP wrote:
| I don't have knowledge of how the message exchange went.
| But if it was Ulbricht to contact the supposed hitman in
| the first place, then you're right that there isn't much
| to discuss about. Policeman in disguise or not, it is an
| attempt to murder someone.
| smcin wrote:
| FWIW, the two agents in the Ulbricht case, Shaun Bridges
| and Carl Mark Force IV, both subsequently went to prison
| for corruption, money-laundering etc. which they were
| perpetrating at the same time as the Ulbricht
| investigation, and tainted a lot of other prosecutions.
|
| [0] gives a timeline and fills in lots of details.
|
| Article [1] describes Bridges:
|
| > _Bridges was a cryptocurrency expert [... with offshore
| entities, including one that he had created after
| pleading guilty in this case]. According to AUSA Haun,
| his involvement with digital currency cases across the
| country caused a "staggering" number of investigations to
| become tainted, and subsequently shut down. She told the
| judge at Bridges's sentencing that the corrupt agent had
| been looking out for opportunities to serve seizure
| warrants and somehow profit from it._
|
| > _The prosecutor also said that bitcoins were still
| missing, and they weren't sure if he had worked with
| other corrupt agents. The US Attorney's Office seemed to
| imply that there had been a lot of weird (but not
| necessarily chargeable) stuff that was still unaccounted
| for._
|
| Article [2] describes Force:
|
| > _[Force 's mental health issues]... his previous
| undercover assignments had ended disastrously. An
| assignment in Denver in 2004 had ended with a DUI. A
| second undercover assignment in Puerto Rico had ended in
| 2008 with a complete mental breakdown. Force was
| institutionalized, and did not return to his job until
| 2010. He was on desk duty until 2012, when he was
| assigned to investigate the Silk Road._
|
| [0]: "Investigating The Staged Assassinations Of Silk
| Road" 11/2021 https://bitcoinmagazine.com/culture/inside-
| silk-road-staged-...
|
| [1]: "Great Moments in Shaun Bridges, a Corrupt Silk Road
| Investigator" 2/2016
| https://www.vice.com/en/article/great-moments-in-shaun-
| bridg...
|
| [2]: "DEA Agent Who Faked a Murder and Took Bitcoins from
| Silk Road Explains Himself" 10//2015
| https://www.vice.com/en/article/dea-agent-who-faked-a-
| murder...
|
| [1] was previously posted on HN 2/2016:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11037889
| barrkel wrote:
| To my mind, it doesn't matter whether a murder actually
| occurred for Ulbricht's culpability. He thought he was
| ordering a murder, he solicited proof, he got proof, and
| he asked for more hits. In his frame, someone was
| murdered on his orders. It's a burden to prove for sure,
| but the fact that he paid substantial cash equivalents in
| bitcoin to me mean he didn't think he was playing some
| fantasy game with scammers.
| empathy_m wrote:
| The chat logs show that he was quite stoic about the
| whole thing and treated it as a mundane business action
| to protect himself ("is a liability and I wouldn't mind
| if..."; "I've received the picture and deleted it. Thank
| you again for your swift action.").
|
| Given that he is now free, and may have access to
| substantial cryptocurrency wealth, I think it would
| probably be best under the circumstances if everyone
| forgot about these allegations and just left him alone to
| live a quiet life.
| meowface wrote:
| This spin is so good that you should be a defense
| attorney.
| cwillu wrote:
| That's a nice end-run around "innocent until proven
| guilty": they didn't have to prove anything about those
| allegations beyond making them, because he wasn't charged
| with them.
| lmm wrote:
| I don't see how that should change anyone's opinion on
| whether the sentence was deserved. Whether it was
| legally/procedurally correct, sure. Whether he didn't get the
| day in court he should have had, sure. But given that no-one
| seems to seriously dispute that he did try to pay to have the
| guy killed, what he deserves is a long prison sentence, and
| whether that's imposed by a court doing things properly, a
| court doing things improperly, or a vigilante kidnapper isn't
| really here or there on that point.
|
| (The rule of law is important, and we may let off people who
| deserve harsh sentences for the sake of preserving it, but it
| doesn't mean they deserve those sentences any less)
| mvdtnz wrote:
| You say the rule of law is important, but also we should
| impose extra-legal long sentences even if the rule of law
| doesn't allow us to? How do you reconcile this perspective?
| lmm wrote:
| I say people sometimes deserve sentences longer than that
| which the law imposes on them. I didn't say anything
| about what we should do in that case.
| lotharcable wrote:
| > The rule of law is important,
|
| The rule of law says innocent until proven guilty.
|
| The reason they didn't go after him for murder for hire
| allegations isn't because they felt bad for him or that
| they didn't want to waste tax payer's money.
|
| The reason they didn't go after him for 'murder for hire'
| was that they knew there was no merit in it.
|
| This is self evident.
| tptacek wrote:
| They did go after him for "murder for hire"; the murders
| were part of his conspiracy predicates, and evidence for
| them was introduced. This stuff about him not being taken
| all the way through a case charged on murder-for-hire,
| after receiving a life sentence in a case where those
| murders were part of the case, is just message board jazz
| hands.
| trhway wrote:
| >case where those murders were part of the case, is just
| message board jazz hands.
|
| you're trying to look like you don't understand or aren't
| aware that jury didn't convict him of murder-for-hire.
|
| He chose a trial by jury, not by a judge. Nevertheless
| the judge herself decided that he is guilty of the
| murder-for-hire, and additionally the judge used
| significantly lower standard than required for
| conviction.
| tptacek wrote:
| That's not what happened at all. You can just read the
| filings on PACER; I'm sure they're all free on
| Courtlistener by now.
| pcthrowaway wrote:
| > But given that no-one seems to seriously dispute that he
| did try to pay to have the guy killed
|
| If there was enough evidence to demonstrate that he
| attempted to murder someone, why wasn't he charged and
| convicted of it?
|
| Also, 2 of the DEA agents involved in his investigation
| were convicted of fraud in relation to the case.
|
| I do believe he probably did attempt to have someone
| killed, but I'm far from certain of it, and think it should
| have no bearing on the case if there's not enough evidence
| to convict him.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| I don't think he did. The guy who he allegedly ordered a
| hit on doesn't believe it and argued for Ross's release.
| ddorian43 wrote:
| Reminds me of some story where a woman petitioned for the
| killer of her relative to be released, and after release
| the killer killed that woman.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| Strange because it reminds me of some story where an
| innocent man was framed for murder and a compassionate
| relative of the murder victim argued for their release
| and the innocent man went on to live a productive and
| happy life.
| GTP wrote:
| This might be a case of conflict of interest though, as
| saying instead that Ulbricht _did_ ask him to kill
| someone could worsen the legal position of the alleged
| hitman as well, depending on the specific circumstances
| of the case.
| fogof wrote:
| > If there was enough evidence to demonstrate that he
| attempted to murder someone, why wasn't he charged and
| convicted of it?
|
| Wikipedia suggests this was because he was already
| sentenced to double life imprisonment. Clearly
| prosecutors should not waste time pursuing charges that
| won't really impact a criminal's status, do you disagree?
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Ulbricht#Trial
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| If they don't "waste time pursuing charges that won't
| really impact" the sentence then the unproven allegations
| should not be allowed to impact the sentence. You can't
| have it both ways.
| formerly_proven wrote:
| You keep claiming these are unproven allegations despite
| this being demonstrably untrue and others repeatedly
| pointing that out all over this thread.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| They're unproven allegations because "proven allegations"
| mean something specific, i.e. that it was charged as a
| count and the jury rendered a verdict of guilty. This is
| especially important when it's not at all clear they
| _could have_ proven it as a separate count, because those
| allegations were tainted by significant law enforcement
| credibility issues.
| tzs wrote:
| What a lot of people are overlooking is that there were
| two separate indictments in two separate courts with two
| separate prosecution teams.
|
| In one indictment, in a New York federal court, he was
| charged with several crimes, but not murder-for-hire. In
| the other indictment, in a Maryland federal court, he was
| charged just with murder-for-hire.
|
| The case in New York went to trial first. The murder-for-
| hire evidence was introduced in that court as part of
| trying to prove some of the elements of the other
| charges.
|
| For example to prove a charge of engaging in a continuing
| criminal enterprise one of the elements is that the
| person occupied "a position of organizer, a supervisory
| position, or any other position of management". Evidence
| that a person is trying to hire hitmen to protect the
| enterprise is evidence that they occupy such a role.
|
| After the convictions and sentencing in the New York
| trial were upheld on appeal, the prosecutors in Maryland
| dropped their case because he was then in jail, for life,
| with no possibility of parole. They said it was a better
| use of resources to focus on cases where justice had not
| yet been served.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > What a lot of people are overlooking is that there were
| two separate indictments in two separate courts with two
| separate prosecution teams.
|
| They're not overlooking this, they're criticizing it.
|
| Suppose you have to prove that someone occupied "a
| position of organizer, a supervisory position, or any
| other position of management" so you introduce several
| pieces of evidence to try to prove it, one of them is
| some sketchy murder for hire allegations from a low-
| credibility source. The jury then convicts on the
| conspiracy charge without indicating whether they
| believed the murder for hire claim was proved beyond a
| reasonable doubt.
|
| Should you now use the murder for hire claim to determine
| sentencing for the conspiracy charge? No, that's crazy,
| it's a much more serious crime and they should have to
| charge and prove that as a separate count if they want it
| to affect the penalty.
| tzs wrote:
| > one of them is some sketchy murder for hire allegations
| from a low-credibility source
|
| The source is a bunch of chat records from Ulbricht's
| seized laptop. There's a fairly detailed description of
| the evidence here [1].
|
| [1] https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documen
| ts/1391...
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| The issue is that the law enforcement agent investigating
| the allegation had serious credibility issues, but the
| same agent had access to the laptop, so now you have a
| chain of custody problem. How much of the chat logs are
| real and how much of them are made up by this guy who was
| convicted for extorting Ulbricht?
|
| In particular, the chat logs allegedly contain multiple
| separate instances of murder for hire, but then the claim
| that Ulbricht had already been sentenced to life without
| parole as the reason these claims were never prosecuted
| doesn't make sense, because a conspiracy to commit murder
| has multiple parties, so where are the murder
| prosecutions of these alleged contract killers and co-
| conspirators?
| jmb99 wrote:
| > But given that no-one seems to seriously dispute that he
| did try to pay to have the guy killed,
|
| It's my understanding in the US that you are innocent until
| proven guilty, right? Therefore, he is indeed innocent of
| those crimes, since he was not proven guilty. Unless I'm
| missing something on how the US justice system works.
| drdeca wrote:
| Their comment wasn't about what was legally right. I
| thought the part where they said something like
| "regardless of whether it is by courts doing things
| properly, by courts doing things improperly, or by some
| vigilante" made that clear enough?
|
| Whether someone morally deserves a punishment for a crime
| depends on whether they actually did it, not on whether
| they are considered innocent in the eyes of the law.
|
| Of course, I don't generally support vigilantism , so I
| don't think people should try to make other people get
| what _they think_ the other people deserve as punishment.
| But, that doesn't mean that people can't deserve worse
| than the law prescribes, just that people shouldn't like,
| try to deliver what they think the deserts are.
| victorbjorklund wrote:
| That is just the "legal" system. Not whether someone is
| morally guilty or not.
|
| Hitler was never convicted of the holocaust in a court of
| law. Does that make him morally innocent? No.
|
| Bin Ladin was never convicted of 9/11 in a court of law.
| Does that make him morally innocent? No.
| empathy_m wrote:
| Honestly any time I read the procedural history of this stuff
| I get nerd sniped by the bizarre details and I lose track of
| the big picture. I feel like the whole thing could be three
| competing Dateline NBC style six-part crime specials and I
| still wouldn't get tired of it.
|
| Ross heard that one of his Silk Roads moderators was
| arrested, and so he hired someone to kill the mod? The
| assassin sent a confirmation photo of his mod, asphyxiated
| and covered in Campbell's Chicken and Stars Soup?? The
| supposed assassin was actually a corrupt DEA agent who later
| served federal prison time for crimes so embarrassing that
| they were never fully disclosed?!?!
|
| There is some kind of thorny moral question I cannot quite
| wrap my brain around.
|
| Ross did not successfully have anyone killed, but it seems
| that he must have thought he was successful?
|
| Ross (it is alleged, and chat logs seem to show) ordered
| someone's death and paid for it and got explicit confirmation
| that they were dead. [actually several someones.] Did he feel
| like a murderer at this point? What a fascinating, real life
| Raskolnikov style figure.
|
| Later, perhaps much later, he gets strong evidence that the
| murder was fake. Nothing has changed in the outside world
| after he learns this -- the victim is no more alive before or
| after he learns this. Does this change his identity? Is he
| more or less of a murderer than before?
|
| Do the people who kill with modified Xbox controllers from a
| warehouse in Las Vegas do the same kind of killing that Ross
| thought he did?
|
| And then there is some kind of moral thought experiment
| happening at a Silicon Valley Rationalist, Effective Altruism
| kind of scale that I can't quite wrap my head around. Do
| people matter as much in person as if they're just blips on a
| screen you'll never meet? If Ross could have sent 1 BTC to
| prevent fatal malaria in a dozen young kids, thousands of
| miles away, but he didn't, should he feel responsible in some
| way for their death? Is he about equally responsible for them
| as for the online people he is pretty sure he ordered killed
| from afar, but never met?
|
| It's just a lot. The whole story is supernaturally intense;
| it's hard to believe it was real. It will make for great TV.
|
| See, e.g.
|
| - https://www.vice.com/en/article/murdered-silk-road-
| employee-... for the faux forum moderator killing
|
| - https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/silk-road-drug-
| vendor-w... for the other faux five killings (another scam on
| Ross - he thought he was having extortionists killed? he kept
| getting confirmations?)
| krupan wrote:
| This should be a top level comment. This whole thing is so
| much more complicated than, "man sells drugs and gets life
| sentence." I too cannot wait for the documentaries
| chrisco255 wrote:
| Does anyone know if Ross had a jury trial and if not, why
| not?
| mihaaly wrote:
| He had a jury trial.
| pg5 wrote:
| Couldn't you buy stuff on Silk Road that would ruin your
| life, like meth or heroin? If true, not exactly a victimless
| crime to run the site.
| butlike wrote:
| You can buy sugar at the grocery store which can ruin your
| life. What's your point? People can get addicted to
| anything.
| 77pt77 wrote:
| > has done great work during his time in prison
|
| What work?
| sunnybeetroot wrote:
| He set up an excellent in prison market
| OccamsMirror wrote:
| He's known to locate certain things from time to time.
| reg_dunlop wrote:
| I'm more interested in the subtext of the pardon.
|
| Why this person specifically? And why at this time? Perhaps the
| discussion shouldn't be about the actual subject of the pardon,
| and perhaps more about the motives of the pardoner...
| Y_Y wrote:
| Bitcoin
| orblivion wrote:
| Trump came to the Libertarian Party convention and
| specifically promised to free Ross if he got their support.
| He actually promised a commutation; I wonder why he upgraded
| to pardon. He also promised a libertarian in his cabinet; oh
| well.
|
| The LP chairwoman has made very interesting political moves
| this election.
| mrandish wrote:
| Yeah, I'm pleased that Ross is out after serving over 10
| years, but I wish it had been a commutation. He was guilty.
| The problem is the judge wildly over sentencing. Ten years
| served is about right for what he was convicted of.
| briandear wrote:
| The problem was the miscarriage of justice.
| jyap wrote:
| His original sentence was life imprisonment without the
| possibility of parole.
|
| So you can't agree with the original sentence and then say he
| "absolutely deserved to be released."
|
| Without the chance of parole, a pardon from the president is
| one of the few ways he could get out of jail.
| rappatic wrote:
| Good point, you are absolutely correct. Then I suppose life
| "with the possibility of parole" would have been a more
| appropriate sentence, though I don't know if that's typically
| given. In any case, I feel prisons ought to release prisoners
| if they demonstrate exceptional rehabilitation and remorse,
| as Ross has, though of course that's a difficult line to draw
| in practice.
| ascorbic wrote:
| Life imprisonment - with or without parole - for a non-
| violent crime still seems excessive. If they'd convicted
| him of conspiracy to murder for hiring the hitman then
| that's a different matter.
| ty6853 wrote:
| He only allegedly needed to hire a hitman because the
| government invented the whole blackmail scenario behind
| it. You can't make this shit up, Silk Road was extra evil
| because it lead to the government creating hitmen and
| reasons to use them.
|
| We need gangster hoodlums on the street because lookie
| here sonny, an online marketplace is dangerous and if it
| isn't dangerous enough well feds will make it that way.
| Thorrez wrote:
| >He only allegedly needed to hire a hitman
|
| You don't need to hire a hitman when someone blackmails
| you.
| rbanffy wrote:
| The non-violent crime part doesn't work for me. He acted
| as an enabler to countless violent crimes. That's quite
| clear.
| naasking wrote:
| > He acted as an enabler to countless violent crimes.
|
| I don't like this argument of imputing transitive guilt.
| If guilt is imputed indirectly, then all of us are guilty
| of many things, like atrocities that our countries have
| perpetrated during war.
| rbanffy wrote:
| He actively and deliberately enabled those activities for
| self benefit.
|
| Also punishing a people for actions of their government
| is a war crime.
| naasking wrote:
| > Also punishing a people for actions of their government
| is a war crime
|
| Right, because we recognize that indirect, transitive
| blame is ethically problematic.
|
| > He actively and deliberately enabled those activities
| for self benefit.
|
| So did the Sacklers with the opioid epidemic, arguably
| even more directly than Ulbricht. Which of them is in
| prison?
|
| "Enabling" is exactly the kind of weasel word that I find
| problematic. It has no strict definition and can be
| broadened to suit whatever is needed to condemn an action
| you happen to dislike in any given scenario.
| rbanffy wrote:
| > So did the Sacklers with the opioid epidemic, arguably
| even more directly than Ulbricht. Which of them is in
| prison?
|
| Do you think two wrongs make a right?
| BargirPezza wrote:
| He was steering the biggest black market on darknet, that
| is pretty bad
| Thorrez wrote:
| >if they demonstrate exceptional rehabilitation and
| remorse, as Ross has
|
| He seems to be denying that he hired hitmen:
|
| https://youtu.be/zHMVyr5NjEY?si=GC1RhHhgLxe8gUOL&t=801
| ec109685 wrote:
| Commuting is the typical response for "he was totally guilty
| but sentenced too long".
| ttul wrote:
| As an aside, in Canada, a sentence of life without parole is
| considered unlawful because it conflicts with Section 12 of
| the Charter guarantees that individuals have the right not to
| be subjected to cruel and unusual punishment. Courts have
| ruled that life without the possibility of parole deprives
| offenders of any hope of rehabilitation or reintegration into
| society, which could amount to cruel and unusual treatment.
|
| A sentence must balance the gravity of the offense with the
| circumstances of the offender, while still allowing for hope
| and redemption. A life sentence without parole forecloses
| this balance.
|
| It's always struck me as odd that the United States - a
| nation that is packed with far more Christians than Canada -
| doesn't shape its system of incarceration to be more inline
| with Christian values and the teachings of Jesus.
|
| Canada's explicit rejection of life sentences without parole
| (LWOP) through decisions like R v Bissonnette more closely
| aligns with Jesus's teachings about redemption and mercy. In
| Canada, even those convicted of the most serious crimes
| retain the possibility of parole - not a guarantee of
| release, but a recognition of the potential for
| rehabilitation that echoes Jesus's teachings about
| transformation and second chances.
|
| This philosophical difference manifests in several ways:
|
| - In Canada, the emphasis on rehabilitation over retribution
| is reflected in the term "correctional services" rather than
| "penitentiary system"
|
| - Canadian prisons generally offer more rehabilitative
| programs and education opportunities
|
| - The Canadian system places greater emphasis on Indigenous
| healing lodges and restorative justice practices that align
| with Jesus's focus on healing broken relationships
|
| - Canadian courts have explicitly recognized that denying
| hope of release violates human dignity, which parallels
| Jesus's teachings about the inherent worth of every person
|
| The contrast becomes particularly stark when considering
| multiple murders. While many US jurisdictions impose multiple
| life sentences to be served consecutively (effectively
| ensuring death in prison), the Canadian Supreme Court has
| ruled this practice unconstitutional, maintaining that even
| the worst offenders should retain the possibility - though
| not guarantee - of earning redemption through genuine
| rehabilitation.
|
| This doesn't mean Canada is soft on crime - serious offenders
| still serve lengthy sentences, and parole is never
| guaranteed. But the maintenance of hope for eventual
| redemption, even in the worst cases, better reflects Jesus's
| teachings about grace, transformation, and the limitless
| possibility of spiritual renewal.
|
| The irony is particularly pointed given that the US has a
| much higher proportion of self-identified Christians than
| Canada, yet has adopted a more retributive approach that
| seems less aligned with Jesus's teachings about mercy and
| redemption.
|
| But hey, you just have to wait for the right president to be
| elected and you might get your chance. So I guess that's
| something.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > It's always struck me as odd that the United States - a
| nation that is packed with far more Christians than Canada
| - doesn't shape its system of incarceration to be more
| inline with Christian values and the teachings of Jesus.
|
| Canada didn't have Prohibition to the extent that the US
| did, which in turn led to the rise and financing of
| organized crime. All the rest of it fell out of that:
| Organized crime was violent and ruthless, so people started
| demanding oppressive laws and harsh penalties to deal with
| it.
|
| One of the major problems with this is that the cycle is
| reinforced by law enforcement. You sensibly get rid of
| prohibition, but then the mob is still around and starts
| looking for a new source of funding, so you get more
| extortion rackets etc. Then a law enforcement bureaucracy
| is created to deal with it, but long-term the mob was going
| to die out without prohibition anyway and the law
| enforcement efforts just speed it up a bit. Except now you
| have a law enforcement bureaucracy with nothing to do, so
| they lobby to recreate Prohibition in the form of the
| Controlled Substances Act, which reconstitutes the mob in
| the form of the drug cartels.
|
| But now instead of saying "prohibition failed, let's repeal
| it" they say "we need more resources" -- _institutions try
| to preserve the problem to which they are they solution_.
| So the Feds fight any attempts to legalize drugs because it
| would put them out of a job, but as long as there is
| prohibition there is organized crime, and organized crime
| is violent and terrible and a ratchet to ever-harsher
| penalties.
| jmb99 wrote:
| > Canada didn't have Prohibition to the extent that the
| US did, which in turn led to the rise and financing of
| organized crime. All the rest of it fell out of that:
| Organized crime was violent and ruthless, so people
| started demanding oppressive laws and harsh penalties to
| deal with it.
|
| Canada definitely had (has?) organized crime in that era,
| although maybe not to the extent the US did. Check out
| the Papalias[1] (my great great uncle was a quasi-crooked
| cop on their payroll), as well as the Musitanos and
| Luppinos, for a couple southern-Ontario examples. There's
| still a (relatively) small but fairly influential Italian
| mafia presence in a lot of smaller southern Ontario
| cities, and at least a few of the Papalias are still
| living off of family money (my family's cottage,
| ironically not the side with the crooked great great
| uncle, is next door to one of the Papalia's cottages).
|
| Hamilton is the way it is today in large part due to the
| mob activity from the 40s-90s.
|
| [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papalia_crime_family
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| The article describes a crime family whose roots started
| in Canada's shorter and less comprehensive experiment
| with prohibition, after which they got involved with
| smuggling heroin into the US.
|
| If something happens to a lesser extent and what does
| happen has a lot of the consequences spill over into the
| US, it's not that surprising that the backlash is more
| severe in the US.
| ipaddr wrote:
| On the surface but then they label you a dangerous offender
| and they keep you in jail. Paul Bernardino is a good
| example.
|
| The differences in the system probably have more to do with
| electing vs appointing. Electing is more likely to send
| someone tougher on crime vs well balance.If officials were
| elected in Canada you would see the same outcome.
|
| Not to mention private vs public prisons and when you make
| it a business you have to find new customers vs a cost
| center you want to limit.
| andypi_swfc wrote:
| It's very rare to see someone commenting on a HN from a
| orthodox (small o) Christian perspective. Thank you - some
| good points. But I'm very suspect that Trump made his
| decision on Ulbricht based on Jesus teachings, and even
| more suspect that the people who vote for him based their
| decision on Jesus teachings, despite any religious
| affiliation they may have. I think Paul Graham's recent
| article on the original of wokeness is very instructive
| here - there's always someone or some group to look down
| on, to make ourselves feel better, whatever side of the
| fence we are on. Cancel culture of the far left or
| progressive Christians, look them up and throw away the
| key, lack of grace by conservative Christians, it amounts
| to the same thing. (I'm a British Christian)
|
| 9 To some who were confident of their own righteousness and
| looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: 10
| "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and
| the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood by himself
| and prayed: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other
| people--robbers, evildoers, adulterers--or even like this
| tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week and give a tenth of
| all I get.'
|
| 13 "But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not
| even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, 'God,
| have mercy on me, a sinner.'
|
| 14 "I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went
| home justified before God. For all those who exalt
| themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves
| will be exalted."
| miracle2k wrote:
| > As an aside, in Canada, a sentence of life without parole
| is considered unlawful because it conflicts with Section 12
| of the Charter guarantees that individuals have the right
| not to be subjected to cruel and unusual punishment. Courts
| have ruled that life without the possibility of parole
| deprives offenders of any hope of rehabilitation or
| reintegration into society, which could amount to cruel and
| unusual treatment.
|
| Germany's highest court has held the same thing.
|
| This is right and proper. We need to defend these
| principles, now more than ever.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| These two thoughts are incompatible though, aren't they?
| Politics and shenanigans around the case aside, the original
| sentence should have taken into account the possibility of
| rehabilitation. But he got life without parole.
|
| That said, it was entrapment and everyone involved should be
| deeply ashamed and prosecuted. At least those two agents did
| get some wire fraud charges [0], but the entrapment angle got
| explored because the charges were dropped.
|
| [0] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-federal-agents-
| charged...
| soulofmischief wrote:
| *never got explored
| bdcravens wrote:
| A 10 year prison sentence was apt. He did knowingly break the
| law (the marketplace defense doesn't really apply, since admins
| had to create the categories that were obviously illegal). A
| life sentence was ridiculous, and added punishment for
| unconvicted crimes, however likely, is a gross violation of
| constitutional protections.
| pmarreck wrote:
| Ross Ulbricht was widely regarded by friends and family as a
| fundamentally decent and idealistic person--if admittedly naive
| about the implications of his actions. Those who knew him
| personally describe him as thoughtful, intelligent, and
| motivated by a vision of a freer and more equitable society.
| His philosophical motivations were rooted in libertarian
| ideals, particularly the belief that consenting adults should
| have the right to make decisions about their own lives,
| including the substances they consume.
|
| I just learned that he was an Eagle Scout.
|
| Not exactly the resume of someone getting locked up and the key
| thrown away.
| GIFtheory wrote:
| This argument is problematic because it implies that a person
| from a different background who committed the same crimes
| (e.g., a poor, black, uneducated person without any fancy
| philosophical ideals) /should/ be locked up and the key
| thrown away. It doesn't work that way. The law applies the
| same to all, and that's the way I like it.
| BoiledCabbage wrote:
| Seriously, that was pretty blatant "he was one of the good
| guys like me and so the law shouldn't really punish him,
| not like one of those other people with different value
| that should be punished to the full extent."
| miningape wrote:
| I mean there's a legal concept of motivation. A murder is
| sentenced very differently if it's premeditated, or not.
|
| The idea of looking at someone's motivations to determine
| their sentencing is critical to our legal system -
| otherwise important defences like the "Battered Wife
| Defence" wouldn't work.
|
| I think most of us can also see a difference between a
| poor person stealing some gloves to stay warm in the
| winter and a rich person stealing those same gloves for
| the thrill. The only difference here is you don't like
| the fact that Ulbricht's motivations were more high
| minded than your average crack pusher ( _cough_ CIA
| _cough_ ) - the judge didn't either - in fact he
| sentenced him harder for it to make an example of him.
| tylergetsay wrote:
| That legal concept isn't a broad idea but rather a
| specific carve out for very specific crimes.
| pmarreck wrote:
| Not at all. My point was actually:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42792552
| Aeolun wrote:
| I don't think this is true? Motivation is a large part of
| sentencing. It's also very important to determine the
| chances of recurrence.
| pmarreck wrote:
| The problem is that if the law is arguably unethical or
| arbitrary, you're going to catch more "good" people in it.
| My comment was not so much a defense of Ross as it was an
| accusation against unjust drug law.
|
| Imagine a hypothetical law which arrests anyone who trades
| in red shirts. Someone comes along and doesn't see what the
| big deal is and decides to trade in these shirts on the
| black market. Lives are saved because it is impossible to
| get shot at while paying for red shirts over the Internet
| instead of in person. Then the dude who ran the red shirt
| marketplace and seems like an opportunistic idealist gets
| locked up with the key thrown away.
|
| Anyway, it is arguable that the Silk Road saved lives,
| given that black markets are persistent regardless of
| legality.
|
| https://cybercrimejournal.com/pdf/Lacson%26Jonesvol10issue1
| I...
|
| https://gwern.net/doc/darknet-market/silk-
| road/1/2013-vanhou...
| WrongAssumption wrote:
| No rewrite that from another perspective saying someone was a
| devout man rooted in Christian ideals. I just learned he was
| a choir boy.
|
| This is why we try not to sentence the way you are
| suggesting.
| pmarreck wrote:
| First of all, leniency is usually expected (and this was
| the exact opposite of leniency) if it is someone's first
| offense or if they seemed like a good citizen prior.
|
| Second of all, people missed my point I guess:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42792552
|
| Third of all, the Silk Road saved lives.
|
| https://cybercrimejournal.com/pdf/Lacson%26Jonesvol10issue1
| I...
|
| https://gwern.net/doc/darknet-market/silk-
| road/1/2013-vanhou...
| Peanuts99 wrote:
| Then why did he run a site which allowed people to order hits
| on people? If it was just an online drug marketplace, that
| would have been a different matter.
| pmarreck wrote:
| Initially, that was possible. They eventually banned those
| types of auctions before the site itself got taken down.
| jMyles wrote:
| > I think it's clear he did many things in the same vein
|
| It is clear as mud. We now know:
|
| * At least four other people had access to the DPR account, by
| design.
|
| * One of those people (the person whose murder was supposedly
| ordered, who has vehemently defended Ross!) asserts that he
| knew that Nob (who we know who was a DEA agent) was one of
| those four people.
|
| * Nob is a serial liar, and is now in prison for having stole
| some of the bitcoin from this operation.
|
| ...what about that make clear that Ross was within a mile of
| this supposed 'murder for hire' business?
| outside415 wrote:
| learn to read. he clearly was over sentenced.
| zik wrote:
| They dropped the contract killer charges - it appears that they
| were fabricated to try to turn public opinion against him and
| get him jailed. But as soon as they went to trial the charges
| were dropped for lack of evidence.
| xadhominemx wrote:
| They were not fabricated although it may have been
| challenging to secure a conviction and in any event Ross was
| going to be sentenced to many decades in prison.
| offsign wrote:
| "he took it a bridge too far" is a massive trivialization.
|
| The guy operated a marketplace for illegal goods in order to
| enrich himself. The illegality wasn't just incidental, it was
| literally his business model -- by flouting the law, he enjoyed
| massive market benefit (minimal competition, lack of
| regulation, high margins etc) by exploiting the arbitrage that
| the rest of us follow the rules.
|
| Said a different way, he knowingly pursued enormous risk in
| order to achieve outsized benefits, and ultimately his bet blew
| up on him -- we shouldn't have bailed him out.
| celticninja wrote:
| Not sure it was high margin as much as it was low fees on a
| large number of transactions, coupled with bitcoin
| appreciation this meant he made a lot of money.
| rbanffy wrote:
| It was a very high RoI. The cost to run it was negligible
| compared to the income it generated.
| ty6853 wrote:
| Trump is a bit of an agorist is well. It's part of the
| American wild west mythical psyche, to the point America made
| a sport from moonshine running cars. Not hard for me to see
| how he half won and walked away with an unconditional pardon.
| ssl232 wrote:
| > to the point America made a sport from moonshine running
| cars
|
| Huh, is that NASCAR?
| ty6853 wrote:
| I believe so
| kortilla wrote:
| Yes, but the moonshine part wasn't part of the sport or
| its celebration. It was about racing cars regular people
| could buy: "stock cars".
| paulgb wrote:
| TIL!
|
| > In the 1920s, moonshine runners during the Prohibition
| era would often have to outrun the authorities. To do so,
| they had to upgrade their vehicles--while leaving them
| looking ordinary, so as not to attract attention.
| Eventually, runners started getting together with fellow
| runners and making runs together. They would challenge
| one another and eventually progressed to organized events
| in the early 1930s.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stock_car_racing
| silver_silver wrote:
| His sentence was excessive and cruel to make an example out
| of him. There's a serial child rapist in the same prison
| serving less time.
| ty6853 wrote:
| The state hates more than anything someone who operates on
| first principles that the empire is wrong.
|
| A serial rapist, even one that would happily do it again,
| will often repent and quickly admit guilt. They have no
| interest in undermining the philosophical basis of the
| state. They will posture themselves as bound but imperfect
| citizens under the law.
|
| Ross violated the only remaining national holy religion,
| the rule of law. He was sentenced for being a heretic.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| > _Ross violated the only remaining national holy
| religion, the rule of law. He was sentenced for being a
| heretic._
|
| Good.
|
| Let's keep in mind that the shared faith in this "holy
| religion, the rule of law" is the only thing holding
| together your country, my country, everyone's countries,
| and civilized society in general. Take that away, and
| everything around us will collapse, regressing the few
| survivors of that event to the prehistorical lifestyle of
| small tribes slaughtering each other for what little
| scraps the land has to give.
| kybernetyk wrote:
| I'm from Germany. I could tell you something about
| blindly following the "rule of law". If you throw
| morality out the window the law can become a very ugly
| instrument.
| omnibrain wrote:
| No, "Rule of Law" means "Rechtsstaatlichkeit". What you
| mean is "It's law, so it's always right" i.e.
| "Rechtspositivismus".
| kybernetyk wrote:
| Yes, Rechtsstaatlichkeit only means that the state and
| its organs have to follow the law themselves. It doesn't
| say anything about the moral quality of the laws.
|
| The Nazi state had to follow its own laws. They just had
| such laws that enabled the total lunacy that the 3rd
| Reich was.
|
| All I'm saying is: If you decouple laws from morality you
| get a really bad time.
| ivan_gammel wrote:
| You are absolutely right saying that rule of law is not
| sufficient condition for the existence of modern society.
| It was a bit confusing still, because nobody claimed the
| opposite: the comment you replied to was saying rule of
| law is a necessity.
| rbanffy wrote:
| It's not sufficient, but it's still necessary.
| ivan_gammel wrote:
| Exactly what I was saying.
| tpoacher wrote:
| _You_ may have been saying this but the parent comment
| that spurred the discussion was making the explicit
| assertion that "the rule of law is the _only_ thing
| holding together [...] everyone 's countries, and
| civilized society in general".
|
| Saying that law is 'the only thing' necessary for the
| existence of modern society effectively means it is also
| a sufficient condition. So yes, someone did claim the
| opposite.
| ivan_gammel wrote:
| I doubt that modern society does fulfill the sufficiency
| criteria [1], so ,,the only thing" can be right, but also
| it is not the claim that it is enough for survival.
|
| [1] USA regressing to a globally disrespected oligarchy
| under Trump is a good example.
| rbanffy wrote:
| Not in my wildest dreams I imagined Brazil would give the
| good example for prosecuting a former president who
| attempted a coup and that the US would fail to do the
| same.
| butlike wrote:
| Why argue more when they agree with you?
| tfourb wrote:
| > The Nazi state had to follow its own laws. They just
| had such laws that enabled the total lunacy that the 3rd
| Reich was.
|
| This is false. Even if you take the Nazi propaganda that
| their laws were themselves lawful (which they were not,
| beginning with the clearly unlawful capture of power) at
| face value, the Nazi regime _did not_ adhere to its own
| laws and regulations. While in some cases the Nazi regime
| did codify a basis in law for their atrocities (i.e.
| excluding and expropriating jews), much of the Nazi
| terror both in a civil and military context would have
| been explicitly illegal under the law at the time.
|
| This includes the November Progroms of 1938
| (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novemberpogrome_1938),
| large parts of the Nazi's approach to warfare, as well as
| the entire Holocaust (the murder of more than 6 million
| jews and other "undesirables"), for which the Nazis did
| not bother to create any legal justification.
|
| While the Nazi regime was deeply bureaucratic (in that it
| documented its policies, orders and their results in high
| detail) this is not the same as "following the law". Most
| of the Nazi's atrocities evolved not through a process of
| lawmaking, but from their racist ideology and were given
| legitimacy through the highly personalized nature of the
| regime: Hitler was explicitly _above the law_ , as were
| his orders, not matter if expressed through him
| personally or in his name by his followers.
| mcv wrote:
| Not sure why this comment got voted down; it's absolutely
| true.
|
| The rule of law means that nobody is above the law, not
| even the Fuehrer or president. Clearly this is not the
| case in many countries, but it is in some, and it should
| be.
| Ray20 wrote:
| > Even if you take the Nazi propaganda that their laws
| were themselves lawful (which they were not, beginning
| with the clearly unlawful capture of power)
|
| What definition of the laws lawfulness are you using?
| Capturing the power - it is what makes law lawful,
| otherwise any law is unlawful.
| tfourb wrote:
| This is a very crude and on every level incorrect
| understanding on how laws work, both in a formalistic, as
| well as a societal way.
|
| When the Nazis captured power, they did so by excluding
| the legitimate (and lawful) parliamentary opposition from
| key votes in parliament by (unlawfully) imprisoning
| opposition parliamentarians. In a strictly legal sense,
| this made their entire regime illegitimate from the
| outset.
|
| What you fail to grasp is that a regime like Hitler's is
| constitutionally and ideologically incapable of being
| "lawful", i.e. having _any_ set of laws and norms that
| would apply consistently, even if these laws were shaped
| by their own ideology. The whole point of Hitler 's
| leadership was that laws were irrelevant and completely
| subservient to facilitating his twisted idea of Arian
| racial domination, with even the "German" society being
| completely dominated by the "Ubermenschen" that he hoped
| to create out of the murderous struggle of war.
|
| Even the ancient Romans and Greeks would have recognized
| the Nazi regime as "unlawful". While the roman empire was
| a dictatorial regime, it had a mostly consistent set of
| laws and norms that even the Cesar had to abide by
| (though these laws gave him tremendous power in
| comparison to modern democratic executives).
| "Personalized" regimes in contrast are not build on laws,
| but revolve around the whims and/or ideology "the
| leader". You can see some aspects of this in Trump's
| approach to governance, though the US is obviously still
| a long way away from the extremes that the Third Reich
| went to.
| mk89 wrote:
| The issue is that we're used to think in terms of
| Legislative, Judiciary and Executive. That's what most
| modern democracies are based on.
|
| If you look at this the old way, Hitler wasn't above the
| law, he was the law, because there was no real split of
| powers.
|
| Your comment, though, is very interesting because it
| defies the stupid idea that back then people respected
| laws, while today....
|
| Somehow this got idolized, which is why (young!) people
| tend to feel nostalgic about such times. In reality,
| there was a lot of corruption, Hitler himself evaded
| taxes, used Party money to fund his own Mercedes etc....
| yeah like today!!! :)
|
| Edit: somehow this propaganda of people of law lasted
| until today. In reality, the guy was a fraud that
| collected millions over the years. While everyone else
| had to live in fear of deportations or worse. I don't
| understand why journalists don't focus on things like
| this to dismantle idiotic extreme parties.
| cassepipe wrote:
| I went on r/AskHistorians and I found this answer which
| seems to agree with you :
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4h2rnc/co
| mme...
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Very insightful answer indeed. I found this part
| particularly interesting:
|
| > _One of the most interesting theories however is Ernst
| Fraenkels "The Dual State". Fraenkel asserts that Nazi
| Germany is a dual state where the normative state (the
| state based on the rule of law) coexists with the
| "prerogative state" (the state not bound by law). While
| some swaths of society such as the relation to private
| property, the civil law etc. continue to function on the
| basis of codified norms (think the building code,
| neighbor disputes, companies suing each other, "ordinary"
| criminal law, stuff in relation to ownership of private
| property), some parts of the state were unbound by the
| Nazis such as the prosecution of political opponents, the
| camp system etc. Fraenkel further asserts that once the
| prerogative state is established, it has a very strong
| tendency to expand into the territory of the normative
| state and that state actions once unbound will cause
| enormous havoc in a certain sense._
|
| This theory kind of generalizes my statements upthread,
| expanding them to cover authoritarian states. Any kind of
| society we could label as authoritarian state is by
| definition already way too large to be fully micromanaged
| by the people at the top. Such a state has to retain a
| quite substantial "normative state", as Fraenkels calls
| it - and this state is what my arguments about
| intersubjective beliefs apply to. When people stop having
| faith in the "normative state" - whether because of
| "prerogative state" overreach or other forces - the whole
| thing collapses, and not even the strongest tyrant can
| hold it together.
| lo_zamoyski wrote:
| Ah, but legal positivism is the norm in liberal
| societies, and not by accident. This follows directly
| from the demands of liberalism which privatizes
| discussion of the objective real and relegates it to
| individual sentiment. One of the paradoxes of liberalism
| is that the maximization of individual liberty
| necessarily demotes authority and elevates power, leading
| to tyranny.
|
| So any appeals to the contrary are rooted in appeals to
| beliefs held in parallel with the liberal doctrines of
| the state. When Protestants ruled the US, that means some
| residual (often warped) Christian sensibility, because
| they were able to attain that consensus. But with greater
| competition today, that old consensus is no longer
| possible. Liberalism ensures that.
| GTP wrote:
| But now, let's get back to the case in point. Who threw
| morality out of the window, Ross Ulbricht or the state?
| LadyCailin wrote:
| Both?
| orwin wrote:
| I thought everybody knew the first thing the Nazis did
| was eroding the rule of law, with the help of Hans Frank,
| before even taking power.
|
| The fact that everybody is equal in front of justice and
| that justice should be independent, two of the basics
| tenet of the rule of law, were hated by the Nazis and
| called 'jewish law', and were targeted. Lawyers and
| judges were increasingly close to the Nazi party. The
| same crime by a party member didn't had the same
| consequence.
|
| I think the Nazis pamphlet said that 'roman law follow
| the materialistic world order, and should be replaced by
| German law'. Where materialistic was a dogwhistle for
| Marxism, and world order for Judaism.
|
| What did help Nazis was that older judges and lawyers
| were often aristocrats who didn't really love the
| republic, and new one were petty bourgeoisie where Nazism
| had a lot of supporters. They helped put a staunch
| conservative (who later joined the Nazis) at the head of
| the German supreme court before 1933. The man blocked
| socdems appointments, and changed how the German law was
| interpreted (basically pushing intent of the law vs
| letter of the law, where intent weirdly always aligned
| with Nazi ideology).
|
| Then, once they had power, the first thing they did after
| the conservative Hindenburg (may he be remembered as
| Hitler first collaborator) declared a 'state of emergency
| was to suspend judiciary oversight over arrest and
| imprisonment.
| Gravityloss wrote:
| I learned so much from reading this, thank you. Is there
| more of this same style dense history writing somewhere?
| (Of course there are caveats and narratives etc., I hope
| people understand that...)
| Dracophoenix wrote:
| With respect to this particular topic, one may consider
| _The Hitler Myth: Image and Reality in the Third Reich_
| by Ian Kershaw to be a worthwhile read.
| foobarian wrote:
| I found this short article also similarly illuminating:
| https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/01/hitler-
| ger...
| sillyfluke wrote:
| Certain discourse in other languages sometimes like to
| underline the difference between "rules" and "law" as in
| "we must aspire to be a state built on law, not a state
| built on rules." (not necessarily claiming English is
| such a language either)
| ben_w wrote:
| Everything done without consideration is very quickly
| evil. Free tragedy of the commons with every free market;
| equivalents of Malthus for poverty wages and zero profit
| margins in the economy; Nash games where all parties want
| to defect and want the other not to; AI optimising for
| paperclips.
|
| Rule of law is a pillar, but not the only one -- in an
| ideal case the laws themselves are bound by
| constitutional requirements, and the constitutional
| requirements are bound by democratic will, and the
| democratic will by freedom of speech, and the freedom of
| speech by a requirement for at least attempting to be
| honest.
| vkou wrote:
| The Nazis did anything but blindly followed the rule of
| law. They did the opposite - they used law as a cudgel to
| beat their enemies with, while somehow magically, not
| being held responsible for any of their own violations of
| it. It's how they rose to power, and it's how they
| liquidated all of their internal opposition in the pre-
| war years.
|
| We are seeing this play out again. The brownshirts have
| all been pardoned (with a clear message to the ones who
| will be involved in the next act - that as long as they
| break the law in support of the regime, they'll get
| bailed out), while everyone else is getting in line to
| kowtow and kiss the ring - because if they don't, they
| might be targeted.
|
| It's actual insanity that people are looking at this and
| saying it is fine.
|
| Then again, the whole country has gone insane, it looks
| at a video of the richest main in the world giving a
| fascist salute, and insist that he's just giving a
| confused wave, or that it's the same thing as a still of
| some other person with an outstretched arm.
| simonh wrote:
| Nobody here is advocating blindly following the rules. We
| can follow the rules with our eyes open, and while
| advocating for the rules being reformed.
|
| In this case the person throwing morality out of the
| window was Ulbricht.
| immibis wrote:
| In Germany it is currently illegal to criticise Israel.
| You'll pardon me for being a bit skeptical about rule of
| law. Rule of good law is good, but rule of bad law is
| bad.
| sources_please wrote:
| > In Germany it is currently illegal to criticise Israel.
|
| Got any sources for this claim? Like an actual law?
| WinstonSmith84 wrote:
| > ... the shared faith in this "holy religion, the rule
| of law" is the only thing holding together your country,
| my country ...
|
| Let's forget a minute about that holy rule of law, "your"
| country has elected a convicted criminal, and it's yet to
| collapse.
| JBSay wrote:
| Quite an interesting fact that both committed victimless
| crimes and both were victims of exceptional prosecution
| WinstonSmith84 wrote:
| That's comparing apples and oranges. One spent 10 years
| in a jail for making himself rich (and some others), the
| other never spent a day in a jail for committing at the
| highest level election subversion, retention of
| classified information, hush money payment (and more) -
| and was caught on the latter, eventually. It was arguably
| "exceptional prosecution" for that hush payment, like Al
| Capone was caught on a mere tax fraud
| PinkSheep wrote:
| Maybe he should've pardoned himself into the past and a
| little bit into the future too, like that other man did.
| /jk
| itsoktocry wrote:
| > _One spent 10 years in a jail for making himself rich
| (and some others), the other never spent a day in a jail
| for committing at the highest level election subversion,
| retention of classified information, hush money payment
| (and more) - and was caught on the latter, eventually._
|
| What an interpretation!
|
| Another one might be: they tried to throw all kinds of
| things at Trump, and they all failed because they simply
| aren't true, until they managed to catch him on some
| triviality.
|
| The fact that you "rule of law" people keep putting out
| _accusations_ as if they were convictions, and
| insinuating people should be judged on these accusations
| is truly horrible for the system.
| mcv wrote:
| Are you calling Trump's crimes "victimless"? And he's
| barely been prosecuted. Everything was postponed
| indefinitely or blocked by corrupt judges.
| cbsmith wrote:
| > and it's yet to collapse
|
| This will age well.
| mcv wrote:
| Yeah, it's pretty clear that the rule of law is not
| particularly strong in the US. The past few years have
| made it clear that some people really are above the law.
| JBSay wrote:
| Grossly excessive sentences for non-victim crimes while
| letting rapists, murderers and corrupt politicians go
| free with at best a slap on the wrist, is why people are
| abandon your "holy religion" in droves
| jollyllama wrote:
| Big shades of The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas in GP
| comment
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Never read it, but I watched its recent adaptation as a
| _Strange New Worlds_ episode called Lift Us Where
| Suffering Cannot Reach, and if it 's in any way
| representative of the source material, then I'd say the
| ethical problems there are nontrivial.
| potato3732842 wrote:
| Look at every society before the modern state monopoly on
| violence. Basically none of them were in danger of
| regressing because of it. The evolution of the modern
| state is a result of inter society competition for who
| can apply the most massed violence against a competing
| state.
|
| We've seen what happens when empires fall apart (Rome for
| example) and things don't revert to "prehistorical
| lifestyle of small tribes slaughtering each other for
| what little scraps the land has to give".
|
| I'm not gonna go too far into this because like you say,
| it's a religion, and I'm not gonna waste my time trying
| to convert anyone.
| vladms wrote:
| Depends on the time scale. I mean the early middle ages
| (500 to 1000) could be described as "(smaller) tribes
| fighting over what is left" (considering all the
| barbarians from the north pillaging the roman empire
| while the Arabs conquering it from the south).
|
| The evolution of modern society is as much a result of
| religion (centralizing a purpose and limiting inner
| fighting) of science (do things more efficient) as it is
| to violence.
|
| Violence might be one way to progress, everybody is
| entitled to an opinion. I just hope you experienced it
| yourself if you believe it is the way you prefer
| personally. I am saying just because I thought some
| things would be great, only to be quite disappointed when
| I actually tried them...
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| > _Look at every society before the modern state monopoly
| on violence. Basically none of them were in danger of
| regressing because of it._
|
| They were too small. But they had their own social orders
| of equivalent importance, and breaking those would break
| them apart. There's a reason religion and tradition
| played bigger role in a distant past, and going against
| them was severely punished. It's not just out of spite or
| "us vs. them"; people take threats to stability of their
| group personally. It's definitely in part a survival
| mechanism.
|
| > _The evolution of the modern state is a result of inter
| society competition for who can apply the most massed
| violence against a competing state._
|
| Yes. More specifically, it's the result of _growth_. It
| 's the same thing as small tribes fighting each other
| over some small areas of land, except scaled up. Bigger
| groups have a competitive advantage over smaller groups,
| but there's a limit to the size of a group beyond which
| it ends up splitting apart; increasing that limit
| requires stacking more layers of _hierarchy_ and
| associated social technologies. "Rule of law" and the
| legal system in general is one of such technologies, and
| it looks like it does today, at scales of groups we have
| today.
|
| A group of dozens can _just work_ on instinct alone. A
| group of hundreds requires some rules and specialization
| and designated authority. Scale that 100x, and you need
| another level of leadership hierarchy just to keep sub-
| group leaders coordinated and aligned. Scale that 100x
| further, and you kind of _have to_ get something looking
| like a modern nation state, as anything else would either
| break apart or be defeated by another group that is more
| like a modern nation state.
|
| See also: Dunbar's number.
|
| > _We 've seen what happens when empires fall apart (Rome
| for example) and things don't revert to "prehistorical
| lifestyle of small tribes slaughtering each other for
| what little scraps the land has to give"._
|
| Europe would disagree.
| flerchin wrote:
| LOL I thought the time after the fall of the Roman empire
| were colloquially termed "The dark ages"
| ETH_start wrote:
| Ironically, by sentencing him more harshly on the basis
| of ideology as opposed to on the basis of the criminal
| code, you are undermining the rule of law, which requires
| sentences to be based only on statutory law.
| uludag wrote:
| I think you may be overstating this. The archeological
| evidence is pretty clear that prehistorical lifestyles
| weren't just small tribes slaughtering each other, and
| that there was a lot of variety and complexity in the way
| prehistoric societies organized themselves. Also, there
| are some societies that exist in 2025 which proved scary
| enough examples of what's possible.
|
| There are also societies which have blatant arbitrary
| authoritarian rule which seem to be well in the 21st
| century. I doubt that faith in the rule of law is the
| _only_ thing keeping our societies together.
| Ray20 wrote:
| > pretty clear that prehistorical lifestyles weren't just
| small tribes slaughtering each other,
|
| Well, that's sounds quite logical. When you kill people,
| they usually fight back. Very strongly fight back. So you
| have to expect something big to make it worth it. But
| small very undeveloped tribes had nothing of such, so
| they have no incentives to slaughter each other.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| > _But small very undeveloped tribes had nothing of such,
| so they have no incentives to slaughter each other._
|
| With neither size nor technology to make a lasting
| impact, the ones that got slaughtered didn't exactly
| leave much in archeological evidence behind for us to
| find.
|
| As for GP's point, obviously those people weren't bred
| for battle with others. All the tiny tribes would happily
| frolic in the forest or whatever small prehistoric tribes
| did when they weren't starving, but eventually they'd
| grow in size, hit a size limit leading to a new tribe
| splitting off, etc.; over time, the number of tribes grew
| to the point that they started to bump into each other
| and contest the same resources, leading to the obvious
| outcome.
| uludag wrote:
| I'm genuinely convinced that prehistoric humans, being
| literally the same species as us, were just as capable as
| us in the ability to thoughtfully construct their
| societies. Like, why, when they bumped into each other,
| couldn't they have formed a confederation? I think
| instead of labeling them as children of nature or
| starving savages warring with everything in their
| vicinity, it makes most sense to see them as more or less
| similar to ourselves.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Editing in a TL;DR: imagine you and your friends are
| thrown back in time to year 20 000 BC or thereabout.
| Imagine you find the nearest tribe of humans, and by
| magical means are able to understand and speak their
| language. Imagine you go to their chief and propose to
| form a confederacy, and ponder what would stop them from
| replying " _ugh_ " and bashing your head in with a club.
| Compare with a closest analog to today, and where the
| difference comes from.
|
| --
|
| > _I 'm genuinely convinced that prehistoric humans,
| being literally the same species as us, were just as
| capable as us in the ability to thoughtfully construct
| their societies._
|
| I agree. We're basically the same people as we were
| before, hardware and firmware, +/- lactose intolerance
| and some extra mutations that, without modern medicine,
| would prohibit one from successfully reproducing. With
| that in mind...
|
| > _Like, why, when they bumped into each other, couldn 't
| they have formed a confederation?_
|
| Because they most likely couldn't have even
| conceptualized this that long ago, much less make it
| work.
|
| A "confederacy" isn't some built-in human feeling. _It 's
| advanced technology._ Social technology, but technology
| nonetheless. In a way, it's merely a more advanced form
| of a bunch of elders getting together to deal with a
| problem affecting all of their tribes - but this is like
| saying passing around crude drawing on stones is
| basically a bit less advanced e-mail or international
| postal network. As an advanced social technology, a
| confederacy has a lot of prerequisites - including
| _writing_ , deep specialization of labor (allowing for
| both rulers and thinkers to thrive), hierarchical
| governance, a set of traditions (religious or otherwise)
| that solidify the hierarchical governance structure and
| some early iteration of a justice system, literate ruling
| class, etc.; all of those are but a few nodes in the
| "tech tree" that leads to a confederacy, and more
| importantly, enables scaling the society up to the point
| we can even talk about a confederacy as we define the
| term today.
|
| > _I think instead of labeling them as children of nature
| or starving savages warring with everything in their
| vicinity, it makes most sense to see them as more or less
| similar to ourselves._
|
| We _still are_ children of nature. We 're not starving
| _because of_ all the advancement in science, technology
| and social technologies we 've accumulated over the past
| couple millenia.
|
| Consider that it is only recently - within the last 150
| years - we finally stopped going to war over land and
| natural resources. _Human nature didn 't change in that
| time_. What changed was that we've expanded to the point
| every place on Earth's surface has someone staking a
| claim to it, that the knowledge of these claims quickly
| becomes known to other groups; we then fought it out in
| 1914-1918 and then for the last time, in 1939-1945, then
| most countries accepted agreements to keep the borders as
| they are, _and then we invented nuclear weapons_ and
| froze the borders via MAD.
|
| The modern world is a beautiful but fragile place. If we
| let any of the supporting structures - whether social or
| technological or military - snap, the whole thing will
| collapse like a house of cards, and the few people that
| survive it will be back to prehistoric savagery. Not
| because they'd suddenly get dumber, but because they'd
| have lost all the social and technological structures
| that makes humanity what it is today, and they'd have to
| rebuild it from scratch, the hard way.
| Ray20 wrote:
| It was later, when humanity accumulate knowledge about
| resources gathering and processing, about nature and how
| to deal with it to not to die all the time. Then yeas,
| tribes were becoming larger, wealthier, more stationary.
| But before that there were very few people, the tribes
| were nomadic with virtually no alternatives and had
| nothing of value. At least nothing so valuable that it
| would be easier to get it by attacking another tribe,
| rather than by simply moving a couple of dozen kilometers
| away.
| kerkeslager wrote:
| Nonsense. "The rule of law" isn't one cohesive thing--
| sure, some parts of it are important for holding together
| a country/society, but in a sufficiently complex legal
| system (like the US') there exists a plethora of laws
| which are irrelevant to holding together society. Every
| such society has laws which are on the books but are not
| enforced, weakly enforced, or unevenly enforced. In fact,
| an implicit part of British Prime Minister Harold
| Wilson's theory of government was explicitly having laws
| which only existed to be broken, to allow citizens to
| exercise their rebellious impulses without causing harm--
| Wilson believed that turning a blind eye to the breaking
| of a certain subset of laws actually minimized the harm
| of unlawful action. An example of this is rules against
| walking on the grass in many public areas in London,
| which is enforced by security guards whose only recourse
| is to tell you to stop.
|
| The US also has laws which we don't care if you break,
| and the laws we place in this category say a lot about
| our society. For example, it's widely accepted that
| people can drive up to 10 MPH above the speed limit and
| consequences will be rare. Even more severe moving
| violations are met with a slap on the wrist which
| primarily effects the poor (fines).
|
| Drug laws were already within this category _before_
| Ullbricht started the Silk Road. The was on drugs was
| explicitly started by Nixon as a war on the antiwar left
| and black people, and if you didn 't fall into one of
| those categories, you were/are largely above drug laws,
| since enforcement generally targets those categories,
| while the social acceptability of popular drugs means
| that crimes of this nature are rarely reported.
|
| Ullbricht's primary offense was breaking a law that was
| already broken ubiquitously. Society did not collapse
| before Ullbricht when these laws were broken, it did not
| collapse when Ullbricht broke them, and it does not
| collapse because of the myriad of darknet sites which
| immediately filled the void left by the Silk Road's
| closure. Ullbricht's arrest didn't end the blatant
| disregard for drug laws on the darknet, and yet somehow
| in the 11 years since his arrest, society still hasn't
| devolved into small tribes slaughtering each other.
|
| In short, if people breaking drug laws was a real threat
| to society, then society would have devolved into tribes
| slaughtering each other already. We have had over 50
| years of people ubiquitously breaking drug laws without
| societal collapse.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| I'm not talking about any particular law, I'm talking
| about the _general idea_ of laws as things that apply to
| everyone, that everyone should obey, and that everyone
| expects everyone else will obey, and that everyone knows
| they 're expected by others to obey. That's the self-
| reinforcing structure of _intersubjectivity_ , that
| allows us to invent and maintain imaginary entities such
| as "dollar", "law", "justice system", "contract", or
| "limited liability corporation", etc. Underlying all such
| entities is the set of shared beliefs about how others
| will behave.
|
| This structure is self-reinforcing and very resilient:
| few people here and there rejecting faith in rule of law,
| or authority of the courts, or money, don't make a
| difference - we write such people off as weirdos and
| carry on with our days, secure in knowledge our world
| will continue to work as it worked the day before. But if
| _sufficient amount of people_ have their faith falter,
| that 's where the trouble starts.
|
| For example, if enough people stop trusting in the
| justice system to deliver something resembling justice
| most of the time, you'll see people ignoring courts and
| laws and taking justice into their own hands[0]. People
| start lynching and killing each other, others see them
| getting away with it, which quickly destroys their trust
| in the system, and _now_ you 're at the precipice. If
| shooting a (person accused of being) thief is fine, if
| shooting a billionaire is fine, then why uphold a
| contract? Might as well get your own at gunpoint, etc. At
| this point everything stops working - banks, healthcare,
| fire services, stores. Your country collapses. You
| probably die.
|
| _That_ is why threats to our shared belief system are so
| dangerous, and need to be dealt with swiftly and
| aggressively. It 's not about elites in power wanting to
| stay in power (though it's no doubt part of it _for them_
| ) - it's because should we all start thinking our social
| structures don't work, and that everyone else thinks this
| too, and start acting on this expectation, they'll all
| collapse in an instant.
|
| --
|
| [0] - No, whatever it is that America has with its police
| is still far from that point.
| kerkeslager wrote:
| > I'm not talking about any particular law, I'm talking
| about the general idea of laws as things that apply to
| everyone, that everyone should obey, and that everyone
| expects everyone else will obey, and that everyone knows
| they're expected by others to obey. That's the self-
| reinforcing structure of intersubjectivity, that allows
| us to invent and maintain imaginary entities such as
| "dollar", "law", "justice system", "contract", or
| "limited liability corporation", etc. Underlying all such
| entities is the set of shared beliefs about how others
| will behave.
|
| You can talk about whatever you want, but you don't get
| to limit what other people talk about.
|
| If you think there's anything like "everyone should obey,
| everyone expects everyone else will obey, and everyone
| knows they're expected by others to obey" around drug
| laws, you're living in a fantasy. You can talk about that
| concept if you want, but I'm saying _that concept doesn
| 't apply to drug law_, which is, in case you noticed, the
| primary group of laws Ullbricht was convicted of
| breaking.
|
| > For example, if enough people stop trusting in the
| justice system to deliver something resembling justice
| most of the time, you'll see people ignoring courts and
| laws and taking justice into their own hands[0]. People
| start lynching and killing each other, others see them
| getting away with it, which quickly destroys their trust
| in the system, and now you're at the precipice. If
| shooting a (person accused of being) thief is fine, if
| shooting a billionaire is fine, then why uphold a
| contract? Might as well get your own at gunpoint, etc. At
| this point everything stops working - banks, healthcare,
| fire services, stores. Your country collapses. You
| probably die.
|
| You're picking unrelated examples and ignoring the issue
| at hand.
|
| If selling drugs is fine, why uphold a contract? If
| driving faster than the speed limit is fine, why not get
| your own at gunpoint?
|
| Sure, generally people agree murder is bad, but that's
| very little to do with the law or any sort of trust in
| the law. Your ivory-tower ideals have nothing to do with
| it: as it turns out, people don't want to be murdered, so
| we're all pretty happy when the cops enforce that law,
| whether we trust them or not.
|
| I'll further add: banks, healthcare, fire services,
| stores, all only work for a segment of our population in
| the US. By your definition of collapse, large portions of
| the U.S. collapsed decades ago.
|
| > That is why threats to our shared belief system are so
| dangerous, and need to be dealt with swiftly and
| aggressively. It's not about elites in power wanting to
| stay in power (though it's no doubt part of it for them)
| - it's because should we all start thinking our social
| structures don't work, and that everyone else thinks this
| too, and start acting on this expectation, they'll all
| collapse in an instant.
|
| "Our shared belief system"?
|
| Let's be clear, this is _your_ belief system, and what
| you 're trying to do is justify ramming it down other
| people's throats with the physical violence performed by
| police. Your belief system is probably the majority
| opinion within the upper-middle-class and richer
| demographic of Hacker News, and might even be the
| majority opinion nationally, but it's not unanimous or
| even close to unanimous. Drug use is well within the
| mainstream in 2025.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| It makes me very sad when people act as if the rule of
| law wasn't important, or worse in case like this they do
| as if the rule of law was only a limitation of freedom.
|
| One cannot be more wrong: there cannot be freedom without
| the rule of law and without the existence of a state that
| enforces it.
| aaa_aaa wrote:
| Current state of your religion sucks big time then.
| mannerheim wrote:
| Selectively punishing someone with a grossly
| disproportionate sentence on the grounds of their
| political beliefs seems contrary to the rule of law.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| He was punished for his visible actions, not his private
| beliefs.
|
| Also, I was focusing less on Ulbricht, and more on what
| 'ty6853 wrote in the comment I replied to. Quoting
| another part of it:
|
| > _The state hates more than anything someone who
| operates on first principles that the empire is wrong._
|
| My point is: the state is _absolutely right_ to hate such
| people. This is true regardless of whether the "empire"
| is North Korea or the United Federation of Planets - it's
| not an ethics issue, it's a structural property of stable
| social organizations.
|
| As for people living today, unless you really suffer
| under the yoke of an evil empire, it's worth remembering
| that, were the state to suddenly break down, things will
| get much, much worse for everyone in it, yourself
| included.
|
| It's too easy for all of us to take our daily lives for
| granted.
| mannerheim wrote:
| Many were convicted of the same acts and received far
| lighter sentences. They specifically sought to make an
| example out of him. That is contrary to the rule of law.
| throw7 wrote:
| The law can't save us.
| jolmg wrote:
| > the rule of law" is the only thing holding together
| your country, my country, everyone's countries, and
| civilized society in general. Take that away, and
| everything around us will collapse, regressing the few
| survivors of that event to the prehistorical lifestyle of
| small tribes slaughtering each other
|
| I've seen this sentiment expressed before, including with
| the movie "The Purge" (that I admittedly haven't seen,
| but I understood the concept as law becomes suspended for
| a day and everyone becomes violent). That idea that the
| only thing keeping people safe is the rule of law seems
| absurd to me.
|
| There's a sense of empathy, there's religion (e.g. desire
| of heaven and fear of hell), there are family values
| (keeping extended family ties together which can induce
| pressure to do what's considered right), a concern over
| reputation, a sense of unity with one's culture and
| wanting the betterment of one's people, collectivism (the
| psychological/social tendency to put others before
| oneself), stuff like not wanting to bring shame to one's
| parents and extended family, a hate for hypocrisy, a
| simple lack of any desire to be violent, etc. etc.
|
| I like to believe that between most people and their
| potential for violence, there's a lot of things besides
| the rule of law. Law enforcement is for outliers that
| have a desire for violence and nothing else to stop them.
|
| If law enforcement would disappear from one day to the
| next, people would be less safe, but I don't think to the
| point that you'd have "few survivors of that event",
| especially if you consider just a single country/culture
| going through that experiment, since this probably
| depends somewhat on culture and its particular values.
| I'm more inclined to think that life would mostly just go
| on as normal, carried by habit/convention and the values
| we instill in offspring.
| butlike wrote:
| Maybe. Or maybe the arbitrary lines drawn and maintained
| that define "country" and "society" are the only things
| allowing hate to prosper. Get rid of the lines and become
| one people.
| pixelsort wrote:
| Also his opsec was sloppy. If you want to believe that
| the spooks were doing full ipv4 scans to DDoS all his
| legit exit nodes that would make a better movie. But
| really, he was just in over his head.
|
| Predictably, dark web market operators adapted afterward.
| The state got lucky and they knew it, so that also
| factored in to their sentencing recommendations.
|
| Glad he's getting out.
| Terr_ wrote:
| > only remaining national holy religion, the rule of law
|
| Uhm... Really? Is that present tense?
|
| If rule-of-law was a national holy religion, the last 10
| years of US politics would have played out very _very_
| differently.
| dns_snek wrote:
| Like any religion, the rules usually don't apply to the
| leaders, only the followers.
| Terr_ wrote:
| Except that's fundamentally incompatible with "rule of
| law."
|
| So whatever real-world thing being described would need a
| different term.
| arcfour wrote:
| By that logic, nobody has lived under the rule of law
| ever, because it's only achievable in an ideal dream
| world.
| Terr_ wrote:
| * ty6853: "The car is reliable."
|
| * Terr_: "No, there have been too many serious
| breakdowns."
|
| * dns_snek: "It's reliably _unreliable_ , so it still
| counts."
|
| * Terr_: "No, that's literally the opposite of what it
| means to describe a car as reliable."
|
| * arcfour: "Terr_! Stop demanding perfection! The
| universe is imperfect therefore _true_ reliability is
| impossible! "
|
| * Terr_: "No, goddamnit! That's not what I said! FFS,
| it's as if [RECURSION EXCEEDED]"
| mcv wrote:
| But that's what "rule of law" means: that the rules also
| apply to the leaders. The fact that leaders in the US
| aren't held accountable for their crimes means the US
| does not have the rule of law, but the rule of power. Or
| the rule of money, probably. The rich are above the law
| and can buy the government.
|
| Rule of law would prevent all of that. Or should.
| eadmund wrote:
| > the last 10 years of US politics
|
| Ten? Oh man. Have you read about the FALN commutation?
| Iran-Contra? Watergate? The 1960 presidential election?
| Roosevelt (both of them)? _Wilson_? _Lincoln_? Those are
| just a very few of the instances of disrespect for the
| rule of law that come to mind immediately.
| Terr_ wrote:
| > Ten? Oh man. Have you read about [list of older
| historical events I suggest you were foolish to ignore]
|
| Slow down there cowboy, it's "ten" because the other
| poster is referencing a conviction which occurred on
| February 5th 2015, uncannily close to exactly ten years
| ago.
| mcv wrote:
| > Ross violated the only remaining national holy
| religion, the rule of law. He was sentenced for being a
| heretic.
|
| That's a weird way of talking about that. The rule of law
| is what keeps rampant corruption and government abuse at
| bay. It means the law also holds for the ruler, and not
| just for the subjects. The rule of law has already been
| significantly weakened in recent years by openly corrupt
| judges and politicians, and traitor being elected in
| defiance of the 14th amendment.
|
| None of this is a good thing. Without the rule of law,
| it's the people that lose, because then you get the rule
| of those in power, who will be above the law.
| ahmeneeroe-v2 wrote:
| This is a really excellent analysis and you will see it
| in a lot of prosecutions once you learn about it
| scottLobster wrote:
| Yep, and now the "heretics" are running the show, or at
| least a large piece of it, so they pardoned him.
|
| The law means less than it used to.
| jajko wrote:
| Selling say drugs that kill people (kids including) and
| illegal weapons that are often used for murders. Such
| activity is by western standards one of worst crimes,
| especially in massive scale and run for profit. Even
| ignoring all other criminal activity, 25 to life seems like
| a adequate sentence.
|
| It seems that from day 1 US is moving quite far from the
| place it was and projected itself to others for past
| decades. More ruthless, money above all, not much fairness
| in international dealings. Maybe US will be richer after
| those 4 years, but at current trajectory it will lose a lot
| of friends and partners.
|
| Please realize this - for Europe, China starts to look like
| a great not only business but also military partner, much
| more reliable long term. _This_ is how much such moves can
| fuck up things.
| ty6853 wrote:
| That's mainly because it cuts into the US government
| profit margins. They and their favored contractors have
| been selling arms for profit and love drug running when
| it suits their aims as they showed with eg support for
| the Contras.
|
| It is important drugs stay illegal so powerful connected
| interests can maintain high profit and control. Without
| that, simple cocaine/meth/marijuana is just an
| agricultural or chemical commodity with essentially the
| margin of generic OTC drugs.
| jajko wrote:
| Yeah I meant more like some shady fentanyl that overdoses
| people en masse, not some rather harmless and sometimes
| even beneficial weed.
|
| The worst part are weapons, there is no way to spin it as
| something benign. Victor Bout for example got 25 years
| and there was no drug smuggling nor contract murders.
| ty6853 wrote:
| Victor Bout is free and selling weapons again with the
| blessing and release of the US government. Always was
| about profiting off of weapons. Don't believe what the US
| really got from it was one ditzy WNBA player.
| kortilla wrote:
| The US government does not have profit margins. It hasn't
| run a balanced budget in decades. What are you even
| trying to say?
| rbanffy wrote:
| They might be alluding to regulatory capture by groups
| such as the NRA, big pharma, and the defense industry,
| which, for all purposes, are an unelected part of the
| government.
| 15155 wrote:
| I love how the NRA - which is almost entirely member-
| funded - gets lumped in with actual industries with eye
| watering margins.
| rbanffy wrote:
| They are a powerful lobby. Just mention "gun regulation"
| in DC to see how many of them there are.
| lupusreal wrote:
| In terms of money they really aren't that big, but they
| don't need much money to wield influence because their
| cause is very popular with _a lot_ of voters and
| politicians know that.
| silver_silver wrote:
| He was serving 2 life sentences + 40 years, not one. Even
| the prosecutors only asked for 20. What he did was wrong,
| but the sentence was disproportionate. The judge intended
| to throw away his life to make a point.
| pixelsort wrote:
| Fitting then, that his release is happening to make a
| point with respect to judicial overreach in New York.
| tgv wrote:
| > for Europe, China starts to look like a great not only
| business but also military partner
|
| Speak for yourself. China is still worse than the USA,
| and Xi isn't bound to any term limit, and has built up
| quite a following.
| rbanffy wrote:
| China seems to understand the concept of soft power,
| something the US has been neglecting for many decades in
| favor of less subtle military intervention.
| tgv wrote:
| You mean: bribery and economic pressure? It surely isn't
| cultural power.
| rbanffy wrote:
| It could start helping finance infrastructure projects,
| schools, hospitals, universities, and so on. Along that
| comes the opportunity to exercise cultural influence and
| develop consumers and suppliers for your own industry.
|
| It's far less nasty than invading, freeing the people
| from their government and installing a puppet in its
| place. Also a lot cheaper. Any missile could pay for a
| school.
| monadINtop wrote:
| Which countries has china invaded, illegally or
| otherwise? Which governments have they toppled, covertly
| or openly?
| CrazyStat wrote:
| Tibet
| lkbm wrote:
| Perhaps more impressively: India, after India had been
| early to recognize PRC and worked to get them recognized
| internationally.
| tgv wrote:
| The next country that recognizes Taiwan as a state will
| find out.
| monadINtop wrote:
| Ah ok, so in other words we have to consider
| hypotheticals in order to even try and draw a comparison
| to the other state in question.
| victorbjorklund wrote:
| Pretty much all criminal laws are like that since only a
| fraction of crimes will ever lead to an arrest we make
| examples out of those are caught to make others less likely
| to commit crimes in the future when they see the
| punishment. The deterrence effect is basically "risk of
| getting caught" * "punishment if you get caught".
| dsego wrote:
| It's not just the deterrence but to publicly condemn the
| act. Condemnation needs to have teeth and the perpetrator
| needs to feel the burden, otherwise it's just empty words
| on paper. The burden is necessary to establish social
| balance. The punishment can't be enjoyable, it needs to
| take away the unfair advantage gained by the criminal
| act, it provides a way to repay moral debt back to
| society.
|
| > A fourth feature of punishment, widely acknowledged at
| least since the publication of Joel Feinberg's seminal
| 1965 article "The Expressive Function of Punishment" is
| that it serves to express condemnation, or censure, of
| the offender for her offense. As Feinberg discusses, it
| is this condemning element that distinguishes punishment
| from what he calls "nonpunitive penalties" such as
| parking tickets, demotions, flunkings, and so forth.
| (Feinberg, 1965: 398-401).
|
| https://iep.utm.edu/m-p-puni/
| mrpopo wrote:
| Pretty sure Silk Road enabled loads of pedophiles to go
| about their activities. This is a false equivalence
| mardifoufs wrote:
| What do you mean? Did it actually allow selling anything
| related to pedophilia? Like CSAM?
| sweettea wrote:
| Despite Silk Road explicitly banning CSAM, and the feds
| not charging Ulbricht with it when you know they would
| love the positive PR if they could?
| silver_silver wrote:
| > The site's terms of service prohibited the sale of
| certain items. When the Silk Road marketplace first
| began, the creator and administrators instituted terms of
| service that prohibited the sale of anything whose
| purpose was to "harm or defraud." This included child
| pornography, stolen credit cards, assassinations, and
| weapons of any type
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_(marketplace)#Pro
| duc...
| Deutschland314 wrote:
| Snoop you compare apples with oranges.
|
| People don't really care about child rapists see the
| Christian churches.
|
| Also you were able to buy everything on silk road including
| guns. The multiplication effect of this is potentially more
| worth.
|
| Nonetheless it's still a straw man argument. I personally
| would not mind at all increasing prison sentences for child
| rapists.
| eckmLJE wrote:
| Silk road had a policy against selling items with intent
| to harm like guns. While occasionally some weapon
| listings would slip through, they would be taken down.
| The focus was drugs (and a lot of legal media). There
| were plenty of other black market sites on the dark web
| that sold everything, but that's not what the silk road
| in particular was about.
| npoc wrote:
| In the UK, serial child rapists are being given 3 year
| sentences
| dani__german wrote:
| In the UK, the police helped hide the crimes of non-
| british child rapists.
|
| The axiom of their "rule of law" was that racism is the
| worst possible sin, and that anything done to appease
| people calling you racist was mandatory. The below link
| MASSIVLEY understated the number of victims.
|
| https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/rotherham-sex-
| abuse-sh...
| npoc wrote:
| Enoch Powell explained all this nearly 60 years ago, and
| was sacked the next day by Edward Heath. The term
| "racist" is at best useless and at worst dangerous. It
| doesn't differentiate between judging people based on
| their physiology and judging them on their culture and
| values. By going out of their way to avoid appearing to
| judge by physiology, people allowed into their society
| millions of people with cultures and values fundamentally
| opposed to their own (e.g. Christians using the British
| common law vs Muslims using Sharia law). The result is a
| slow destruction of society that Enoch Powell predicted
| so long ago in his 1968 speech.
| sim7c00 wrote:
| in my country it depend on thr color of your skin and
| your bank account to what charge you get. =) wonderful
| world!
| mcv wrote:
| Yes, but so are a lot of sentences in the US. I've heard of
| people being put away for decades for mere drug possession.
|
| That said, rapists surprisingly often get just a slap on
| the wrist, or not even that. The US absolutely needs some
| balance and consistency in its sentencing, but pardoning
| this one guy sends a really weird message in that regard.
| At the very least, just commute the sentence so at least
| the conviction still stands.
| pixxel wrote:
| > he enjoyed massive market benefit
|
| Life imprisonment, no parole.
|
| You have to be a complete and utter wanker to think his
| punishment was justified.
| sneak wrote:
| There were no victims of his conduct.
|
| The idea that possession of drugs is or should be illegal is
| purely arbitrary, and is used thus to justify massive
| violations of human rights. It is literally insane that the
| state claims authority over what you are allowed to do to
| your own body.
|
| No victim, no crime.
| mirpa wrote:
| While you might argue which drug is dangerous and which
| isn't, ban on drugs is not arbitrary decision. You can't do
| whatever you want with your body, because you might loose
| control and hurt others. Drug abuse affects others as well
| (financially, mentally, physically...). I am victim of
| someone's drug abuse. I never took any drugs. So if you are
| looking for victims of drug abuse, here I am.
| tallanvor wrote:
| Some of the decisions were rather arbitrary at best, and
| racist at worst, though. The sentence disparities
| regarding, for example, cocaine depending on how you are
| using it was designed to punish black people more
| harshly. Opium bans had as much to do with anti-Chinese
| sentiment than anything.
|
| I'm not arguing that drugs should be legal, but we do
| have to be clear that the reasons for banning them and
| the punishment are not necessarily rational.
| rayiner wrote:
| That's pure historical revision. The sentencing
| difference was created in 1986 based on the belief that
| it was more addictive. It wasn't until a decade later
| that research showed the causation had been reversed
| (more addicted people were more likely to use crack). If
| you look at the timing, there was a huge increase in drug
| crime that occurred as a result of the crack epidemic:
| https://www.nber.org/digest/oct18/lingering-lethal-toll-
| amer....
|
| The recent change in policy simply reflects the
| prevailing trend of reducing disparities in sentencing
| for criminals while increasing disparities in crime
| victimization by failing to enforce the law.
| jeffhuys wrote:
| Then why the distinction with alcohol though?
| simonh wrote:
| Alcohol is in fact heavily regulated and controlled in
| most countries, and we have cultural practices in place
| that largely manage the risks for the vast majority of
| people that consume it.
|
| Personally I'm in favour of further narcotics
| legalisation, but with regulation to manage it's social
| effects and taxation to fund the expensive mitigation
| measures it would require.
| oneeyedpigeon wrote:
| > You can't do whatever you want with your body, because
| you might loose control and hurt others.
|
| Why is it legal to drive a car, then?
| GTP wrote:
| It is legal if you're in good shape and therefore the
| risk of that happening is minimal. It is illegal to drive
| a car under an altered state that makes it more likely to
| happen. It is a balance between the benefits of
| permitting something and the likelihood of something bad
| happens. In normal conditions, the benefits are believed
| to outweigh the risks, so it is generally permitted to
| drive a car. But it is not permitted to drive it if
| you're under the effect of some substance that can alter
| your perception of reality.
| oneeyedpigeon wrote:
| OK, that's fair. So I agree that:
|
| > You can't do _whatever you want_ with your body
|
| is pretty reasonable, but how about we rephrase it as
| something like:
|
| > You can't do something with your body that
| significantly increases the risk of harming others
|
| ?
| GTP wrote:
| Yes, I would agree with this principle, with the caveat
| that there could be always be corner cases that deserve a
| special treatment.
| krupan wrote:
| Honestly, if cars were only invented in the last few
| years, it probably wouldn't be legal without extensive
| training and licensing
| GTP wrote:
| Drugs weren't the only items sold there, there were also
| weapons. If you illegally sell weapons in a country where
| it is already much easier to _legally_ get a weapon than
| most other countries, you can be sure that those weapons
| aren 't going to be purchased by a layperson trying to
| defend themself but by criminals going to use those to harm
| other people.
| rbanffy wrote:
| The crime being not selling the weapons, but failing to
| keep appropriate records that ensured the use of the
| weapons was responsible and that users would be held
| accountable for their use.
|
| On my book, this is pretty serious.
| mightyham wrote:
| It's clear you don't personally know anyone who has been
| affected by a serious drug addiction. It is devastating not
| just for them, but their family and everyone that cares
| about them. It's unbelievable to me anyone could claim that
| dealing drugs is a victimless crime.
| 15155 wrote:
| How are liquor stores functionally different?
| carlosjobim wrote:
| Those kind of drugs are bought by traditional street
| criminals. Darknet it's mostly about psychedelics and
| such.
| richwater wrote:
| A lack of personal responsibility is tragic, but hardly
| the fault of Mcdonalds when someone has a heart attack.
| agumonkey wrote:
| I'm afraid that the current administration is fond on this
| business model. Borderline criminal business models behind
| curtains.
| glerk wrote:
| > he knowingly pursued enormous risk in order to achieve
| outsized benefits
|
| Like it or not, this makes him a heroic figure in the eyes of
| many people.
|
| > we shouldn't have bailed him out
|
| Bailing him out comes at no cost. Letting him rot in prison
| provides no benefit to anyone.
| sirbutters wrote:
| Bailing him out comes at no cost? That's one way to see it.
| In my opinion, it sends a message that as long as you can
| provide value to this new administration, you get
| preferential treatment - no matter how shady and unethical
| your business ventures are.
| potato3732842 wrote:
| >minimal competition, lack of regulation, high margins etc
|
| Those benefits don't come from nowhere. You're basically
| getting compensated to take on the risk, same as any other
| business. The difference in this case is that the risk is
| that a bunch of thugs with guns will show up and either kill
| you or put you in a cage in addition to the usual financial
| ruin.
| cluckindan wrote:
| Many criminal gangs from biker groups to foreign cartels are
| doing the same thing and reaping profits in the $100Bs scale
| annually.
|
| Your argument is not an argument for incarceration, it is an
| argument for abolition of prohibition and regulating the
| sales of some psychoactives.
|
| The same stone would hit the fentanyl epidemic, it would hit
| the pushers of "zombie drug" laced cocktails, it would hit
| cross-border trafficking, to name only a few. Society would
| massively benefit. So would the economy.
| sobellian wrote:
| > Many criminal gangs from biker groups to foreign cartels
| are doing the same thing and reaping profits in the $100Bs
| scale annually.
|
| That comparison does not flatter Ross Ulbricht.
| krupan wrote:
| "Society would massively benefit"
|
| Yes. Just like San Francisco and Seattle did when they
| legalized drugs
| cluckindan wrote:
| "Legalized drugs" as in "buy and use whatever legally" is
| not what is being suggested here.
| pooper wrote:
| >> we shouldn't have bailed him out.
|
| I don't have a horse in this race but the first thing that
| comes to my mind when I hear "we shouldn't have bailed him
| out" is silicon valley bank and its depositors. That to me
| was the biggest show of hypocrisy by silicon valley.
| bhawks wrote:
| The most prolific drug dealers who sold on silk road have
| served their sentences and are out of prison.
|
| Ross was given a life sentence without possibility of parole an
| incomparable sentence in relation to all other parties that
| were involved.
| highwaylights wrote:
| I don't see why he deserves to be released.
|
| So many people are in jail for crimes they didn't commit, or
| for non-violent offenses that were committed out of hardship
| and a need to eat.
|
| They gave evidence he tried to have someone killed, and that he
| saw confirmation it had been done.
|
| Even if the accusation is somehow false and he didn't order
| that killing, how many people did he actually kill just by
| running Silk Road?
|
| I'm so sick of the narrative that aww shucks he's a good kid
| from a good family and he just made a boo-boo and didn't mean
| to build a multi-billion dollar illicit fortune from
| trafficking deadly drugs and outright poisons all over the
| world.
|
| If this dude wasn't a money-raised white kid from California
| no-one would care.
| Aeolun wrote:
| He didn't deserve to be imprisoned that long in the first
| place, ergo, he deserves to be released. The fact that nearly
| half the US prison population deserves to be released doesn't
| change anything about this guy being deserving too?
|
| People generally don't get locked up for life even if they do
| kill someone (in civilized countries), as long as they can be
| rehabilitated.
| belter wrote:
| He might even run for President....
| Spacemolte wrote:
| What? - whatever nasty stuff happened because of those drugs
| being distributed and sold still falls back on that guy, and
| lets be real, some shitty stuff has to have happened with a
| direct link back to those drugs.
| herbst wrote:
| This was the first time many people had access to clean drugs
| in a comfortable way. It's easy to blame him, but the reality
| is that the alternatives are worse for customers.
| 627467 wrote:
| I personally find it ridiculous that people agree with the
| sentencing when you compare to sentences for tobacco industry
| practices, opioid epidemic, etc..
| butlike wrote:
| > I think his original sentence was absolutely deserved
|
| The original sentence was two life terms. TO be pedantic, it
| sounds like you meant to say he deserved sentencing, but not
| the original sentence.
| npvrite wrote:
| A. His prison sentence was totalitarian and three letters stole
| his crypto and illegally convicted him.
|
| B. Orange is not a hero. I don't bow down to Kim Jong Un/Hitler
| wannabees.
|
| C. Tor is a three letter honeypot.
| cbg0 wrote:
| [citation needed] on those items
| wolfgang42 wrote:
| Tangentially related: I had the disconcerting experience of
| reading a Wired article about his arrest[1] while unknowingly
| sitting about six feet from the spot where he was apprehended.
| When I read that the FBI agents had stopped at Bello Coffee while
| preparing their stakeout, I thought, _huh, interesting
| coincidence, I just had a coffee there._
|
| Then Ulbricht walked into the public library and sat down at the
| table directly in front of me, and suddenly as I was reading I
| could look up and see exactly the chair he had been in, where the
| plainclothes police had positioned themselves, how they had
| arranged a distraction.
|
| Having this tableau unexpectedly unfold right in front of my eyes
| was a fascinating experience, and it certainly made the article
| suddenly get a lot more immersive!
|
| [1] https://www.wired.com/2015/05/silk-road-2/
|
| EDIT: to be clear, I was not present for the arrest. I was
| reading the magazine, some years _after_ the arrest, but _in the
| same place as_ the arrest. (I didn't qualify the events with "I
| read that..." since I thought the narrative ellipsis would be
| obvious from context; evidently not.)
| paulsutter wrote:
| Wait, you were reading about his arrest while he was being
| arrested? That article was written after his conviction?
| j-bos wrote:
| He first read the article while sitting where Ulbricht was
| when Ulbricht was arrested.
| EricRiese wrote:
| Plot twist: wolfgang42 _is_ Ulbricht
| tocs3 wrote:
| Clearly time travel. He had brought the article back in
| time so he could read it as it happened.
|
| By the way, I thought the post was written well. It did
| take a little thinking but it was an interesting take.
| syspec wrote:
| Sorry, it went over my head a bit, you read about his arrest
| while he was being arrested?
| wolfgang42 wrote:
| He was being arrested in the article, not IRL. When I say
| "Ulbricht walked into the public library and sat down at the
| table directly in front of me" I mean that I read
|
| _> He went... past the periodicals and reference desk,
| beyond the romance novels, and settled in at a circular table
| near science fiction, on the second floor... in a corner,
| with a view out the window and his back toward the wall._
|
| and realized that I was in the Glen Park public library, at a
| circular table near science fiction on the second floor, in a
| corner with my back to the window, and facing directly
| towards where the article had just said he had sat.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| I see so you accidentally retraced his footsteps from years
| prior and then realized it as you were reading about it.
| pwdisswordfishz wrote:
| > He was being arrested in the article, not IRL.
|
| So the article lied that he was arrested?
| chocolateteeth wrote:
| Cute
| Satam wrote:
| I had the same confusion initially, interestingly chat GPT
| gets it:
|
| So while wolfgang42 wasn't there when Ulbricht was actually
| arrested, their realization created a vivid mental image of
| the event unfolding in that space, which made the story feel
| more immersive.
|
| In short: they were reading about an old event, but it
| happened to occur in the same spot they were sitting at that
| moment. Hope that clears it up!
| blooalien wrote:
| Okay, that's actually pretty wild. I totally misunderstood
| too, but the response from the "AI" does indeed "clear it
| up" for me. A bit surprised actually, but then again, I
| suppose I shouldn't be, since _language_ is what those
| "large language models" _are all about_ after all... :)
| babkayaga wrote:
| Indeed. But their is something surprising here, however.
| people like chomsky would present examples like this for
| decades as untracktable by any algorithm, and as a proof
| that language is a uniquely human thing. they went as far
| as to claim that humans have a special language organ,
| somewhere in their brain perhaps. turns out, a formula
| exists, it is just very very large.
| TuringTest wrote:
| > _chomsky would present examples like this for decades
| as untracktable by any algorithm, and as a proof that
| language is a uniquely human thing_
|
| Generatove AI has all but solved the Frame Problem.
|
| Those expressions where intractable bc of the
| impossibility to represent in logic all the background
| knowledge that is required to understand the context.
|
| It turns out, it _is_ possible to represent all that
| knowledge in compressed form, with statistical
| summarisation applied to humongous amounts of data and
| processing power, unimaginable back then; this puts the
| knowledge in reach of the algorithm processing the
| sentence, which is thus capable of understanding the
| context.
| erehweb wrote:
| Huge amounts of data and processing power are arguably
| the foundation for the "Chinese room" thought experiment.
| dambi0 wrote:
| I don't think I understand this entirely. The point of
| the thought experiment is to assume the possibility of
| the room and consider the consequences. How it might be
| achievable in practice doesn't alter this
| erehweb wrote:
| The room is possible because there's someone inside with
| a big list of rules of what Chinese characters to reply
| with. This represents the huge amount of data processing
| and statistical power. When the thought expt was created,
| you could argue that the room was impossible, so the
| experiment was meaningless. But that's no longer the
| case.
| dambi0 wrote:
| if you go and s/Chinese Room/LLM against any of the
| counter arguments to the thought experiment how many of
| them does it invalidate?
| erehweb wrote:
| I'm not sure I'm following you. My comment re Chinese
| room was that parent said the data processing we now have
| was unimaginable back in the day. In fact, it was
| imaginable - the Chinese room imagined it.
| dambi0 wrote:
| I was responding to the point that the thought experiment
| was meaningless.
| ben_w wrote:
| I never bought into Searle's argument with the Chinese
| room.
|
| The rules for translation are themselves the result of
| intelligence; when the thought experiment is made real
| (I've seen an example on TV once), these rules are
| written down by humans, using human intelligence.
|
| A machine which itself generates these rules from
| observation has at least the intelligence* that humans
| applied specifically in the creation of documents
| expressing the same rules.
|
| That a human can mechanically follow those same rules
| without understanding them, says as much and as little as
| the fact that the DNA sequences within the neurones in
| our brains are not themselves directly conscious of
| higher level concepts such as "why is it so hard to type
| 'why' rather than 'wju' today?" despite being the
| foundation of the intelligence process of natural
| selection and evolution.
|
| * well, the _capability_ -- I 'm open to the argument
| that AI are thick due to the need for so many more
| examples than humans need, and are simply making up for
| it by being very very fast and squeezing the equivalent
| of several million years of experiences for a human into
| a month of wall-clock time.
| Nevermark wrote:
| I didn't buy that argument at all either.
|
| Minds shuffle information. Including about themselves.
|
| Paper with information being shuffled by rules exhibiting
| intelligence and awareness of "self" is just ridiculously
| inefficient. Not inherently less capable.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Which should be expected, because since human brain is
| finite, it follows that it's either possible to do it, or
| the brain is some magic piece of divine substrate to
| which laws of physics do not apply.
|
| The problem turned out to be that some people got so
| fixated on formal logic they apparently couldn't spot
| that their own mind does _not_ do any kind of symbolic
| reasoning unless _forced to_ by lots of training and
| willpower.
| overu589 wrote:
| That's not what it means at all. You threw a monkey in
| your own wrench.
|
| The brain has infinite potentials, however only finite
| resolves. So you can only play a finite number of moves
| in a game of infinite infinities.
|
| Individual minds have varying mental technology, our
| mental technologies change and adapt to challenges (not
| always in real time.) thus these infinite configurations
| create new potentials that previously didn't exist in the
| realm of potential without some serious mental vectoring.
|
| Get it? You were just so sure of yourself you canceled
| your own infinite potentials!
|
| Remember, it's only finite after it happens. Until then
| it's potential.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| > _The brain has infinite potentials_
|
| No, it doesn't. The brain has a finite number of possible
| states to be in. It's an absurdly large amount of states,
| but it _is_ finite. And, out of those absurd but finite
| number of possible states, only a tiny fraction
| correspond to _possible_ states potentially reachable by
| a functioning brain. The rest of them are noise.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| > _their realization created a vivid mental image of the
| event unfolding in that space, which made the story feel
| more immersive._
|
| Glad that ChatGPT, probably like GP themselves, is a
| visualizer and actually _can_ create a "vivid mental
| image" of something. For those of us with aphantasia, that
| is _not_ a thing. Myself, I too was mighty confused by the
| text, which read literally like a time travel story, and
| was only missing a cat and tomorrow 's newspaper.
| dambi0 wrote:
| Isn't it at least equally likely that one would be more
| prone to confusion if one was a visual thinker?
|
| I don't think we can infer anythin about how LLMs think
| based on this.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Right. I'm not claiming the LLM has visual imagination -
| I suspect that OP has it, and that ChatGPT was trained on
| enough text from visual thinkers implicitly conveying
| their experience of the world, that it's now able to
| correctly interpret writing like that of OP's.
| Sophira wrote:
| As a visual thinker myself, I was also confused by how
| the story was presented. ChatGPT did better than me.
| Applejinx wrote:
| You could also say that ChatGPT erred similarly to the
| original writer, who was unclear and misleading about
| events.
|
| We needn't act like they share some grand enlightenment.
| It's just not well expressed. ChatGPT's output is also
| frequently not well expressed and not well thought out.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| There's many more ways to err than to get something
| right. ChatGPT getting OP right where many people here
| didn't tells us it's more likely that there is a
| particular style of writing/thinking that is not obvious
| to everyone, but ChatGPT can identify and understand,
| rather than just both OP and ChatGPT accidentally making
| exactly the same error.
| Applejinx wrote:
| Why would that be more likely? Seems like OP and ChatGPT
| (which is just many people of different skill levels)
| might easily make the same failure to communicate. Many
| failures of ChatGPT are failures to communicate or to
| convey structured thinking.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Because out of all possible communication failures OP and
| ChatGPT could make, them both making _the exact same
| error_ , in a way that makes the two errors cancel out,
| is extremely unlikely.
| ben_w wrote:
| It's a strange feeling, watching the AI get better at
| language comprehension than me.
|
| I made a similar mistake on the original comment as you
| (I read it as "Ulbricht returned to the cafe, he actually
| sat down right in front of me while I was reading the
| story about his previous arrest here, and that's when I
| realised it was the same place"), and also thought you
| were saying that you think ChatGPT has a visual
| "imagination" inside.
|
| (I don't know if it does or doesn't, but given the "o" in
| "4o" is supposed to make it multi-modal, my default
| assumption is that 4o can visualise things... but then,
| that's also my default assumption about humans, and you
| being aphantasic shows this is not necessarily so).
| xerox13ster wrote:
| Legitimately and I say this was absolutely no shade
| intended. This is a reading comprehension problem,
| nothing to do with aphantasia.
|
| He clearly states that he was reading an article, he uses
| past tense verbs when referring to Ross, and to the
| events spelled out in the article. If you somehow thought
| that he could be reading an article that ostensibly has
| to be describing a past event as he was seeing it in real
| time that is a logic flaw on you.
|
| It has nothing to do with what you can or cannot
| visualize. All you have to do is ask yourself could he
| have been reading an article about Ross's arrest while
| watching it? Since nobody can violate the causality of
| space time the answer is no.
|
| This isn't just you this is everybody in this thread who
| is reading this and going this is a little confusing. No
| it's very clearly him speaking about a past experience
| reading an article about a past event.
| oneeyedpigeon wrote:
| I realised what was going on, but I did a double-take at:
|
| > Then Ulbricht walked into the public library and sat
| down at the table directly in front of me
|
| The problem is that two past events are being described,
| so tense alone cannot distinguish them. Cut the readers
| some slack; the writing could have been better.
| adinisom wrote:
| Done for effect: it felt to the OP as if it was the
| present so the writing conveys that, while elsewhere
| making it clear the arrest was not the present.
| themdonuts wrote:
| Yes, same here.
| whycome wrote:
| To follow the tense and delivery of the previous
| sentence, it would have been clearest to say
|
| "Then when Ulbricht..."
|
| That "then" always does a lot of heavy lifting in English
| prose.
| JohnMakin wrote:
| I am as baffled at the responses and appreciated this
| explanation as it was helpful to me to work on my
| communication style and expresses a lot of similar
| frustrations I have. Like what is actually going on here?
| this isn't shade at anyone, I just feel like people are
| losing some fundamental ability to deduce from context
| what they are reading. it's doubly concerning because
| people immediately reach to an AI/LLM to explain it for
| them, which cannot possibly be helping the first problem.
| Nevermark wrote:
| If an LLM clears up a misunderstanding, I am having
| trouble seeing that as a bad thing.
|
| Maybe in 10 years we can blame poor reading comprehension
| on having a decade of computers reading for us. But it's
| a bit early for that.
| firesteelrain wrote:
| Who will think if LLM is doing all the thinking?
| dontlikeyoueith wrote:
| The problem is that people already have piss-poor reading
| comprehension. Relying LLMs to help them is going to make
| it worse than it already is.
| JohnMakin wrote:
| I wonder what is going on? I've noticed this getting
| worse for a long time to the point I'm not sure it's my
| imagination anymore. I usually like to lambast whole word
| reading as a complete failure in the american school
| system that contributes to this, but I think it's likely
| something else. Shorter attention spans?
| Nevermark wrote:
| Long form reading is dying.
|
| We have a multitude of immediate distractions now.
|
| Books build richer worlds & ideas. But without learning
| to love books very early in life, which takes a lot of
| uninterrupted time, they don't come naturally to most.
|
| I used to read a few books a week, virtually every week.
| Sometimes two or three in a long day and some night. I
| still read a lot daily, interesting and useful things in
| short form. But finding time to read books seems to have
| become more difficult.
| lee-rhapsody wrote:
| Agree. This entire thread is weird. How do so many people
| in this thread have such obvious reading comprehension
| issues?
|
| On a similar note--I've noticed that HN comments are
| often overwrought, like the commenter is trying to sound
| smarter than they actually are but just end up muddling
| what they're trying to say.
|
| Perhaps these things are connected.
| mlyle wrote:
| I do think the comment had something about how it was
| written that made it hard to follow. I understood the
| first sentence. But then I got to
|
| > Having this tableau unexpectedly unfold right in front
| of my eyes
|
| And the metaphor / tense shift caught me by surprise and
| made my eyes retrace to the beginning. I still got it,
| but there was a little bit of comprehension whiplash as I
| hit that bump in the road.
|
| In some ways, we're treated to an experience like the
| author's as we hit that sentence, so in that sense it's
| clever writing. On the other hand, maybe too clever for a
| casual web forum instead of, say, a letter.
| firesteelrain wrote:
| Agree this is a consequence of people reading too fast
| and reacting.
| hackinthebochs wrote:
| _Feel the AGI_
| mod50ack wrote:
| One, ChatGPT isn't a "visualizer."
|
| Two, I have aphantasia and didn't picture anything. I got
| it the first time without any confusion.
|
| Are you seriously asking ChatGPT to read things for you?
| No wonder your reading comprehension is cooked. Don't
| blame aphantasia.
| beacon294 wrote:
| Reducing any judgment out of your comment, you have to
| admit that the commenter's action was a successful
| comprehension strategy they learned from and can use in
| the future without chatgpt.
| kordlessagain wrote:
| That's because they are describing the inner workings of
| their visualization systems.
|
| They saw him walk in because he was where it happened. The
| image of Ross, and others, was in mind, however.
| racl101 wrote:
| Yeah, whoosh for me.
| remram wrote:
| > When the FBI agents stopped to have a drink I thought
|
| You mean "when _I read the part where_ the FBI agents stopped
| to have a drink I thought "?
|
| This part makes your comment super confusing. Where you there
| then or later?
| inopinatus wrote:
| I believe they are suggesting an experience of imaginatively
| visualising the events of the arrest linearly as they were
| narrated in their read-through of the article,
| serendipitously aided by being physically present at the same
| location, and are referencing the article's narration
| partially in the present tense to similarly immerse us _in
| medias res_ as we follow their remark.
|
| Alternatively, they are themselves Ross Ulbricht, describing
| an out-of-body fever dream or post-traumatic flashback. This
| seems ... somewhat less likely.
| wolfgang42 wrote:
| I thought that starting my story _in media res_ would make
| for a better dramatic effect, but it seems I overestimated my
| audience and went a little too heavy on the narrative
| ellipsis.
| sdwr wrote:
| Boo! Don't blame the audience!
|
| > Then Ulbricht walked into the public library and sat down
| at the table directly in front of me, and suddenly as I was
| reading I could look up and see exactly the chair he had
| been in, where the plainclothes police had positioned
| themselves, how they had arranged a distraction.
|
| Alternately:
|
| > Ulbricht had walked into the public library
|
| gives the game away.
|
| If you still want to play around a bit:
|
| > I could see where Ulbricht walked into the public
| library. The table he sat at. I looked up and saw where the
| plainclothes police had positioned themselves, how they had
| arranged a distraction.
|
| That way you are leaving some ambiguity, but are not
| directly lying with the tenses.
| pineaux wrote:
| Well, a lot of times the audience is to blame... There
| are many people that are stupid, aren't trained in style
| figures of writing or just not trained in reading in a
| way that allows for complex conceptual frameworks. It
| also happens in software: someone writes great code, it's
| very complex and some people don't understand it and
| blame the author of writing unreadable code. Its easy to
| call something unreadable if you don't understand what
| it's saying. Let me bring it differently: it takes two to
| tango. I found his story interesting and engaging. Let me
| bring it in another way: Sometimes the joke is brilliant,
| but the audience just doesn't understand it. It's not a
| bad joke or a bad comedian. It's a bad audience.
|
| To go into the meat of this: he is imagining it while
| reading in the same location as the incident happened.
| This is a style of writing. It's definitely not wrong.
| oneeyedpigeon wrote:
| To paraphrase the asshole quote: "if one person
| misunderstands you, that's their fault; if everyone does,
| it's yours". The same goes for your comedian analogy:
| sure, you can tell a brilliant joke in French to a
| Chinese audience, but why?
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| I think you _could_ have told it as experiencing the events
| without making your post confusing, but you 'd have to redo
| your first paragraph. Your first paragraph is external,
| meta, and places his arrest in your past, which throws off
| the effect when that suddenly changes in the next sentence.
| It's not the audience's fault that that is hard to parse.
| kurisufag wrote:
| I enjoyed it, personally.
| ipaddr wrote:
| I found it interesting and could visualize you as you were
| visualizing it while reading. The only part that made me go
| back was I thought he sat down to your table until I reread
| you could see the table he sat down at years ago.
| homebrewer wrote:
| > I overestimated my audience
|
| How many languages do you speak? A large part of this site
| speaks at least two, and usually English is not the first
| one of them.
| vasco wrote:
| I've seen this type of thing recently and also have been
| told some comments were "obviously" meaning something else.
| I think people must've stopped reading books and lost
| interpretation skills.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Can you form vivid mental images in your head?
|
| Many of us can't. Personally, for nearly three decades I
| thought the ability to vividly experience a book this way
| was just some overused and extremely exaggerated metaphor -
| and then I discovered _aphantasia_ is a thing, and I score
| close to top of its severity scale.
|
| So perhaps it's less about your starting point, and more
| about describing a frame of mind some in the audience don't
| have, and can't relate to.
|
| Curiously, I don't recall ever seeing this particular style
| of writing before, in any of the books I ever read.
| oneeyedpigeon wrote:
| > it seems I overestimated my audience
|
| I was willing to give you the benefit of the doubt,
| somebody who aspires to be a better writer. But, no, this
| clarifies that you're just pretentious.
| beejiu wrote:
| I assume you mean "I could look up and see exactly the chair he
| had been in" figuratively?
| wolfgang42 wrote:
| I mean, it's possible that the library had rearranged their
| chairs in the intervening years and that exact one was now at
| a different table, but it was certainly a chair in the same
| _location._
| inopinatus wrote:
| this is Neurath's library1.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurath%27s_boat
| coliveira wrote:
| The responses to this comment show that people's ability to
| read and comprehend text has decreased dramatically in the last
| few years. Frightening...
| inopinatus wrote:
| I was afraid of this too but it turned out to be presbyopia
| internet2000 wrote:
| If every reply is pointing out how confusing it is, maybe the
| original comment is just poorly written.
| wolfgang42 wrote:
| You're not going to hear from the people who thought it
| made perfect sense, so the replies are a pretty biased
| sample. (This is also true of the parent complaint about
| reading comprehension, tbh.) But I see three confused
| replies and three corrections (not counting my own), so it
| doesn't seem to be _every_ reply.
|
| I think the problem is that I took an artistic style in an
| attempt to paint a picture for the reader, but I did it in
| a long thread on a technical forum where people are
| probably mostly skimming rather than engaging in literary
| criticism, so I should maybe have anticipated this would be
| a problem.
| vonunov wrote:
| I thought it was fine, I wasn't confused for a moment.
| The only real problem here is that HN attracts a certain
| brand of nerds who are inclined to think it's hilarious
| when Maurice Moss says "Yes, it's one of those", many of
| whom are likely frothing right now because I just
| committed a comma splice in the previous sentence.
| chimeracoder wrote:
| > The responses to this comment show that people's ability to
| read and comprehend text has decreased dramatically in the
| last few years
|
| Or they show that GP wrote an ambiguous piece of text.
| rpmisms wrote:
| An engineering forum may not be the place for creative prose,
| too.
| throw37263 wrote:
| Or HN just has a lot more international readers now and
| English isn't their first language.
| pcdoodle wrote:
| Aaron695's comment are always fun to read. For some reason
| he's kinda 86'ed here.
| defrost wrote:
| I (and others) have vouched a few of his comments back to
| life, he does write a good comment.
|
| I don't know the original reasons for his apparent perma-
| dead'ing (users can option to "show dead" and see these
| comments) but I suspect it's due to going fully Australian
| wih swear words and invectives when he gets a bit
| passionate about something .. or even just adding colour
| for a lark, as we do.
| mergy wrote:
| Give it up for Glen Park.
| cush wrote:
| Before I got to the edit I was convinced you were in The
| Neverending Story
| pyuser583 wrote:
| This is why I love SF. It's so small.
|
| You can walk anywhere, and there's a good chance something big
| happened nearby.
| nick3443 wrote:
| You did a Boondock Saints!
| beeflet wrote:
| THERE WAS A FIREFIGHT
| stormcode wrote:
| What's the symbology there?
| beeflet wrote:
| I think that nick was comparing the magazine writer to
| the detective overly dramatically re-creating the scene
| of a crime in boondock saints:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsuH1msEkvM
|
| BTW Boondock Saints is like one of the dumbest movies of
| all time, they made a behind-the-scenes documentary about
| how the film failed because of how arrogant the
| directors/screenwriters were. It's so stupid, it's great
| Unearned5161 wrote:
| for the record, I appreciated your creative prose and enjoyed
| the trippy narrative
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| Maybe the single most confusing comment ever
| 2-3-7-43-1807 wrote:
| also single most irrelevant comment ever
| lee-rhapsody wrote:
| Not really. If you've ever read fiction--like, at all--it's
| intuitive.
| alwa wrote:
| Just as an additional datapoint, since I'm confused by fellow
| commenters' confusion--I thought your narrative was clear,
| colorful, and entertaining, and I hope you'll keep things so
| literary and engaging in your future contributions too :)
|
| As with so many matters of crime, punishment, and high dudgeon,
| the physical reality of the situation always feels so banal.
| Dread Pirate Roberts' lawless dark kingdom, where he
| commissions trans-national assassinations... looks a lot like a
| nerdy dude's laptop on a municipal library table.
| pests wrote:
| Yes, I thought it was an interesting blend of past and
| present. If this were a scene in a show or movie it could be
| edited beautifully - the reader, sitting alone in a corner,
| looks up and in a lucid, almost psychedelic way, the past
| comes to life with Ulbrict sitting in front of him, that
| unfold as he continues reading.
| smcameron wrote:
| I also wasn't at all confused.
| Nevermark wrote:
| Until you looked over his shoulder at his Bitcoin account
| balance rising dramatically in real time.
|
| Huge amounts of income can even make something as boring as
| an online digital scrapbook tech sexy.
| siamese_puff wrote:
| I understood exactly what you meant and that is an awesome
| experience
| pineaux wrote:
| Yes
| Nevermark wrote:
| This is so off topic. Or maybe not.
|
| I once walked home after an evening of some friends and beer.
|
| As I came up to my house it was dark but I clearly saw a
| little person walking through my back garden. About 3 foot
| tall, at the most, it seemed. And they were holding the hand
| of a smaller person half their height. Walking together, no
| hurry at all.
|
| I just froze and watched them walking away, and turn a
| corner.
|
| The feelings of disbelief, but wanting to believe were crazy.
|
| I came out of my shock. Ran the length of my home and managed
| to see mother and child raccoons now walking on all fours.
|
| They must have walked 20 feet on their back legs together,
| holding hands.
|
| For a minute of my life I was actually Alice in Wonderland
| and there were tiny people who walked gardens at night.
| Dilettante_ wrote:
| You met some tanuki, 100%.
| keepamovin wrote:
| You may be interested in looking at your experience though this
| lens: https://youtu.be/y61vpQ9cZ8s?si=jMXF35v6-2t5w0cj
| ews wrote:
| I used to live in Glen Park at that time and I vividly remember
| seeing Ross working as a cashier at the Canyon Market, helping
| me bag my groceries. It was probably around the time he was
| starting the Silk Road. The place where he was arrested was
| also my favorite table at the Public Library, where I used to
| go work. It is incredible to be that close to history.
| palata wrote:
| I liked the way you wrote it, I could picture you sitting in
| the library, picturing the arrest yourself :-).
|
| The reactions remind me of a philosophy class I had, where the
| professor went for a thought experiment in order to explain an
| idea. "Imagine a world where ...". There was a physicist in the
| class who kept interrupting the professor, saying "well that's
| not possible because of how physics works". I would have asked
| him what he thought about Star Wars or The Lord of the Rings;
| could he enjoy them at all? But he ruined the class for me so I
| didn't :-).
| alex1138 wrote:
| Imagine a world where I grab you by the shoulders and throw
| your smug ass out of the classroom!
| carlmr wrote:
| Regarding your edit. The first paragraph kind of lines up with
| you reading about it. But the second one is kind of confusing,
| and I think it's because "then" can mean two different things
| here. You meant "at the time of his arrest". If you casually
| read it without cross referencing the first paragraphs context,
| you might think it means "as I was sitting there".
|
| And there's nothing in the following sentences that corrects
| this garden path assumption.
|
| >Then Ulbricht walked into the public library and sat down at
| the table directly in front of me
|
| Would not confuse as many if you wrote
|
| > _At the time of his arrest_ Ulbricht walked into the public
| library and sat down at the table directly in front of me
|
| Or even clearer
|
| > _At the time of his arrest_ Ulbricht _had_ walked into the
| public library and sat down at the table _which was now_
| directly in front of me
| oharapj wrote:
| His writing employs a little bit of poetry in order to
| capture his feeling. Not all writing benefits from being as
| clear and bland as possible. HN should probably read some
| non-fiction books from time to time
| mabster wrote:
| Agreed. It was well written.
|
| The focus wasn't on the exact timeline and facts of the
| situation. It was on what it felt like as he read the
| piece.
| rhatsgf wrote:
| I have read at least 1000 European and American novels,
| play, poetry etc. and never had a single issue.
|
| The comment you refer to is just poorly written.
| oharapj wrote:
| Not sure which novels you're picking but in my experience
| novels are frequently more ambiguous and harder to parse
| than the parent comment, often on purpose. If you've
| really 'never had a single issue' maybe you're not
| choosing challenging texts
| tahfg wrote:
| That is it! Another HN genius knows it all! Perhaps end
| your sentence with a full stop if you are lecturing.
| oharapj wrote:
| Are you sockpuppeting? Lollll
| lee-rhapsody wrote:
| Do you mean fiction books?
| carlmr wrote:
| I think they want to confuse us.
| 12345hn6789 wrote:
| Why is he describing emotionally a factual event? He is
| leaving facts up to assumptions. I suppose sure, his intent
| was to confuse people. It worked.
| johnfn wrote:
| Wow, you've totally cracked the mystery. This explains why
| all the commenters are at each other's throats - half of them
| are reading it one way and half are reading the other way,
| and only one of the two ways makes any sense.
| kelvinjps10 wrote:
| But now It doesn't feel the same as the original comment
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| It would be morbidly neat if that article is printed out and
| put on the wall over there.
| ErikBjare wrote:
| I had a similar experience years ago when I read about the same
| thing in an Airbnb less than a kilometer from the library.
| simonvc wrote:
| i had a similar experience working in copenhagen. read an
| article about copenhagen sub orbital rockets, looked up and out
| my window and my eye landed on the rocket i was just reading
| about. weird.
| etothet wrote:
| It was almost you not you!
| jraines wrote:
| I had a similar experience watching Mr. Robot. There's a scene
| where it shifts to first person PoV and the voiceover says
| something like "am I seeing this? Is this real?" ... and it was
| EXACTLY the PoV I had every day walking out of my office on
| 36th st back then.
| dekhn wrote:
| My kids used to go to that library! We lived in the
| neighborhood (Glen Park- one of the "gems" of San Francisco)
| and the downtown is almost like a little village (except with
| California levels of traffic and trash). It was a bit weird to
| think that my kids were probably reading books while this guys
| was, uh, transacting his business nearby.
| hluska wrote:
| This is unrelated but you just did a wonderful job of
| explaining why I love history so much. There's something so
| exciting (to me) about deeply researching an event, going to
| where it happened and seeing the land (or library) come alive
| with images of the past.
|
| Good writing!
| Henchman21 wrote:
| Literacy and nuance is hard with written words -- especially
| when a large chunk of your audience is either a non-native
| English speaker or and Adderall addict. I feel like this
| community is heavily laden with both, and surely there must be
| some significant overlap between those groups.
|
| In other words, it was _too well written_
| MattSayar wrote:
| I read this article when it was first published years ago, and
| it is written so well I still "see the movie" in my head when I
| think about it. Your experience must have been next-level.
| mrandish wrote:
| This is wonderful. I've never argued that Ross shouldn't have
| served time but it's always been clear his prosecution and
| sentencing were excessive and unjust. The prosecutors asked for a
| 20 year sentence, which seemed disproportionate given the
| sentencing guidelines for a first-time offender and the non-
| violent charges he was convicted of. But the judge sentenced Ross
| to TWO life sentences plus 40 years - without the possibility of
| parole. There's no doubt Ross made a series of unwise and
| reckless decisions but serving over ten years of hard time in a
| FedMax prison is more than enough given the charges and his
| history.
|
| It's just unfortunate that Trump, and now, excessive pardons are
| politically polarized, which could cloud the fact that justice
| was done today. I don't credit Trump in any way for doing "the
| right thing" or even having a principled position regarding Ross'
| case. Clearly, others with influence on Trump convinced him to
| sign it. It doesn't matter how the pardon happened. Biden
| _should_ have already pardoned Ross because that crazy sentence
| shouldn 't have happened in the first place.
| arp242 wrote:
| > Biden should have already pardoned Ross because that crazy
| sentence shouldn't have happened in the first place.
|
| Biden did commute the sentence of several other non-violent
| cases just last week or thereabouts, and Trump has been talking
| about Ulbricht for quite some time so it's not a complete
| surprise.
|
| I guess the whole "murder for hire" thing excluded him from the
| "non-violent" category. But how that got tacked on seems very
| odd; the judge basically said "we didn't really handle it in
| the court case and it wasn't a charge, but it was mentioned a
| few times and it seemed basically true, so I included it in the
| sentencing". Like, ehh, okay?
|
| To be honest, I don't really understand much of the logic
| ("logic") of the US justice system....
| mrandish wrote:
| Judges are allowed to consider some evidence during
| sentencing which was not presented at trial. The standard for
| this evidence is lower than the "beyond a shadow of doubt"
| standard required for a criminal conviction. This is allowed
| because during sentencing the judge is considering
| information related to the history and character of the
| defendant. The 'hiring an online hitman' (who was an FBI
| informant) allegation was never charged or tried. Even if it
| hadn't been obvious entrapment, it might well have evaporated
| under discovery and cross-examination by a competent defense.
|
| Including such evidence in sentencing consideration is not
| uncontroversial in the U.S. However, it can cut both ways, in
| that a judge can consider extenuating circumstances in a
| defendant's life to reduce sentencing. We want judges to
| evaluate cases and make sentencing adjustments where
| appropriate. So, I don't think I'd do away with the practice.
| The real issue is that this specific judge went absolutely
| bonkers far beyond the 20 years the prosecution asked for
| during sentencing (which was already very high) and sentenced
| Ross to two life sentences plus 40 years without parole.
|
| Most of us who are happy that Ross was pardoned agree that he
| was guilty and deserved a jail sentence for the crimes he was
| convicted of. The only problem is the sentence was so wildly
| excessive for a non-violent, first-time offender. Compared to
| guidelines and other sentences it was just crazy and wrong.
| Ross has served over ten years. Now he's free. That's
| probably about right.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Calling him a non-violent first time offender is very odd
| given the magnitude of what his crimes were. He created a
| very large scale marketplace for all things illegal.
| Independent of his own hiring of hit men (hello non-
| violent?), selling substances that lead to overdoses, guns,
| bomb making materials, etc is certainly my definition of
| violent. Then add the scale; I fully agree with life
| sentence without chance of parole. This pardon is shameful.
| idunnoman1222 wrote:
| The silk road did not sell guns and bombs.
| azinman2 wrote:
| I saw it when it was active.
| butlike wrote:
| On the one hand you say we should retain judges making
| sentencing adjustments where appropriate, but who judges
| the appropriateness of the adjustments?
|
| It sounds like if an extenuating circumstance resonates
| with a judge, then the sentence will get modified.
| Sentencing shouldn't be based on a single person's
| "feelings."
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| Madoff got 150 years for non-violent charges (and he didn't
| even try to have anyone killed). Died in prison.
| t-writescode wrote:
| It is wildly harmful and an escalation of monstrous practices
| to look at one or several unjust actions and/or sentences and
| declare that those who do worse than the person who was dealt
| out such a retribution should receive an even longer
| sentence.
|
| If someone gets 10 years for smoking weed, the solution is
| _not_ to put someone in prison for 20 years for punching
| someone.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| I wasn't implying that either Ulbricht or Madoff's
| sentences were unjust.
| cbsmith wrote:
| On the same principle, noting that someone who punched
| someone got one day in jail is not a good justification for
| why someone shouldn't get two days in jail for smoking
| weed.
| loeg wrote:
| Madoff stole $20-35B, but by some measures a human life is
| only worth $10M. I am not really asserting those figures are
| comparable, just that Madoff stole a _lot_ of money.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| Nah, it's more that you do not fuck with the money system.
| SBF is learning that same lesson.
|
| Jeff Skilling (Enron) served 12 years in jail for insider
| trading and securities.
|
| Not saying that Skilling, Maddoff or SBF shouldn't have
| gone to jail. They deserved it. But I do find it
| interesting that financial crimes can tend to be the most
| harshly judged, likely because of who they impact (the
| people with money) and because they cause distrust of the
| financial system as a whole.
|
| > Madoff stole $20-35B
|
| Not to defend Madoff, but it's not like he made off with
| that money himself, so I'm not sure "stole" is the correct
| term. Most of that money went to investors -- it just went
| to a different set of investors than the ones who had put
| that money in (the nature of a Ponzi scheme).
| dmix wrote:
| > Nah, it's more that you do not fuck with the money
| system.
|
| Isn't a common critique of the justice system that white-
| collar crime gets you less prison time (in nicer jails)
| than being for ex a drug dealer?
|
| Plenty of finance scammers and conmen who stole millions
| get <5-10yr sentences
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| yes, unless you're a big enough finance scammer that you
| stole from really rich people (most scammers who steal
| millions don't get it from the very rich)
| mattmaroon wrote:
| People have gone to jail for longer for selling weed, I
| think the argument that finacial crimes get you longer
| prison sentences is absurd.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| I didn't say financial crimes in general, I specifically
| said financial crimes on a level that impact a large
| number of very rich people.
| mattmaroon wrote:
| But even then the times aren't longer than someone who
| gets caught with a 100 grams of coke. Skilling got 12
| years for a financial fraud so heinous the whole system
| was re-regulated. You get that for selling crack on the
| corner.
| DrillShopper wrote:
| In those cases it's not about how much they stole but who
| they stole from?
|
| Steal the pensions and other retirement funds of
| millions? At worst, slap on the wrist.
|
| Steal a single dollar from a single billionaire? Hope you
| like solitary, buddy.
| microtherion wrote:
| I expect SBF will be out soonish. He's exactly the sort
| of white collar crook that Trump would pardon.
| ar_lan wrote:
| I think there's almost no chance. SBF is a perfect
| example of someone to throw the book at. He's effectively
| Madoff 2.0, the people everyone from the lowly to the
| elite hate.
|
| Ross Ulbricht is a very unique, interesting case. I don't
| for a second believe that Trump has any moral imperative
| with pardoning him, but his sentence for the crimes he
| was prosecuted for was very clearly unjustly large in an
| extensively murky case. There's also a whole slew of
| benefits to Trump for pardoning him - it's largely
| perceived as very pro-crypto, pro-libertarian (ironic),
| etc.
| ArnoVW wrote:
| In any sane democracy I would agree with you. But this
| POTUS has pardoned 1500 people that actively participates
| in an insurrection, some of who hurt and even killed
| police officers. He's pardoned a the Dread Pirate
| Roberts.
|
| All of those people were perfect people to throw the book
| at.
|
| For the next 2 years all bets are off.
| pseingatl wrote:
| Hasn't the Trustee recovered 90% of the money invested?
| Phantom returns were ignored; at the time of the arrest
| the phantom returns were considered money lost.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > Not to defend Madoff, but it's not like he made off
| with that money himself, so I'm not sure "stole" is the
| correct term.
|
| What else would the term be? Did you always feel that
| Robin Hood was being unfairly maligned when he was
| described as robbing from the rich and giving to the
| poor?
| nearbuy wrote:
| If someone robs a bank, or steals a wallet, they're
| probably hoping to get as much money as they can. If that
| wallet happened to $1B in it, I don't think it makes the
| thief more heinous. If we sentence people based on the
| amount of money they manage to steal, we're sentencing them
| largely based on luck.
| Rnonymous wrote:
| If you shoot someone and hit their head killing them or
| just their ear, its a matter of luck (and possibly
| skill), the charges are different. The justice system
| judges based on intent as well as outcome (i.e. execution
| X luck).
| tehwebguy wrote:
| Norm: Murder and attempted murder are the same thing
|
| Seinfeld: Different skill level
| idunnoman1222 wrote:
| Well, also, if you're a competent murderer, you're more
| dangerous to society, which is the reason we lock people
| up
| ar_lan wrote:
| It's not possible to accidentally steal $1B when your
| intention was to steal $10K. Scale does matter - this
| isn't "luck".
| jandrese wrote:
| Madoff stole from the rich. That is a sure fire way to have
| the book thrown at you. Smart criminals steal from the poor,
| because they don't fight back as much and the justice system
| doesn't care.
| butlike wrote:
| The rule is: do whatever, but don't make the federal
| government look bad.
|
| AKA file your taxes, essentially.
| CSSer wrote:
| > non-violent charges
|
| Although the murder-for-hire charges were dropped, transcripts
| published by Wired in 2015[0] show Ross Ulbricht openly
| discussing contract killings: he haggles over price, suggests
| interrogation, and even provides personal details about a
| target's family ("Wife + 3 kids"). These charges were dismissed
| partly because he had already been sentenced to life in New
| York, making further prosecution moot--but the transcripts
| themselves factored into his sentencing. No killings occurred
| (he was likely scammed), yet the conversations challenge the
| notion that his crimes were purely non-violent. He was willing
| to have someone killed to protect his idea.
|
| [0]: https://archive.is/pRG3U.
| Springtime wrote:
| _> These charges were dismissed partly because he had already
| been sentenced to life in New York_
|
| It was further complicated because a couple of the law
| enforcement officers involved with setting up one of the six
| murder-for-hire scams* stole the Bitcoin Ulbricht paid and it
| was also felt that trying to prosecute based solely on the
| other chat logs would have been difficult. The FBI agent who
| arrested Ulbricht was interviewed about it recently[1].
|
| * The other five are said to not have been law enforcement,
| which makes it curious the number of times Ulbricht was
| scammed in this manner.
|
| [1] https://risky.biz/RB770/
| CSSer wrote:
| The charges, sure. The ethical and moral implications, no.
| sschueller wrote:
| The murder for hire was done with the admin account which was
| called "Dread Pirate Roberts" from the novel "The Princess
| Bride". The thing about the name is that is passed on over
| and over. The admin has claimed multiple times that he is not
| the original nor first administrator (Ross) of the silk road.
|
| In addition you have the guy that was supposed to be murdered
| also claiming that it could not have been Ross.
|
| The murder for hire case was very weak and then in addition
| you had the two federal agents working the murder for hire
| case charged for stealing bitcoins.
| CSSer wrote:
| This is silly whataboutism. They have plenty of evidence,
| including PST/PDT timestamps and proof he logged out of
| other personal accounts when he logged into that account,
| that suggested it was him. Despite his claims, they watched
| him extensively and found no indication that anyone else
| was posing as DPR.
| kernal wrote:
| > I don't credit Trump in any way for doing "the right thing"
| or even having a principled position regarding Ross' case.
|
| This is probably the most ridiculous comment in this thread.
| Trump even spoke at the Libertarian convention and specifically
| mentioned how unjust the sentence was and that he would pardon
| Ross as one of his campaign promises and he delivered. Trump
| saw parallels between the attack on Ross and the politically
| motivated law fare the democrats attacked him with. I think the
| real issue you have with this pardon is that Trump did it and
| not some democrat.
| cbg0 wrote:
| > Trump saw parallels between the attack on Ross and the
| politically motivated law fare the democrats attacked him
| with.
|
| How exactly was it politically motivated law fare?
| speakfreely wrote:
| I think he's referring to the NY state case, which is
| difficult to dispute that it was done for political
| purposes. Although I'm sure Trump would say it applies to
| the federal classified documents case, as well.
| mrandish wrote:
| Actually, I support neither major political party. I'm
| probably closest to a moderate "free markets, free minds"
| libertarian (note: the small "l" means I'm not in, or aligned
| with, the national Libertarian Party). I haven't voted for
| any candidate from either major party for decades. I
| _greatly_ disapprove of Biden, Harris and Trump equally,
| along with _almost_ all state and federal politicians of both
| parties. There are less than a handful of national-level
| politicians I would trust to dog sit, much less run my
| country.
|
| Interestingly, I get hate from nearly everyone whose bought
| into either side of the political mainstream, and _not_
| because I dislike their candidate (few serious people would
| argue even their favored candidate doesn 't have significant
| negatives). No, people can't stand that I don't dislike the
| other candidate/party _more_ than I dislike their preferred
| candidate /party. It's bizarre because it seems entirely
| reasonable to have concluded that all the major party
| presidential candidates are so flawed, each in their own
| uniquely terrible ways, that they are beneath any serious
| comparison of which may be _less bad_. It 's simply beyond
| reasonable discourse to engage in evaluating whether a dog
| shit sandwich might taste better or worse than a cat shit
| sandwich. They are all animal shit sandwiches.
|
| I'm responding because you're objecting to my mild statement
| about Trump's likelihood of having a principled position
| regarding Ross' case and thus you may have assumed I favor
| the other candidate or party. Hardly! This is especially
| galling because I've had to defend Trump, who I dislike as
| much as Biden/Harris, against reflexive "Orange Man Bad"
| attacks - if only to point out, sometimes Trump does things
| which are good. And the same was true of Biden. Both of them
| have done good things - even if only in the sense of a broken
| clock being right twice a day.
|
| To be clear, my observation about Trump not basing many of
| his political positions on long-held, fundamental principles
| applies equally to both major parties. Neither party is
| grounded in principle. In recent decades, both parties have
| abandoned so many of their own long-held, traditional
| "left/right" pillar positions _judged by how they actual
| govern when in power_ , if not in their campaign claims, as
| to now be mostly incoherent. Neither party can seriously
| claim they arrive at their current political positions by
| deriving them from deep, unchanging principles. Once again,
| I'm not making a partisan judgement for or against either.
| This is simply a factual statement. Neither party's platform
| positions or political actions over time are self-consistent
| enough to be grounded in principle. At most, they try to
| later market the political calculations they've made for
| pragmatic, contextual reasons as aligned with some principle
| - but that's just transparent retconning to pander to their
| base. This is obviously true because no voter can _reliably_
| predict what their own party 's (or candidate's) position
| might be on some enitrely new issue in advance.
|
| In the case of Ross, Trump came very close to granting a
| pardon at the end of his term in 2020. He ultimately didn't
| pardon Ross due to the uncharged, untried allegations of Ross
| hiring an online hitman. Trump pardoned Ross now despite the
| same things still being true. The reasons Trump cited for the
| pardon were the excessive prosecution and sentence, but those
| things were also equally true in 2020. So, while I think it's
| just that Ross is free after over 11 years in a FedMax
| prison, that's why I don't believe Trump's reasoning was
| grounded in principle. And it has zero to do with liking
| Biden/Democrats more or Trump/Republicans less (because I
| dislike both equally). If Biden had pardoned Ross it would
| also not have been for principled reasons.
| jillesvangurp wrote:
| > TWO life sentences plus 40 years - without the possibility of
| parole
|
| IMHO convicting somebody of such a thing is a crime in itself.
| Simply not excusable. Especially when the crime is essentially
| a form of white collar crime at best. Bank robbers, drug
| dealers, and some actual murderers often get more lenient
| sentences than that.
|
| I think this was a case of the justice system being abused to
| make a political point. Casually destroying somebody's life to
| make a political point should be criminal in itself (with
| appropriate sentences and public disgrace). I don't agree with
| Trump's politics. But this seems like he's righting a clear and
| obvious wrong; so good for him. Regardless of his motivations.
| vasco wrote:
| The numbers of pardons granted per president is interesting:
| https://www.justice.gov/pardon/clemency-statistics
| mrandish wrote:
| It is interesting but, if I'm understanding the stats being
| tracked there, it's about petitions received and granted.
| However, many of the recent pardons by both Biden and Trump
| were unusual and controversial because they were either never
| petitioned, preemptive (in the case of Biden's family, staff
| & political allies) or granted to broad groups (in the case
| of Trump Jan 6th protesters). I'm not sure they are reflected
| on the site, or at least not yet, and if/when they are, how
| the site would reflect one pardon impacting dozens or
| hundreds of people.
|
| In general, the recent wave of pardons in the last month
| reflect the trend over the last 20 years of pardons by both
| parties being increasingly political, self-interested and
| granted to connected donors who mount targeted campaigns.
| Sadly, it's not a great look. Yet I believe the pardon
| process can, and should, serve an important function of being
| a final check and balance to correct prosecutorial and
| judicial excess when it occurs. I'd be happier if the
| majority of pardons were commutations of grossly excessive
| sentences in cases most people have never heard of.
|
| Hopefully, many of the more unusual and controversial recent
| pardons were a final paroxysm in response to the increases in
| politically-related prosecutions or threats of such
| prosecutions by partisans on both sides. Regardless of the
| validity (or lack thereof) of these prosecutions (or
| threats), it's clear many were pursued more aggressively,
| timed or conducted with at least one eye on either
| influencing political optics or retribution. Overall, it's
| certainly not been a shining moment for our republic. Both
| parties share the blame and need to do better.
| leobg wrote:
| Most Pardons: Clinton & Reagan (4/month). Fewest Pardons:
| Bush senior / Biden (1.5/month)
|
| Since Reagan.
| jjallen wrote:
| But he's only served a tiny fraction of what you say was an
| unjust sentence. So the jury's still out as to whether he's
| served enough time. Other hard drug dealers get way more time
| than Ross has served.
|
| Its astonishing that granting pardons to drug dealers and
| attempted murderers is something Trump sees as one of the more
| urgent matters affecting the most powerful nation on Earth.
|
| I wish this weren't true.
| slavik81 wrote:
| He's served over ten years. That's 1/8th of an average
| lifespan. It would be a fairly normal sentence for second
| degree murder where I'm from.
| azinman2 wrote:
| And in Singapore drug dealers get death penalty. Wherever
| your from seems extremely lenient.
| idunnoman1222 wrote:
| And where you are seems extremely insane. Literally every
| adult I know has done an illegal drug at some point.
| cbozeman wrote:
| It's not insane, it depends on what you value.
|
| If you value societal order above all else, then you want
| extremely horrific punishments for crimes, you want near-
| absolute certainty that you'll be punished for criminal
| acts, and you want capture and trial to be swift, so that
| people know that breaking the law results in:
|
| Swift capture Swift trial Swift execution
|
| And with those three things, you get a highly ordered,
| law-abiding society, because it becomes common knowledge
| that breaking the law results in death, guaranteed, so
| unless you're just stupid or insane, you don't break the
| law.
|
| If you don't value that kind of clockwork societal order,
| then you get... Western civilization.
|
| Frankly I'll take the chaos of our Western civilization
| over the stifling draconian societal order of places like
| Singapore any day of the week.
| tshaddox wrote:
| > If you value societal order above all else, then you
| want extremely horrific punishments for crimes, you want
| near-absolute certainty that you'll be punished for
| criminal acts, and you want capture and trial to be
| swift, so that people know that breaking the law results
| in:
|
| You're ignoring the issue of which acts are criminalized.
| butlike wrote:
| That one's easy. Don't sell drugs in Singapore. Give them
| away and then the recipients accidentally drop money a
| block or so away.
| psychlops wrote:
| Highlighting the polarization and weaponization of the
| justice system is worthy subject matter for the most powerful
| nation on Earth. It needs to be set onto a new path that is
| fair to all involved.
| microtherion wrote:
| Maybe Trump is counting on Ulbricht starting a blockchain
| based online grocery chain to bring down the price of eggs.
| knodi123 wrote:
| > sentencing guidelines for a first-time offender
|
| First time offender?!?!? Applying that term to a guy who spent
| years traveling around the world under multiple fake IDs while
| using state-level security on his hardware and racking up law
| violations every single day seems like an absurd stretch.
|
| I mean, come on. By that logic, Al Capone was a first time
| offender when the feds finally nailed him for the first time.
| Pablo Escobar was a first time offender when he finally got
| nabbed. Good lord.
|
| "First time offense" applies to your _first offense_. Not
| relevant when you've committed thousands of offenses over years
| while living on the run.
| ricochet11 wrote:
| those thinking this is a criminal who shouldn't be released i
| recommend reading this thread
| https://x.com/tayvano_/status/1641931312385888256
| yapyap wrote:
| finally! let's go!
|
| though he was very stupid with how he did it, I am happy he is a
| free man
| foogazi wrote:
| Wait, is he smart or stupid ?
| yapyap wrote:
| I am surprised Trump pardoned him, not unhappy bout it tho!
| foogazi wrote:
| How are cartels terrorist organizations but online drug markets
| are not illegal ?
| presentation wrote:
| They aren't illegal?
| ricardonunez wrote:
| The difference is the terrorizing and beheading part.
| UltraSane wrote:
| Presidents and governors should NOT have the power to pardon
| people. And if they do it should be ONE pardon per term.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Until you can prove to me that all courts, judges, attorneys,
| and juries are above reproach and no innocent people are
| imprisoned there absolutely should be a method for someone to
| pardon. Sometimes a pardon will be issued for people you
| disagree with, but that's part of it. Just like somebody will
| say something that pisses you off, but that's the cost of free
| speech
| UltraSane wrote:
| A single person should never have the sole power to undo an
| unlimited number of lawful convictions. It seems like a power
| designed for corruption.
| eviks wrote:
| is the power to put people in prison designed for
| corruption? And if so, should it be limited to a max of 1
| person / judge / term?
| UltraSane wrote:
| The court system has a LOT more checks than one man's
| whims
| dylan604 wrote:
| you say lawful convictions, but yet have not provided any
| evidence of all convictions being lawful. we absolutely
| know that people have been wrongly imprisoned. but at this
| point i feel like i'm talking to a 3month old bot
| UltraSane wrote:
| I trust a conviction by a unanimous jury verdict with
| strict rules of evidence than but the whims of one
| person.
| negus wrote:
| Are you proposing to drown mercy and forgiveness in
| bureaucracy?
|
| Corruption is a valid point generally. And this question
| can be raised when discussing pardon for president's
| family. But is this point valid for this specific case, for
| the man who already spent 11 years in prison and has no
| relation to the president?
| macintux wrote:
| The authority to pardon is one of the most direct indicators we
| have for the moral character of an executive.
| UltraSane wrote:
| So?
| macintux wrote:
| So I'd prefer to give a good person the power to do good
| things by pardoning those worthy of liberty, and a bad
| person the power to make their corruption evident for the
| world to see.
| UltraSane wrote:
| I see absolutely no reason to have the risk of terrible
| pardons like we have seen over and over in the US.
| Clinton pardoned Mark Rich while he was still wanted by
| the DOJ because he donated a lot. Trump just pardoned
| everyone convicted in the Jan 6 insurrection.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Less that than that the obviously corrupt, criminal, and/or
| treasonous should be kept from office at all costs.
|
| Either way, obviously, the system has failed.
|
| Or as the commonplace goes, is working as designed.
| santoshalper wrote:
| Disclosure - I immensely dislike Trump and think Ross Ublricht
| deserved to be convicted.
|
| That said - There is no evidence that anyone was ever killed,
| there is pretty thin evidence that he actually ever intended to
| hire any hitmen (though he may have defrauded people who thought
| they were hiring hitmen), and a life sentence for non-violent
| drug trafficking seems draconian. I certainly don't think this
| should have been one of Trump's priorities (I'm guessing it came
| through Vance, Musk, or someone else in the crypto community),
| but I don't have a big problem with it.
| PKop wrote:
| Since no one is posting it, here's Trump Truth Social post on the
| matter:
|
| "I just called the mother of Ross William Ulbricht to let her
| know that in honor of her and the Libertarian Movement, which
| supported me so strongly, it was my pleasure to have just signed
| a full and unconditional pardon of her son, Ross. The scum that
| worked to convict him were some of the same lunatics who were
| involved in the modern day weaponization of government against
| me. He was given two life sentences, plus 40 years. Ridiculous!"
| mmaunder wrote:
| I wonder if Assange will get the pardon he's campaigning for:
|
| https://www.action.assangecampaign.org.au/
| dynamite-ready wrote:
| I'd wager the chances of that happening are much lower under
| this current administration. Surprised Biden didn't consider it
| though.
| toyg wrote:
| Neither Obama nor Biden would ever pardon Assange, because it
| would not win them any votes with the constituencies they are
| really after. At least Manning carried some trans votes.
| sidcool wrote:
| I'm indifferent to him being pardoned. But people saying he
| didn't deserve any punishment seems weird to me.
| blast wrote:
| To me too. But life without parole seemed weird as well.
| sophacles wrote:
| That's why commutation is a thing. The courts have ruled this
| as within the pardon powers. His sentence could be changed to
| reflect something much more aligned with other convictions
| for the same crimes.
| dmix wrote:
| Commutation is not considered during sentencing or
| mandatory minimums or anything like that. It's only an
| option for very popular cases and even then it's rare.
| kortilla wrote:
| No, op is saying Trump could have commuted the sentence
| rather than wiping the whole thing out
| Bluescreenbuddy wrote:
| A presidential pardon doesn't "Wipe anything out". It's
| still on your record. It's not expunged
| sidcool wrote:
| Yeah. That was harsh, I agree.
| osrec wrote:
| To me what is weird is the "complete" pardon from a president
| that is supposedly going after immigrant drug dealers and
| murderers.
|
| Basically, if you've done something wrong, but can drum up
| enough support for the winning political candidate, you get a
| chance to cut a deal and wipe the slate clean.
|
| To those that say he's rehabilitated etc, I'm sure there were
| other worthy prisoners too, but why does this particular guy
| happen to get the pardon on day one?!
|
| Same with the pardoned capitol rioters.
|
| It just feels like a very slippery downwards slope, where
| political back scratching trumps everything else.
| gosub100 wrote:
| Ross founded a nonviolent way to sell drugs that competes
| with the narco traffickers responsible for millions (?) of
| deaths.
| osrec wrote:
| He did also try to get someone killed. It didn't happen,
| but can you see how the non violent guy was slowly
| turning to violence too?
|
| I'm sure the initial narco kingpins were nice, non-
| violent people too, but rarely do the people involved
| with supplying drugs stay that way - regardless of
| whether you're Pablo Escobar or just some kid peddling
| weed in a sleepy village in the south of France.
| jeffhuys wrote:
| > rarely do the people involved with supplying drugs stay
| that way
|
| I'm really intrigued how people can say these things like
| they're facts. That's really happening a lot more
| nowadays. It's an opinion you have.
|
| Or am I wrong, and do you have a source or personal
| account of some kid in a sleepy village in the south of
| france? Or could it be that the people who DO stay that
| way don't reach the media, because they DO stay that way?
| osrec wrote:
| It's something I've observed personally.
|
| One example that stands out: I was playing pool in a
| quiet bar in a sleepy village. The next thing I know, a
| sixteen year old walks in and attacks another 16 year
| old. They are at each others throats, smashing cues on
| each other and throwing pool balls at each other. They
| are absolutely battered and bleeding by the end of it.
| One of the kids was the barman's son. As they finish
| their fight and are dragged out, another barman says to
| me "there's no need for that in here" and adds "you know
| what it's all about - who owed who money for drugs".
|
| Just one example, but I've seen it a few times.
| ttyprintk wrote:
| I think it was a pretty quick transformation. One half of
| the LucyDrop account threatened to leak real-world names,
| because he was threatened over deals his partner made out
| of his control. Plan A for Ross was to arrange real-world
| harm.
| pitaj wrote:
| > He did also try to get someone killed.
|
| He was not convicted of that.
| osrec wrote:
| Regardless, but my point stands - he was heading down a
| bad path.
|
| Quoting from Wikipedia: The district court found by a
| preponderance of the evidence that Ulbricht probably
| commissioned the murders.[41] The possibility that
| Ulbricht had commissioned murders was considered by the
| judge in sentencing Ulbricht to life and was a factor in
| the Second Circuit's decision to uphold the sentence.
| Aurornis wrote:
| It's always interesting to see how he's become a folk hero to
| some people who can do a lot of mental gymnastics to downplay
| the fact that he tried to hire a hitman to kill people. It's
| weird to read all of the comments trying to discount the
| attempted murder because it didn't actually happen.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| Weren't the people he tried to kill his collaborators? That
| kinda puts it in a nothingburger in my book.
| MacsHeadroom wrote:
| The people he "tried to kill" were fabrications of two FBI
| agents in an entrapment scheme who both ended up in prison
| shortly after Ross.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| He served 12 years. Feels about right for the crimes he
| committed. Depending on your political association feel free to
| put quotation marks somewhere in the previous sentence.
| npteljes wrote:
| Me too. 12 years seems like enough, especially considering the
| sentence lengths other people get. If he tries again, they can
| catch him again. But running an illegal marketplace with
| clearly allowing whatever goes, and not receiving any
| punishment for it? That is wild.
| underseacables wrote:
| I thought it was a ridiculously long sentence compared to what
| other people have received. 10 years was right. That's enough
| time. I know that he was accused of hiring a hitman, but he was
| never convicted of that. It should have never been used in his
| sentencing. I think the government tried to make an example out
| of Ross Ulbrich, and it was a miscarriage of justice.
| YPPH wrote:
| The solution is a commutation, not a pardon.
| MPSFounder wrote:
| These discussions are very interesting. So many red flags from
| Trump (this pardon, ending birthright citizenship...), and people
| try to justify these things. America is unfortunately heading for
| a very dark time. Politics aside, I am rather uncomfortable with
| the power the president possesses. We were always mindful that
| there are systems of checks and balances. However, given the
| current court overturned a precedent (Roe), I am unsure what the
| future holds. This pardon makes me very uneasy.
| sidibe wrote:
| The sympathy for this guy from so many of you makes me sad.
|
| The messages show he wanted and thought he was getting people
| murdered. But that's perfectly OK because it was actually the
| evil FBI he was talking to!
| 77pt77 wrote:
| Surely you must understand that he was also white and solid
| middle class.
|
| And he was able to code sloppy LAMP code.
| sidibe wrote:
| Ah I hadn't seen his photo. Could have been me after a night
| of drinking, lets not ruin the poor guys life just because of
| a few callous decisions.
| yalogin wrote:
| Is SBF next in line for a pardon?
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| SBF lost a lot of money for a lot of rich people; he's not
| getting off so easy as someone selling illegal drugs and
| ordering hits on competitors
| nostromo wrote:
| I think the attacks on some of these black and gray markets has
| increased violent crime in the real world. I wish the federal
| government would stop shutting them down and instead use them as
| tools to build cases against people breaking the law.
|
| For example, for a while most prostitution and sex work seemed to
| be online, on places like Craigslist right next to ads for used
| furniture and jobs. And it seemed to be really effective in
| getting prostitutes off the streets.
|
| Now that those markets were shut down, I'm seeing here in Seattle
| we're having pimp shootouts on Aurora and the prostitutes are
| more brazen than ever. Going after Craigslist has had a negative
| effect on our cities and has increased crime, and I suspect going
| after SilkRoad has had a similar impact.
| bloudermilk wrote:
| I don't think much changed, really. The contraband and services
| offered on these marketplaces has always been backed by
| criminal enterprises. Mostly the markets provided level of
| indirection that made purchasing palatable and gave a false
| sense of safety.
| anon84873628 wrote:
| Sure, but the point is about secondary effects. If pimps are
| "competing" online then they need to compete on, well,
| marketing and UX. If they compete in real life then it is
| about who controls physical territory.
|
| There are lots of studies about the unintended consequences
| of prohibition.
| joe_the_user wrote:
| Online markets for sex work allowed women to operate far more
| safely than "the street" allow. I had friends who were
| affected by the crackdown on craigslist etc.
| bloudermilk wrote:
| I sincerely didn't mean to minimize the harm to sex
| workers, which is devastating.
|
| My point is rather that an online marketplace in the
| absence of decriminalization and reform can only provide a
| marginal increase in safety. Sex workers marketing on
| Backpage, Craigslist, Onlyfans, and IG still face a great
| deal of risk of violence, pressure from pimps, and
| prosecution by law enforcement. It's a deeply complex
| systematic issue which can't be fixed by a website.
|
| For drugs in particular, darknet marketplaces primarily
| rely on unspeakably violent criminal enterprises upstream.
| The consumers, sellers, and communities implicated in this
| supply chain are all losers in this system. The cartels are
| the winners and the global "war on drugs" establishment are
| a close second place.
| idunnoman1222 wrote:
| Well, the cartels own most of the avocados so why don't
| you think about that next time you go shopping?
| joe_the_user wrote:
| I sympathize with the call for decriminalization.
|
| Still, in the case of sex work, I think you are simply
| wrong. Your overall sketch is the "movie version" or
| police/puritanical version of sex work, a version that
| equates trafficking and voluntary transactions (not that
| those transactions can't exploitative in other ways). The
| majority sex work isn't filled with violence except on
| the level of the literal street. Notably, my friends and
| acquaintances who used Craigslist back in the day didn't
| deal with any pimps and a moment's thought would show
| pimps are only needed when someone sells sex at a
| physical location.
|
| Also, afaik, onlyfans is a virtual only platform so
| workers there face the same physical dangers as people on
| zoom calls.
|
| Drugs is a more complex beast.
| toasterlovin wrote:
| > a moment's thought would show pimps are only needed
| when someone sells sex at a physical location
|
| Pimps are needed whenever there is coercion involved. It
| seems unlikely to me that only street prostitution
| requires coercion. I think we'll soon learn that most of
| the women on OnlyFans are there because of a violent and
| manipulative man.
| aftbit wrote:
| Ask an actual sex worker what they think about that.
| outside415 wrote:
| you are either a naive man or a dumb man, unclear which.
| brohee wrote:
| Illegal online marketplaces absolutely do reduce "turf wars".
| It's argueable that there is harm reduction compared to
| street dealing. Then I suspect it creates new consumers so
| there is that too.
| cogman10 wrote:
| I wish instead of criminalizing addiction we'd fund harm
| reduction centers and rehabilitation services.
|
| I would much rather the police be focused on stopping violent
| crime rather than these victimless crimes.
|
| Legitimizing drugs/prostitution makes is easier to regulate and
| ultimately make safer. Shoving this stuff into a black/gray
| market is what ultimately creates violent crime.
| nipponese wrote:
| > I wish instead of criminalizing addiction we'd fund harm
| reduction centers and rehabilitation services.
|
| We tried that in SF, I was a supporter. Seeing it first hand
| with a with a family member in public school flipped me.
| Dumping money into people who aren't ready to convert back
| into tax payers (even in the most basic sense) while schools
| got the back burner was enough. Not to mention the tents.
| cogman10 wrote:
| > Seeing it first hand with a with a family member in
| public school flipped me.
|
| Why is this an either or?
|
| SF spends about $1 billion dollars on schools [1] and while
| the program ran it had around a $40 million dollar budget
| [2]. For an area that houses huge tech companies, this
| doesn't seem like an extreme budget to be working with.
|
| > Not to mention the tents.
|
| Ok? And what options would you give these people, just be
| homeless somewhere else where you can't see them?
|
| [1] https://www.sfusd.edu/about-sfusd/sfusd-news/press-
| releases/...
|
| [2] https://sfstandard.com/2021/11/17/supervisors-
| approve-6-5m-i...
| daseiner1 wrote:
| SF spends nearly $1B on the homeless.
| nine_k wrote:
| Homeless and drug addicts are not the same.
|
| Letting the homeless block streets with tents is not the
| same as caring for them, or rehabilitating them.
| daseiner1 wrote:
| correct. my comment was intended to point out the
| disturbing misplacement of priorities, given that the
| budgets for educating the citizens of the future and for
| fetty smoking bums are comparable.
| janalsncm wrote:
| Dollars spent is a poor metric for effectiveness. If you
| were to become homeless in SF tonight, is there shelter
| available for you to sleep in?
| culi wrote:
| While I think anecdotes are valuable and should not be
| easily dismissed, we have decades of research and evidence
| supporting the benefit of harm reduction centers. They
| reduce risk of overdose morbidity and mortality while not
| increasing crime or public nuisance to the surrounding
| community.
|
| E.g. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8541900/
| nipponese wrote:
| It's just really hard to swallow the findings in this
| paper (all non-US cities) when you can see such a visible
| change on the streets in SF since the pandemic.
|
| By all official accounts crime is down in SF, but many
| agree something has changed in the way homeless carry. I
| would dare to use the word "entitled" to describe the
| cavalier way large encampments and bicycle chop shops are
| set up.
| kcrwfrd_ wrote:
| I think a confounding variable is that SF also
| significantly reduced jail sentencing and prosecution of
| other types of crime during the pandemic.
| raverbashing wrote:
| Honestly, it's because SF didn't actually do anything
|
| Having harm reduction sites doesn't mean you get to shoot
| whenever and whatever
|
| SF's governance is delirious honestly
| miningape wrote:
| Yeah although this is more a consequence of how SF decided
| to handle it. Rather than decriminalising they're just
| enabling users.
|
| Look towards other countries with similar policies
| (Portugal, Netherlands, etc.) in their cases they saw a
| decrease in drug usage and fatalities. The difference is
| they decided to not encourage their behaviour by allowing
| open air drug markets to flourish, with kiosks just down
| the street handing out the necessary paraphernalia.
| ImJamal wrote:
| The decline in Portugal may have been temporary.
|
| https://archive.is/3iXlM
| LAC-Tech wrote:
| Those won't stop the problem at the root, right?
|
| The inflow/manufacture of narcotics won't be affected at all.
| You'll still have a constant new influx of junkies, and it
| you'll essentially by funding this widescale and expensive
| solution forever.
|
| Much better to simple make drug trafficing and manufacture a
| capital offense. It's been extremely effective in a lot of
| jurisdictions. Even if you're squeamish about the death
| penalty, a back of the envelope calculations will tell you
| you're saving a lot more lives than you spend due to
| decreased overdoses, drug wars etc,
| Eisenstein wrote:
| Where has that strategy been effective? Do you have any
| numbers? Does it have any side effects?
| lifty wrote:
| I think he's referring to Singapore. Don't have any
| numbers but it does look like it's working.
| MacsHeadroom wrote:
| It's a tiny island nation with a single sea port, single
| bridge, and single airport. Meanwhile western nations are
| so porous they can't keep millions of undocumented people
| out.
| idunnoman1222 wrote:
| Having garbage bins in my neighborhood, keeps garbage
| from being put on the ground. There are other
| neighbourhoods where the garbage bins don't help at all
| stickfigure wrote:
| Next up: The final solution for littering. And traffic
| violations. And adultery. Utopia awaits the bold!
| floydnoel wrote:
| no victim means no crime. victimless "crimes" are just
| 'arbitrary rule' violations (like going 56mph in a 55mph
| zone) or infractions. the twisting and distortion of language
| by the state is counterproductive to society.
| echoangle wrote:
| How does that make any sense? So you could never pass a law
| to reduce risk because in most cases, breaking it won't
| create a victim?
|
| Speed limits are done to reduce the risk of you killing
| someone. Do you really think you should be able to drive
| however you want and until you actually have an accident,
| it's fine?
| butlike wrote:
| It's how you do it in Germany in the left lane
| kristiandupont wrote:
| >no victim means no crime
|
| If you feel entitled to redefine the word "crime", that is.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Portland tried this. It was a resounding failure.
| user3939382 wrote:
| I think you meant decreased crime, judging by the context of
| the rest of your comment.
| pawelmurias wrote:
| Pimps dying is great. The government should arresting,
| convicting and executing way more of them.
| herbst wrote:
| Coming from a country where prostition is legal and drugs
| heavily decriminalized, all with plenty of help programs for
| people who need it. I can only say that the problem is not the
| platforms but forbidding things that people won't stop using is
| simply delusional.
| munificent wrote:
| _> getting prostitutes off the streets._
|
| By this, do you mean "reducing the total amount of prostitution
| occurring" or "making prostitution less visible"?
|
| Your third paragraph implies the former, but I suspect the
| answer is actually the latter. There is probably less total
| prostition now, but what's there is more visible.
|
| You talk about "increased crime" in reference to pimp
| shootouts, but you know prostitution and sex trafficking are
| crimes too, right? If thousands of women and girls are
| suffering but you can't see it because it's all organized
| online, that's not necessarily better.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| So does this mean the war on drugs is finally over and we're
| going to stop mass incarceration for non-violent drug offenses?
| If so, that _would_ be good news.
| ecocentrik wrote:
| He also just classified drug cartels as terrorist organizations
| so drug dealers are now technically facilitating terrorism.
| Apart from liberating this white collar drug dealer, all of his
| other actions have escalated the war on drugs. While he was
| signing these orders, he claimed that drug cartels were
| responsible for up to 300,000 American deaths annually (a
| completely fabricated number.)
| mr_00ff00 wrote:
| https://www.bop.gov/inmates/fsa/overview.jsp
|
| Feel like you have already made up your mind on what you want
| to believe, but he has actually helped a lot with non-violent
| drug offenders. That's part of the reason poor communities
| (especially Latino) have voted for him despite harsh border
| policies.
| ecocentrik wrote:
| Justice reform is generally positive for the country and
| not just individual cultural groups. I just don't expect
| those reforms to apply to drug offenders when so many of
| his supporters seems like they are seeking retribution for
| the loss of loved ones that killed themselves with drugs to
| the extent that they celebrate calls to bomb neighboring
| countries.
|
| I don't think we're going to see clear messaging on this
| from Trump.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| Trump also said anyone caught selling drugs should get the
| death penalty, so take your pick.
|
| https://reason.com/2023/10/24/trump-who-freed-drug-
| offenders...
| tveita wrote:
| Not going to post this link to every post where it's relevant,
| but: Trump returned to that theme in November
| 2022, when he officially launched his 2024 presidential
| campaign. "We're going to be asking everyone who sells drugs,
| gets caught selling drugs, to receive the death penalty for
| their heinous acts," he said.
|
| https://reason.com/2023/10/24/trump-who-freed-drug-offenders...
|
| You'll note there are comments here saying saying that he
| generally keeps his campaign promises. On the bright side I
| don't agree, but on the other hand I think he does often
| enough, especially for the "well of course he didn't literally
| mean that" ones.
| olalonde wrote:
| I wonder if the decision to drop the "murder for hire" charges
| was originally influenced by his existing life sentence, and
| whether the pardon now alters that reasoning. Is it still
| possible for him to be prosecuted on those charges?
| aksss wrote:
| I think they were dismissed with prejudice, which if true, is a
| "no". That said, all prior charges and attempts were federal
| charges, and nothing in a pardon or federal dismissal prevents
| an individual state from bringing charges, IIRC. Would be a
| heavy lift though without cooperation from feds to turn over
| investigation materials.
| cratermoon wrote:
| Just a reminder: the condition for accepting a pardon is
| acknowledging that you _did_ commit the crime in question and
| accept the court 's finding of guilt.
|
| In contrast: Biden didn't pardon Leonard Peltier, the president
| commuted his sentence. Peltier maintains his innocence.
| johnneville wrote:
| Can you share more about your first point? A brief search shows
| the 1915 Burdick supreme court case said that accepting a
| pardon can imply guilt. However, it doesn't seem to say that
| acknowledgement or acceptance of guilt is a requirement by the
| recipient of the pardon.
| plsbenice34 wrote:
| Do you have a source for that condition? How does that work for
| Biden pardoning Fauci for crimes that havent been revealed yet?
| cratermoon wrote:
| classic whataboutism.
| throwaway314155 wrote:
| > cLAsSIc WhATAbOuTiSm
|
| tl;dr? Cratermoon cannot in fact cite a source for their
| claims.
|
| This sort of shit is why people can't reasonably trust
| accusations of logical fallacy on the internet. You can't
| just yell whataboutism whenever you don't want to answer
| challenging questions.
| smashah wrote:
| All I can think about after reading this is "Rest In Power Aaron
| Swartz"
| spiritplumber wrote:
| Legalities aside, is it more evil to hire a dude to kill your
| enemy, or to go kill your enemy yourself? (I'd go with the former
| because if you go kill your enemy yourself you're at least
| accepting that it may go the other way).
| southernplaces7 wrote:
| For all his many defects and cloudy motives for doing it, Trump
| deserves applause for this. It's with actions such as this that
| he also shows why he's a genuine maverick of a president, with
| who it's genuinely possible to expect deeply unexpected actions
| (for better or worse).
|
| For all his talk of being progressive and cultivation of a
| youthful maverick image of his own, you would have never seen
| such a move from Obama and forget about it under the mealy
| mouthed Biden or a hypothetical Hillary administration. With
| Trump, rather uniquely and singularly, it happened.
|
| Ulbricht made many mistakes, less so morally but definitely
| legally, of the kind with which he could have expected to cause
| punishment to rain down upon him, but the way in which his case
| was managed and the way in which he was sentenced truly were both
| disgusting in numerous ways.
|
| They were classic examples of prosecutorial and political
| vengeance and give much truth to Trump's own description of the
| same as "The scum that worked to convict him were some of the
| same lunatics who were involved in the modern day weaponization
| of government against me. He was given two life sentences, plus
| 40 years. Ridiculous!"
|
| If you in any way mistrust heavy-handed government prosecutions
| and persecutions, it's hard to disagree much, even if it's also
| not hard to imagine Trump being just as abusive in other contexts
| where prosecution of enemies would suit his interests and
| personal vengeance.
|
| Now if we see him pardon Snowden too, i'd happily give a standing
| ovation.
|
| Before someone here smugly chimes in about how Ulbricht also
| tried to hire out a murder by contract, bear in mind that this
| accusation was riddled with holes, suspicions of entrapment and
| in any case wasn't formally used for his sentencing, AND still
| wouldn't justify the kind of onerously grotesque sentence that
| was dumped on him. Pedophiles who committed child murders have
| been sentenced to less than Ulbricht was.
| yownie wrote:
| >For all his talk of being progressive and cultivation of a
| youthful maverick image of his own, you would have never seen
| such a move from Obama
|
| he pardoned Chelsea Manning I think you're forgetting.
| dimator wrote:
| the fact that he will never pardon Snowden tells you all you
| need to know: this pardon was pandering and suits his own
| purposes. there are no higher principles here besides quid pro
| quo.
| jimt1234 wrote:
| I wouldn't even call it pandering. He straight-up said the
| pardon was because the libertarians supported him.
| southernplaces7 wrote:
| Trump is literally into the second day of his presidency,
| nobody can know whether he might or might not pardon even
| Snowden for some reason of his own. I had zero expectation of
| a pardon for Ulbricht yet here it is and it's more impressive
| than Obama's pandering (but to me still applause-worthy)
| pardon of Manning, though none came for Assange.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| > you would have never seen such a move from Obama
|
| you forgot Chelsea Manning; so I stopped reading there
| toyg wrote:
| Pardoning Manning while still going hard after Assange was a
| new level of pandering to the LGBTQ lobby. Pretty disgusting
| in its own right, I agree.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| I disagree that it was pandering to the LGBTQ lobby.
|
| I agree Assange should not have been pursued at all.
|
| You can't directly compare the two situations. Manning was
| a US citizen, serving a sentence in the US. During Obama's
| term, Assange was not yet accused of any crime in the US,
| so there was no presidential pardon to be had, though Obama
| could have dropped the extradition request.
|
| Biden did eventually reach a deal with Assange that allowed
| him to count time served -- essentially the same as
| commuting a sentence, so along the lines of what Manning
| got -- and return to Australia.
|
| So in the end, Assange and Manning were both freed after
| serving time.
| southernplaces7 wrote:
| Those of you downvoting this comment, I sincerely wonder if
| it's because you really think Ulbricht deserves to rot the rest
| of his life in prison despite a deeply flawed, openly vengeful
| trial and a sentence that simply doesn't usually correspond to
| any of what he was convicted of in most cases, or because you
| simply can't, emotionally, approve of anything Trump might do,
| even if you'd otherwise agree with it.
|
| I'd say either posture is an insult to your own capacity for
| reasoned thinking, but I am curious about which kind of insult
| it is.
| agentultra wrote:
| Is this president extremely concerned about drug dealers and
| gangs in the US?
|
| Why is he pardoning a drug trafficker?
| smt88 wrote:
| I understand your point, but it has become a waste of energy to
| try to point out hypocridy and ideological inconsistency among
| that group.
|
| It's better to ignore the rational reasons to oppose them and
| focus on the emotional ones. For starters, people are repulsed
| by their cruelty.
| krige wrote:
| I disagree, the lukewarm emotion driven campaign ("we're not
| the other guy!") and lack of any rational strategy or
| arguments from the oppositon is how these people won in the
| first place.
| noisy_boy wrote:
| Appeal to emotions stands on the trustworthiness/track
| record of the pleader. The opposition, full of
| public/private office musical chair players, has been in
| the pocket of lobbyists/corporate interests - they don't
| have any standing to plead to emotions (not saying the
| incumbents do but they have been successful in harnessing
| their already enraged supporters).
| PartiallyTyped wrote:
| Pleading to emotion works only if the target audience is
| not ideologically possessed, and by ideologically, I mean
| that they hate the mere thought of voting democrat even
| if they support the democrat's agenda.
|
| The Democrat agenda has far far higher approval ratings
| than Democrats, and that says a lot about the current
| state of affairs.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| To add, conservatives voters often claim they vote they way
| they do because "the other side" makes no attempt to
| understand them. I think GP is asking an honest question.
| If nothing else, I had the same question because I want to
| understand what the conservative voters want in this case,
| if not the surface level racism.
|
| To anyone who voted for Trump because he said he'd be hard
| on drug dealers: how do you feel about him pardoning a top
| level drug dealer?
| aleign wrote:
| When did he pardon a top level drug dealer? Source?
| PartiallyTyped wrote:
| Ross Ulbricht _is_ the top level drug dealer GP is
| referring to.
| butlike wrote:
| Systems administrator. Not dissimilar to the civil
| engineer who planned the streets the drug dealers down
| the block hang out at.
| smt88 wrote:
| The answer is that what they want isn't ideologically
| consistent.
|
| They want him to be hard on criminals who do things they
| don't like. The biggest drug dealers alive are the
| Sacklers or maybe McKinsey, and they're not in scope
| either.
|
| Progressives aren't consistent either. No one is. For
| example, Dems keep screaming about being a country of
| laws when referring to GOP antics, but want to ignore
| certain immigration, anti-abortion, and drug laws (in
| some cases by just refusing to enforce them).
|
| Unfortunately what's good for the goose is good for the
| gander, as they say.
| knodi wrote:
| Yes, yes but children detention center which separated kids
| from their parents and then lost the paper work connecting
| them back to their family, even some kids died of neglect in
| the detention center...cruelty.
|
| The rise of the morally bankrupt in America.
| shoxidizer wrote:
| Pardoning Ulbricht was a campaign promise he made at the
| Libertarian National Convention in response to it being a
| popular demand among the libertarians.
| noirbot wrote:
| And more importantly, among the crypto crowd that dumped
| millions into his campaign. Libertarians have essentially no
| clout or money on their own. This was a pardon bought by
| Coinbase and Gemini and A16z.
| twelve40 wrote:
| Why would Coinbase and Gemini and A16z care about an
| obviously shady person who reportedly tried to hire a
| person to kill someone? surely they could find a more
| legitimate hero to advance the legal crypto case? i mean,
| it's kind of like them - companies trying to do legit
| crypto - rallying today around SBF when they already have
| image problems from other exchanges?
| talldayo wrote:
| There is no "legit crypto" - it's a myth. Every single
| exchange that swaps spit with the Bitcoin ledger is
| laundering money made by criminal (often violent or
| fraudulent) means. Many if not most altcoins are equally
| as fraudulent, or used to launder ("tumble") other
| suspicious coins.
|
| Let's be honest anyways, the cryptocurrency "industry" as
| we know it is less than 4 years old, and in 4 years it
| may be gone. Exchanges like coinbase and so-called defi
| innovators like A16Z need this legally-dubious signalling
| or they'll risk never having another leader corrupt
| enough to sanction their behavior.
| beeflet wrote:
| I got cash out of an airport currency exchange ATM the
| other week, and when I tried to use it to by groceries
| yesterday, the cashier tested it for cocaine and it came
| back positive. There is no "legit cash".
| denkmoon wrote:
| Are cashiers really testing notes for cocaine? That's
| insane.
| AlexandrB wrote:
| What's even the point? It's still legal tender, I don't
| think they can refuse it.
| tombert wrote:
| I think that might be a myth? If I tried buying a $0.50
| candy bar with a hundred-dollar bill, I think that the
| cashier might refuse it and I don't think they'd get in
| trouble for doing so.
|
| I thought the "legal tender" argument only worked in
| regards to debts to the government, though IANAL.
| mint2 wrote:
| Why is a cashier testing money for cocaine residue? What
| country is requiring gimmicky pointless stuff like that?
| handsclean wrote:
| "I stepped in a puddle once. There is no 'dry land.'"
| --Man in ocean
| herbst wrote:
| There is cocaine in some levels on any paper money that
| has been around for longer than a few weeks.
|
| The weird thing here is that a cashier would test it!?
| DaSHacka wrote:
| I think this is what GP was trying to get at, in response
| to GGP's claim about all crypto being directly tied to
| tumblers and illegal activity.
|
| It wasn't confusing to me, but evidently the way it was
| worded confused others.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| It's confusing because there's no logical point to it nor
| does it follow along as a regular conversation.
|
| "Some cash has cocaine on it" has no logical relationship
| to "all cryptocurreny use is illegitimate".
|
| If they wanted to refute the original claim and say that
| cryptocurrency has legitimate uses or if they wanted to
| make a separate point to say that cash is similarly only
| useful to criminals, they failed.
| Bluescreenbuddy wrote:
| Did you make this up? None of what you said adds up
| beeflet wrote:
| no it literally happened at publix the other day, its
| like a mall cop mentality I guess. I suppose it is not
| that strange because most bills have traces of cocaine on
| them https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contaminated_currency
| snakeyjake wrote:
| > the cashier tested it for cocaine and it came back
| positive
|
| There is no commercial product capable of testing cash
| for drugs. Anyone claiming to sell such a product is
| lying.
|
| There is a wipe, like a baby wipe, that is sold as a
| "cocaine detection wipe". It is a lie.
|
| It uses a dumbed down version of a spot test that is very
| good at detecting cocaine, but it also reacts with many
| other substances that are not cocaine.
|
| The test was dumbed down because the substances needed to
| make it more accurate are much more dangerous than the
| cobalt thiocyanate (which is STILL not good for you) used
| in the "safe" tests.
|
| There are thousands and thousands and thousands of
| substances that will cause a cocaine detection test to
| return a positive reaction. One of them is Benadryl.
| Benadryl causes such a strong and vibrant reaction that
| you would think the entire object being tested was made
| of pure cocaine.
|
| If you keep a single packet containing one Benadryl pill
| in your bag and you use it and while taking it a handful
| of diphenhydramine (Benadryl) molecules get transferred
| from your fingers to the outside of the packet, and then
| you toss the packet into your bag and they get
| transferred from the packet to the interior of your bag,
| to a wallet in your bag, to the cash itself, testing the
| cash in that wallet with a cocaine field test will
| produce a stronger positive result than if you had rolled
| up a bill and snorted a line immediately prior to the
| test and there was still powdered cocaine on the bill.
|
| This is not a joke or exaggeration. If you touch a single
| Benadryl pill with the tip of your index finger, then
| poke the tip of your finger to a sheet of paper, then you
| put that sheet of paper in a printer and a rubber roller
| in the paper-handling mechanism rolls over the spot you
| touched, every single sheet of paper printed by that
| printer for MONTHS will test positively for cocaine.
| (using the tests that don't require training, PPE, and
| expensive lab equipment).
|
| Did your totally real and not bullshit cash have drugs on
| them, or Benadryl, or ANY substance with the ring of
| carbon atoms that the test detects?
|
| "But this study found 80% of bills had dru..."
|
| Buddy 100% of all bills that have been used just once
| have actual literal shit, feces, dookie, poop, (and
| staph!) on them.
|
| There is poop in your wallet right now.
| beeflet wrote:
| They rubbed some sort of pen thing on it, and they took
| the bills to some machine in a back room. At the time, I
| figured it was because they thought the bills were
| fraudulent (I was paying with 100s because my card didn't
| work).
|
| Maybe the pen thing was only to test if the bills were
| fraudulent, and then the machine in the back of the store
| could also do drug tests? Or maybe it was all a lie and
| they were just bullshitting me.
|
| The benadryl thing was a good read
| pyrale wrote:
| If even the worst are untouchable, who will try to
| examine the good-looking ones?
| noirbot wrote:
| Not sure, but when they have various political candidates
| getting millions from the crypto PACs and all of them in
| unison talking about how Ross Ulbricht needs a pardon,
| I'm not sure what else to tell you. Maybe someone just
| knew Ulbricht personally and is using their money to
| spring him.
|
| But unless you can point to any other group with actual
| power and money who was pushing for it, the most obvious
| answer is that the main funders of the crypto PACs were
| at least ok with it. There's no way they couldn't have
| subtly squashed this pardon with Trump if it was just the
| Libertarians asking for it given that they seem to have
| gotten him to commit to do literally everything else they
| want.
| rchaud wrote:
| Because much like the billionnaires already flanking
| Trump, the heads of Coinbase and A16Z are out-of-touch
| charisma black holes that have no clue how to talk to the
| average Trump voter to get them on their side. Ross
| Ulbricht is the avatar for their ultimate goal of
| legitimizing crypto in the US financial system.
| ttyprintk wrote:
| I'd like to know who wrote that speech. A lot of talk about
| how libertarians are domineered and persecuted. Something
| like "after criminal prosecutions, if I wasn't a libertarian
| then, I sure am now" in front of a very idealistic audience
| whose skepticism of government is unrelated to how many
| billionaires it fingerprints. So, they booed and heckled him,
| and in hindsight I wonder if he was grasping for concessions.
| barnabee wrote:
| No love for Trump or libertarians but I am a cypherpunk[0] at
| heart. I'm on board with the idea of ensuring that things can
| happen online outside of the jurisdiction of any nation[1],
| so for his part in building towards that I'm happy Ross is
| free.
|
| On the other hand, it's clear to me that the correct amount
| of jail time wasn't zero either, given everything else he
| allegedly did.
|
| [0] https://www.activism.net/cypherpunk/manifesto.html
|
| [1] I think about this in the same way that we accept the
| possibility of bad things happening because people can have
| private conversations in their own home, or are able to have
| complete control over potentially dangerous tools and
| vehicles. IMO the risks are worth the trade-offs and these
| are important rights to protect in the relationship between
| people, technology, and government (or whoever wields power).
| hbbio wrote:
| A drug trafficker sells drugs
|
| A developer builds a platform like eBay but without censorship
| that can be used by the drug trafficker
|
| It's not the same thing
| _s wrote:
| I make and sell soap. The soap contains an ingredient that
| anyone can use to make bombs. Some people buy my soap only
| for that purpose. I know because they literally tell me how
| they use my soap. I can remove that ingredient but I would
| loose a lot of sales.
|
| The police finds my soap in the lab of someone who blew up a
| building. Some people died. Was it my fault, knowing how it
| was being used? Did I do anything illegal? Unethical?
| Immoral?
| hbbio wrote:
| > I can remove that ingredient but I would loose a lot of
| sales.
|
| Or: I can remove that ingredient but it goes against my
| principle of not accepting constraints.
|
| > Some people died. Was it my fault, knowing how it was
| being used? Did I do anything illegal? Unethical? Immoral?
|
| https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15398776/
| jshen wrote:
| Jail is for people that don't accept constraints outlined
| by democratic society.
| highwaylights wrote:
| This is a nonsense argument.
|
| The manhattan project was very intentionally an attempt
| to create a WMD, it wasn't a side-effect of something
| else. You don't have a point here.
| beeflet wrote:
| Interesting thought experiment, but no, I don't think it's
| llegal/unethical/immoral to sell that soap. But in practice
| this sort of business will change their formula to avoid
| bad press and regulation.
| herbst wrote:
| Having done some internet things (email stuff) that have
| been abused by others I always felt obligated to make the
| abuse as hard as possible once I found out about it.
|
| I am not sure about the legal standpoint, but from a moral
| one I would have felt bad running the business knowing it's
| regularly abused to harm others and I am not doing anything
| against it.
| kube-system wrote:
| If you set up what is clearly a perfect marketplace for
| drugs, and you know it's going to fill up with drug dealers,
| and it does fill up with drug dealers, and there's one
| goofball that decided to sell a hamburger.... you're not an
| innocent guy who is running a hamburger marketplace.
| highwaylights wrote:
| It's not not the same thing either.
|
| The purpose of eBay isn't to facilitate illicit transactions,
| doing so is abusing the platform.
|
| SR was very much for illicit transactions.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| No no no, my friend. Ulbricht was not a lowly drug trafficker
| (also, incidentally, not black or latino). He was an
| _entrepreneur_ who built a _marketplace_ that would bring
| together buyers and sellers, cutting out the middleman, and
| driving _efficiency_! Basically trustedhousesitters.com, just
| for illegal drugs instead of pets ;)
| isoprophlex wrote:
| To appease the broligarch technologists, who all enjoyed buying
| LSD with cryptocoins.
| outside415 wrote:
| what's it like to be poor in a rich country? the libertarian
| party supported his reelection bid and by support Ross he
| garnered more of their votes. this couldn't be more obvious. he
| did the same for crypto.
|
| according to Trump: "A promise made is a promise kept", he is
| keeping his promise to his constituents.
|
| enjoy your CNN propaganda.
| kubb wrote:
| Basically he'll do anything to get the votes he needs,
| there's no morality behind it.
| outside415 wrote:
| thank god he won. someone had to do whatever was necessary.
| kubb wrote:
| I wish we had leaders with integrity, but we won't for
| the foreseeable future.
| outside415 wrote:
| I am just happy someone is slowing the H1B and indian out
| sourcing down. between that and AI california tech was
| about to die for Americans.
| kubb wrote:
| Whether that happens remains to be seen. In the first row
| on his inauguration was an Indian tech CEO and Elon loves
| H1Bs.
| lossolo wrote:
| Trump yesterday: "I like both sides of the argument, but
| I also like very competent people coming into our
| country, even if that involves them training and helping
| other people that may not have the qualifications they
| do. I don't want to stop..."
|
| "We want competent people coming into our country. And
| H-1B, I know the programme very well. I use the
| programme. Maitre d', wine experts, even waiters, high-
| quality waiters, you've got to get the best people.
| People like Larry, he needs engineers, NASA also needs...
| engineers like nobody's ever needed them"
| gitaarik wrote:
| So that's the interesting thing about it; he gets the votes
| from it, so apparently many people agree with him? Only in
| public nobody seems to agree with him? How is that
| possible?
| kubb wrote:
| The trick is inside or brains. We're having trouble
| dealing with detailed percentage breakdowns and
| differentiating between groups of people.
|
| Instead we think of "the average person" and project that
| on everyone.
|
| You looked at the small libertarian interest group, and
| based on that projected how everyone is. Now you look at
| hacker news and you're projecting how everyone is. This
| projection is where our reasoning fails.
| gitaarik wrote:
| Yeah but to be honest, most mainstream media channels
| that I see criticize Trump a lot. And the media that
| praises him is often seen als radical / extreme /
| whatever right.
|
| So, either the old government is in power of the
| mainstream media, or people are secretly on the right and
| don't speak out about it. Or maybe a combination of the
| two.
| kubb wrote:
| It's the selection of media that you see. Try watching
| Fox. Try listening to Joe Rogan. Try going on a clean
| YouTube account and watching random videos for a week.
| It's there.
|
| You made a false dichotomy, but I'm sure you can figure
| that one on your own.
|
| There's also the other aspect where you align your views
| to the views of your group.
|
| There are places in the US, where being a Republican is
| absolutely the core of what you are, and you will adopt
| and genuinely love any candidate from that party.
| krige wrote:
| Most of his voters have no idea what his campaign or
| promises are, and that's intentional, see mexican voters
| apparently surprised by his anti-mexican stance _now_.
| gitaarik wrote:
| > see mexican voters apparently surprised by his anti-
| mexican stance _now_.
|
| Source?
|
| And it seems people don't particularly like Trump, but
| vote on him because he seems to be the only one that
| wants to do something about illegal immigrants:
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/18/us/politics/trump-
| policie...
|
| And I understand that it's even frustrating for legal
| immigrants, who waited for years to get citizenship, that
| illegal immigrants don't have to do anything and get it
| right away.
| triceratops wrote:
| >illegal immigrants don't have to do anything and get
| [citizenship] right away
|
| Do they really? How? Asking for a friend.
| npteljes wrote:
| >Only in public nobody seems to agree with him? How is
| that possible?
|
| Societal taboos for example can create a division like
| this. You can see this divide between truly anonymous
| forums vs moderated conversations online.
| sebzim4500 wrote:
| >Only in public nobody seems to agree with him
|
| What? In my experience his supporters literally never
| shut up about how they are the silent majority. The irony
| seems entirely lost on them.
| beowulfey wrote:
| This is representative of the dichotomy we face within
| society, in that we rarely associate with people who have
| different opinions than us, even when we think that we do
| regularly. It is the paradox of our social circles that
| overlap but never interact.
| philwelch wrote:
| This is democracy manifest.
| kube-system wrote:
| Trump clearly values favoritism to a high degree. He is doing
| exactly as he has promised, running the country like a
| businessman. If you scratch his back, he will scratch yours.
| Principles take a back seat to "getting the job done". For
| other examples, see his changed stances on TikTok, various
| foreign interests, cryptocurrencies, EVs post Elon support,
| etc. And in the opposite vein, he abandons support for anyone
| who challenges his authority on principles.
| a2128 wrote:
| That sounds like corruption
| AlexandrB wrote:
| Principled politicians are very rare. Do you think the
| outgoing administration was particularly principled?
|
| People need to stop thinking of politicians as their friends
| and having parasocial relationships with them. They're public
| servants and should be treated as such.
| IMTDb wrote:
| See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Realpolitik
| cbsmith wrote:
| s/businessman/gangster/
|
| Principles are much more important to a businessman than a
| gangster.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| In America? Not for a while.
| tasuki wrote:
| Don't online drug marketplaces lead to reduced gang activity?
|
| One does not need a gang and violence to sell drugs online.
| Selling drugs offline, gangs and violence will get involved.
| KeplerBoy wrote:
| There are gangs and violence all along the supply chain. The
| online marketplace only removes the last (few hundred) miles.
| herbst wrote:
| So it's much safer for customers and will likely reduce
| drug violence?
| KeplerBoy wrote:
| It's not that simple. It might still be a net negative if
| it increases drug demand by ease of access.
| herbst wrote:
| I don't think you increase demand by ease of access.
|
| Also buying bitcoin, exchanging to Monero, installing
| Tor, understanding the risks, etc. Is much more work than
| just finding the next dealer.
| KeplerBoy wrote:
| > I don't think you increase demand by ease of access.
|
| Well that's the entire principle of price elasticity. The
| less costly (not only in terms of money, but also in
| terms of risk and time) something gets the higher the
| demand, at least up to a point.
| cbsmith wrote:
| > Don't online drug marketplaces lead to reduced gang
| activity?
|
| Online isn't the important factor here.
|
| > One does not need a gang and violence to sell drugs online.
|
| Gangs and violence aren't there to support a marketplace.
| They don't help you find customers or customers to find you.
| They don't improve the efficiency of exchange. They're there
| to enforce outcomes. Selling drugs leads to outcomes that
| don't care whether the buyer and seller found themselves
| online.
| bilekas wrote:
| I mean, I don't know why it's a full pardon, IMO Ulbricht's
| sentence was far too long and harsh, I'm sure it was to make a
| point that others should not replicate it, but wouldn't a stay
| on the remainder of his sentence been a better option here ?
| highwaylights wrote:
| You're assuming the reason for the pardon is "the sentence
| was unfair" rather than "some people that cheered at my rally
| said they would like me to do this".
| amendegree wrote:
| My understanding is that it's more Trump generally attempts
| to keep campaign promises, he doesn't always succeed, but
| when all it takes is an executive order, he generally does
| it pretty quickly.
|
| In instances where it takes more than his signature (e.g.
| the wall) he has failed to make good on many promises but
| he definitely put in effort to trying to make them happen.
| gitaarik wrote:
| Creating a website where you can trade (potentially illegal)
| stuff is not the same as being a drug trafficker.
| ohashi wrote:
| Are we pretending the silk road was actually a legitimate
| marketplace and a few bad actors might have used it for
| things that break the law?
| gitaarik wrote:
| It just allowed unrestricted trade outside of regular
| economy. In a world where the governments themselves are
| corrupt and criminal, you could argue over the ethicality
| of the concept. But comparing it to drug cartels is unfair
| I would say.
| ngetchell wrote:
| He ordered murders. There isn't much of a difference in
| my eyes.
| aleign wrote:
| Sure, but that is a non-sequitur.
| e44858 wrote:
| "Allegedly" ordered murders, not proven in court.
| barnabee wrote:
| It's not necessarily unethical to break the law, merely
| illegal.
|
| Civil disobedience is a pretty important part of how we
| have always dealt with bad laws and bad governments.
| jmcgough wrote:
| I don't think he knows who RA is, I'm betting the cryptobros
| who ran his rug pulls and NFTs for the last year have his ear
| after making him millions of dollars.
| dead_gunslinger wrote:
| He said he would do this during his campaign as a promise, a
| lot of libertarians voted for him based on this. He delivered
| on the promise after he won a convincing majority. I'm not sure
| why democracy offends you this much.
| unobatbayar wrote:
| Words can't describe how happy I am.
| RomanPushkin wrote:
| Explain to me like to five year old why when I create a
| _successful_ drug marketplace that sold whole bunch of illegal
| drugs should be pardoned?
| arittr wrote:
| Now that I didn't expect
| xeckr wrote:
| Good.
| liamwire wrote:
| Genuinely thought we'd never see the day. My feelings on Ulbricht
| are mixed and have evolved over the decade he's been in prison.
|
| However, the Silk Road allowed me to try LSD as an 18 year old in
| a safe(r) way than those that came before me.* It was those
| experiences that revealed I'd been depressed most of my life, and
| that it also didn't have to be that way, by way of _experiencing_
| what that would feel like. I went on to seek new experiences,
| make new friends for the first time in my life, engage with
| professional mental health support, went to university, and
| started multiple businesses. It also introduced my staunchly-
| atheist self to the experience of spiritual /transcendental
| experiences, and how those can exist separately from, and don't
| require, belief in deities or religion.
|
| It can't be said where I'd have wound up without those
| experiences, but my own understanding of myself feels pivotally
| tied to something I couldn't have gone through without Ross'
| actions. Still, I acknowledge it appears more likely that not he
| tried to have people killed, and regardless of the circumstances
| surrounding this, that is condemnable.
|
| *Had it not been for an anonymous group at the time, The LSD
| Avengers, posting reviews using gas chromatography mass-
| spectrometry and reagent tests of suppliers on the site, I
| wouldn't have had the confidence to take the risk of trying what
| I'd received. LSD is physiologically safe, not to say anything of
| any psychological risks, but knowing the dose allowed me to enter
| into the shallow end of the pool, so to speak. Common substitutes
| however cannot have the same said of them.
|
| If I'd lived in a time and place that allowed for state-funded
| drug testing (something my own state has in fact recently
| abolished despite wildly successful trials), perhaps things
| would've not required a Ross Ulbricht to exist in my case, but I
| see this as a failure of the system and of drug prohibition as a
| whole.
|
| Ross would've existed one way or another I believe, for better or
| worse, by another name, had he chosen another path. Now he gets
| the chance to try his life again. I felt the same way.
| clutchdude wrote:
| Question - did you need drugs such as LSD to have that
| experience or did it lower the barrier to entry?
| jMyles wrote:
| It's baffling to me that there are actually comments on Hacker
| Gosh Darn News of all places suggesting that Ross justly belonged
| in prison.
|
| He successfully created a tool to undermine one of the most
| unjust and predatory policies of the US State - the policy of
| drug prohibition.
|
| He's a damn hero. I don't understand why Trump, who most of the
| time seems like a simply awful human being with no end of
| appetite for state power, has chosen to do this, but I'll
| certainly take it.
|
| It's beyond obvious that voting and other mechanics of
| representative rule have not succeeded at simple policy change
| such as ending prohibition. I look forward to several decades of
| truth trumping power in the form of the internet undermining
| states, until the asinine mode of political organization known as
| the nation state is deprecated entirely.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| It's hard to know why he wouldn't - he conspired to have people
| killed, and facilitated illegal activity, i.e. the sale of all
| sorts of drugs. You might be saying "well, drugs shouldn't be
| illegal", or even, "well, conspiring to kill people shouldn't
| be illegal", but they were illegal at the time.
| starspangled wrote:
| Seems like a legal slight-of-hand, and also unjust and
| unethical and absolutely ripe for government abuse.
|
| He was punished for the crime of attempting or conspiring to
| commit murder. Without ever having been found guilty in a
| trial by jury of his peers determining beyond reasonable
| doubt that the facts met said crime.
| Whatarethese wrote:
| Hope he goes on Dark Net Diaries.
| amac wrote:
| The right decision.
| nodesocket wrote:
| Ross just posted this photo on X. Man served 10 years, time for
| him to be free.
|
| https://x.com/Free_Ross/status/1881925029497377104
| leonewton253 wrote:
| I regret not voting for Trump. Hopefully most of his BS will be
| contested and the good stuff he does sticks.
| pjbeam wrote:
| DPR is free!! I'm very happy for him and hope he makes good on
| this second lease on life.
| andsoitis wrote:
| Ross Ulbricht on X: https://x.com/realrossu
| presentation wrote:
| If you're wondering like I was why he is able to tweet from
| prison, this article explains that he's dictating tweets via
| phone to his family, and they are sending back comments to him
| via mail. [1]
|
| [1] https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2018/08/16/silk-road-
| founder-r...
| metadat wrote:
| I wonder if this action was executed at the suggestion of Mr.
| Musk?
|
| It seems questionable Trump even understands or cares what Silk
| Road did or how it worked.
| DrFunke wrote:
| I laundered money on The Silkroad (sent birthday cards filled
| with cash for bitcoin). It was a level of criminality I was
| fairly comfortable with. I do retain some fear that my door would
| be kicked in some day. Lawyers of HN, Am I in the clear now too?
| Ross tried to have a guy murdered, after all.
| beeflet wrote:
| That depends, did you send the cards on their birthday?
|
| IANAL, but I think you should be in the clear as long as you
| left a big red lipstick kiss on the bottom of the card.
| palad1n wrote:
| I can't believe Trump did something right. If Harris were prez
| he'd be languishing there till who knows when.
| upmind wrote:
| Was there anything said about pardoning Snowden?
| notananthem wrote:
| This thread really shows how unhinged the community is. Dude
| hired contract killers and ran the most prolific darkweb forum
| for whatever. He's not some martyr. He's just a bum.
| nipponese wrote:
| It's very hard to square his sentencing.
|
| If he had been running an IRL drug and gun facilitation
| marketplace in my city, I would have said 20 years was
| appropriate.
|
| But when the feds make it a techno-political issue, I feel the
| urge to push back.
| belter wrote:
| May I respectfully and humbly suggest to this community to avoid
| posting Twitter links?
| weberer wrote:
| People have been fighting that uphill battle for close to 10
| years now. I don't see it happening.
| dewey wrote:
| This is the first time I've seen it and in the pre-Elon years
| there was also not much reason to do that. I don't think the
| perception was bad more than > 5 years ago.
| sherburt3 wrote:
| What's wrong with twitter links?
| belter wrote:
| First you can only read if you create an account, second its
| owned by this person: https://preview.redd.it/vpt4ycl43eee1.g
| if?width=480&format=m...
| sherburt3 wrote:
| Well we wouldn't want those dirty twitter links to affect
| the ideological purity of HN
| Prbeek wrote:
| Fantastic news for the guy probably responsible for the wide
| adoption of bitcoin. I hope curl php no longer troubles him.
| pavlov wrote:
| The US constitution increasingly seems like the principles of the
| Roman Republic after Caesar -- a quaint relic that gets regular
| ceremonial lip service but provides no checks and balances on the
| leaders.
|
| Presidents of both parties abuse pardon power with monarchic
| glee. The president now has full immunity. The incoming president
| and his wife launched crypto-tokens whose only utility is to
| allow foreigners to send billions of dollars to them anonymously
| (of course with full identification of the buyer in private
| communications thanks to the crypto private key, so you can be
| sure of who sent the bribe).
|
| People are obviously tired and overwhelmed. It's hard to pay
| attention because Trump has recently threatened so much more:
| invading foreign allies, military trials for political opponents,
| using the army against citizens, and so on. When he carries
| through with just 20% of what he said, it's supposed to be no big
| deal. But the institutions and norms are destroyed and they don't
| magically come back if the other party wins.
| fbnlsr wrote:
| This might be a minor thing, but does anyone know if a full
| pardon will allow him to use an electronic device or access the
| internet? Often times, people convicted of crimes related to an
| online activity are forbidden this right, and I wonder if that's
| the case for him, and if so, what his life would be in this day
| and age.
| ropejumper wrote:
| With a full pardon it's as if he never did anything in the
| first place.
| WrongAssumption wrote:
| That's an expungement, which is not a power the president
| has. He can grant a pardon, which is forgiveness, but does
| not erase that a crime was committed.
| ropejumper wrote:
| You're right, but I meant the consequences for him from
| this point on, which are essentially as if he hadn't done
| anything.
| sharpesttool wrote:
| Hard to square the circle with this. Trump is against China's
| drug imports (and more generally China's imports), but releases
| someone convicted of running a "import some drugs from China"
| business because... well crypto money. Oh money that's it. No
| contradiction!
| dredmorbius wrote:
| There is no circle. There is no square. There is unbridled and
| unanchored self-interest, power-lust, and opportunists.
| lbriner wrote:
| Someone might have already pointed it out but for me, the
| sentence of RA is not the main issue, the issue is allowing a
| single person to stamp through an entire legal system and
| undermine all of the time and money that is invested in it, even
| if that person is a president.
|
| I suspect that the idea originally was to give some safety valve
| but if it is used more than a few times by a President, it makes
| a mockery of it and it should be removed as a power. How can a
| President ever decide that the entire legal process is flawed and
| their opinion is right? If the sentence was too long then change
| the sentencing guidelines.
| varsketiz wrote:
| I tend to think this way about ideal leadership, but in reality
| big systems I can see end up having exception paths, or even
| processes
| contravariant wrote:
| The main failure here is the failure of the elections system to
| elect anyone reasonable.
|
| On its own it is not that bad an idea for someone who carries a
| mandate of the majority of the population to be able to grant
| pardons.
| kortilla wrote:
| All of the presidents pardon tons of people unpalatable to
| the other side of the political spectrum. They usually just
| save it for the end of their term so it doesn't cause too
| much noise.
| ArnoVW wrote:
| While it is true that there is always controversy, this
| does not mean that there is equivalency.
|
| Yes, every president has pardons that are arguable (Biden
| pardoning his son, for example). And anyone pardoned has
| been found guilty of a crime, by definition. But not all
| crimes are equal.
|
| Pardoning 1500 people that participated in a (luckily
| failed) insurrection that caused 5 deaths and 100+ injured,
| is an extremely bad precedent, and sends a very bad signal.
|
| Pardoning people convicted of marijuana possession (like
| Biden did) is not the same thing as pardoning the head of
| the worlds biggest guns and drugs marketplace. Even if he
| did not kill anyone himself (it was proven, just to a
| lesser extent, but fine). Those drugs and guns most
| definitely did kill people.
| falcor84 wrote:
| Why is it not a bad idea? Isn't it then just an example of
| Tyranny of the Majority?
|
| Taken to the extreme, we could have an impartial legal system
| putting in prison criminals from an even mix of society, and
| then the president pardoning everyone from the majority
| group, leaving in prison only the minorities.
| lukan wrote:
| "Isn't it then just an example of Tyranny of the Majority?"
|
| And how would you call a justice system, so complicated and
| convulted and therefore expensive that poor people (from
| minorities) don't really stand a chance to get their
| justice there?
|
| Obviously Ross was not in that group, but I see
| presidential pardon as a potential tool to counter the
| flaws of the justice system.
| oneeyedpigeon wrote:
| The justice system is flawed, but I don't see how adding
| a political dimension makes it any better.
| lukan wrote:
| Because fundamentally the idea is to be a democracy.
|
| The laws should represent, what the people want. Not a
| small caste of lawyers and lobbyist what it often rather
| seems to be.
|
| Presidential power is a direct way to represent peoples
| wishes. Or well, could be, if the voting system wouldn't
| be flawed as well ..
| Propelloni wrote:
| Unjust? Broken? But adding one broken thing to another
| broken thing will do nothing to fix any one of them.
| lukan wrote:
| Do you have concrete ideas on how to improve?
|
| And till those steps are implemented, don't you think you
| would enjoy it, if the next president would pardon
| Snowden, or your personal favorite case of unjustice?
| Propelloni wrote:
| As if the laws and justice of a nation are a questions of
| personal favorites! Maybe I have read too much
| enlightenment philosophers, but I happen to think in
| terms of general principles in this case.
|
| This might be a good first step, too. Read more books
| from a time when people were struggling with arbitrary
| justice.
| stuartjohnson12 wrote:
| If my server is unreliable, adding an unreliable backup
| is better than nothing.
| Propelloni wrote:
| Maybe, but do you think it is good enough?
| dredmorbius wrote:
| That really depends. There are times when adding backups
| or "safety" features can make circumstances _worse_.
| falcor84 wrote:
| Exactly, I've had cases when half-assed "backup"
| components led to cascading failures that were horribly
| difficult to troubleshoot.
| oneeyedpigeon wrote:
| Which is exactly what we _do_ have: a president pardoning
| everyone from the majority political group. It 's not
| consolation that the majority/minority groups are roughly
| equal.
| contravariant wrote:
| In a similar situation a majority could simply make it
| illegal to belong to the minority group. And without a way
| to pardon them the damage would be permanent.
|
| You want a majority to be able to decide who gets punished
| and who goes free, and even the best designed laws will
| have unforseen consequences. If the majority is 'evil',
| well there's just not all that much that _can_ be done in a
| democracy. Yes it would be better to live in a dictatorship
| of the most virtuous person in existence, but if you ever
| figure out how to do _that_ please let me know.
| Escapado wrote:
| Honest question/thought experiment: if we only elected people
| who are qualified for their job (assume we can measure
| competence at least in some dimensions like we do for a
| myriad of other professions before we allow people to work in
| them) and if the election process was set up in a way where
| when casting your ballot you have to take a multiple choice
| quiz which tests for basic knowledge on what you will vote
| for and the country you're in (as in "what is the household
| budget roughly, is this candidate in favour or against x, did
| the crime rate increase or decrease nominally" take these as
| rough examples of what I mean), to ensure that the people who
| vote for something have some clue what they are voting for
| and the broader context it's embedded in (we require a
| license to drive a car, this would be akin to have a having a
| license to vote) would that remedy the situation a little?
| The idea would be that informed people would vote for
| informed people. Could you imagine this being a net benefit
| or not? I would assume it would make democracies
| significantly better than they are now. Imagine going to a
| doctors office to find out your doctor is a Plummer and he
| was voted into this job and that the people working for him
| and handling your prescription is a random assortment of
| people he seems to like.
| upwardbound2 wrote:
| I'm sure there are benefits and that might it help overall
| if implemented here and now in our current America with our
| current levels of public access to civics and career
| education (MAYBE.) However, this change would be the exact
| opposite or a total repeal of the Voting Rights Act of
| 1965, which good people died for. At a meta level, I trust
| those who died for voting rights to care more and know more
| about the correct answer to your question than I do, and I
| guess I would recommend to look back at historic speeches
| from MLK and other leaders to understand their full
| reasoning about why literacy tests were either irredeemable
| or undesirable, and their reasons for thinking so.
|
| If we assume that both you and MLK were right, but that
| different policies better suit different conditions, then
| your proposal could maximize meritocratic effectiveness in
| an already-very-fair society, whereas MLK's way (the Voting
| Rights Act) provides a better minimum standard of human
| rights (similar to 1st and 2nd Amendment protections for
| people).
| Escapado wrote:
| Thanks for pointing me to that. One thing that stands out
| about that argument though is that voting is already
| discriminatory, right? Permanent residents and minors are
| not allowed to vote (the latter because we take age as a
| proxy of competency, no?), despite facing the
| consequences of elections just as anyone else does. I do
| understand that a risk for misuse absolutely exists, but
| at the same time it looks like populism, social media
| abuse, smear campaigns, science denial and plain old
| corruption in sheep's clothing are rampant enough that we
| can agree that many many votes are cast by misled people,
| who would have made another choice if they really
| understood what they voted for. I guess it would boil
| down to the difficult question of which harm is greater.
| fgna wrote:
| While I can see this preventing many of the current issues,
| I can't help but wonder who will serve the interests of the
| people that are not allowed to vote.
|
| Would it be a better system if the not-allowed group is
| totally dependent on the people that are allowed to vote?
| Escapado wrote:
| I see. In a sense we are already doing that. Minors can
| not vote (and if I am correct the reasoning is that they
| don't have the competency to cast a proper vote) and even
| foreign permanent residents can't either, even though the
| outcome of the elections totally influences their lives.
| In a sense these not-allowed groups are already totally
| dependent on the people that are allowed to vote.
|
| I guess my argument boils down to: We already
| discriminate. My thoughts are that the way we do it is
| not optimal.
| lukan wrote:
| "this would be akin to have a having a license to vote)
| would that remedy the situation a little? The idea would be
| that informed people would vote for informed people. Could
| you imagine this being a net benefit or not?"
|
| The idea has been around for a bit and I call it
| interesting, but also with huge potential of misuse.
|
| Change the test slightly, so your target audience will
| yield better results, giving you a better result.
|
| Either way, as long as climate change and darwinism are
| controversial topics, I see it hard to implement in a
| meaningful way.
| oneeyedpigeon wrote:
| > would that remedy the situation a little?
|
| I've had this thought before and my tentative conclusion is
| "no". It boils down to the purpose of democracy which is
| NOT to produce the best government but to make people feel
| ok about having a government at all.
| Escapado wrote:
| That's an interesting perspective, but I wonder if we
| can't have both.
| ttyprintk wrote:
| The Ancient Greek experiments with democracy seem to
| culminate in a system that "gives you the government you
| deserve". But those citizens also faced dire consequences
| for causing any harm to society---that's an important
| characteristic we've lost.
| lolc wrote:
| Like a literacy test?
|
| https://www.crmvet.org/info/lithome.htm#litbkgnd
|
| Sorry for the snark, it's just a very hard problem because
| we'd end up in a situation where the voters would decide
| who is part of their club.
| tchalla wrote:
| > On its own
|
| The reality is in front of you. So, you can't look at this
| "on its own".
| barnabee wrote:
| Assuming a sufficiently functional congress[0], why not
| require that pardons go through congress as well rather than
| be unilateral presidential actions?
|
| [0] A big if, I know...
| gadders wrote:
| Did you say this about Biden pardoning his whole family for
| their crimes, or just the ones Trump issued?
| dehrmann wrote:
| Not GP, but yes.
| gadders wrote:
| Good. For a lot of people the validity of the pardon
| depends on who is issuing it.
| varsketiz wrote:
| Not GP.
|
| I think Bidens family pardons are problematic as well. I can
| understand why he did it.
|
| I dont understand the argument for pardoning Ross.
| gadders wrote:
| I think time served is an appropriate sentence for what he
| did.
|
| I think life with no parole was far to harsh.
| Terr_ wrote:
| > I suspect that the idea originally was to give some safety
| valve
|
| That reminds me of the early 2000s, where there were a lot of
| US debates around around terrorism and "harsh interrogations"
| i.e. torture.
|
| A certain bloc of politicians and commentators kept bringing up
| a hypothetical scenario where there was a nuclear bomb counting
| down, and some guy wouldn't admit where it was hidden in a
| major city. My favorite response to that involved presidential
| pardons, something along the lines of:
|
| 1. "So what? _If_ everything you say is true, then the
| authorities would simply torture the guy _and seek a pardon
| afterwards._ We already have an exceptional mechanism for those
| exceptional situations, meaning that 's not a reason to change
| it."
|
| 2. "Conversely, any interrogator who _isn 't_ confident of a
| pardon is on who does _not_ believe it 's at ticking-bomb
| situation, meaning they cannot justify torturing someone
| anyway, they just want to do it to make their job marginally
| easier. That's bad, so it should stay illegal."
| murphy1312 wrote:
| It is a relic from the time when most countries had kings who
| could pardon people.
| lolwatter wrote:
| Maybe the legal system shouldn't have been used to go after
| individuals based on political reasons? Wouldn't that be a good
| start? Fed always win, so send Fed after someone and they will
| be in jail soon. It doesn't matter what they did or didn't do,
| this is sadly the way it's done now.
|
| 1500 in jail for protesting in DC? Really, less than that in
| jail after months BLM riots afaik. Sure, jail a few bad boys,
| but 1500? No way.
|
| Throw a rock at people in power and go jail. Rape and murder is
| fine, no threat to DC.
| realaleris149 wrote:
| The number of people is irrelevant. What is relevant is what
| each one did. If they did something illegal that is punished
| with prison time, they go to prison.
| ngetchell wrote:
| Trying to justify stealing the election, then trying to
| rewrite history saying the other side broke stuff when they
| prostested is the laziest sort of whataboutism I've seen on
| this site.
|
| Trump and his minons tried to undo the results of an
| election. An election he lost. Lost even while abusing his
| power as president (see his calls in Ukraine and Georgia as
| evidence).
|
| Nobody on the left supports looters or rapists. If there is
| evidence someone committed a crime, prosecute them. Trump is
| the only person I know that supports rapists (see Epstien and
| Gaetz). He says if you are loyal to him, you don't have to
| face the consequences of your actions. That to me is what is
| most scary.
| FilosofumRex wrote:
| It's part of the separation of powers and the system of checks
| & balances against powers of branches of government.
|
| Congress makes laws and impeaches presidents, courts judge
| constitutionality of laws and try cases of treason and
| presidents appoint judges and grant pardons.
|
| You can't have impeachment without pardon, otherwise, there
| wouldn't be a check against judicial tyranny.
| rafaelmn wrote:
| Legal system is very often at odds with public perception of
| justice, changing the law is slow and does shit for people
| currently in jail - having veto power for elected officials is
| a good safety mechanism and helps perception of justice.
| account42 wrote:
| Bidens pardons have been even more absurd - pardoning people
| for unspecified crimes before they have even been charged.
| Including his family.
| vidarh wrote:
| In the context of a deeply vindictive successor surrounded,
| it seems like the entirely rational choice to make.
|
| It's not one that should be needed or acceptable, and had his
| successor been someone who seemed to respect law and order
| I'd have agreed with you, but in the present circumstances
| it'd seem crazy not to.
| sofixa wrote:
| Because of very legitimate threats of politically motivated
| prosecution against them. Hell, his son was was prosecuted
| and dragged through the mud publicly, including in fucking
| Congress, for run of the mill regular crimes. Why was there
| such a treatment for a regular criminal?
| mardifoufs wrote:
| Come on, that's such a cop out. Like even with an extremely
| partisan lens, it's a very very weak argument. Like yes,
| presidents and their family will be targets of more
| scrutiny (as you said, for political reasons). That's
| normal. What's not normal is pardoning your family to avoid
| said scrutiny.
|
| Trump was also the target of "politically motivated
| judicial scrutiny" (and rightfully so!) So I guess he would
| be justified in pardoning himself and his entire family,
| right?
| sofixa wrote:
| I'm not American and even I can tell you that this is a
| terrible attempt at false equivalence.
|
| Trump was president and commited a ton of crimes while
| being one, and a ton of others before and after. He was
| rightfully prosecuted, but unfortunately escaped any real
| consequences. His trials were mediatised and saw big
| attention form politicians because he was a former
| president, _who was impeached_ being sued for a ton of
| different criminal activities, including multiple
| directly related to his job (the top job in the US). His
| trials were directly relevant to the wider public and
| political establishment, and should have prevented him
| from ever running again for even a school board.
|
| Biden's son is a nobody. No high positions in government,
| no power, no shady deals getting billions from Saudis or
| whatever. Run of the mill small time criminal who got
| paraded through Congress simply because his father was
| president.
|
| It's really absurd to try to compare the two, or claim
| that the myriad of trials against Trump were "politically
| motivated". The man is a fucking convicted criminal,
| rapist, absurd creep, tax cheat, stole from a children's
| cancer charity, plan and simple and obvious for anyone.
| And uet he's back at the top job, publicly promising
| vengeance to all those who wronged him. He directly and
| publicly threatened Zuckerberg and others.
|
| It's really absurd trying to compare the two, and I
| refuse to believe this can be done in good faith.
| keepamovin wrote:
| Still something tells me you have zero problem with the
| thousands of pardons Biden issued, correct?
|
| Don't dress up your stance in fancy garb when it comes down to
| something baser.
| varsketiz wrote:
| This is not in any way related to Trump pardoning Ross or the
| fact that president can issue pardons at their discretion.
|
| What you are doing here is a distraction from the topic -
| whataboutism.
| mardifoufs wrote:
| Actually in matters of law (which this definitely is),
| "whataboutism" is just judicial or executive precedent.
|
| This is like crying about whataboutism when a judge cites
| judicial precedent to justify a sentence. Good luck with
| that, it might work as a "nuh-uh" in online discussions but
| in real life, precedent does actually matter.
| varsketiz wrote:
| I understand what a precedent is in law and in life :) It
| seems like an illogical position to hold here.
|
| Biden did bad pardons, now Trump has no other course (eg
| fix the system), but to do bad pardons as well? Except
| when Trump does it it is not bad because Biden did it
| first?
| zo1 wrote:
| We have to. Short of arguing on first-principles, agreeing
| on them, and then using those principles to evaluate
| everything done on both sides, this is one of the top
| mechanisms we have to bring a spotlight to the
| contradictory mess we have on our hands.
|
| Personally, I blame lawyers and prosecutors. A law should
| be simple, easy to evaluate if it was broken, and always
| prosecuted. And when it comes to punishments, they should
| be explicit and without the possibility of being altered.
|
| We've gotten too complacent with making all these arbitrary
| rules, then fiddling with their non-enforcement and
| severity by virtue of reduced sentences.
| varsketiz wrote:
| Well put. It seems to me that too few realise this.
| that_guy_iain wrote:
| They literally gave the power of pardons so that one person
| could right wrongs. Previously, it was used a lot more than it
| is now. There are lots of people in prison on unfair sentences
| which are technically legal but still wrong. Sentencing
| guidelines are just guidelines.
| sebzim4500 wrote:
| He's a single person but this was a campaign promise of a
| campaign that 77.3 million americans voted for.
| tonymet wrote:
| Is this a complaint about Trump or Biden ? So far Biden has
| pardoned more than 20x Trump , and Bidens recipients were Much
| more controversial
| gigatexal wrote:
| So are online illegal drug marketplaces legal now if they're run
| entirely on crypto?
| leftcenterright wrote:
| A full unconditional pardon is one thing, reduction of sentence
| through judicial processes is another. He never pardoned Snowden
| and Assange .
|
| Why do they still have courts in the US again?
| karel-3d wrote:
| Silk Road 3.0 here we come!
|
| (Silk Road 2.0 already existed. The guy running it is in prison
| now, I think.)
|
| edit: ah seems Silk Road 3.0 existed too. So, 4.0 then
| freehorse wrote:
| So Trump keeps his promises to the ones who supported him. Makes
| one think how what other promises he has made to other people and
| groups having funded and supported his campaign.
| omnibrain wrote:
| Who's next? Sam Bankman-Fried or Elizabeth Holmes?
| dead_gunslinger wrote:
| These ones are left for the next Democrat administration,
| current one is probably hostile to them given their political
| leanings.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| We need pardon reform.
|
| I'd argue the President should not be allowed to issue pardons
| that are:
|
| (1) Preemptive ( _i.e._ absent conviction);
|
| (2) To himself, his current or former Cabinet members, or to any
| of the foregoing's current or former spouses or children or
| grandchildren (or their spouses); or
|
| (3) Issued after the presidential election in the final year of
| their term.
|
| Furthermore, pardons for violent offences or corruption should be
| prohibited; provided, however, the President should retain the
| power to commute such sentences, and the Congress should have the
| power to regulate the manner in which the President may commute
| such sentences.
|
| (Notably, I don't believe this would apply to Ulbricht. He wasn't
| convicted of a violent crime.)
| tallanvor wrote:
| While I would tend to agree with the first one, and preventing
| someone from pardoning himself or herself, the rest is a bit
| much. But it's a moot point anyway. At this point amending the
| constitution is virtually impossible.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _the rest is a bit much_
|
| The Cabinet or the lame-duck pardons?
|
| Cabinet members are close to the President and in commanding
| positions of authority; if they're scared of a law they
| should work to change it.
|
| Lame ducks, on the other hand, aren't subject to the single
| veneer of a check on Presidential pardons: popular outrage.
| Limiting it in that span, when a President is unaccountable,
| and where we have ample history of silliness, seems
| warranted.
|
| Note that I'm not proposing restricting commutations in any
| of those cases. (I suppose we should add a clause prohibiting
| the President from preemptive commutations, too.)
|
| > _amending the constitution is virtually impossible_
|
| Not true. We're probably closer to the end of our
| Constitutional stasis than at any time in our lives.
|
| Hell, you might be able to ram something like this through
| _today_ if you added a clause that nullifies past pardons per
| those standards.
| w0de0 wrote:
| > Constitutional stasis
|
| Tickles me to see "stasis" so used - not incorrectly, ofc,
| but nonetheless as a perfect contranym of the original
| Greek.
|
| [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stasis_(ancient_Greece)]
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| I'd argue it's quite similar. Since Nixon, we've been in
| a hyperpartisan divide that doesn't permit Constitutional
| flexibility.
| quasarj wrote:
| What? Trump just did it with an executive order!
| vharuck wrote:
| >(1) Preemptive (i.e. absent conviction);
|
| I think this is necessary class of pardons. A hypothetical
| example of a good preemptive pardon would be Congress repealing
| an unjust law, and the president pardoning anybody who broke
| that law before the repeal.
|
| >(2) To himself, his current or former Cabinet members, or to
| any of the foregoing's current or former spouses or children or
| grandchildren (or their spouses)
|
| Agree on not pardoning himself or cabinet members. Maybe could
| extend that to include all political appointees. Politicians
| shouldn't enjoy special privileges like these. But I'm less
| convinced about preventing family pardons. Those people
| (generally) aren't politicians. And, if they plan to abuse the
| president's pardon to commit crimes, they'd either be asking
| after the crime and risking the president refusing, or asking
| before and leaving the president open to conspiracy charges.
|
| >(3) Issued after the presidential election in the final year
| of their term.
|
| I've grown too cynical about the voters to believe this would
| matter. Most people don't follow politics closely enough to
| know who's been pardoned, what they did, and any
| political/personal connections they had with the president.
|
| If I may suggest a limitation, how about allowing the House or
| Senate to veto a pardon with a 2/3 majority?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _hypothetical example of a good preemptive pardon would be
| Congress repealing an unjust law, and the president pardoning
| anybody who broke that law before the repeal_
|
| Congress could do this when they pass the law. If they
| didn't, they specifically chose not to.
|
| > _less convinced about preventing family pardons. Those
| people (generally) aren 't politicians_
|
| What if we invert the question: in what case would the family
| require a pardon such that their spouse or parent in a
| position of massive power couldn't help them out of a
| legitimate scuffle?
|
| > _Most people don 't follow politics closely enough to know
| who's been pardoned_
|
| Then why do most of the controversial pardons come in this
| envelope?
|
| > _how about allowing the House or Senate to veto a pardon
| with a 2 /3 majority?_
|
| I like this much better.
| sharperguy wrote:
| An example of someone who could be pardoned would be someone
| committing an act of violence towards police to prevent them
| from enforcing a law which was later considered to be unjust
| and worthy of revolt against.
| chromatin wrote:
| > Preemptive
|
| amazing use of the diaresis
|
| Regarding the substance of your comment, we do not have (IIRC)
| established judicial precedent for the constitutionality of
| preemptive pardons. The practice originated with Ford pardoning
| Nixon, and has not yet been challened nor withstood judicial
| examination.
|
| Personally, I'd like to see some of Biden's pardons challenged.
|
| > (3) Issued after the presidential election in the final year
| of their term.
|
| This is an interesting one for those who are seeking a second
| term but are at risk of losing
| mschuster91 wrote:
| Nothing better showing how much Twitter has utterly degenerated
| than a _gold checkmarked_ scam account (letter confusion) as the
| top reply [1].
|
| [1] https://x.com/Frecs_Ross/status/1881968595632377962
| dredmorbius wrote:
| For those who cannot / prefer not to click through: top reply
| is a new "coin" launch.
| decentralised wrote:
| This is just. If a president can pardon people preemptively then
| they can pardon someone retroactively as well.
| Fokamul wrote:
| Ross deserved prison 100%, but 2x life + 40 years in American
| prison, which is hell on earth on purpose. That's just beyond
| fc** up.
|
| All these people here saying his sentence is deserved. It's just
| sick. How is your crime rate going? Declining...right? ....nope
| Ylpertnodi wrote:
| ...and the chemicals he would have supplied are being sliced
| and diced (padded out, to make more money), and you have to (in
| my country) go to some pretty dodgy areas to get what you want.
| eddie_catflap wrote:
| It seems like a lot of the opposition to this I'm seeing online
| is because Trump is the one that granted it.
|
| Ridiculous hyperbole about Ross 'inventing the Dark Web' or
| 'Trump freed a sex trafficker' is a great reminder that for some
| people, their ideological opposition can never do anything right
| and they'll condemn anything they do without even a second of
| consideration.
|
| I'm not an avowed Trump supporter (or even American) but believe
| this was the right call to make. The sentence was overly harsh
| and he has both served his time and reformed. I'm glad he has
| been released.
| DrNosferatu wrote:
| Some questions, as many of us are from another continent and are
| only marginally aware of the matter - so, for many here at HN:
|
| 1. Ross Ulbricht the ultimate entrepreneur?
|
| 2. Ross Ulbricht was a freedom fighter?
| Ylpertnodi wrote:
| As a eu-er, yes and yes. (For me, and many of my friends).
| DrNosferatu wrote:
| Wow - really surprised.
|
| - So, what about the exploitation, violence, and devastating
| addiction that results from no-rules drug
| purveying/trafficking?
|
| (how would you compare Ross Ulbright to medical opioid
| purveyers/traffickers? If the same, what are they morally?)
|
| - Isn't murder for hire outright objectionable?
| throwaway2037 wrote:
| This is a general question for any reader here who disagrees with
| the original prison sentence. (Ignore the Presidential pardon for
| a moment.) What is a reasonable prison sentence for his crimes?
| 10-20 years?
| 2-3-7-43-1807 wrote:
| can't wait for him to star on joe rogan podcast!
| gadders wrote:
| Original story here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9626985
|
| I wish we could run some sort of sentiment analysis to see who
| was pro and anti the sentencing then vs now.
| peter_retief wrote:
| I always thought the sentence was too extreme, he broke some laws
| he should do some time. Not life without parole.
| varispeed wrote:
| This is amazing. Well done.
| gigatexal wrote:
| What's the overall take of HN here? Was the government
| overstepping? Is everyone supporting this undoing of his
| sentence? Are we generally pro free drug trade? Or are we more
| anti-FBI?
| varsketiz wrote:
| My grasp of the sentiment in the comments - majority of folk
| here seem to think Ross did enough time for his crime.
| gigatexal wrote:
| thanks for summarizing
| ozim wrote:
| I don't support the undoing.
|
| Government wasn't overstepping, facilitating bad stuff on such
| scale has to be taken down with big consequences.
|
| There is no ,,I was just running a site and people used it for
| bad stuff" he had all intentions and he profited from it.
| gigatexal wrote:
| I agree. The lengthy sentence likely was such that it stood
| as a deterrence to other upstarts / would-be drug marketplace
| kingpins.
| aksss wrote:
| "We"? Examine your own principles, review the facts, come to
| your own conclusion.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| The overall take of HN is that a sober discussion of this
| situation isn't possible on this site.
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| This wasn't the case in the older thread. I've seen you
| mention that you think HN hasn't changed that much but I
| think juxtaposing this comment thread against the older one
| is illuminating. HN has drifted more toward a general news
| site than anything particular special. Like most news sites,
| comments are characterized by short, overly emotional
| comments that argue in borderline bad faith. Comments aren't
| particularly interested in discussion but instead just
| cathartic emoting.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| From characteristics of HN that I can observe directly
| (stories making the front page, sites represented,
| classifications of those sites), relatively little change.
|
| Mind, that's what a two-year-old historical scrape of the
| front-page alone shows.
|
| What I _don 't_ see in that is voting behaviour,
| submissions overall, stories which _haven 't_ made the
| front page, etc., etc., etc. Much of that is only available
| within the HN server/DBMS itself, though some might be
| evident from a more comprehensive scrape of the site. Since
| items (submissions and comments) are assigned
| monotonically-increasing IDs, that's at least theoretically
| possible, though at 42.8 million items and counting it'd
| take some doing, _and there is still a great deal of
| information concealed from the public_ : comment votes,
| purged content, flag detail, vouch detail, unannounced
| moderator activity.
|
| What _has_ changed markedly is the pardonee 's relationship
| to the political system, and the political system's own
| degree of (dis)functionality. To that extent, HN both
| reflects, participates, and is a mechanism for influencing
| / being influenced by a larger system which _has_ changed
| markedly.
|
| HN has long been unable to discuss contentious subjects.
| It's particularly prone to status quoism, and in the
| present environment, the status quo is markedly
| authoritarian, fascistic, and personality-cultish, all of
| which HN's biases inherently (if not intentionally)
| support.
|
| It disappoints me tremendously, as for all those faults HN
| remains one of the better online discussion sites. The bar
| is falling rapidly however, so cold, cold comfort there.
|
| Late edit: Specifically as regards general news sites,
| those have _always_ featured heavily on HN, with the _New
| York Times_ specifically being among the top 3, if not the
| _top_ submitted site. That changed markedly around 2019 not
| due to changes in HN, but as the _Times_ significantly
| tightened its paywall, causing front-page appearances to
| drop to roughly 1 /4 their previous quantity. To that
| extent, HN sees _less_ general news, and less reasonably
| nonpartisan news now than in its first decade or so. The
| degree to which social media sites, and Twitter in
| particular, have themselves shifted rightwards, there 's
| also a strong bias.
|
| Specifically partisan "think tank" (read: propaganda) sites
| have long had a submission penalty, and don't seem to be
| more prevalent so far as I've checked. Partisanship _has_
| crept up on other sites /domains, however.
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| > From characteristics of HN that I can observe directly
| (stories making the front page, sites represented,
| classifications of those sites), relatively little
| change.
|
| Right I'm specifically talking about comments here. I
| agree that the site, largely, posts and engages with very
| similar content as it always has.
|
| > It disappoints me tremendously, as for all those faults
| HN remains one of the better online discussion sites. The
| bar is falling rapidly however, so cold, cold comfort
| there.
|
| This sounds like your disappointment is largely that HN
| has high volume behind political opinions which you
| disagree. I agree with you and probably share very
| similar political opinions, but it's also true that fora
| throughout the net and web have always had resident
| biases oriented around the founding members. To me that
| is what it is and not necessarily an indictment on
| conversation _quality_ which is distinct from the
| political and social environment it resides in, though I
| realize it 's not completely possible to divorce the two.
|
| > It disappoints me tremendously, as for all those faults
| HN remains one of the better online discussion sites. The
| bar is falling rapidly however, so cold, cold comfort
| there.
|
| Perhaps, but for myself and I suspect many like myself,
| online discussion sites died years ago once they became
| dominated by the kind of comments you see on this thread.
| Knee-jerk opinion blasting and short, emotional posts
| rarely generate signal but only noise.
|
| > Specifically as regards general news sites, those have
| always featured heavily on HN, with the New York Times
| specifically being among the top 3, if not the top
| submitted site.
|
| My comparison with general news sites isn't to say that
| HN now has more of it; I've also done my own analysis of
| site submissions and I agree, I think there's less
| general news on the site than before. What I mean to say
| is, the comments here are generally indistinguishable
| from those you see on the Verge, NYTimes, local news
| sites, and even most of Twitter.
|
| This sort of gets to the heart of what HN meant to me and
| I suspect many of us: HN was a unique gathering of tech
| and non-tech folks who discussed things charitably and in
| good faith. This means not responding with short,
| emotional comments meant to be more cathartic than
| explanatory. This meant that acknowledging that another
| poster may have a very different political or social lens
| than yours and that while a discussion may change no
| minds, it can educate participants in the various ways of
| thinking that manifest from these varied backgrounds.
|
| Today's HN though is nothing special. I can get this
| quality of commentary from pretty much any large
| discussion site online. The only thing that's interesting
| here is the _selection_ of topics, but that 's never been
| HN's strong suit as it's fairly easy to curate tech
| topics through various socials and RSS. It's always the
| commentary and community that's given me, and I suspect
| others like me, value on this site.
|
| FWIW I don't blame anyone or anything and this post is
| largely meant as catharsis for myself, much like all the
| snappy emotional shouting in this thread is meant as
| righteous catharsis for many of the posters. But I also
| think it's time to acknowledge that large scale
| discussion on the web in English is dead. The
| participants have become too balkanized, too angry, and
| too disinterested in learning through conversation to
| have any educational effect. Instead online English-
| language discussions on large fora largely function as
| catharsis.
|
| EDIT: I see a lot of people very loudly proclaim how
| they've given up news sites and social media to read HN.
| This feels utterly nonsensical to me as there's pretty
| much no difference in comment quality. Instead, it points
| to some form of identity sorting where commenters try to
| "identify" as the kind of person who indulges in fora
| rather than news sites or social media. To me this feels
| even more counterproductive because the establishment of
| an "HN Identity" leads to even more partisanship than
| what we already have affecting discussions.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| _This sounds like your disappointment is largely that HN
| has high volume behind political opinions which you
| disagree._
|
| No.
|
| It's that there's little opportunity for meaningful,
| substantial discussion in a form that moves discourse
| forward.
|
| HN's guidelines are reasonable. Their application is
| lacking. And where discussion occurs on controversial
| subjects which challenge the status quo, one example of
| which is the current governance of the country in which
| HN operates, HN's guidelines actively handicap those
| arguing against power.
|
| The fact that those with the advantage of power _also_
| tend strongly toward nonsubstantive, partisan rhetoric,
| inflammetory baiting, and gloating ... helps little.
|
| My comparison isn't of HN against discussion at other
| sites. Again, HN is generally better though the bar is
| parlous low. There are some other smaller discussions
| which seem better managed, the most notable of which I'm
| aware is Metafilter, for reasons which may merit further
| exploration. There are reasons to believe that _any_
| sufficiently large discussion will tend to a minimum
| viable standard for reasons I 've discussed for many
| years though scattered amongst many comments here and
| elsewhere, ultimately having to do with media theory,
| power laws, and group dynamics.
|
| What the HN of the past three days _does_ suggest is at
| least four years of distressingly poor discussion
| quality. I hope not longer than that, and if at possible,
| shorter.
|
| As for news: I read / listen to news _media_ to some
| extent. Many of those are exceptionally poor, and my
| results recently writing a parser for CNN 's "lite" page
| give measurable assessment of that. My own media
| selection is generally left-centrist, and includes
| numerous non-US venues. I can assure you that the general
| take on the US is somewhere between disappointment,
| shock, and horror.
| nsajko wrote:
| Is Trump not supposed to be tough-on-crime? How does pardoning a
| drug dealer factor into that? Is Trump against the war on drugs?
| TriangleEdge wrote:
| I'm genuinely surprised of the reactions on this thread. Trump
| just announced that cartels down south are terrorist
| organizations. This means that some of the members will likely
| die by the hand of the us govt. How is running an open market for
| drugs, weapons, etc different? Seems contradictory to me, what am
| I missing?
| dools wrote:
| This pardon is corrupt. Ross' parents donated to Trump and he
| pardoned their son as a favour.
|
| Whether or not you think he deserved the prison time, the problem
| here is how utterly brazen Trump is in accepting bribes.
| jgilias wrote:
| Trump doesn't care about Ross' parents or their donations much.
|
| What he did care about were libertarian votes. There was a deal
| that libertarians will support Trump if he promises to free
| Ross. This is on record, you can find it.
| SV_BubbleTime wrote:
| So, I'm seeing politician followed through on promise to
| voters. I'm sure this can swing to some orange man bad, I'm
| just not seeing it.
| rnernento wrote:
| In 2021, Ulbricht's prosecutors and defense agreed that Ulbricht
| would relinquish any ownership of a newly discovered fund of
| 50,676 Bitcoin (worth nearly $5.35 billion in 2025) seized from a
| hacker in November 2021.[78] The Bitcoin had been stolen from
| Silk Road in 2013 and Ulbricht had been unsuccessful in getting
| them back. The U.S. government traced and seized the stolen
| Bitcoin. Ulbricht and the government agreed the fund would be
| used to pay off Ulbricht's $183 million debt in his criminal
| case, while the Department of Justice would take custody of the
| Bitcoin.[79][80]
| dbspin wrote:
| [flagged]
| haswell wrote:
| What are you suggesting here? That the earlier bitcoin
| seizure somehow led to this pardon? I'm not following.
| dbspin wrote:
| No you're right. I'm sure Trump released him as a deeply
| principled and selfless act.
| haswell wrote:
| I'm not suggesting that. I'm trying to understand what
| benefit you believe Trump received out of this whole
| scenario, and specifically how the handling of the
| bitcoin played a role.
| jdhzzz wrote:
| Well an upper bound anyway. Maybe, "The Art of the Deal"
| could have gotten it a lot closer to $1.2 B.
| lvl155 wrote:
| Bingo. US always has been about commerce and money. It wouldn't
| shock me if Ross has at least a few million hidden in some
| "lost wallet" printed out in a vault some where. He was smart
| enough to know he would get caught one day.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| It's unlikely he has a hidden stash that is truly hidden.
| Back then the government wasn't all over the blockchain
| (compared to today) and obfuscation was not like what is
| available today.
|
| So even if he does have a stash, it is likely marked, and he
| will get a knock on the door real fast if it starts moving.
| Pxtl wrote:
| I'm pretty sure there were tumblers back then. Alternately,
| there's the old "bury some gold under a family member's
| garden" trick.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| there weren't good tumblers back then. and monero didn't
| exist yet, although a cryptonote implementation did
| andirk wrote:
| I'm no blockchain forensics...icist, but coins were moved
| from let's say one main Silk Road wallet to many other
| people's wallets legitimately, or as legit as a illicit
| drug transaction can be. Silk Road wallet A transfers coins
| to rando person's wallet B. Also, wallet A occasionally
| transfers to wallet F which he owns. Who's to say which
| wallets he controls?
|
| One of the possible ways Ulbricht got caught was a single
| Google Captcha that showed his IP address (San Francisco,
| go figure). So he covered his tracks pretty well.
| scotty79 wrote:
| Wow. Suddenly the pardon makes perfect sense.
| haswell wrote:
| Why does this make the pardon make sense?
| scotty79 wrote:
| Because in absence of this there was zero benefit to anyone
| with any power to make it happen. Getting clear $5bln
| without any legal objections is a clear benefit to many
| parties involved. I'm sure many people close to it have
| many ideas how to skim some off the top for themselves.
| liendolucas wrote:
| I think that we have to agree that anyone doing this today will
| definitely go to jail, and is my personal opinion that there must
| be a punishment. Now, the discussion could be if a life sentence
| is a fair sentence or not. I personally feel that a life sentence
| is a disproportionate punishment, moreover if the subject shows a
| different attitude after being in jail for more than a decade.
| Ten years time to medidate about what you did is plenty of time
| to change someone's mind, obviously if you are a person willing
| to do things differently.
| aksss wrote:
| Wasn't it _two_ life sentences plus forty years?
| honeybadger1 wrote:
| can we all just agree that he was given a ridiculous sentence and
| trump did a good thing, is that so hard.
| chocolateteeth wrote:
| How is the thread basically off topic?
| giantg2 wrote:
| I'm curious, what are the arguments for or against him being
| pardoned?
| I_am_tiberius wrote:
| I know he wasn't convicted of hiring a hitman, and I know the
| attempt didn't succeed, but he still tried to kill other people.
| Moreover, during a Bitcoin conference, he gave a live talk from
| prison via phone and still lied, claiming they planted the log on
| his laptop. A full pardon is ridiculous. It's unfair to so many
| people, including his partners like Variety Jones, also known as
| Thomas Clark. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure he won't do
| anything like this again.
| OscarTheGrinch wrote:
| Actual murderers get out in the time that Ross served.
|
| The concept of justice must include an element of
| proportionality, I would argue that Ross's sentence, for a
| first time non-violent criminal, was over the top. Without
| proportionality justice becomes arbitrary, based more on luck
| and your connections to power.
|
| We punish those we can punish: the little guy. Whilst those
| running governments, corporations and networks that facilitate
| repression, hatred and genocide go scot free.
| Algent wrote:
| Wasn't silk road selling way more than just drugs ? Like,
| pornography and gun, worldwide. When you facilitate both sex
| trafficking, organized crime and potentially terrorism you
| can't exactly be surprised you get hit with everything.
| eckmLJE wrote:
| No, silk road did not sell weapons. There was legal content
| like pornography and other media on there, but Ulbricht was
| an idealist and excluded material with "intent to harm".
| kerkeslager wrote:
| Notably, as Ullbricht predicted, the Silk Road was
| immediately replaced by sites which did not have such
| ideals, and openly sold weapons and illegal pornography.
| consp wrote:
| They were there already and shutting down the silk road
| changed nothing in that perspective.
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| So all the people who got convicted for selling firearms
| on Silk Road, how'd that happen then?
| kerkeslager wrote:
| It didn't happen.
|
| Ctrl-F for "Products" on this page[1] and stop making
| shit up.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_(marketplace)
| Algent wrote:
| Interesting and surprising they really had rules, thanks
| for the clarification. I'm ashamed to say I opened this
| page and read it wrong the first time by skipping the
| first sentence.
| busymom0 wrote:
| You might be interested in my comment about Carnegie
| Mellon University's researchers findings on what Silk
| Road sold/didn't sell/what was popular.
| red-iron-pine wrote:
| don't conflate Silk Road == all Darknet Markets
|
| plus in North America you don't really need a darknet
| market to get a gun illegally. US FedGov ain't gonna get
| to involved in illegal gun sales in Europe.
| diggan wrote:
| Huge leap from "selling pornography" to "facilitate sex
| trafficking"... Where you get the sex trafficking part
| from?
| busymom0 wrote:
| > Carnegie Mellon University's researchers did an analysis
| of Silk Road gathering data on a daily basis for eight
| months before it was shut down. Some of their findings
| include:
|
| > "'Weed' (i.e., marijuana) is the most popular item on
| Silk Road" (p.8)
|
| > "The quantities being sold are generally rather small
| (e.g., a few grams of marijuana)" (p.12)
|
| > In Table 1, we take a closer look at the top 20
| categories per number of item offered. "Weed" (i.e., mari-
| juana) is the most popular item on Silk Road, followed by
| "Drugs," which encompass any sort of narcotics or
| prescription medicine the seller did not want further
| classified. Prescription drugs, and "Benzos," colloquial
| term for benzodiazepines, which include prescription
| medicines like Valium and other drugs used for insom- nia
| and anxiety treatment, are also highly popular. The four
| most popular categories are all linked to drugs; nine of
| the top ten, and sixteen out of the top twenty are drug-
| related. In other words, Silk Road is mostly a drug store,
| even though it also caters some other products. Finally,
| among narcotics, even though such a classification is
| somewhat arbitrary, Silk Road appears to have more
| inventory in "soft drugs" (e.g., weed, cannabis, hash,
| seeds) than "hard drugs" (e.g., opiates); this presumably
| simply reflects market demand.
|
| > Silk Road places relatively few restrictions on the types
| of goods sellers can offer. From the Silk Road sellers'
| guide [5], "Do not list anything who's (sic) purpose is to
| harm or defraud, such as stolen items or info, stolen
| credit cards, counterfeit currency, personal info,
| assassinations, and weapons of any kind. Do not list
| anything related to pedophilia."
|
| > Conspicuously absent from the list of prohibited items
| are prescription drugs and narcotics, as well as adult
| pornography and fake identification documents (e.g.,
| counterfeit driver's licenses). Weapons and am- munition
| used to be allowed until March 4, 2012, when they were
| transferred to a sister site called The Armory [1], which
| operated with an infrastructure similar to that of Silk
| Road. Interestingly, the Armory closed in August 2012
| reportedly due to a lack of business [6].
|
| https://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/nicolasc/publications/TR-
| CMU...
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| We punish people all the time for non-violent, white-collar
| crime; often very severely. Bernie Madoff got sent to prison
| for 150 years and died there and, as far as I know, he never
| solicited a murder for hire.
| archerx wrote:
| Bernie committed a crime worse than murder; stealing from
| the rich.
| kerkeslager wrote:
| Madoff is the exception rather than the rule--and even
| Madoff operated his Ponzi scheme for over 40 years before
| being prosecuted.
|
| Madoff's arrest and prosecution was actually pretty
| ineffectual in my opinion. If an amoral person can live as
| one of the richest men in the world for 40 years in
| exchange for spending the last 10 years of their life in
| minimum-security prison, I think a lot of amoral people
| would take that trade.
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| Bernie Ebbers and Jeff Skilling both got more than 20
| years for Enron. The CEO and co-owner of NCFE got 30
| years and 25 years respectively for their role in a
| securities and wire fraud relating to that business.
| kerkeslager wrote:
| > In December 2019, Ebbers was released from Federal
| Medical Center, Fort Worth, due to declining health,
| having served 13 years of his 25-year sentence, and he
| died just over a month later.[1]
|
| ...living until the age of 61 as one of the richest men
| in the world, then spending 13 years in minimum-security
| prison.
|
| > In 2013, following a further appeal, and earlier
| accusations that prosecutors had concealed evidence from
| Skilling's lawyers prior to his trial, the United States
| Department of Justice reached a deal with Skilling, which
| resulted in ten years being cut from his sentence,
| reducing it to 14 years. He was moved to a halfway house
| in 2018 and released from custody in 2019, after serving
| 12 years. [2]
|
| ...living until the age of 53 as one of the richest men
| in the world, then spending 12 years in minimum-security
| prison.
|
| Re: NCFE: Lance K. Poulsen went to jail at 65, and while
| I wasn't able to find out his current situation, he's
| about due to get out of jail if the other cases are any
| indication[3]. Rebecca S. Parrett, 60, fled after her
| conviction and was arrested at age 62 in Mexico, largely
| due to fleeing to a country with robust US extradition
| (why?)[4].
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Ebbers
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Skilling
|
| [3] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-national-
| century-finan...
|
| [4] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/fugitive-ohio-
| executive-previ...
| immibis wrote:
| Yeah, but in that case, we should pardon all people convicted
| of drug possession or distribution, not specifically Ross.
| OscarTheGrinch wrote:
| Sure, sounds good. The war on drugs was a dumb idea.
|
| Let's spend 1/4 of that all the drug enforcement money on
| harm reduction.
| pc86 wrote:
| "Actual murderers get out in less than a decade" is a reason
| to put actual murderers in prison forever, not to let
| everyone else out even sooner.
| tasty_freeze wrote:
| If a Mafia boss never strong armed a merchant, never busted
| any kneecaps, and never pulled a trigger but simply paid
| other people to carry out various crimes, should the law give
| him a short sentence because he was non-violent?
|
| I don't know what the appropriate sentence for Ulbrecht, but
| I think your claims about proportionality are missing the
| fact he didn't just direct commit a few crimes, such as
| trying (unsuccessfully) to hire a hitman, but he facilitated
| hundreds of thousands of crimes. Maybe you think selling
| drugs and guns to randos should not be illegal, but that is a
| separate question of whether or not he broke the laws as
| written.
|
| As for your last point, I don't disagree that the
| wealthy/powerful/connected live under a different justice
| system than everyone else.
| graemep wrote:
| I once noticed (in the UK) that two people who I read news
| stories about in the same week got similar sentences. One for
| breach of copyright, one for sexually assaulting a teenager.
|
| That said, I think Ross did knowingly enable violence?
| johnwheeler wrote:
| I don't think he should have been sent to ADX Florence, but gen
| pop in San Quentin seems reasonable. Give him 10 more years in
| Jail me says!
| rossfan wrote:
| Because the federal government would never plant a log on his
| computer in order to obtain a conviction. Next people will be
| saying the CIA killed JFK. How can we lose faith in the
| judicial system, fuck, the very government considering how
| consistently benign and trust worthy its been time and time
| again.
| snapcaster wrote:
| I honestly have no idea what the truth of the case was, but
| it is crazy to me how people never seem to update their
| priors on what the US gov is capable of. Everytime they get
| caught doing something like this people go "wow thats crazy"
| and then immediately go back to telling everyone saying non-
| mainstream ideas to take their meds
| lvass wrote:
| Poe's law.
| perihelions wrote:
| He did kill people. That factored into his sentencing[0]: the
| multiple overdose deaths from heroin and other things Ulbricht
| sold/facilitated/took a cut of the proceeds of.
|
| He killed _children_.
|
| - _" During the sentencing hearing, Forrest heard from the
| father of a 25-year-old Boston man who died of a heroin
| overdose and the mother of a 16-year-old Australian who took a
| drug designed to mimic LSD at a post-prom party and then jumped
| off a balcony to his death. Prosecutors said the two victims
| were among at least six who died after taking drugs that were
| bought through Silk Road."_
|
| [0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-29/silk-
| road... ( _" Silk Road Mastermind Handed Life in Prison for
| Drug Bazaar"_ (2015))
|
| It's squarely within the Overton window to impose extremely
| harsh sentences for people who sell heroin*. Most (?) Asian
| countries *execute* people who sell heroin. Trump himself has
| proposed, multiple times over the years, executing US heroin
| dealers[1,2]--which underscores the incredible degree of
| hypocrisy behind this pardon.
|
| *(It's also within some people's Overton windows to contemplate
| the opposite of this, in a framework of harm minimization. I
| can't steelman this argument in the specific case of Ulbricht.
| Is it harm reduction to sell heroin? Is it harm reduction to
| sell fatal drugs to high-school age kids?)
|
| [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43465229 ( _"
| Trump urges death penalty for drug dealers"_ (2018))
|
| [2] https://www.npr.org/2023/05/10/1152847242/trump-campaign-
| exe... ( _" Trump wants the death penalty for drug dealers.
| Here's why that probably won't happen"_ (2023))
| JohnnyLarue wrote:
| Yes, but Ulbricht is a _very_ different case. He 's white,
| you see.
| perihelions wrote:
| Judge Forrest absolute _nailed_ this, in her withering
| response to one of Ulbricht 's appeal attempts:
|
| - _" "No drug dealer from the Bronx selling meth or heroin
| or crack has ever made these kinds of arguments to the
| Court," she said. "It is a privileged argument, it is an
| argument from one of privilege. You are no better a person
| than any other drug dealer and your education does not give
| you a special place of privilege in our criminal justice
| system. It makes it less explicable why you did what you
| did.""_
|
| https://www.vice.com/en/article/unsealed-transcript-shows-
| ho... ( _" Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified
| Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence"_ (2015))
|
| In an increasingly nihilistic world, I'm glad people like
| Forrest still exist.
| busymom0 wrote:
| That judge is just wrong. Ulbricht was not selling drugs.
| Conflating running a market place vs drug dealers on the
| street is just wrong. Craigslist has tons of illegal
| stuff. Even FB and Twitter do.
| cedws wrote:
| Ulbricht didn't kill those people. Those people took drugs
| under their own autonomy and died as a result.
| maxlin wrote:
| This. With taking in to account how much criminal exposure
| Silk Road removed from the whole equation, saying "he
| killed them" is like saying Elon Musk kills everyone who
| dies in an FSD accident even if the system is safer than
| human drivers by average.
| xyzzy9563 wrote:
| Plus he didn't even sell the drugs. He created a technology
| platform that facilitates it. I can think of many other
| communications platforms that also do this, for example
| Google, email, Verizon, etc.
| sbarre wrote:
| So by your logic, a drug kingpin who doesn't actually
| handle the drug-selling transaction should not be liable
| for anything, even though the money rolls up to them?
|
| Ross directly profited from the sale of those drugs. So,
| yes, he was "selling the drugs".
| xyzzy9563 wrote:
| Google and Meta also profit from selling ads to the
| people who use it to trade drugs. All I'm saying is
| there's a rough equivalence. Perhaps the Silk Road
| platform should be banned but he was not a drug dealer
| himself. Creating a communications platform is not the
| same thing as being a drug dealer.
| sbarre wrote:
| He created/operated a platform with the primary purpose
| of facilitating the sale of drugs. He profited from those
| transactions. That makes him a drug dealer.
|
| Comparing Meta and Google to Silk Road is a bad faith
| argument. You might as well compare Silk Road to the
| phone network at that point.
| xyzzy9563 wrote:
| There were many other items and services sold on Silk
| Road, it wasn't just drugs.
| amarcheschi wrote:
| According to wikipedia [1], 70% of the products sold on
| silk road were drugs
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_(marketplace).
| wikipedia uses as reference https://web.archive.org/web/2
| 0160407165324/http://gawker.com... and https://web.archiv
| e.org/web/20131012012106/http://www.thegua...
|
| plus, at least ebay, amazon, big tech comply or at least
| sometimes comply with the law banning some products which
| can't be sold or advertised
| JohnBooty wrote:
| I'm generally lasseiz-faire when it comes to most drugs,
| although I do think some drugs like opioids are rather
| objectively a cancer to society and anybody in that
| pipeline needs to be punished.
|
| So. Comparisons to Google, Verizon, etc?
|
| While his actions aren't equivalent to a "direct" old-
| fashioned drug dealer selling fentanyl, they're clearly
| also not equivalent to providers like Google or Verizon.
|
| They provide truly general purpose communications
| networks. Common carriers. That's different from a
| marketplace explicitly designed to facilitate a
| particular thing like selling drugs.
|
| I mean, you _can_ upload non-porn videos to PornHub, or
| attempt to met platonic knitting circle buddies on there.
| But let's not sit around and pretend the entire operation
| isn't designed around the explicit purpose of selling
| porn.
| xyzzy9563 wrote:
| It wasn't designed for just drugs. There were many
| different categories.
| danem wrote:
| Different categories, yes. But mostly drugs.
|
| https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Gh5_2YgWoAABY-O?format=jpg&na
| me=...
| JohnBooty wrote:
| There was a category for drugs. And specific
| subcategories for different specific kinds of drugs.
|
| Unlike, say, the phone network or your neighborhood
| street corner it was pretty unambiguously designed to
| sell drugs (and more)
|
| Apart from any sort of judgement we might want to make,
| facts are facts and Silk Road was factually designed to
| sell drugs.
|
| You don't get to participate in the discussion until you
| acknowledge basic reality.
| that_guy_iain wrote:
| > He did kill people. That factored into his sentencing[0]:
| the multiple overdose deaths from heroin and other things
| Ulbricht sold/facilitated/took a cut of the proceeds of.
|
| > He killed children.
|
| Nit: People died, who may not have died, because of his
| actions but he didn't kill them. Very few people are forced
| to take drugs.
| kerkeslager wrote:
| It's worth noting that darknet sites have at every point in
| their history provided higher-purity drugs on average than
| what was available elsewhere[1]. It's hard to say whether
| or not more people used drugs because of the Silk Road. But
| without question, many people who purchased drugs on the
| Silk Road and survived, would have purchased those drugs
| elsewhere and died from impurities in the Silk Road's
| absence. I think there's an argument to be made that
| Ullbricht saved lives by purveying safer drugs.
|
| [1]
| https://www.euda.europa.eu/publications/insights/internet-
| dr...
|
| EDIT: Added citation for commenter who couldn't be bothered
| to use a search engine. Link contains links to multiple
| studies.
| sulam wrote:
| Citation needed.
| that_guy_iain wrote:
| The purity can also cause overdoses and deaths because
| they're not used to it being that pure so they took the
| same amount they would take with a less pure so took a
| substantially larger dose. Especially with opium based
| drugs that would be a big problem.
| perihelions wrote:
| - _" But without question, many people who purchased
| drugs on the Silk Road and survived, would have purchased
| those drugs elsewhere and died from impurities in the
| Silk Road's absence. I think there's an argument to be
| made that Ullbricht saved lives by purveying safer
| drugs."_
|
| But how's that different from arguing that every crack
| dealer who doesn't cut their crack product is a
| utilitarian, net-positive life-saver?
|
| Alice sells pure crack. Bob one street down adds fentanyl
| for the extra kick. It's a reasonable inference that
| Alice's clients, deprived of Alice, would switch to Bob
| and promptly off themselves. Does it therefore follow,
| that Alice-who-sells-crack is an upstanding, lifesaving
| even, member of society, who should be left free to sell
| more crack? If not, then what's the differentiation
| between Alice-who-sells-crack and Ross Ulbricht--what
| innovation has that cryptocurrency startup innovated,
| that makes it it a substantively different moral
| scenario?
|
| Certainly, no crack dealer has ever, in the history of
| the US, tried to advance this specific utilitarian
| argument, which Ulbricht attached himself to (as Judge
| Forrest pointed out--it's a privileged argument of a
| privileged person).
| kerkeslager wrote:
| > Certainly, no crack dealer has ever, in the history of
| the US, tried to advance this specific utilitarian
| argument, which Ulbricht attached himself to (as Judge
| Forrest pointed out--it's a privileged argument of a
| privileged person).
|
| Tell me more about how _a judge_ is calling people
| privileged.
|
| I mean, do you have any discussion of the idea at hand,
| or are you just going to appeal to how we feel about
| hypothetical people who might have said the idea? Either
| the idea is correct or it's not, it doesn't matter if
| it's a crack dealer, a darknet market administrator, or a
| judge who makes it.
| perihelions wrote:
| - _" Tell me more about how a judge is calling people
| privileged"_
|
| ok
|
| - _" The family received food stamps for four years
| beginning when Katherine was 12. They were homeless for
| six months. "I came from nothing," Forrest said. "I came
| from a father who made no money. He was a playwright and
| then a writer, and even though he published a lot of
| books, I was a complete scholarship student all the way
| through."_
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katherine_B._Forrest
| itsoktocry wrote:
| > _It 's squarely within the Overton window to impose
| extremely harsh sentences for people who sell heroin._
|
| Some of us see a major difference between selling heroin to
| someone, and building the marketplace from which these
| victim's freely bought drugs.
|
| I think he is owed some responsibility, but he didn't kill
| them.
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| Pray tell, what is the difference between operating an
| electronic market where people can buy drugs and operating
| a physical one (say, a street corner) where people can do
| the same?
| starspangled wrote:
| Operating a street corner? You mean like in the capacity
| of a city municipality, providing sidewalk, road,
| drainage infrastructure, perhaps some street lighting.
| lvass wrote:
| Are you saying people who lay paving blocks or asphalt on
| a street should be guilty of drug dealing?
| itsoktocry wrote:
| Is this a serious question?
|
| What does it mean to be "operating an electronic market"?
| Are you under the impression he was physically
| intermediating these transactions in some way? That the
| drugs passed through his hands?
|
| That's one difference.
| lucb1e wrote:
| > What does it mean to be "operating an electronic
| market"?
|
| Ask Ross Ulbricht
|
| > Are you under the impression [...] That the drugs
| passed through his hands?
|
| They never said that, and it doesn't have to for being
| partially responsible. The Pirate Bay didn't host any
| copyrighted material, but the founders "were found guilty
| in the Pirate Bay trial in Sweden for assisting in
| copyright infringement and were sentenced to serve one
| year in prison and pay a fine." Hosting the website where
| the issue is rampant is sufficient; no infringing
| material (drugs or movies) have to pass through your
| hands
|
| But I think we might be in agreement here since you said
| above that Ross had some responsibility. I also don't
| think it's the same as handing out the drugs yourself
| akudha wrote:
| Isn't scale a difference? How much damage can one guy do
| from a street corner VS the other guy operating a large
| marketplace where anyone can buy anything from anywhere?
| vasilipupkin wrote:
| huge difference. People can sell drugs on facebook
| marketplace but that doesn't mean that Zuckerberg is a
| drug dealer. The difference is you bear responsibility
| for what you do.
| lucb1e wrote:
| > People can sell drugs on facebook marketplace but that
| doesn't mean that Zuckerberg is a drug dealer
|
| In our legal system, they are in fact partially
| responsible if they don't disallow it and don't act upon
| reports. I'm not sure there is a difference whether it's
| physical or digital
| vasilipupkin wrote:
| fine, partially responsible is still a huge difference
| plorg wrote:
| One is the capital class, the other is not.
| carlob wrote:
| > Some of us see a major difference between selling heroin
| to someone, and building the marketplace from which these
| victim's freely bought drugs.
|
| I kinda do see your point, but I think I reach the opposite
| conclusion. If you are one person on a street corner it's
| one thing, if you enable a whole electronic marketplace you
| have a much larger effect.
|
| Then again we should decide whether it's a bad thing to
| sell drugs, but if it is I would see him as more culpable
| than a random street dealer.
| sbarre wrote:
| > Some of us see a major difference between selling heroin
| to someone, and building the marketplace from which these
| victim's freely bought drugs.
|
| Let's say I "build a network" of mules, planes, trucks,
| trafficking routes, and people who handle the distribution
| of drugs. I provide all the logistics to make the drugs go
| from supplier to end user.
|
| So, a marketplace of sorts... in the real world, not on the
| Internet.
|
| But, I don't actually sell the drugs to the end user on the
| street corner. That's someone else.
|
| But a cut of each of those sales rolls up to me, and
| without me, those sales aren't happening (sure they could
| happen via someone else, but this particular network exists
| because I built it and I run it)..
|
| I am what is referred to as a "drug lord".
|
| How am I not responsible for heroin getting into the hands
| of vulnerable addicts?
| immibis wrote:
| I don't see the difference between building a marketplace
| in which people freely buy drugs from you and building a
| marketplace in which people freely buy drugs from people
| who aren't you.
| JohnBooty wrote:
| Yeah, that's the part the legal system has a hard time
| with. We don't have definitions or suitable penalties for
| these things
|
| I mean, I'm not sure Pablo Escobar ever sold drugs or
| murdered anybody with his own hands. Metaphorically though
| there was a ton of blood on his hands. Charles Manson
| allegedly never killed anybody himself either. But we
| generally agree these guys were bad for society.
|
| I'm generally lasseiz-faire about drugs, and I generally
| put the onus of responsibility on the person choosing to
| ingest them.
|
| But there are some drugs, like opioids, that kind of
| transcend that. They cannot reasonably be safely used in a
| recreational manner, and are objectively a cancer to
| society.
| valval wrote:
| He was not the dealer.
| xyzzy9563 wrote:
| True. If he is culpable for other people dealing drugs on
| his platform, then so is Meta and Mark Zuckerberg for
| allowing WhatsApp to facilitate drug trades.
| riehwvfbk wrote:
| Nah, that treatment is reserved for Telegram. Zuck does
| MMA and isn't Russian so he's cool.
| Fnoord wrote:
| He does block certain tags 'by accident'.
| cheeseomlit wrote:
| "He killed children" is a pretty massive leap- he didn't sell
| heroin, he sold shrooms. Other vendors on the site sold
| heroin. And there is the matter of personal responsibility to
| consider- nobody forced those people to take heroin, and if
| they hadn't gotten it from the silk road they'd have gotten
| it elsewhere. The Sacklers are responsible for far more human
| misery in that regard, to an almost inconceivable degree, and
| they never have and never will see the inside of a cell
| perihelions wrote:
| - _" and if they hadn't gotten it from the silk road they'd
| have gotten it elsewhere"_
|
| That's very unlikely to be true in the case of the high-
| school kid who died buying a synthetic drug off the
| internet. They almost certainly did not have a dealer
| connection sophisticated enough to sell that. They almost
| certainly would have lived, if Silk Road were not available
| to them at that point in their life.
|
| You're advancing an argument about drug markets and
| personal autonomy in the general case, but it's a _very_
| poor fit to the concrete facts in the specific situation we
| 're looking at.
| cheeseomlit wrote:
| IMO these are circumstances too far removed from Ulbricht
| to hold him directly responsible. How many people bought
| drugs from the Silk Road, used them safely and
| responsibly, and in doing so avoided contact with violent
| criminals who they'd otherwise have to buy from,
| potentially saving them from the
| violence/misery/blackmail/overdoses that so commonly
| accompanies association with drug dealers IRL?
|
| Though I think this argument is tangential to the point
| on proportionality- Ross's sentence is an affront to
| justice when considered in the context of the Sackler's
| treatment
| greentxt wrote:
| "association with drug dealers IRL?"
|
| I'd rather get my milk from the corner store than some
| anonymous reseller on amazon. Real life drug dealers
| operate in markets too.
| cheeseomlit wrote:
| So would I, but the milk guy at the corner store probably
| isn't going to stab you over a matter of 20 dollars
| akudha wrote:
| _if they hadn 't gotten it from the silk road they'd have
| gotten it elsewhere_
|
| "If I don't do it, someone else will" - I suppose this is a
| convenient excuse that can be applied to anything unsavory,
| from the little guy selling shrooms at the street corner to
| nation states making nasty biological and chemical weapons?
|
| Not saying there isn't truth to it, just wondering how as a
| society we seem to accept that doing unsavory things is a
| necessity because others are doing it (or they will be
| doing it soon, so we better be the first)
| cheeseomlit wrote:
| I say that less to justify Ulbricht's conduct and moreso
| to hold people responsible for their own actions. "If I
| don't do it someone else will" is a pretty flimsy moral
| justification for anything. But accusing someone of
| murder because they facilitated a transaction between two
| other parties they never met is a bridge too far, and IMO
| ignores the responsibility and agency of those parties
| who willingly participated in the transaction
| ty6853 wrote:
| Wait until you hear how many people home swimming pool
| salesmen kill, and their victims are even younger children.
|
| Hell at least illegal drugs can be lifesaving. No one needs a
| home swimming pool.
| 15155 wrote:
| We should license them by the gallon: assault pools with
| scary slides will be non-transferable to new owners.
| greentxt wrote:
| Most pool owners aren't dead? Am i being trolled?
| wbobeirne wrote:
| Most drug users are not dead either.
| stickfigure wrote:
| This is so stupid. By this standard, automobile manufacturers
| kill 44,000 people in the US every year, including countless
| children. 3,500-4,500 people in the US are murdered by
| swimming pool contractors every year.
| busymom0 wrote:
| Other than the fact that he was not a drug dealer and other
| criticism others have already pointed out, Carnegie Mellon
| University's researchers did an analysis of Silk Road
| gathering data on a daily basis for eight months before it
| was shut down. Some of their findings include:
|
| > "'Weed' (i.e., marijuana) is the most popular item on Silk
| Road" (p.8)
|
| > "The quantities being sold are generally rather small
| (e.g., a few grams of marijuana)" (p.12)
|
| https://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/nicolasc/publications/TR-
| CMU...
|
| 2+ life sentences for a website which sold weed is just
| outrageous. Also note that since 2012, people have become a
| LOT softer on weed and even other drugs have been legalized
| since then. Trump himself has said that he has friends who
| have benefitted from weed.
| butlike wrote:
| Isn't the australian other story _LITERALLY_ the age-old "a
| friend of a friend's cousin jumped out of a window on LSD
| because they thought they could fly?"
|
| I'm surprised they didn't call in the witness who thought
| they were a glass of orange juice.
| maxlin wrote:
| Ridiculous? He was in prison for 10 years.
| I_am_tiberius wrote:
| A full pardon means the individual gets their legal record
| cleared (as if the crime never happened).
| snapcaster wrote:
| they don't get the 10 years back dude jesus christ
| ddtaylor wrote:
| Nobody will undo whatever has been done to him. I don't
| know all of the specifics but I have spoken on HN here
| about my incarceration at much much much lower level
| facilities.
|
| This man was at a USP and at other times other
| facilities. Those are places where even with the best
| intentions you are not expected to move in any capacity
| without serious safety concerns. We're talking "shower
| with your boots, a spotter and and a shank on you"
| environment without the slightest joke.
|
| It took a while likely because Ross is non-violent and
| smart, but eventually he was unable to stay in general
| population to some capacity. My understanding is he has
| spent significant time in solitary confinement or PC -
| effectively the same thing at these facilities, very
| small single cell rooms with a slot in them and the
| minimum required 1 hour of "yard time" per day, most of
| which has been suspended to some degree due to COVID and
| the slow response.
|
| The end result is this guy for sure has spent months to
| years in a very small cell, possibly without even seeing
| the sun. I didn't see the sun "for reals" for 6 months. A
| keyboard warrior can swoop in here and talk about how
| they cannot do this or how X time restrictions exist, but
| the reality is they just need to move you back to your
| cell on paper for a day and then back in or trick you
| into signing some kind of paperwork consenting.
|
| My heart goes out to both of them and I am reminded that
| I was the person that help mined the first 1FREEROSS
| Bitcoin vanity address to help crowd fund his defense.
| Lyn never gave up the slightest even during times that
| were fucking impossible to imagine.
| nso wrote:
| He tried to have someone's life violently taken away. He
| should have rotted in there.
| smeej wrote:
| The typical sentence for attempted murder-for-hire in the
| U.S. isn't a double life sentence plus 40 years without
| the possibility of parole.
| eddieroger wrote:
| he doesn't get back time but he does get back status as a
| cleared individual, which comes with things like the
| ability to vote and buy weapons.
| namirez wrote:
| I'm also wondering why a full pardon rather than a
| commutation.
| red-iron-pine wrote:
| Trump team wants his help running crypto shenanigans
| immibis wrote:
| This is the only explanation that makes sense to me.
| mardifoufs wrote:
| Seriously? What a weird suggestion, crypto now has
| nothing to do with crypto back when he was running Silk
| road, and there are tons of crypto bros to pick from if
| the Trump team wanted someone to help run "their crypto
| shenanigans". I don't think anyone involved in crypto
| back in 2013 could've seen how much of a mess it would
| become anyways
| HWR_14 wrote:
| > I don't think anyone involved in crypto back in 2013
| could've seen how much of a mess it would become anyways
|
| It seems that crypto then and now are pretty similar,
| mess wise.
| rtkwe wrote:
| Does he need help? They've already released two nonsense
| meme coins to bilk their followers and crypto people
| hoping to time the dump correctly.
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| That's transparently obvious if you read the press
| release: Trump analogizes his own personal treatment by
| the Justice Department with that of Ulbricht c.f.
| "weaponization of the justice system".
| ddtaylor wrote:
| I am curious if this matters for the purposes of the
| Bitcoin "damages". By today's exchange rates it could be
| an insane amount of money. If the "crime" is supposed to
| be wiped clean as if he never did it, then in theory it
| would mean give him back his property, etc. I don't know
| the specifics about that or if it would change with
| respect to clemency or commuting of a sentence.
| zacharyvoase wrote:
| That's not true actually. Like most things at law, it's
| more complicated than that.
| Thorrez wrote:
| Then commute his sentence to time served. Don't pardon him,
| which says he wasn't guilty to begin with.
| maxlin wrote:
| In his promise Trump said exactly "I will commute the
| sentence of ... "
|
| I don't know the differences but also from my perspective
| they don't seem to differ that much. Might as well be that
| Trump said "yeah and pardon that guy Ulbricht ... " while
| doing tons of other stuff wielding his new powers like he's
| doing now and his word was taken exact, given there's
| little difference
| HWR_14 wrote:
| A pardon is not used when you think the crime occurred but
| the punishment is too harsh. That's a commutation (which the
| president also has the power to do). It can replace the
| punishment with a lighter one or none at all.
|
| A pardon is used when you want to erase the criminal record
| on top of that.
| wonderwonder wrote:
| The issue is that so many of the officials that investigated
| him were corrupt. How can we be confident any of the evidence
| was real. He is obviously not innocent but when at least 2 of
| the investigators went to jail for crimes committed during this
| investigation it casts serious questions on the validity of the
| case as a whole.
|
| The police, DEA and Secret service have vast power they can use
| against the populace. If those same agents are committing
| crimes then it taints the entire investigation and prosecution.
| If a cop is found to have planted drugs on past arrestees,
| quite often a good portion of his other cases are thrown out as
| well as he has corrupted everything he touched.
|
| It likely doesn't rise to the legal doctrine of "fruit from a
| poisoned tree" but its in the ballpark.
|
| For the people downvoting me for some reason:
|
| A DEA agent involved in the investigation "was sentenced to 78
| months in prison for extortion, money laundering and
| obstruction of justice"
|
| A secret service agent involved in the investigation "was
| sentenced to 24 months in prison by U.S. District Judge Richard
| Seeborg in San Francisco following his earlier guilty plea to
| one count of money laundering."
| verteu wrote:
| A few moments' research reveal many reasons to think the
| evidence was real, eg:
|
| Ulbricht's right-hand-man Roger Thomas Clark, who was
| involved in one of the murder-for-hire conversations,
| admitted the conversation was real during his trial:
|
| "In his own remarks, Clark didn't comment on that murder-for-
| hire conversation--which he at one point claimed had been
| fabricated by Ulbricht but later conceded was real."
|
| https://www.wired.com/story/silk-road-variety-jones-
| sentenci...
| rco8786 wrote:
| > I'm pretty sure he won't do anything like this again.
|
| Famous last words, eh?
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| On the contrary, his not guilty plea, his ongoing insistence
| on his innocence, and libertarian true-believer tendencies
| etc. suggest the opposite.
| LincolnedList wrote:
| Next time he will double check the hitman is legit
| moogly wrote:
| What's even going on? Why is everyone treating this guy as some
| kind of political prisoner all of a sudden?
|
| I would've expected responses like this for Aung San Suu Kyi or
| Dawit Isaak or someone, but _this guy_? Really?
|
| Oh, I guess he is an e n t r e p r e n e u r... I get it now.
| andyjohnson0 wrote:
| Non-USian here. I'm interested in _why_.
|
| Given that Trump didn't pardon Ulbricht during his first
| presidential term, why now?
|
| What does Trump, who is notoriously transactional, get in return
| for this? Alternatively, what signal is he sending and to who?
| mardifoufs wrote:
| To be honest if Trump would've pardoned him in his first term
| it would've been way too short of a sentence for what he did.
| Though I hate the usual libertarian defense that makes him out
| to be an innocent martyr, I think that 10 years is somewhat
| enough for what he did. It would have been a normal sentence in
| a lot of countries outside the US.
| andyjohnson0 wrote:
| Thanks. I appreciate your view on the sentence, but I'm
| interested in why _Trump_ would issue a pardon.
|
| I'm unconvinced that Trump in 2020 thought Ulbricht's total
| sentence was okay, but four years later has apparently
| changed his mind. So who's the client here? It doesn't seem
| to be Ulbricht - is it libertarians in general? Why does
| Trump, as a second term president, actually care?
| mannerheim wrote:
| There are credibility issues if you make promises you don't
| follow up on, especially very public promises that are
| completely within your power to carry out; there are no
| limits on the presidential pardon power, barring that it
| only applies to federal crimes.
| grey-area wrote:
| For my friends, anything. For my enemies, the law.
| constantcrying wrote:
| Here is what the discussion looked like almost a decade ago:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9626985
|
| Very striking to see how the sentiment has drastically shifted,
| while the facts of the case did not. There is a really cultural
| shift visible in how this issue is seen on here.
| skylurk wrote:
| Seems kinda the same to me?
| aspect0545 wrote:
| Now people complain about the pardon, back then people
| complained about the sentence. People love to complain.
| jkestner wrote:
| I internalized a long time ago when doing customer service
| that people don't write you when they're happy.
| looofooo0 wrote:
| I am very happy with your informative comment. Thanks
| you, you can go on with your life now.
| diggan wrote:
| I know it seems almost impossible, but it might be that the
| group of people who complained about the sentence, may be a
| different group than the one who complain about the pardon.
| echoangle wrote:
| Aren't most comments in this thread supporting the pardon?
| hombre_fatal wrote:
| Pardons are inherently political. If your guy does it, it's
| good. If other guy does it, it's bad. And like most
| political topics, it's hard to have a earnest convo
| divorced from that simple dynamic.
| agos wrote:
| are they the same people?
| kllrnohj wrote:
| you know there's a pretty massive gap between "double
| lifetime sentence + 40 years w/ no chance of parole is too
| harsh" and "10 years w/ full pardon expunging the record is
| bad". A really, really fucking massive giant gap between
| those, in fact.
|
| But surely it's just that people love to complain, right?
| Can't possibly be that they thought something like 25yr was
| more reasonable?
| tim333 wrote:
| I guess people feel ten years in prison was adequate
| punishment.
| reactordev wrote:
| I don't disagree but I also don't agree with the life
| sentence. If he was charged properly with the crimes stated
| during his trial, maybe that would be warranted but he wasn't
| charged with it, only the website charges and conspiracy.
| Which some of them could apply to meta or craigslist if you
| got creative.
| immibis wrote:
| What I don't understand is why _Donald Trump_ , of all people,
| is being lenient on drug traffickers.
| cess11 wrote:
| Crypto commodity grifter gets known crypto commodity
| laundering expert out of jail.
| Nevermark wrote:
| There is a high correlation between his condemnation of drugs
| and characterizations of families, many poor and desperate,
| illegally crossing the border.
|
| Most illegal drugs by far go through regular border
| crossings, but he hasn't obsessed about them in the same way.
| diggan wrote:
| AFAIK, it wasn't done because he wants to be lenient on drug
| traffickers, but because the overall case of Ross Ulbricht is
| huge in certain political circles that he was pandering to
| during the presidential race, so seems he's "paying back" for
| those votes or something.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Which political circles is Ross Ulbricht a big thing?
| Seems... random.
| diggan wrote:
| https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-silk-
| road-f7eb0d48c1...
|
| > "Ross Ulbricht has been a libertarian political
| prisoner for more than a decade," said a statement from
| Libertarian National Committee Chair Angela McArdle. "I'm
| proud to say that saving his life has been one of our top
| priorities and that has finally paid off."
|
| Seems the US-version of libertarians is that group.
| acdha wrote:
| He's famously flexible based on whatever he thinks is
| advantageous now. This could be as simple as his claims to
| have been unfairly persecuted by law enforcement, it could be
| part of his wealth gained from cryptocurrency, or it could
| simply be that he thinks it'll make his opponents angry. Rich
| people often act on whims just to show that they have the
| power not to need to justify their actions.
| lupusreal wrote:
| It could be any of that, but it could also be as simple as
| libertarians requested it, he told them he would, and he
| didn't feel any reason to renege on that.
|
| (I do think there's probably an element of deliberate
| disrespect to federal law enforcement and the justice
| system, but that alone doesn't answer the question _why
| Ross specifically?_ )
| hoppp wrote:
| Basically he did it to get the vote of the right-
| libertarians. He made a promise to them.
|
| They idolize Ross for creating a drug market because they
| view it as freedom of speech.
| idiotsecant wrote:
| I don't think I buy this. He doesn't need to care about
| citizen votes anymore, and how big is the libertarian with
| a capital 'L' true believer block in Congress? Is there
| any? I'm not sure there was ever any political support for
| Ross Ulbricht.
|
| Has to be something else going on here, none of the
| explanations in this thread are hitting it on the head for
| me.
| hoppp wrote:
| He doesn't care anymore, but he kept his promise.
|
| There was the free Ross movement, they promised to vote
| for him if he pardons Ross and he did.
|
| He apparently tweeted about how much Ross's mum supported
| him during the campaign.
|
| But my source for all this info is reddit
| jpadkins wrote:
| he promised to free Ross at the libertarian national
| convention. promises made, promises kept.
| https://x.com/CroissantEth/status/1856551964156342303
| immibis wrote:
| He rarely keeps his promises, so he must still want
| something from libertarians.
| lupusreal wrote:
| If he wants to make the most of his next/last four years
| as president, then he needs to keep his supporters happy
| enough to vote in Republican congressmen in two years.
| Many of his supporters are the type to not vote at all
| because they think politicians are all two-faced liars,
| so it's important to keep them sufficiently moralized to
| vote in 2026.
| tasty_freeze wrote:
| It was a big cause that many libertarians cared about. I'm
| sure all the crypto people who have Trump's ear have been
| pushing him on this. There are also rumors that some state-
| level libertarian leaders promised not to promote their
| candidate if Trump promised to free Ulbrecht.
| cpursley wrote:
| Trump has never been a big drug warrior (against drug users).
| His social views are basically late 80's 1990s Democrat and
| not out of line with Clinton, etc.
| Projectiboga wrote:
| Clinton was a drug war supporter. He started the whole "Yea
| But it is Still Federally Illegal under Federal Law" in
| response to proposition 215 in California in late December
| of 1996.
| dekhn wrote:
| Trump is predictable. This was his side of a transaction
| designed to secure support from a voter contingent. His
| personal opinions don't matter much when he is making a deal.
| echoangle wrote:
| Can you explain the differences you see? People found the
| sentence too harsh at the time, too, it looks like.
| rescripting wrote:
| I'd be wary of drawing correlations like this. The people who
| commented on that thread are not going to be the same people
| commenting on this one. The topic isn't even the same; in the
| first thread the topic is his sentencing, and in this its his
| pardon.
|
| The attraction for people to post on Hacker News is mainly to
| complain, and so in the first you get complaints the sentencing
| is too harsh, and in this one you get complaints that he
| shouldn't have been pardoned. Its not necessarily a cultural
| shift, just an artifact of the types of discussions people have
| online.
| smeeger wrote:
| its crazy to look at this old thread and know that i almost
| certainly left a comment in it. although ive created and left
| behind hundreds of accounts in the meantime. i first got on
| HN feb 2015 when i read an article about "famed god" getting
| arrested in las vegas... his shirt had "hack the world"
| written on it and when i googled "hack the world famed god,"
| not knowing about the movie reference, it gave me a HN thread
| about the incident. and then HN became my home for almost ten
| years... i didnt have facebook or instagram or vine. i
| literally just spent all my time on HN. now that the
| displacement of programmers by AI has begun, somehow my
| interest has waned.
|
| at the time, the murder for hire accusations seemed
| legitimate and they still do today. hopefully they charge him
| with attempted murder if the statute of limitations isnt up.
| echoangle wrote:
| It was dismissed with prejudice, and can't be tried again:
|
| https://freeross.org/wp-
| content/uploads/2018/07/Doc_14_Dismi...
| smeeger wrote:
| ok. so for some reason the federal government indicted
| him on attempted murder in 2018(?) and for some reason
| the charge was dismissed... on what grounds was it
| dismissed? and i believe he could still be charged by the
| state of California or another state so hopefully we will
| see that
|
| edit: this section of reasons' article summarizes the
| situation nicely.
|
| "Now that Ulbricht has no chance of having his initial
| conviction and sentencing overturned or adjusted, it's
| likely the feds out of Maryland decided the indictment no
| longer was needed to make sure the government had some
| further means in their back pocket to punish Ulbricht for
| showing a safer, saner way around their insanely damaging
| drug war."
|
| the reason the charges were dismissed is similar to the
| reason he wasnt charged initially: because attempted
| murder charge was unnecessary from the prosecutors point
| if view. not because he is innocent of the charge. the
| article also notes that _torture_ was an element in those
| murders. this guy should not be walking free
| IIsi50MHz wrote:
| Doesn't "dismissed with prejudice" usually mean something
| like "the evidence presented for the charge is so lacking
| that the charge should never have been brought in the
| first place"?
| smeeger wrote:
| see my edit. i am a full supporter of letting adults have
| freedom to buy and use whatever drugs they want but i
| also think murdering and torturing people should not be
| allowed
| ArnoVW wrote:
| Not a lawyer but I believe that "with prejudice" means
| that the judge denies appeals (so yes generally it means
| the case is considered frivolous)
| lupusreal wrote:
| > _the reason the charges were dismissed is similar to
| the reason he wasnt charged initially: because attempted
| murder charge was unnecessary from the prosecutors point
| if view_
|
| But why were the charges dismissed _with prejudice_? That
| 's not the normal way to dismiss charges.
| smeeger wrote:
| from coingeek:
|
| U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland Robert Hur has
| filed a motion to dismiss the pending charges filed
| against Ross Ulbricht
|
| Last week, Hur sought "to dismiss with prejudice the
| indictment and superseding indictment" pending against
| Ulbricht
|
| in the motion that he filed, which is linked above, the
| reason he provides is that ross had already been
| sentenced and all his appeals had been denied. the motion
| never mentions lack of evidence or the corrupt
| investigators. this isnt mentioned in the freeross page
|
| https://freeross.org/false-allegations/
|
| the idea that chat logs were forged or that someone else
| was using his account are plausible but just barely. its
| much more plausible that a powerful drug lord ordered
| hits. its practically unavoidable in the course of
| running a large, high volume illegal drug operation. its
| routine. and the feds didnt need a murder charge to screw
| him, not even a little bit. i havent seen enough evidence
| to dismiss either camp but i think it should go to trial
| so the public can see all the evidence and the matter can
| be settled. there certainly is grounds for further
| investigation.
| dartos wrote:
| There's no statute of limitations on murder btw.
| smeeger wrote:
| or attempted murder?
| diggan wrote:
| > The attraction for people to post on Hacker News is mainly
| to complain
|
| I mean, I won't admit it openly but something like that yeah.
| It doesn't help either that the way to show you disagree is
| by sharing what you disagree with (which is great) but the
| way you show you agree is by upvoting (which others don't
| see).
|
| So one comment with three complaints in the replies but 100
| upvotes might look like "people wholeheartedly disagree with
| this person" but in reality, most readers actually agreed.
| Comments that are just "I agree" are kind of pointless, so I
| prefer how things are, but useful to not read too much into
| "X people said Y" on HN.
| ragnese wrote:
| Interesting observation. I agree and upvoted. ;)
|
| EDIT: I'm not being sarcastic, either, BTW. But, I do love
| the irony of writing a positive reply to your comment.
| infogulch wrote:
| It's interesting to consider how the tension in the design
| choices for HN's discussion board have affected the
| perceived & actual tenor of the platform:
| 1. Votes are not shown, but they affect the rank of posts.
| 2. Every post regardless of rank is shown beneath its
| parent, as in a tree. 3. Only highly downvoted
| posts are grayed out or hidden. 4. The community
| considers simple agreement to be low value noise.
|
| It doesn't seem like a stretch to guess HN's flavor from a
| handful of these facts...
| the__alchemist wrote:
| Making a distinction of whether individuals have changed
| perspective on the topic, and whether a community has are
| different levels of examination, and both may provide
| insights. In this case, _Hacker news_ is an emergent
| phenomenon of individuals; it 's OK to examine its evolution
| as whole.
| NoMoreNicksLeft wrote:
| I thought it was parallel construction from illegal NSA
| surveillance then, I think it is that now. Once you have
| the suspect in custody and his belongings examined it's
| "oh, see, we found this Stackoverflow post, that's how we
| knew".
|
| It's absurd. Even the non-Silk-Road charges look as if they
| were tacked on so that people like us weren't sympathetic
| about what were only non-violent drug trafficking charges
| ("look, he also hired a killer to murder an enemy!").
| lazystar wrote:
| that's what has me worried about the kohberger trial. the
| prosecution's delayed it for years; if he gets out, the
| techniques that caught him so quickly will potentially
| have done more harm than good.
| gspencley wrote:
| > and so in the first you get complaints the sentencing is
| too harsh, and in this one you get complaints that he
| shouldn't have been pardoned.
|
| You can also hold both positions simultaneously without
| contradiction. That is to say that you can think that his
| sentence was too harsh while at the same time being of the
| opinion that what he did was a crime (and should be a crime)
| and that he should remain convicted and un-pardoned, just
| with a different sentence than the one he was given.
| rescripting wrote:
| Agreed, which supports my point that these two threads
| aren't discussing the same thing and so can't be used as a
| measure of a culture shift.
| krisoft wrote:
| > Very striking to see how the sentiment has drastically
| shifted
|
| I'm not sure. I have two questions on that. Is there the
| appearance of a sentiment shift? I see plenty of people arguing
| both against and for incarcerating him in both this thread and
| that old one.
|
| And then if there is an appearance of a sentiment change (which
| I'm not sure about) is that evidence of a sentiment change or
| just selection bias? People who are okay with an outcome are
| much less likely to write a comment than people who are upset.
| That alone would change the bias of the comments.
| MisterTea wrote:
| I see the same arguments: too harsh, not harsh enough, he tried
| to have people murdered, etc.
| rhatsgf wrote:
| The facts are: Trump now does NTF and coinschemes himself and
| got talked into this by his new entourage. That is what most
| people here complain about.
|
| And he does this to distract from the fact that he will not
| stop the Ukraine war, not stop H1B etc.
|
| Many of the same people also complain about the Biden laptop
| and Biden's pardons.
| Projectiboga wrote:
| He just fired or transfered everyone government involved in
| supporting Ukraine in their defensive war.
| jonnycoder wrote:
| He just revoked Biden's Eo that strengthened h1b
| canjobear wrote:
| It seems like the same set of arguments to me.
| epr wrote:
| As someone who's been following this since the beginning, the
| most striking difference is the assumption that Ross was in
| fact the DPR ordering hits, which he repeatedly denied.
| Obviously, he could be lying, but that's the main question for
| me. Since people now assume he was the one and only DPR (I
| wonder if people didn't get the concept from The Princess
| Bride), they assume DPR chat logs where murder-for-hire
| occurred must have been him as well.
| meowface wrote:
| Both threads seem to share a similar sentiment: he should not
| serve much time for the drug marketplace but should for the
| murders-for-hire. There's just a difference in how many people
| believe those allegations and to what extent they should factor
| into the sentence given the charges were dropped despite the
| allegations almost certainly being true.
| efficax wrote:
| life in prison was too harsh, but a full pardon is too lenient.
| eschulz wrote:
| Perhaps, but I'm of the opinion that if a sentence is unjust,
| or if the means to convict violated the defendant's rights,
| then the defendant should walk. While this may seem
| unreasonable, it's the only way to check the state which has
| unlimited resources when it decides to go after somebody.
|
| I don't really have an opinion on this case because I'm not
| completely familiar with all the details. It's certainly
| going to be contentious.
| WaitWaitWha wrote:
| Just to be clear, a pardon does not _expunge_ or erase one 's
| criminal record.
|
| > life in prison was too harsh, but a full pardon is too
| lenient.
|
| I think you should compare it as: life in prison was too
| harsh, but 10 years is too lenient.
| larkost wrote:
| The idea of a pardon is exactly that: it erases the record
| of the crime/conviction.
|
| I think you are thinking of a commutation. That ends the
| punishment while not absolving the person of the crime.
|
| So the January 6th criminals who got pardons no longer have
| a criminal record (on this count at least). The 14 people
| who were only granted commutations are still counted as
| felons.
| WaitWaitWha wrote:
| I must have read it incorrectly:
|
| https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/olc/opinions/
| 200...
|
| > As these opinions confirm, a presidential pardon
| removes, either conditionally or unconditionally, the
| punitive legal consequences that would otherwise flow
| from conviction for the pardoned offense. A pardon,
| however, does not erase the conviction as a historical
| fact or justify the fiction that the pardoned individual
| did not engage in criminal conduct. _A pardon, therefore,
| does not by its own force expunge judicial or
| administrative records of the conviction or underlying
| offense._
| whimsicalism wrote:
| yes, HN is becoming increasingly hyperpartisan and not even in
| a very interesting way
| knodi wrote:
| Yes, by cultural shift if you mean, moral bankruptcy.
| robswc wrote:
| To suggest there hasn't been a cultural shift is insane, imo.
|
| I wouldn't argue that both sides have gotten more extreme,
| rather the political spectrum curve has flattened. There is
| much less rational discourse in general.
|
| Reddit is a great example. Even 10 years ago you could have
| mostly rational discussions. Now its no better than Facebook. I
| saw a post today about people being upset the government is
| giving OpenAI half a trillion dollars. They didn't even realize
| it wasn't government money. They didn't want to be corrected.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| the internet has a lot more people on it, it is much less
| self-selecting than in the past. even this website is a lot
| less self-selecting than in the past
| eric_cc wrote:
| Reddit started off libertarian in its early days and has since
| gone radically far left. And similarly, HN has slowly drifted
| further and further left.
|
| %-wise there are just fewer libertarian-minded people here
| these days.
| runarberg wrote:
| This debate about IQ could have been had yesterday, and I'm
| pretty sure I saw a pretty similar debate a few months ago on
| this site. Not much has changed there at least.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9629493
| namirez wrote:
| I don't get it. Was every non-violent drug offender in federal
| prisons pardoned or only this guy? If so, why?
| kundi wrote:
| Is Donald also refunding everyone's deposits on Silkroad?
| jerlygits wrote:
| If I wanted to know this, I'd visit Reddit.
| subjectsigma wrote:
| The amount of doublethink, false-flagging, misinformation, and
| "looking the other way" in this thread is just absolutely
| disgusting.
| m3kw9 wrote:
| More people should get these "pardons" instead of the parole
| process based on the similar criteria on how they are pardoned.
| ubermonkey wrote:
| I'm just assuming any pardons issued since Monday are probably to
| bad people.
| sys32768 wrote:
| I wish this thread were discussing how in America you can get
| drunk in a bar, step into a 4,000 motorized bullet, kill someone
| or an entire family, and get a slap on the wrist.
| major505 wrote:
| Didnt he paid a hitman to kill a dude, and ended up being an fbi
| agent ?
| charlieok wrote:
| Ross, you can set up identities on decentralized social platforms
| now!
|
| https://rossulbricht.medium.com/decentralize-social-media-cc...
| stego-tech wrote:
| I'm not necessarily going to comment on his behaviors directly,
| as everyone else has already stated that in part or in whole. My
| grievance, my perspective, is that it's yet another white man
| getting a slap on the wrist for wrongdoing while doing nothing to
| correct any of the underlying problems or pardon others who
| engaged in similar or lesser behaviors.
|
| The war on drugs has always been farcical, deliberately
| engineered to target minority groups who were opposing power
| dynamics at the time. It's why - despite popular opinion to the
| contrary - cannabis remains broadly illegal at the Federal level
| and enforced globally through a web of treaties. It's always been
| about creating the means of entrapment for those inconvenient to
| power.
|
| Pardoning Ross smacks of a gift to cryptobros to earn their
| loyalty to the current powers that be, rather than an
| acknowledgement of a past mistake. It is nakedly political,
| pardoning a white man from an otherwise good background while
| others languish in prison on far less serious charges or
| convictions. Were any of the drug dealers on his black market
| similarly pardoned? Were any of his consumers? Of course not,
| because Ross was a Capitalist making profit in an untapped
| market, and the others were individuals who were not.
|
| The entire thing is nauseating, and is enough to wash my hands of
| all involved were the need to dismantle this farce of a war not
| so grave.
| jashper wrote:
| This is the best news I've heard in a while
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| I feel torn about this because it seems there was good evidence
| for attempted murder- and I cannot understand why they never
| tried him for that (seemingly larger) crime. However, for the
| crime he was actually found guilty of, the sentence was unfair
| and unreasonable. It seems they unethically sentenced him for
| crimes he was not even ever charged with.
|
| I'd also argue he almost certainly saved a huge number of lives
| with Silk Road: the ability to view eBay style feedback and
| chemical test results makes buying illegal drugs far safer than
| buying them on the street. On Silk Road people could buy from a
| reputable seller with a long history of providing unadulterated
| products, and could view testimonials from other buyers who had
| sent the products for chemical analysis.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Not going to comment on the murder part as that's well
| discussed here.
|
| I would take issue with assuming that it was net positive with
| ratings. Given the anonymous nature handling bots spamming fake
| reviews would be even harder to catch here, and you ultimately
| don't know who ended up addicted/hooked/DUI's etc from the easy
| availability this provided. I'm not sure the total effects
| could ever be qualified, but it's not like unadulterated drugs
| are automatically safe. Just look at how many lives pharma-
| grade opioids ruined, even though they were "safe".
|
| That's also not to mention guns and all kinds of other
| dangerous & illegal parts of it.
|
| I do not understand why he pardoned this guy when he's
| supposedly anti-drug and anti-cartel.
| mtoner23 wrote:
| i think this points to a bunch of weird crypto people are
| actually in charge of a lot of this administration
| grayhatter wrote:
| > I do not understand why he pardoned this guy when he's
| supposedly anti-drug and anti-cartel.
|
| why do you believe he's anti-drug or anti-cartel?
| azinman2 wrote:
| Well, he just did an executive order to label cartels as
| foreign terrorists, and has spoken at length about drugs in
| many of his speeches. Not sure why you think such a
| statement is controversial.
| hedora wrote:
| He made sure the Sacklers could keep their fortunes and
| continue to sell opioids.
| grayhatter wrote:
| Because I don't think he has a honestly held belief about
| anything. I think he's happy to do whatever is most
| expedient for his interests.
|
| He wants to be known as a guy who trades favors, so here,
| he ignored all the previous fear mongering about [scary
| thing], and is repaying the favor to the "libertarian
| party" who wanted this, and voted for him.
|
| Almost everything he _says_ is just for show, fits his
| pattern of behavior better than, "he believes [thing he
| said]" does.
|
| I just read another article about how the person who says
| we need to follow "law and order" and "respect police"
| just pardoned everybody convicted of violence against
| police... again, trading favors instead of consistently
| following something he said.
| nozzlegear wrote:
| I'm no Trump fan and won't go to bat for him, but being
| anti-drug and anti-cartel is literally one of his schticks.
| grayhatter wrote:
| I replied with more details in a sister thread but
| calling it a schtick is more accurate that I think you
| meant. It's exclusively a shtick; he doesn't actually
| believe it, or care about it.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| > I would take issue with assuming that it was net positive
| with ratings.
|
| I know this is probably as minority view, but I think if
| adults consent to buying and using any drug, that should be
| both fully legal, and their right and responsibility- any
| negative consequences are 100% their own fault, not the
| person who sold them. It's probably true that making drugs
| easier to buy made more people buy them, but I was only
| considering the ill effects of fraudulently adulterated
| products. Do the math differently if you don't see it this
| way.
|
| I don't know how Silk Road was designed, and have never
| actually used it or anything like it- but I imagine it would
| be possible to eliminate fraudulent reviews with proper
| design, and they may have done so. eBay, for example, is
| almost free of fraudulent reviews because posting a single
| review is very expensive- you'd need to sell an item to
| yourself for full price, and then pay eBay their full (rather
| large) cut to post a single fraudulent review.
|
| As a buyer, you should be able to take a single high effort
| review that contains something like mass spec chemical
| analysis results, and further confirm that the reviewer
| themselves has a credible history of making purchases and
| reviews broadly across a lot of different sellers. An
| impossibly expensive to fake signal. This could also be done
| automatically by the platform- by making the more credible
| reviews display first.
|
| > I do not understand why he pardoned this guy when he's
| supposedly anti-drug and anti-cartel.
|
| I explained this in another comment:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42787217
|
| Trump is not an idealist- he will promise anything to anyone
| if it gets power and attention. Previously, he had attempted
| a political career as a leftist, and switched to the right
| because it was getting more traction.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Re-consenting: this is a different argument than saying
| more lives were saved because the reviews would remove
| adulterated products. Again, just look at opioid addiction
| for very clear evidence of the opposite effect.
|
| It is very clear from what you've said that you haven't
| used it :) I have browsed it when it was active and I was
| very pro tor. You're making a lot of assumptions that
| simply don't hold for silk road.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| > Again, just look at opioid addiction for very clear
| evidence of the opposite effect.
|
| I was playing devil's advocate, but agree there is more
| culpability to a seller if the drug overwhelms your
| ability to make the choice in the first place- however a
| lot of very illegal drugs do not do this. More so if
| you're using emotionally manipulative ads and selling
| methods as the alcohol and pharma industry do.
| azinman2 wrote:
| No doubt people were buying weed and hallucinogens on
| Silk Road, but there was A LOT of opioids, Xanax,
| cocaine, meth, and other highly addictive drugs that
| change people's brain chemistry for the worse.
| x0n wrote:
| silk road was on the dark web, a place that is oriented
| 100% around anonymity. This precludes any sort of
| "elimination of fraudulent reviews" since there's no
| reasonable way to build any sort of chain of trust.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| I explained several ideas to eliminate fraudulent reviews
| in my comment, that you didn't address. The main thing is
| to make a review coupled with a purchase that involves a
| large cut to the platform, so each review is very
| expensive. Secondly, don't take reviewers themselves
| seriously unless they've also made a large overall number
| of purchases to a diversity of sellers- making becoming a
| credible reviewer also expensive.
| san1t1 wrote:
| The dark web is based around network anonymity.
|
| You can find, and log into, your facebook account, should
| you have one, here, where I'm sure you would be quite
| identifiable.
|
| facebookwkhpilnemxj7asaniu7vnjjbiltxjqhye3mhbshg7kx5tfyd
| dot onion
| markhahn wrote:
| anonymity doesn't preclude chain-of-trust (really
| "reputation"). after all, anonymity only means "can't be
| linked to real-life identity".
| barbazoo wrote:
| > I know this is probably as minority view, but I think if
| adults consent to buying and using any drug, that should be
| both fully legal, and their right and responsibility- any
| negative consequences are 100% their own fault, not the
| person who sold them. It's probably true that making drugs
| easier to buy made more people buy them, but I was only
| considering the ill effects of fraudulently adulterated
| products. Do the math differently if you don't see it this
| way.
|
| I'd agree with you if the people that used these drugs did
| so rationally. That's not the case mostly though from what
| I've heard. Trauma is often the root cause and that's out
| of many people's control. From then on it's ub to society
| to help them.
|
| If a high performing exec wants to buy drugs to function
| better, sure maybe that's ok but I doubt that's the
| majority of people.
| trey-jones wrote:
| I proclaimed nearly this exact opinion in the jury box
| after being summoned between 15 and 20 years ago. They
| didn't pick me for trial, which was the intended effect. I
| really _did_ believe it at the time. Nowadays, I just think
| it 's way more complicated and there are no simple or
| blanket answers.
| ErrantX wrote:
| > Trump is not an idealist- he will promise anything to
| anyone if it gets power and attention. Previously, he had
| attempted a political career as a leftist, and switched to
| the right because it was getting more traction.
|
| This is a critical point. His explicitly goal is to be an
| autocrat, there is no other ideology other than what works.
|
| That's why I think the only real bit of him is the one that
| admires Putin. That is who he wants to be.
|
| It's why his moves seem so random.
| hedora wrote:
| Historically, many anti-drug / anti-cartel leaders are
| actually members of a rival cartel, and want to use law
| enforcement to fight their wars for them.
|
| The Mexican government has a long history of this. The LAPD's
| (well documented for over 50 years) do the same thing.
|
| Trump is a convicted felon with lots of ties to organized
| crime. Nothing about him pardoning members of some criminal
| organizations but not others is surprising.
|
| In related news, he signed an executive order forcing
| prosecutors to seek the death penalty when police are killed,
| and in the same day pardoned 132 of his supporters that were
| convicted of assaulting police officers during an event where
| officers were killed.
| azinman2 wrote:
| You think Trump is involved with drug selling organized
| crime, and this guy somehow was on "his side"?
| reverendsteveii wrote:
| >he signed an executive order forcing prosecutors to seek
| the death penalty when police are killed
|
| He also pardoned a drug dealing cop killer at the end of
| his last term. Said cop killer has since been arrested for
| attempting to strangle his wife to death.
|
| https://www.wesh.com/article/cop-killer-pardoned-by-trump-
| co...
| motorest wrote:
| > Historically, many anti-drug / anti-cartel leaders are
| actually members of a rival cartel, and want to use law
| enforcement to fight their wars for them.
|
| For reference, Rudy Giuliani was lauded as the anti-
| organized mayor that brought down the Italian mob in New
| York, but ultimately was flagged as actually being an upper
| echelon of Russian organized crime who worked to establish
| it by eliminating competiton.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudy_Giuliani
| Maxatar wrote:
| The Wikipedia article does not flag Giuliani as being a
| member of Russian organized crime, but someone who
| Giuliani's law firm represents, an individual by the name
| of Dmytry Firtash.
|
| Furthermore the timeline for this is over a decade after
| Giuliani was mayor of New York.
| jprete wrote:
| The link doesn't say that. The phrase you use is a
| reference in the Wikipedia article to the DOJ's
| characterization of Dmytry Firtash, "a Ukrainian oligarch
| who is prominent in the natural gas sector", not
| Giuliani.
| rmah wrote:
| Well, now you probably understand that Trump is not really
| anti-drug/anti-cartel. Nor do I think he's pro-drug/pro-
| cartel. I think he doesn't actually care except in how those
| issues affect his political career and public profile. Many
| of Trump's more ... let's call them "random" seeming
| statements and actions make much more sense if you look at
| them through the lens of "he doesn't actually care one way or
| the other".
| kmeisthax wrote:
| Trump is pro-Trump. That's it.
| markhahn wrote:
| Well, also pro-publicity and pro-distraction (firehose).
| Of course those are ultimately self-benefiting too.
| diggan wrote:
| > That's also not to mention guns and all kinds of other
| dangerous & illegal parts of it.
|
| I think it isn't mentioned because Silk Road didn't actually
| facilitate any selling/buying of weapons or any items "whose
| purpose was to "harm or defraud."" https://en.wikipedia.org/w
| iki/Silk_Road_(marketplace)#Produc...
|
| > I do not understand why he pardoned this guy when he's
| supposedly anti-drug and anti-cartel.
|
| He's the candidate that was preferred by Christians, yet
| probably he was the least Christian-like candidate. Just
| today/yesterday he criticized a Bishop for values that are
| clearly Christian, people seem to swallow it. I'm pretty sure
| trying to add logic/reasoning to the choices he makes is a
| lost cause.
| zombiwoof wrote:
| Facebook doesn't make the comments that will kill people
| banku_brougham wrote:
| Probably the first social media genocide was organized on
| Facebook, the Rohingya genocide.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_genocide
| diggan wrote:
| Similarly, the first social media revolutions were also
| organized on Facebook (and Twitter):
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_Spring
| toasterlovin wrote:
| "Facebook is a communication tool for friends and family
| that is sometimes used for illegal activity" is
| categorically different than "Silk Road is a tool created
| to facilitate illegal activity."
| azinman2 wrote:
| I saw guns on it when I joined years ago.
| stickfigure wrote:
| There's a reason Wikipedia doesn't accept "I saw it" as a
| citation.
|
| Wikipedia isn't perfect, but if I had to put odds on
| Wikipedia vs "rando on internet forum who claims to
| remember something from years ago", I'm going with
| Wikipedia 10 times out of 10.
| azinman2 wrote:
| As you wish. I have a lived experienced with Silk Road. I
| am not random for myself.
| diggan wrote:
| Well, I didn't. Stalemate?
| MarkPNeyer wrote:
| There are many Christians who would happily to get in long
| arguments over which values are "clearly Christian."
|
| If you really want to understand, it's not hard. It just
| requires making an honest effort to try, without judging.
| And that's what stops people who don't understand it. Try
| chatting with an LLM sometime about what it looks like from
| their perspective. Knowing it's not a human makes it easier
| to avoid getting upset.
| diggan wrote:
| > If you really want to understand, it's not hard. It
| just requires making an honest effort to try, without
| judging
|
| I was brought up Christian, sealed my religiousness with
| a confirmation when I was 15 (which required studies and
| field trips), and been around religious people for a lot
| of my younger life. Oh, and my mom worked at a church
| where I grew up, spent a bunch of time in the church, for
| better or worse.
|
| I'd like to think that the values of compassion and mercy
| are two of the most fundamental Christian values, at
| least from the protestants I spent a lot of time with. It
| seems to me, that the American bastardization of
| Catholicism, might not actually be very Christian if
| those two values aren't include in there.
|
| I'm not religious anymore, but if I learned anything from
| (truly) religious folks, then it would be that you should
| treat your fellow humans as just that, fellow humans.
| napkin wrote:
| (SWIM's experience with Silk Road):
|
| For LSD there existed a third-party forum, where a group of
| (supposedly) vendor-neutral, unaffiliated individuals would
| purchase samples from vendors, send them to private or state-
| sponsored labs around the world and publish/discuss the
| results (often with online links to lab results).
|
| Yes, of course vendors could have also attempted to
| infiltrate these forums. But as enough of these functions
| were provided by/for the community, the profit incentive
| tilts. If you ran a vendor account on the Silk Road, your
| effort was better spent maintaining/improving good infosec
| and mail/postal security. Some techniques they developed were
| quite innovative, the professionalism was evident.
|
| Ross's story is fascinating and tragic- as everything that's
| said for and against his character is generally true. Silk
| Road was built on naive yet admirable ideals. It fostered a
| special community, some of which really did reflect those
| ideals. He got in over his head, and really did try to have
| someone killed.
|
| Though, the details on that latter point are a bit more
| complicated- authorities had infiltrated Ross's inner circle-
| the motive and the 'hitman' himself were fictional. Ross
| still took the bait though, which is pretty damning. Until
| that point, they weren't sure they had a sufficient case on
| him.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| Is that why they never prosecuted the attempted murder? It
| sounds like entrapment.
|
| That's the point people don't seem to be getting about
| anonymous reviews- if the review is more costly than the
| value it provides the seller, they won't do it, and it's
| fairly easy to make that the case. A separate enthusiast
| forum where the reviews are from people with a long history
| of high effort engagement is a good example of that. That's
| basically the idea behind crypto as well- making false
| transactions is more expensive than the value it could
| return.
| rtkwe wrote:
| Entrapment requires some coercive/persuasive force by the
| government to push you to commit the crime, the
| government is allowed to setup entirely fake scenarios
| and let you choose to do a crime.
| Extropy_ wrote:
| The worst part is that it doesn't even appear to be the
| case that the government set up the scenario in which
| Ross bought murders
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| The above person claimed "the motive was fictional" which
| sounds coercive?
| rtkwe wrote:
| Depends a lot on the exact setup. He still chose to try
| to hire a hitman allegedly. The standard is fairly high,
| "that man is informing on you" isn't entrapment, without
| knowing a lot of details it's hard to know and it's
| rarely actually entrapment.
| johndhi wrote:
| The truth is no one knows why they didn't bring those
| charges, or the real details behind the evidence or what
| happened in those interactions. It's pretty much shrouded
| beneath things like: -DOJ released some details and
| screenshots, but -the FBI agents who were involved in
| investigating this topic were like arrested for stealing
| bitcoin from silk road or something, so their work is
| hard to find credible -general lack of clarity as to the
| identity of the person running silk road at the time this
| happened
| reverendsteveii wrote:
| >It sounds like entrapment
|
| The law is murky and seems to hinge on the court's
| opinion on whether the person who committed the crime
| would have had they not been influenced by an officer.
| The police being the ones to start the conversation
| doesn't rise to the level of entrapment. The police
| deceiving you into wanting to commit a crime _may_ rise
| to the level of entrapment if the courts find you wouldn
| 't have done it otherwise (the example I found that
| illustrated this best was "Hey there's a warehouse full
| of valuables let's go rob it" isn't entrapment but "Hey
| this guy said he's gonna kill your kid you need to kill
| him first" probably does absent any reason to believe you
| would have killed him without being deceived first). My
| guess would be that the grey area, plus the relative ease
| with which they were able to secure a life sentence for
| the other charges, is why the murder-for-hire charges
| never went to trial.
| deaddodo wrote:
| My understanding is that they did not charge him with the
| attempted murder because it was later found that both
| parties/witnesses (other than Ross) later turned out to
| be corrupt and financially benefitting from the situation
| (keeping his murder payment for themselves) and the Silk
| Road in general.
|
| It made the situation...messy, to say the least.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Built on naive yet admirable ideals? Special community? It
| was the world's largest drug market, selling things like
| fentanyl in large quantities. What admirable ideal is
| this?!
| napkin wrote:
| You really cannot stop illicit drug use. A hard approach
| to prohibition not only makes people less safe, it's a
| massive waste of spending. On just a pragmatic level-
| Fentanyl and analogues are by weight hundreds of times
| more potent than morphine. How do you even effectively
| stop that from getting across borders? Silk Road provided
| a brief counterpoint, and ideally wouldn't have had to
| exist. The ideals it represented were more broad- for
| drug regulations/spending that focus on safety, and
| respect individual rights / bodily autonomy (ofc limited
| to not harming or endangering others).
| singleshot_ wrote:
| > How do you even effectively stop that from getting
| across borders?
|
| One idea that springs to mind: if a person starts up an
| anonymous, online marketplace for that activity, imprison
| him forever.
| napkin wrote:
| The Silk Road represented a tiny fraction of illicit drug
| revenue per country. Some report-skimming would indicate
| less than a single digit. A series of more profit-
| oriented darknet markets replaced it. I don't know what
| the costs were associated with its takedown but they must
| have been enormous. I doubt it became large enough for
| cartels to care much, but the effect of shutting it down
| is certainly good for them.
|
| I don't personally hold the opinion that Ross Ulbricht
| shouldn't have been pursued according to the law- or
| support his pardon- or even that darknet drug markets
| should exist! I'm also not really interested in crypto.
|
| However I strongly believe that a completely different
| approach to drug laws & regulations is necessary to make
| people safer and reduce crime.
| 6footgeek wrote:
| Just him though? Just the first guy and not all of the
| numerous people that started clones after, were tried and
| all received much less punishment?
| potato3732842 wrote:
| Separating the drugs from the adjacent crime and problems
| that come with an illicit industry by finding a way to
| make it run kinda like normal business seems pretty
| admirable to me.
| armandososa wrote:
| he is just anti-mexico.
| hinkley wrote:
| Something anyone with an addict in their life needs to know:
|
| While substances can efficiently help someone destroy their
| life, keeping them away from drugs won't stop them from
| destroying their lives. There's something already broken in
| these people that they need to fix before it's too late.
|
| There are perfectly legal alternatives that can be just as
| effective with a little more effort. Putting heroin in your
| arm is just quicker than downing a fifth of vodka, or chasing
| dopamine at the dog track.
| sweeter wrote:
| Its purely transactional. The Libertarians gave him their
| endorsement and one of the things they wanted in return was
| this pardon and deregulation.
| azinman2 wrote:
| The libertarian party or a bunch of crypto bros? I don't
| get why "libertarians" would care about this one guy?
| Beijinger wrote:
| It was a promise to his libertarian voters....
| dutchbookmaker wrote:
| I can only go off what I read in American Kingpin but from
| that book, to pardon Ulbricht is absolutely insane.
|
| Not to mention lets compare what Ulbricht did to say Snowden?
|
| Are you kidding me?
|
| It is like we live in some idiot version of the Twilight
| Zone.
| johnwheeler wrote:
| The guy is a crook.
| garyfirestorm wrote:
| They can try now! Because he is pardoned for the existing
| convictions not for future convictions
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| That is interesting. I'd suspect he could possibly be found
| guilty of attempted murder, and have the sentence reduced or
| eliminated by arguing that his previous sentence unjustly
| assumed guilt for this as well, and factored it into the
| sentence he already served.
|
| If I remember correctly, there were comments from both the
| prosecution and judge that would basically prove that point-
| and they allowed evidence related to those other crimes in
| the trial. If they could prove this misconduct, they may even
| be able to argue double jeopardy.
| sebzim4500 wrote:
| Good luck, when the main investigators have since gone to
| prison for crimes related to this investigation.
| hedora wrote:
| Unless Trump screwed up the paper work, he'll have been
| pardoned for past crimes, which includes the murder.
| nozzlegear wrote:
| And even if he did screw up the paper work, he could just
| write another pardon anyway. He can write infinite pardons
| (for federal charges, anyway).
| Pxtl wrote:
| > I'd also argue he almost certainly saved a huge number of
| lives with Silk Road: the ability to view eBay style feedback
| and chemical test results makes buying illegal drugs far safer
| than buying them on the street.
|
| So will the Trump admin be making any moves on legalization or
| safe supply? Especially since between Musk and Kennedy's
| admitted drug use, the white house pharmacy report, and the
| allegations about the Trump family itself, it seems obvious
| that the White House appreciates the usefulness of illegal
| stimulants?
|
| Or is this another case of "in-groups whom the law protects but
| does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does
| not protect"?
| smeeger wrote:
| the benefit wasnt really unique to silk road or ross. it was
| just a very convoluted, roundabout demonstration of how safe
| drug use can be when its done in the right environment.
| legalization would be even safer...
| trey-jones wrote:
| Safer for buyers and users I guess. Based on being able to
| smell marijuana coming from so many car windows just walking
| around town, I'm not sure it would be safer for the public.
| I'm not anti-legalization by the way - I think it's similar
| to gambling: a mixed bag.
| doctorpangloss wrote:
| You are feeling the same thing that some people felt who wanted
| OJ Simpson exonerated.
| no-dr-onboard wrote:
| How so?
| doctorpangloss wrote:
| Okay, another comparison would be, everyone who wants Luigi
| Mangione exonerated also is feeling what some people felt
| when they wanted OJ Simpson to be exonerated. Do you see
| now?
| zarzavat wrote:
| Luigi is a symptom of an overly _inactive_ justice
| system, if you don 't prosecute crimes then some people
| take the law into their own hands (as a matter of fact).
| Preventing vigilantism is why having a working justice
| system is important to a functioning society.
|
| DPR is according to his defenders a symptom of an overly
| _active_ justice system prosecuting crimes that shouldn
| 't be prosecuted. Though I'm not sure I personally agree
| with that.
|
| OJ was just a crook.
| jdminhbg wrote:
| The Luigi some people have constructed in their minds is
| a symptom of an overly inactive justice system. The Luigi
| of real life is the symptom of a man suffering a
| psychotic break.
| doctorpangloss wrote:
| See, you are one of the people who feels about Luigi
| Mangione what some people felt about OJ Simpson. You're
| getting it. You can read about how some people talked
| about OJ Simpson's supposed innocence, it is exactly the
| same energy.
| some_random wrote:
| I don't see how those are remotely comparable, the OJ
| people believed he didn't do it and was set up by the
| racist LAPD while the Luigi people think that what he did
| was good actually. I guess the Ross Ulbricht people are
| more like the latter but they still seem pretty
| dissimilar.
| karlzt wrote:
| As for the murder part Christina Warren knows best:
|
| _The murder for hire bit was always the most bullshit of all
| the charges. Not only were the fbi agents that were part of
| that later jailed for their own actions related to the case
| (including theft and hiding /deleting evidence), it was never
| real and no one was ever in danger. _
|
| https://bsky.app/profile/filmgirl.bsky.social/post/3lgcck6i6...
| verteu wrote:
| > it was never real and no one was ever in danger.
|
| Because one of the hitmen he hired was a scammer, and another
| was an FBI agent. Still clearly a crime to hire them for
| murder.
|
| Ulbricht's right-hand-man Roger Thomas Clark, who was
| involved in one of the murder-for-hire conversations,
| admitted the conversation was real during his trial:
|
| "In his own remarks, Clark didn't comment on that murder-for-
| hire conversation--which he at one point claimed had been
| fabricated by Ulbricht but later conceded was real."
| j-krieger wrote:
| Wow! There have been _multiple_ (astoundingly so) arrests of
| agents who were present in the Silk Road case. As far as I
| can see:
|
| 1 DEA agent for extortion, money laundering and fraud. 1
| Secret Service Agent for money laundering. 2 Key advisors in
| the case.
| billiam wrote:
| I just can't fathom the lack of self-awareness of people who
| championed Ross Ulbricht's cause, seemingly because he looks
| like them, codes like them, and sat in the same public library
| they frequent or became associated with a techno-libertarian
| identity. Hundreds of drug and gun dealers are sentenced every
| week, some certainly unjustly. Where is the outrage for them?
| doctorpangloss wrote:
| Ha ha, it turns out that there is affirmative action, for
| libertarians!
| stickfigure wrote:
| Those people that championed Ulbricht's cause are for the
| most part also the people championing the cause of drug
| dealers and other victims of New Prohibition. If you
| genuinely care about this cause, you might ask yourself
| whether alienating other supporters is the best approach.
|
| If you're just looking for someone to feel superior about,
| find another forum.
| 486683864 wrote:
| There was literally no evidence of an attempted murder. Just an
| empty and unsubstantiated accusation.
| Beijinger wrote:
| "for the crime he was actually found guilty of, the sentence
| was unfair and unreasonable."
|
| Was it? Based on current law in the US?
|
| While I do not know English Common law well, in many
| jurisdictions, every part of the drug dealing is drug dealing.
| Even if you never touch a drug and just provide payment
| processing services, transport or whatever, as long as you are
| aware of it and profit from it, it is drug dealing. So every
| transaction on Silk Road would also be his crime. And there
| were many, many many. On the other hand, for non-first degree
| murder, in several jurisdictions his sentence would have maxed
| out at 15 years. First time offender, he could have walked
| after 10.
| some_random wrote:
| The cybersecurity podcast Risky Business interviewed an FBI
| agent who was deeply involved, I'd highly recommend listening
| to it if you want that perspective. If I remember correctly,
| the agents who were investigating the murder for hire stuff
| were later found to have been stealing some of the bitcoin they
| were confiscating and the prosecutors fro the Ulbricht case
| decided they didn't need to bring up those charges to get a
| conviction (which they obviously didn't).
| josefritzishere wrote:
| I know values and priorities change over time. that gets
| reflected in the party platforms. But ee are in a weird place
| politically... where Republicans are now soft on crime? It's
| weird.
| subpixel wrote:
| I will take this opportunity to reflect on the fact that I spent
| some time considering a purchase of certain controlled substances
| on Silk Road, but failed to recognize that my own purchasing
| impulse was a pretty good indicator that the currency involved
| might be worth a casual investment.
| impalallama wrote:
| This is the same president that wants to give the death penalty
| to Drug Dealers but I guess that's fine so long as you use
| crypto.
| entropyneur wrote:
| I don't think he should have done any time for the drug-related
| charges. And 10 years is more than enough for a murder-for-hire
| in which nobody got hurt. So this seems... just.
| knodi wrote:
| Curious what your thinking behind "he should have done any time
| for the drug-related charges"?
| entropyneur wrote:
| I believe the responsibility for the harm caused by addictive
| drugs lies on the user to such great extent, that whatever
| remains for the people who facilitate the sale is not enough
| for it to be a criminal offence. It's still immoral the same
| way it's immoral to operate a gambling shop.
|
| But in Ulbricht's case I'd say even this part is mitigated by
| the fact that facilitating the trade of dangerous drugs was a
| side effect of running a useful service for responsible drug
| users.
| someothherguyy wrote:
| > It's still immoral the same way it's immoral to operate a
| gambling shop.
|
| What if they sell things that aren't what they say they are
| and the user dies or is hurt?
| entropyneur wrote:
| That's totally the responsibility of the seller, not the
| platform. Especially so, if the platform takes steps to
| prevent such incidents.
| someothherguyy wrote:
| Is it though? You might want to debate a moral
| philosopher over me, but I don't think you should make
| broad statements like that as if it was established
| truth.
| anonu wrote:
| So is SBF next? FTX customers were made whole and he didn't try
| to kill anyone or facilitate the narcotics trade.
| cleandreams wrote:
| I think this pardon just reflects Trump's transactional politics.
| Ulbricht has sympathizers in high places now because crypto is
| all over this administration.
|
| In the long run letting political influence trump (no pun
| intended) the criminal justice system is a very bad thing.
|
| By world standards our criminal justice system is a strength of
| the country. A pity if we lose that.
| CuteMemeCoin wrote:
| Ulbricht was unfairly sentenced.
|
| All of the death threat allegations were never proven.
|
| He did not deserve to rot in prison for life for creating a
| website.
| Gothmog69 wrote:
| And yet the Ross Ulbricht case was a huge injustice. Biden
| should have done it.
| idunnoman1222 wrote:
| Hacker news absolutely loved this 1700 comments which makes me
| want to list all hacker news threads ordered by most comments
| because these are usually the best ones
| AcerbicZero wrote:
| Based.
| lulznews wrote:
| Trump haters in absolute shambles here.
| snakeyjake wrote:
| Libertarians are the cheapest fucking buys of all time.
|
| They will sell their souls to a man who would grind them into a
| paste and sell that paste as a protein snack to his cultists-- in
| exchange for a hollow, symbolic win that either impacts them in
| no way whatsoever or maliciously hurts people they don't like.
|
| At least with other political groups you have to, you know, BRIBE
| them.
|
| Libertarians are so used to receiving absolutely nothing that
| they will mistake the scent of a steak for a full meal.
| mannerheim wrote:
| That hollow, symbolic win could have been given to them by
| anyone other than Trump. If nobody else thinks a group's
| interests are worth listening to, don't be surprised when they
| start chasing after the tiniest morsels.
| jjallen wrote:
| So if you start a website and facilitate thousands of drug deals
| and get lots of people to ask the president to pardon you, and
| you're white, you can get a pardon. But for everyone else you
| can't. Even if you're in prison for possession of drugs for more
| than ten years.
|
| Also if you try to overthrow the government you get pardoned
| which I would have guessed approaches treason.
|
| These are pardonable offenses and conditions.
| aerostable_slug wrote:
| There's no reason to bring race into this. Trump has pardoned
| PoC convicted of drug offenses, e.g. Weldon Angelos.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weldon_Angelos_case
| jjallen wrote:
| He's white and that can't be left out of it. Let's not
| pretend race doesn't matter in any of these things. It is a
| fact that he's white and I'm guessing ALL of the Jan 6th
| people are too.
| aerostable_slug wrote:
| When Trump pardoned Christopher 2X, was he simply confused
| about his race? There are plenty of people Trump pardoned
| that weren't white:
|
| https://www.justice.gov/pardon/pardons-granted-president-
| don...
|
| This kind of divisive nonsense is purposeless and doesn't
| productively add to the conversation.
| bmelton wrote:
| I felt the same when Biden pardoned the judge who put kids in
| jail for pay, or the nursing home CEO who took money away from
| the elderly to buy yachts, but I'd decided that pardons were
| effectively for sale (tho likely by barter) -- seeing Biden
| close out his term and Trump open his term with pardons has
| been kind to those who'd like to compare and contrast, but they
| both mostly just appear to be paying down debts.
| bastardoperator wrote:
| We're just letting sex traffickers of children off the hook now?
| Gross. Putting my head in the sand for the next 3 years and 11
| months.
| throwaway314155 wrote:
| ...her?
| 0xbadcafebee wrote:
| Gentle reminder that we have 1,459 more days of this shit. We
| really don't have to upvote every crazy fucking thing this guy
| does, or HN will be nothing but that for the next four years.
| WesternWind wrote:
| A full pardon should mean that he can get all his bitcoin back,
| as I understand it.
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