Fruit of the poisoned tree? or whatever the criminal defense lawyers say on Law and Order.

A quick dictionary check doesn't support your apparent belief that smears must be untrue.

OED (thanks, Ben!):

c. A slanderous or defamatory remark; an attempt to defame by slander. colloq. (orig. U.S.).

Here is an online definition without a requirement of falsehood:

"3. To stain or attempt to destroy the reputation of; vilify: political enemies who smeared his name."

Look down into the noun section of that entry. Better yet, consult your connotation subroutine.

Bruno's been very good at the aggrieved victim act, the fucker. Spitser clearly mishandled his power in "travelgate," and Bruno was able, by doing a lot of shouting and holding interminable hearings, to keep all of the focus on Spitser's more flashy wrong-doing. The classic reporters' fallacy (of course the Republicans are schmucks, and the Democrats are so much more interestingly like me that their foibles are so much more interesting! and worth endless coverage!) intersected with everyone's distaste for the minutae of state politics, so, sorry Spitser.

Let's contrast two things: a prosecution where someone gets caught red-handed because there's an ongoing investigation based on some kind of prior or incidental trigger. And then there's the prosecution where someone says, "Get the fucker, whatever it takes" and the fucker is caught doing something.

Number 2 is a bad thing, as LB notes. And really, for me, it actually does take away from whatever it is that the person gets caught doing, whether it's perjury in front of Ken Starr or Seligman maybe kind of being involved in influence-peddling, sort of...or Bruno doing something. The wrong of saying, "Take every governmental instrument I have at my command and get the fucker" means that whatever you find, while not worthless in material terms, is spoiled meat.

I agree this gets really messy when we're talking about municipal, state or federal officials where there is every reason in the world to think they're dirty. I don't know how I feel about the current federal campaign to get Vince Fumo in Philly, for example. The guy seems as dirty as a mudpit to me, but on the other hand, they're getting him for stuff that's roughly like getting Capone on tax evasion. Bruno is clearly a dirty character (though I don't think quite Fumo-level), but the problem is that a goodly proportion of the NY state legislature, Democrat and Republican, is similarly dirty, and if the chief executive is going to hunt for one of their scalps, he ought to have been hunting for a whole collection. If he could spare the time while hunting for other game entirely, which he obviously couldn't.

5 is absolutely correct.

Then add to it from later in the article: "The effort to tarnish Mr. Bruno". Yes, yes, I know you can tarnish someone with something they actually did.

The judgment here is particularly egregious given that a lot of people who did not follow that story very closely (like me), are more prone to be reading something about Spitzer right now. In fact, I skimmed the article this morning and absolutely assumed there was no real wrongdoing on Bruno's part, although now with a closer read I see where that is kinda maybe implied.

LB is right, more shoddy journalism that leaves an unwarranted impression on the reader.

Oh, Bruno will probably be the last one standing at the end of all of this. I just hope he moves from Majority Leader to Minority.

5

Sure smear has a connotation of falsehood. This is because smears are often false. So what? Rape has a connotation of being forcible but it doesn't have to be and it is not incorrect to use rape to refer to non-forcible rape. The use of smear in the headline is correct English usage even if the attacks on Bruno were merely unfair rather than false.

And then there's the prosecution where someone says, "Get the fucker, whatever it takes" and the fucker is caught doing something.

Number 2 is a bad thing, as LB notes

bad news for "The Untouchables".

7: I'd argue that there are a couple of categories: there's a prosecution where the target really doesn't seem to have done anything illegal or even untoward, like the Seligman thing; there's a prosecution where the target did do something illegal, but not something they would have been likely to get in any trouble for without a politically motivated prosecution, like Clinton's perjury, and mmmaybe Spitzer's screwing prostitutes, depending on how that story played out; and then there's a politically motivated investigation/prosecution that uncovers real wrongdoing, like what Spitzer seems to have done to Bruno, or what happened to Spitzer if you believe that the US Attorney's office would have reacted the same way if they'd caught Joe Bruno doing the same stuff.

All three categories are wrong from the perspective of the prosecution, but the target of a politically motivated prosection who actually got caught engaging in significant wrongdoing really doesn't get to make that fact go away the way Bruno has.

I would concur with LB's 12 and add another variant: the case where the target's wrongdoing is an "open secret" in certain circles. In the most extreme case, the wrondoer may even selectively flaunt the misbehavior, because the very aura impunity lends him additional power. I would put Jack Abramoff, Dan Rostenkowski, and Arch Moore, Jr. in that category.

In these cases, an excess of zeal on the part of prosecutors can be excusable, even commendable.

Speaking from a standpoint of total ignorance of the facts of the Bruno case, I wouldn't rule out the possibility that Bruno's abuse of state aircraft fell into the open secret category.

12 if you believe that the US Attorney's office would have reacted the same way if they'd caught Joe Bruno doing the same stuff.

So, to what extent do people feel this is actually in question? From the perspective of the US Attorney's office, if they receive word that Suspicious Activity Reports have been filed about a major politician's financial transactions, are they really at liberty to ignore that information? If it came to light that they had ignored that information, say, in a subsequent investigation occasioned by more obvious wrongdoing on the part of the subject, wouldn't that pretty much be the end of their government careers? Would you take that risk for Eliot Spitzer?

To the larger point, as much as I dislike politicians, I despise prosecutors and cops even more. As much as it is probably true to say "they're all guilty of something" and all that matters is the probity of the investigators, seems to play right into the cop ideology that defends warrantless searches, probable-causeless stops and all sorts of other threats to liberty.

I guess if I weren't an anarchist, this would present more of a paradox.

So, to what extent do people feel this is actually in question?

Me.

I don't actually have an opinion on whether they were necessarily obligated to follow up on the SARs; it seems perfectly reasonable that they would be -- on the other hand, if moving a couple of thousand dollars around triggers one, I'll bet they see a shitload of SARs relating to elected officials, and I'm not sure that following all of them up would be practical. But I don't know enough about the odds to have a strong belief one way or the other. (And this assumes that the conduct did spontaneously generate SARs, rather than his identity being a factor.)

Where the political looking decisionmaking came in, IMO, is at the moment they realized "Oh, Spitzer isn't engaging in political corruption or in the sort of financial crime the structuring laws were aimed at, he was hiring hookers." At that point, a normal use of prosecutorial resources would have been to say: "Is our job doing vice prosecutions? Nah, we're a public corruption unit. Maybe we should send this to the relevant local prosecutor and see if they give a shit, but it's a waste of public resources for us to follow this up." And no, that would not have been a career-ending decision if it came out, it would have been business as usual.

One important point is that the Rove-Ashcroft-Gonzales Justice Department has to be assumed guilty until proven innocent.

Spitzer's been seriously if not fatally damaged, so no prosecution is really necessary any more.

Gross abuse of police powers by politicians seems to be pretty common in New York at the state level too. That's been an accusation against Spitzer, Giuliani, and a female U.S. Senate candidate whose name I forget (who was forced to drop out.

Forgotten history: before the Iraq War, Scott Ritter fell suddenly silent because news of a two-year-old arrest for a sexual crime was leaked (cybersex-related, IIRC.) The legal case had been sealed and was not prosecuted, and I think that it was only a misdemeanor. There's reason to believe that the (illegal) leak came from a judge with Republican ties.

Googling doesn't find the complete story, but there's this.

I may add, though, that the case was not prosecuted in 2001 when it came up, or in 2003 either. It popped up in the news long enough to knock Ritter out, and then disappeared again. If it wasn't a frameup it must have been an extraordinarily weak case.

Here's my old story: Scott Ritter.

Prosecutorial discretion is a necessarily corrupt and arbitrary enterprise because it relies on the judgment and integrity of human beings, and human beings suck.

I'm a fan of Spitzer's, but he changed the rules on those Wall Street guys, and it's pretty understandable why they're pissed off.

Whatever the actual narrative that led to Spitzer's downfall, it's unambiguous that politics was involved at various stages. It's unclear to me that politics shouldn't be involved in cases like this. Whatever exactly happened to Spitzer doesn't seem comparable to what happened to Seligman or Bill Clinton.

Defendants are always unhappy with prosecutors, I've heard tell. I haven't followed Spitzer's Wall Street cases closely enough to know if he did change the rules, but since I'd like to break the stranglehold of finance on the US and the world, I thought he was doing a good thing.

Even before this arrest, a lot of Democrats disliked Spitzer, and since his arrest he's gotten very little sympathy. Personalities, procedural liberalism (hi, Bob!), and the colonization of the Democratic Party by finance, including at the personal-friend level, presumably are the reasons.

Looking at it from the point of view of attempts to roll back the Reagan revolution and deregulation, Spitzer's destruction strikes me as a very bad thing, and given the relative slightness of his offenses (for which he probably won't even be prosecuted), I find it difficult not to think of this as a political hit.

And why was #9 the only one whose name was leaked? That does not look like "prosecutorial discretion" to me.

I disagree with 15, man. I think if there's one thing that people in law enforcement, especially those at high levels, have in common, is that they want to take people out. I don't think the public corruption unit or the prosecutor's office or whoever is soooo partisan (but maybe I'm wrong about this) that they would be willing to just shrug at another politician's hooker-hiring transactions (and really, this was probably just an opportunity to catch Spitzer on something people in the know probably knew he was doing for a while).

I think the idea of pursuing and catching red-handed a prominent public official essentially in the act of fucking someone for a lot of money, and revealing it to the world, would be too sexy a prospect to just go "eh." That's what these guys do, that's why they're in the business they're in, that's what gets them off.

I agree with you that it might not have been a career-ending thing if it had been Bruno (indeed, it might have been, oh, Republicans as usual), but otherwise, I think the love of the scandal is too delightful to the people holding the strings not to come out with guns blazing.

I mean, it's a public corruption unit. They exist to take out public officials. Come on.

I, of course, completely agree with the point in the post.

I mean, it's a public corruption unit. They exist to take out public officials. Come on.

I don't think Spitzer was done, etc. But I have to admit that I have trouble squaring "they exist to take out public officials" with the sense that obviously they therefore wouldn't do a political hit. In the paperback novels, at least, the head of anti-political corruption was the Soviet citizen for other citizens to worry about.

Thanks for the reminder, John. I remember that at the time - you just had to cite Scott Ritter, and some wingnut would be bleating "He's a paedophile you know!" (Pointing out that his sexual misdeeds, if any, were clearly entirely unrelated to his knowledge about Iraq, got one nowhere.) It was an awfully conveniently timed leak, and knowing what we know now about the DoJ, does look awfully suspicious.

In the Ritter sex-crime case the judge (and presumed leaker) was Thomas Spargo, who was also involved in the Florida 2000 riot that stopped the vote count, and who was removed in office in 2006 for taking bribes.

The Ritter story is news to me!

That's been an accusation against Spitzer, Giuliani, and a female U.S. Senate candidate whose name I forget

that would be the one who hired Bernie Kerik to wiretap her husband.

Find a nonsensical and partisan defense of Pirro here.

Yeah, I always think "Perrino", who's also cute and crooked.

15: I think the political decision-making has to come in earlier, at the level of however it works to decide that politician X's activities are suspicious enough to warrant snooping around their transactions. To the extent there's a problem with the Spitzer case, the problem is with the snooping, not the decision to go after him once they'd found he was breaking the law.

I know you consider prostitution a serious problem, but I can't help but think this is getting lumped in with legal extramarital affairs, because I can't think of any other crimes where I'd want the legitimate public corruption office to say, well, we weren't looking for this, so we'll look the other way. ("Yes, he did pay to have the body removed, but the wire says he did so out of his own trust fund, so we'll ignore it.")

The release of Spitzer's name, and not the names of #1-#8, is also suspicious.

It seems doubtful that Spitzer will be prosecuted, as I understand.

The release of Spitzer's name, and not the names of #1-#8

They released at least one other name, didn't they?

And today's bullshit p. 1 headline: "Obama's Test: Can a Liberal Be a Unifier?"

31: What are you complaining about? In galleys it was: "Obama's Global Test: Can a Liberal Be a Unifier? As If"

Conservatives are the natural unifiers: for example, 80% of the country now is unified in thinking this administration is a fuckup.

That well known Bolshevik organ, the FT, is now running this on its op-ed page.

34: I'm impressed that they designated McCain as a neocon. Not that it matters much; you'd have thought that if there was one group that could be forced out of power with an eye toward accountability, it would have been the neocons. But no. Onward and upward, evermore, it appears.

I have trouble squaring "they exist to take out public officials" with the sense that obviously they therefore wouldn't do a political hit.

I think LeBlanc's point isn't that they wouldn't do a political hit; it was that they wouldn't *refrain* from hitting someone for merely political reasons.

I'm not sure I agree with her; I can see them refraining from revealing (say) someone hiring hookers in a time when hiring hookers were seen more as "boys will be boys" and especially if the official in question was a buddy of the prosecution's office. But maybe I just think that because I've seen too many movies.

; it was that they wouldn't *refrain* from hitting someone for merely political reasons.

I think that's wrong, too, though I assume that depends on the structure of the department and the strength of the people at the bottom and middle rungs.

The trouble with the theory that public corruption units never pass up opportunities to nail public officials is that probably 90% of public officials do something improper - if only because the rules can be arcane (think of the Al Gore campaign fundraising thing - this phone is OK for fund-raising; that phone is indelibly corrupting) and we all do shit like use the office copier for home projects. It's all prosecutorial discretion.

The primary limiting factor is budgets - these guys are pretty resource-constrained, so they have to decide. This is why LB's 15.2 makes sense to me - not because these guys are so high-minded, but because they've got bigger (or rather, more corrupt) fish to fry. Time spent wiring whoever it was to confirm that Spitzer was, in fact, committing a misdemeanor*, is time spent not following up the police lieutenant who just bought a house in the Hamptons. Spitzer may be a bigger fish, but the cop is the one who's mobbed up or running drugs on the side. You have to be pretty partisan, or have otherwise fucked-up priorities, to focus on Spitzer instead.

* Right? Isn't being a john a misdemeanor? Can't be a felony.

we all do shit like use the office copier for home projects. It's all prosecutorial discretion.

Agreed, but good luck getting people who vote Republican to admit it.

This, in the NYT, is ridiculous. A Times reporter gets beat up for legally taking pictures, but he's okay with it:

I'm not inclined to press charges. While my assailant's actions were frightening, they resulted in part from what he interpreted as provocation: that is, my taking pictures after he had explicitly warned me not to. He did not take my wallet, cash or briefcase; something he could easily have done while I was on the ground. Nor do I recall him using much more force than was needed to wrest the camera from me. He didn't kick me gratuitously when I was down. He did what he threatened to do, but no more.

Stuff like this is what turns people against the Times and makes them vote Republican. We don't want people with the mentality of this photographer in charge of our national security.

Well, I can certainly see why you'd vote Republican then, what with all the Times reporters running for president.

But Gaijin is otherwise right about the gratuitous gutlessness going on there. Yes, focus on the suits, dude, but don't let some guy just randomly beat you down without pressing charges. That's messed u p.

I guess you were not capable of realizing that it is possible for Times reporters and certain people who are not Times reporters to share a set of views on whether, when, and to what extent it is appropriate to punish those who carry out violent attacks against us. I'll try not to confuse you in the future.

and makes them vote Republican

Awesome non sequitur, dude. You might notice that this very partisan Democratic crowd absolutely fucking hates the NYT and has had two posts in the last week about what a terrible paper it is. What makes people vote Republican has nothing to do with the Times, and everything to do with being either amoral or stupid, so far as I can tell.

Huh. Which Democratic politicians have failed to press charges against someone who beat them up? I did not know about this.

And lots of conservatives hate Rush Limbaugh, but he's still seen as representative of conservatives in the public eye.

That would be because Rush actively identifies himself as a conservative and his views as representative of conservatism, as do a lot of his listeners. He's also seen as representative of Republicans because he and his listeners actively deride Democrats and "liberalism" in the same breath, and with the same simplistic sense of binaries.

I didn't see the reporter in that piece doing those things. But maybe that's just because I'm confused.

But the NYT also identifies itself as liberal and commonly criticizes conservative or Republican positions, B, so your argument, such as it was, fails. Believe it or not, it is possible for a newspaper to have an editorial slant without meeting your own specific criteria for demonstrating that slant in each and every article and blog post by every one of its reporters.

I can't believe you are really as ignorant and limited in your thinking as your recent comments would suggest, which means you are jerking me around. Sorry, not interested.

There's also some distinction to be made between Rush Limbaugh and a guy nobody had ever heard of who writes on NYC zoning and construction issues, but it feels ridiculous to have to point that out.

to be made between the political relevance of Rush Limbaugh and a guy

it is possible for a newspaper to have an editorial slant without meeting your own specific criteria for demonstrating that slant in each and every article and blog post by every one of its reporters.

That would be exactly my point.

gratuitous gutlessness

Granted. And because the commercial real estate reporter for the Times is a wuss, I'm now outraged by Chappaquiddick.

Granted. And because the commercial real estate reporter for the Times is a wuss, I'm now outraged by Chappaquiddick.

Oh, come on. You habitually jump on any instance of salacious wrongdoing by some church guy somewhere as more damning evidence of how the entire Republican party is a steaming pile of suck, and you won't let me have some fun with a Times reporter acting like a stereotypical soft-on-crime liberal wuss? I accuse you of basic unfairness, sir.

But, see, Apo's *funny* when he does it. And again, the Republican party really *does* make a big fat deal out of representing real values, as opposed to the values of all those homo liberals, which is really offensive. Whereas I'm not aware that the Democratic party makes a big fat deal out of being pacifist or non-violent, and even if it did, pacifism and non-violence are not actually really offensive.

#44: What makes people vote Republican has nothing to do with the Times, and everything to do with being either amoral or stupid, so far as I can tell.

Also, some of the greedy bastards might just want to save money.

Then again, you probably count that as amoral.

If you pay more attention to your wallet than you do to things like torture, homophobia, sexism, warmongering, hideously regressive and deficit-inducing tax schemes, and rampant favoring of huge multinational corporations over actual Americans, then I actually count that as *im*moral, actually.

Because I'm a pussy and a liberal.

Wow, sometimes I start out in these situations feeling sympathetic for Gaijin, but he almost never fails to cure me of it. You really do have to be a mindless fucking jerk to want to hang on to your Dubya tax cuts while your country's economy crumbles around you. Honestly.

as more damning evidence of how the entire Republican party is a steaming pile of suck

Mmm, no. As more damning evidence that vocal church guys are steaming piles of suck. That the Republican Party never stops prostrating themselves at those guys' feet is whole other issue.

But yeah, if you weigh lifting the Social Security tax cap more heavily than torture, gay bashing, limitless federal debt, and senseless carnage, then yeah, you're amoral at best. If you base your vote on your personal assessment of the manliness of the NYT's real estate reporter, then you're stupid.

You really do have to be a mindless fucking jerk to want to hang on to your Dubya tax cuts while your country's economy crumbles around you. Honestly.

So, how much extra money do you donate to the government on your tax return? (I already assume you don't claim any deductions.) Come on, nobody's stopping you from giving more. Every bit counts!

But yeah, if you weigh lifting the Social Security tax cap more heavily than torture, gay bashing, limitless federal debt, and senseless carnage, then yeah, you're amoral at best.

I did not know that under Clinton or Obama, we would suddenly eliminate, or even make a dent in, the national debt. (I guess I should have assumed they would repeal the National Pro Gay-Bashing Act that Bush rammed through Congress, though.) As for torture, remember that extraordinary rendition as a policy was first instituted under Bill Clinton. Finally, we can have differing opinions on the best way to eliminate or minimize senseless carnage. Which, in a way, is what my initial comment was all about.

So, how much extra money do you donate to the government on your tax return?

I live in Canada, dude.

And I generally vote Liberal, because if you don't pay taxes, you don't get services.

As for torture, remember that extraordinary rendition as a policy was first instituted under Bill Clinton.

But used much less promiscuously, with (IIRC) better formal safeguards, and--I think we can take this as read--mo' better informal safeguards. The only issue with Republicans of late is sorting them into the "Incompetent" bin or the "Corrupt" bin.

And you actually tried "it's-all-Clinton's-fault." In the eighth fucking year of the Bush Administration. That's pathetic, Gaijin. That's gratuitous gutlessness.

And of course, McCain, as a former P.O.W., is a known opponent of harsh interrogation techniques. So you can vote for him with your torture conscience clean. (Or you can keep attacking a straw man; your choice.)

61.1: Yeah, the fact that liberals are just as sensitive to the concept of "free riders" as conservative, and are not therefore willing to pay higher taxes than everyone else is required to--especially because even stupid liberals who don't care about or understand money are smart enough to realize that, say, an extra $10k, even, isn't going to make much difference, whereas, oh, say $12 billion just might.

Plus what DS is saying.

65: Yeah, he's really laid it all on the line to oppose torture. What a maverick.

So you can vote for him with your torture conscience clean.

Unless continuing an unnecessary war of aggression indefinitely bothers your conscience.

I did not know that under Clinton or Obama, we would suddenly eliminate, or even make a dent in, the national debt.

If only there had been a recent Dem president who balanced the budget...

Well, we weren't talking about the estate tax, but you could easily cut $12 billion from the budget instead of taxing transfers of wealth among family members. But the truth is, even an extra 12 large won't make much difference. Our national debt is currently $9.4 trillion. $12 billion represents 0.13 (that's point-one-three, not thirteen) percent of that.

And you're assuming, unwisely I think, that the government won't end up just pissing that $12 billion away on something else. All things considered, I'd rather keep my money. (Especially since I don't even live in America, but that's another story.)

Seriously GB, in what universe are we that you expect us to look at the last three decades and vote Republican on fiscal issues?

12 billion would make more of a difference than the clearly (merely) foolish "why don't you pay more on your taxes, then, if you're so worried about the economy, huh, huh?" question.

And *you're* assuming that heirs won't just piss their inheritances away, and that your father's money is "yours", and that we could easily cut $12 billion while, what, continuing the war that you seem to think is such an important demonstration of our being unwilling to be wimpy NYT real estate reporters.

And *you're* assuming that heirs won't just piss their inheritances away, and that your father's money is "yours"

People have a right to piss away their money if they so choose. And of course, my father's money is his, not mine. But if he gives it to me, it becomes mine. What it isn't, however, is the government's.

The bottom line here is that the NYT reporter is a giant wuss.

But if he gives it to me, it becomes mine.

And gets taxed as income!

The bottom line here is that the NYT reporter is a giant wuss.

Comity!

God, we argue about tiny shit in this country. We act as though it's the estate tax that's keeping us from balancing the budget; as though partial-birth abortions accounted for more than a statistical blip; as though foreign aid & welfare account for more than pocket change. It's like the biggest mote-beam problem ever.

GB's right that the estate tax amounts for peanuts. (He's utterly out of his mind to think that the Republican party, whatever the personal merits of McCain, deserves to manage a mini-mart after the past eight years.) Sure, we could use that $12 billion for lots of good things, but we can save what is it now, nearly $3 trillion? by not starting stupid wars.

I don't mean to be totally contrarian here, but I'd also rather not hand the government $12 billion so they can decide they can afford to invade Iran.

If necessary, I'll step up to defend the estate tax on philosophical and moral grounds, even if its "only" worth $12 billion. For instance:

you could easily cut $12 billion from the budget instead of taxing transfers of wealth among family members

What $12 billion in government services are less important than allowing rich people to give $12 billion to other rich people?

Gaijin Biker is why a lot of us hate people younger than about 40. His comments are of a vintage that turned rancid ten years ago or more. Fortunately he wrote my response for me:

I can't believe you are really as ignorant and limited in your thinking as your recent comments would suggest, which means you are jerking me around. Sorry, not interested.

GB, why do you bother? Almost no one here is interested in your dated libertarian bullshit, we've all heard it so many times that we're sick of it, we're so biased against it that we wouldn't agree with you even if you happened to be right once, you're not really smart enough to win many arguments, and you're not trollish enough to make anyone lose their temper. What's in it for you?

You seem to want to exist in some imaginary world nicer than this one, where your small grumbles about NYT reporters and taxes are actually taken seriously, and where the semen-stained dress is a big news item.

Update: McCain has caved on the torture issue. Old news to us, but you're in a different time zone.

I'm in favor of increasing the estate tax until it is no longer insignificant -- up to about $100 billion.

75: but I'd also rather not hand the government $12 billion so they can decide they can afford to invade Iran.

Sure let's give it back to the segment of society who most benefit from the pursuit of stupid wars and who are most motivated to use it to expend enormous (now enormouser) resources to elect the crooks and liars who continue to do so.

One must admit that attitudes like GB's and too-clever idiots like Ted Frank are clearly those that predominate in the waning days of a better nation. Civil society is for losers, winners go out and fuck the prom queen take what's theirs.

76: I think it only can be defended on moral and philosophical grounds. Defending it on economic grounds really strikes me like insisting that the seventy-five cents I spent on a Diet Coke yesterday is what's really keeping me from financial security, or the woman on B's site back when she was first looking at homes who was insisting that it was not low property values in the Midwest or her husband's six-figure salary that enabled her to own her own home, but that she bravely only allowed her children to rent movies from the library where it was free.

79: The argument in favor of the estate tax can't be that it taxes private citizens whose political views we don't like.

Yes it can, Cala.

80: The argument in favor of the estate tax can't be that it taxes private citizens whose political views we don't like.

No, but it can be that the steady accumulation of inter-generational wealth invariably leads to growing wealth inequalities within society and a class of very powerful people who are vested in service to capital rather than service to life and liberty of their fellow citizens.

People have a right to piss away their money if they so choose. And of course, my father's money is his, not mine. But if he gives it to me, it becomes mine.

It's yours if you can keep it. But you can't, which is sort of the problem for you. There isn't a One True Instantiation of property rights.

The argument in favor of the estate tax can't be that it taxes private citizens whose political views we don't like.

I actually don't think Stormcrow's point depends on them having political views we don't like.

82: Right, but that's not what "Sure let's give it back to the segment of society who most benefit from the pursuit of stupid wars" means. I'm sure there are rich liberals, too. I'm sure quite a lot of the people affected by the estate tax won't do anything more scandalous than ensure their kids can go to college. The problem's the growing inequality and the political blindness and instability that leads to.

The wealthy don't really have to do much to benefit from stupid wars.

The estate tax only effects the very, very rich, Cala. It theoretically kicks in at about $2 million, and there are lots of dodges with foundations, gifts, etc. to protect more money than that.

The very rich tend conservative, if I'm not mistaken, but Republicans zero in on the exceptions in order to make the Democrats seem like the rich people's party. The innoculation strategy.

Are we really arguing that the average estate tax person is a war profiteer? I mean, it's not like I'm ever going to have to worry about the estate tax, kinda the opposite acutally, but surely it's not out of the question for some of the Unfoggedtariat.

Anyone standing to inherit more than $2 million dollars may very well own stock in companies that benefit from war. This include the obvious members of the military industrial complex, but it's hard to argue that, say, media companies, for instance, don't make big bucks from wars.

mean, it's not like I'm ever going to have to worry about the estate tax, kinda the opposite acutally

The estate tax is going to have to worry about Cala!

They're bloodsucking leeches who make soup from the tender bodies of small children, Cala. I don't know why you stick up for them.

Also, I should point out, GB, seriously? The most important issue in this election is the estate tax? That's somewhere beyond fiddling and into manufacturing the violins.

90: I think she's waiting for the fuller argument found in your forthcoming "A Modest Proposal re: Wealth Inequality."

Children do make excellent stock. Young marrow.

We don't want people with the mentality of this photographer in charge of our national security.

Ah, but this is exactly the sort we want - someone who measures the problem, ponders his own time and resources, and looks to find out what is causing the problem he wants to solve.

You'd rather the guy lash out blindly? Sue the bystanders? Punch out a random person on the street to take out his frustrations? That approach hasn't done the U.S. much good, but it's the one we've taken.

Me, I'm pro-American, and want to see America prosper. Stupidity and patriotism have been conflated in this country for too long.

Say what you will about Reagan, but when the chance came to turn Hezbollah from a terrorist enemy of Israel into a terrorist enemy of the U.S., he sided with the U.S. and withdrew when that barracks got bombed. It seems like a small and obvious point, but find me a Republican today with the sense to choose advantageous fights, rather than pick the fights our enemies want us to fight.

and you're not trollish enough to make anyone lose their temper.

Only Emerson could call someone "not trollish" and make it an insult.

Children do make excellent stock. Young marrow.

The backfat of rich kids is tastier than bacon. Or so I've heard.

I think it only can be defended on moral and philosophical grounds.

No, no, no. The estate tax is so wonderful precisely because it can be defended both on progressive moral and philosophical grounds* and also on efficiency grounds.

The efficiency argument goes like this: let's stipulate that you want tax policy to raise revenue efficiently. The ideal tax would collect lots of money in a way that (1) doesn't weaken incentives to productive activities like working, saving, investing, innovating; (2) is difficult to evade / easy to enforce; (3) does not impose a disporportionate burden of compliance on the taxpayer; (4) discourages economically wasteful activity.

Let's look at the estate tax:
1. The great thing about making inheritance a taxable event is that even the prospect of taxation can't make anyone voluntarily refrain from dying, so no effective disincentive. (And remember, every dollar collected from the estate tax does not have to be collected from taxes on desirable activities like working and investment.) Does anyone want to make an empiricallly supported argument that estate taxes (at they level they are imposed in the U.S.) discourage working, saving or investment? The anti-tax crowd is not beyond asserting the claim, but when it comes to empirical proof, they tend to conflate (1) with...
(2) The estate tax can be evaded or minimized with astute estate planning. To the extent this is true, that's a flaw of the loopholes, not the tax. The fact of someone's death is impossible to hide, and the transfer of assets in someone's estate creates a paper trail that is comparatively easy to audit.
(3) The burden of compliance with the estate tax is incrementally trivial to the expense of sorting out a wealthy person's estate.
(4) The fact that the estate tax bill can trigger the need to liquidate assets is often used as a criticism of the tax ("We had to sell the family business!") I think it's a feature, not a bug, from an efficiency standpoint. The knowledge that heirs will need liquid assets to pay the estate tax is a disincentive to unproductive acts of pyramid-building, like purchasing art works, mansion, and yachts. At the same time, the very generous payment schedules allow the heirs plenty of time to monetize any illiquid assets without resorting to fire sales.

The estate tax: economically efficient taxation! The fact that it soaks undeserving rich bastards is merely icing on the cake!

* I don't want to recite the whole list here, but the key arguments seem to be what JP Stormcrow said in 82, plus the fact that scions of the wealthy didn't do anything to "earn" their birth to wealthy parents, so anything they inherit after taxes is just gravy from a perspective of just rewards.

#91: Also, I should point out, GB, seriously? The most important issue in this election is the estate tax? That's somewhere beyond fiddling and into manufacturing the violins.

B brought it up in #66, Cala. I guess I should have ignored her.

#94: You'd rather the guy lash out blindly? Sue the bystanders? Punch out a random person on the street to take out his frustrations? That approach hasn't done the U.S. much good, but it's the one we've taken.

I'd be happy if he pressed charges against the violent thug who attacked him, and let the legal system run its course. This he has chosen not to do because, hey, the guy didn't beat him up too badly, and besides, he was fairly warned that an ass-kicking was imminent.

#79: One must admit that attitudes like GB's and too-clever idiots like Ted Frank are clearly those that predominate in the waning days of a better nation. Civil society is for losers, winners go out and fuck the prom queen take what's theirs.

Yeah, because no rich people ever tried to get richer in the good old days. Like when you had to own land to vote, or when the "robber barons" held sway, or when J.P. Morgan built US Steel into a monopoly.

The truth is, the billionaires and centi-millionaires of today can easily afford whatever tax scheme a Democratic administration cooks up. But what about a midlevel associate in a Manhattan law firm, still paying off her student loans from 7 years and almost $300,000 worth of higher education? She's pulling down about $200K a year, so she's not about to retire and live off the interest of her vast fortune any time soon. Yet she suddenly finds her take-home pay slashed by about 15% a year, while no tangible difference in the health of the nation's finances emerges as a result. In fact, it's quite possible that the increased tax revenue will fuel increased, wasteful government spending. The only direct benefit of raising her taxes is that it will make some people happy that the government is finally soaking "the rich". That doesn't seem like a good deal for her, or for anyone, really.

One tax reform that makes sense and is fair would be to tax hedge fund income from performance fees as income, instead of as capital gains. That's only fair: That money is income from you doing your job just like anyone else, so you should pay income tax rates on it. But if we ever get serious about reducing the national debt, we'll have to think about cutting spending (yes, including our military budget), not taxing our way to prosperity.

She's pulling down about $200K a year, so she's not about to retire and live off the interest of her vast fortune any time soon. Yet she suddenly finds her take-home pay slashed by about 15% a year, while no tangible difference in the health of the nation's finances emerges as a result. In fact, it's quite possible that the increased tax revenue will fuel increased, wasteful government spending. The only direct benefit of raising her taxes is that it will make some people happy that the government is finally soaking "the rich". That doesn't seem like a good deal for her, or for anyone, really.

Seriously, I was exactly that person a month ago. A fifteen percent pay cut wouldn't have hurt a bit, and anyone in my position for whom it would either had some very peculiar individual circumstances or was making poor spending decisions. I just voluntarily took an approximately 60% pay cut, and we're still not talking poverty or anything close to it.

$300,000 in college debt, including undergraduate and law school?

She went to a college that cost $40,000 a year, and borrowed every penny? I don't feel very sympathetic already.

We need to disincentivize doing dumb things like that. Maybe encourage saving rather than debt.

Thus has it always been, the ungrateful peasantry relentlessly pursuing Schadenfreude at the expense of the lawyers.

You know, maybe its a failing on my part, but I seem to be entirely unable to muster any sympathy for the financial woes of someone making $200,000 a year.

That attitude is what makes people vote Republican, you know.

Yay 102. (And, um, 104 too.)

You mean, all along, people have been voting Republican to spite me?

People of America! Message received! If I promise to do a nice deed for a rich person, will you please stop electing amoral idiots?

100/101: what? I am that person today, and a 15% pay cut would literally throw me into poverty. You're talking about $30,000! That's nothing to you?

tax hedge fund income from performance fees as income, instead of as capital gains. That's only fair: That money is income from you doing your job just like anyone else

Now I'm wondering whether there is any world in which I would support different tax brackets by profession, rather than strictly by income. Because as hazy as my understanding of hedge funds is, I have the distinct suspicion that running them is not only not "just a job like anyone else" but not actually necessary.

I make less than $30,000 a year, Brock, so you can just go boo hoo hoo all the way home.

You have to do a nice deed for a rich person *and* you have to prosecute someone for beating you up. Only then will the Republicans of America consider no longer supporting unprovoked war, illegal torture, and the oubliette.

Going from $200K to $170K would throw you into poverty? Is this because of your medical bills?

poverty

I think this word does not mean what you think it means.

Or else 108 was a joke. I hope it was a joke.

Ben, $30k is a lot of money. That's my point.

I have the distinct suspicion that running them is not only not "just a job like anyone else" but not actually necessary.

I don't think I understand what this means.

(I think Brock is joking, people.)

Witt is advocating the liquidation of certain hedge fund assets.

Well, it wouldn't be poverty in the sense of the federal definition of that term, but it would be poverty in the sense of $30k less in the bank at the end of the year.

114 makes it look like Brock is not joking.

poverty in the sense of $30k less in the bank at the end of the year.

Right, that sense.

I put it to you that that is a stupid sense.

And if you lose $30k each year off a $200,000 salary, you'll in debt within 7 years!

117 is delightful. "No, not poverty in the strict TECHNICAL definition, but by some new definition of my own design in which making $170,000 qualifies."

109: That one I agree with GB on, Witt. he's talking about the tax break that hedge fund managers get because they way they get much of their compensation from the fund is treated as capital gains (lower rate) rather than income tax. A tax break that the Dems (especially Schumer and Clinton) have chosen to not take on.

I'm so lucky that I would only lose a mere 6K if my pay was slashed by 15%

I'm joking about the poverty, but not joking in the broader sense of being flabergasted by LB's "wouldn't have hurt a bit". I'd definitely notice. And I'm not at all a big spender.

$30K is less money to a person making $200K than a person making $30K.

I don't think I understand what this means.

I was pushing my thought experiment. Like, what if we had tax brackets based on profession? Most of us would agree that garbage haulers and pediatricians are necessary, and while we take pleasure in house painters and dermatologists, they are perhaps a little less necessary. So the trash guys are in the 15% tax bracket and the skin docs in the 25%.

And then we might agree that some professions, by virtue of the fact that they arguably add nothing of value to society and in fact may be actively detrimental, are not necessary. And we might tax those people at 50%, or 80%, or whatever, to compensate for the cost to society of allowing them to engage in that work. (And perhaps to deter them from entering those professions.)

I'm not claiming this is a well-thought-out argument, but that's the thinking so far.

(And I don't mean I'd "notice" in the sense that it would affect my monthly budget or spending decisions or anything like that.)

So ... who cares, then?

126: oh, I get that, and I like it as a thought experiment. (I'm not sure I'd want gov't beaurocrats deciding which professions were socially useful and in what measure, but that's a detail.) I was questioning the "not actually necessary"--the phrasing made it sound as if hedge funds would just run themselves, so why do we need managers? But now I see that you were saying not that hedge funds would run themselves, but that we don't need hedge funds at all. Not sure I agree, but I'm clear now what you meant.

123: Ah, I didn't write clearly. yes, I understand that debate. It's probably the only part of the hedge-fund stuff that I'm sure I do understand. and I agree.

So I wasn't asking the question "Should we tax hedge-fund people as if they're earning salary or just as if they're getting dividends?" because to me it's obvious that we should (even though we're not right now).

Instead, I was thinking, "Do we need to live in a world in which 'hedge fund manager' is an acceptable job title?"

But now I see that you were saying not that hedge funds would run themselves, but that we don't need hedge funds at all.

Right.

And I'm arguing with wisps of smoke here, because I don't really understand this industry at all, but I believe human society managed to survive a very long time without hedge funds. And unlike, say, mortgages, or even venture capital, I've never gotten a persuasive explanation of why this particular finance mechanism needs to exist.

Without disagreeing that people who make $200,000 a year can certainly learn to live on 15 percent less, I understand Brock's point. When I made $326 a month base pay as a Private I lived OK (admittedly $326 a month went further in 1974, but not that much further), but now that I make vastly more, it's not like I feel vastly richer. It is that way with most people; you adopt a lifestyle and financial pattern that matches your income, so any major disruption seems huge. I think this is true whether you make $30,000 a year or $300,000 a year. So someone making $200,000 a year is really going to notice a $30,000 cut. Not that they can't readjust their lives and live just fine on a mere $170,000 a year. Or that it would be unfair to add a tax burden just because they would feel a short or mid-term pinch. But it's silly to think that they would not notice of feel the disruption.

BTW, using the actual Ted Frank calculator someone making $200K/yr (gross) would in fact have their take home pay cut by about $13K. Not that that changes anything in the discussion.

Oh, I hope no one was seriously arguing that a $30K cut would be inconsequential to someone making $200K.

I've never gotten a persuasive explanation of why this particular finance mechanism needs to exist

You may not find it persuasive, but I imagine that a hedge fund manager would say that she helps direct capital from investors with capital to invest to companies that need capital in a way that often is more flexible and efficient for the company needing the capital than seeking it in the public capital markets.

Well, you're right that I don't find it especially persuasive, but I also recognize that I really don't have the training or the experience to evaluate the claim. Thanks, though.

135: I believe you just described a private equity manager. I'm actually thinking about this and I'm not sure hedge fund managers really do anything socially useful. (Perhaps they help make financial markets more efficient, thereby improving pricing signals and overall asset allocations. But that's debatable.)

I'm not sure hedge fund managers really do anything socially useful.

Remember what they say about people who live in glass houses, Mr. Transaction Cost.

"glass houses" s/b some clever joke based on "Glass-Steagall"

Idealist's description actually fits most financial intermediaries, including banks. It shows how nebulous the notion has become.

A hedge fund is basically a mutual fund that is only open to "qualified investors", so is exempt from most securities regulation. They are one of the few programs left to distribute wealth downwards -- in this case from the very rich to hedge fund employees, but in this fallen world it's the best we can do.

140: except their investor base is less comprised of very rich individuals and more comprised of state and corporate pension or other retirement funds.

141: Oh, goodie.

In fact, it's quite possible that the increased tax revenue will fuel increased, wasteful government spending.

Oh, shut up.

125: Brock, you're a big spender. Period. Even granted the high cost of living wherever you live.

You adopt a lifestyle and financial pattern that matches your income, so any major disruption seems huge.

Yeah, and frankly, taxing you heavily makes sense just for the sake of hugely disrupting you. Regardless of whether it increases government revenue, and regardless of whether the money is well spent.

Oh, I hope no one was seriously arguing that a $30K cut would be inconsequential to someone making $200K.

No, we were arguing that it would be painful in a salutary way.

Brock, you're a big spender

Curious what makes you say this?

I expect the Republicans and the Clinton campaign will soon request Obama to denouce comment 143.

Somehow this seems like the right thread to mark my reflexive conservative moment of the day:

The city expects to save $60 million per year by modernizing a complicated record keeping system that now requires one full-time timekeeper for every 100 to 250 employees. The new system, dubbed CityTime, would free up thousands of city employees to do less paper-pushing.

What about freeing up thousands of city employees to not be on the city payroll? Good grief. Blithe assumptions like this are what give liberal-leaning reporters a bad name.

(Yeah, yeah, jobs are protected, blah blah.)

"Bruno has got to have pictures of every journalist in New York in a series of compromising positions: the way the coverage of 'Troopergate' has focused solely on Spitzer's wrongdoing, downplaying the fact that Bruno did get caught with his hands in the cookie jar, has been the most amazing thing I've ever seen."

The fact that Cuomo, the Democratic attorney general, issued a report exonerating Bruno probably has something to do with this. Cuomo of course has his own agenda but it seems likely Bruno's actions were common practice in Albany.