> I guess it goes to show how low trust is in the legal system.
I think it's more about trust in propaganda. Both parties take a ton of money, and some of it always turns out to be from dubious people. A lot of those dubious people go to jail. But this "SBF hasn't been arrested in the first 20 minutes so Democrats are corrupt" line is one I've seen as a talking point all over the US right. But it never comes with any perspective.
E.g., we could look at Elizabeth Holmes. As Wikipedia says, "The credibility of Theranos was attributed in part to Holmes's personal connections and ability to recruit the support of influential people, including Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, Jim Mattis, and Betsy DeVos, all of whom had served or would go on to serve as U.S. presidential cabinet officials." Republican cabinet officials, I should add. It was more than 2 years between Carreyrou's bombshell article and her indictment.
Do I believe that she got a lot of money and cred from cozying up to politically prominent individuals? Definitely. Do I believe that delayed the investigation? No, complex crimes, especially ones with intent requirements, require patient, careful investigations. And I don't even recall anybody saying that she wasn't immediately arrested because she was politically connected.
> I think it's more about trust in propaganda. Both parties take a ton of money, and some of it always turns out to be from dubious people. A lot of those dubious people go to jail. But this "SBF hasn't been arrested in the first 20 minutes so Democrats are corrupt" line is one I've seen as a talking point all over the US right. But it never comes with any perspective.
So much "news discourse" today comes from people who have lost their minds to partisan politics. With every news item, the only question they ask is "how does this prove that my side is 100% right and very unfairly treated".
It's not even the partisanship that is annoying about this, it's the straining for a connection. A lot of things don't have a meaningful connection to partisan politics, and trying to force it constantly leads to a lot of uninteresting noise.
It's as if there were millions of people constantly trying to relate everything happening in the world to Weird Al Yankovic. Except that would at least be funny.
They're not trying to understand the case or offer an opinion about it. The term "virtue signalling" refers to a similar category of speech, ie., signalling (vs communicating).
You can distinguish communication from signalling by the introduction of a hypothetical premise: suppose "The Issue" (eg., SBT) was discovered not to relate to "Identity" (eg., Left/Right, etc.), then would you/the-speaker still care?
If not, then what you're actually concerned about is the impact of this issue on your ingroup/outgroup game, not the issue itself.
Here, most either want to distance their identity from SBT, or associate it with their enemies.
I want to take your comment and frame it. Honestly, the state of public political discourse these days makes me want to become a hermit and live in the middle of nowhere, primarily because it is extremely rare to see any good faith arguments. Instead, you have each side already knowing their desired outcome, and the only mental work going into the argument is "how can I pretend this event proves my side." And folks can say what they want about looking at the past with rose-colored glasses, but the sheer amount of conspiratorial nonsense that gets play at high levels, where it really shouldn't, is so much worse now than in the pre-Internet days.
The thing that makes me particularly annoyed is when people's conspiracy theories don't make sense even if you believe all of their (usually false) points. I mean, if you believe that all politicians have 0 morals and only act in self interest, the idea that a politician who only cares about self interest would for some reason put their reputation on the line for SBF is insane. There is practically nobody, in public, sticking up for this villain, so even if a politician took money from him in the past, they have no reason to help him now. It's just totally logically inconsistent and makes absolutely no sense.
It’s worth noting that the “right” doesn’t consider these people you mention as the “right”. It’s the same reason Joe Biden will say “MAGA Republicans”. The Republican base is almost entirely different than the elected officials (same with most of the left btw).
I recommend the book “the new right” by michael malice
The right views much of their political leadership with contempt. They equally view them as the “enemy”, perhaps more-so.
When people hear “he donated to both parties” what the people on the right here is “they donated to my enemies”. The “MAGA Republicans” mostly are concerned about illegal immigration, off shoring of jobs, corruption, globalism, etc. Republican leadership and SBF openly worked against their interest. It’s colloquially called the “uniparty” for a reason
I'm using the term "the US right" here in the fashion of political scientists, especially non-American ones. I understand that the US right, which has for decades spent a lot of time pursuing orthodoxy (see, e.g., "RINO", or the the way there is no longer a pro-choice wing of the Republican Party), has a lot of internecine fighting over who is truly within the tribal boundaries. But I think none of that is relevant to my point. Whether you think somebody is "the right" or not doesn't map well onto who might be able to squash a prosecution for political reasons. Being a cabinet member is a more useful proxy.
The reason I was bringing it up was regarding how it was relevant to your point…
First, I agree it’s about who can squash prosecution. That said, it’s a bit bigger than that. These funds were used to help elect people. Meaning, it was directly used to squash people who would prosecute SBF in the future.
> Both parties take a ton of money, and some of it always turns out to be from dubious people. A lot of those dubious people go to jail. But this "SBF hasn't been arrested in the first 20 minutes so Democrats are corrupt" line is one I've seen as a talking point all over the US right. But it never comes with any perspective.
That’s why who was funded matters, you can use it as a proxy for who is corrupt / who best aligns with a given interest.
The US right doesn’t view it as “both parties” taking funds. The reason it’s a right wing talking point is it’s one party getting the money. The “uniparty” - ie the democrats & the republican leadership who appear to work against the republican base. That’s who’s getting the fund — not the republicans who are opposed to funding Ukraine, for instance. The republicans who more closely represent the base, did not get funds from SBF, that we know of.
It’s also why the right doesn’t believe there will be any arrest(s). Who’s motivated? If it goes to trial / is investigated those in power will be named.
If any arrest(s) are made, it would be similar to ghislaine maxwell - where she goes to prison for sex trafficking minors… but none of the recipients of those minors are charged or named.
I think it's more about trust in propaganda. Both parties take a ton of money, and some of it always turns out to be from dubious people. A lot of those dubious people go to jail. But this "SBF hasn't been arrested in the first 20 minutes so Democrats are corrupt" line is one I've seen as a talking point all over the US right. But it never comes with any perspective.
E.g., we could look at Elizabeth Holmes. As Wikipedia says, "The credibility of Theranos was attributed in part to Holmes's personal connections and ability to recruit the support of influential people, including Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, Jim Mattis, and Betsy DeVos, all of whom had served or would go on to serve as U.S. presidential cabinet officials." Republican cabinet officials, I should add. It was more than 2 years between Carreyrou's bombshell article and her indictment.
Do I believe that she got a lot of money and cred from cozying up to politically prominent individuals? Definitely. Do I believe that delayed the investigation? No, complex crimes, especially ones with intent requirements, require patient, careful investigations. And I don't even recall anybody saying that she wasn't immediately arrested because she was politically connected.