Category: Tax the Rich

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So, apparently there are billionaires who will pay $250,000 to see the wreckage of the Titanic. I suppose if you have an extra $250,000 to burn through gawking at a sunken luxury liner might be a way to do it.

I don’t wish anyone ill. It is sad that people died in this tragedy nonetheless I find the whole past week more than a little irritating. First, how much government time and money was used to find these billionaires. I agree you have to look for them. It is the humane thing to do when people are trouble. Let me rephrase that when rich people are in trouble. When poor people are in trouble due to their bad decisions, the answer is to leave them on the streets because they will never learn their lesson from their mistakes unless they suffer. But OK, I understand the need to search for missing rich people despite the less than gracious response to other people in trouble.

I feel the same way about rescuing untrained people from Mount Everest. People want to climb Mount fucking Everest because they have the $65,000. They are untrained mountain climbers and they are, just for the thrill of saying they climbed Mount Everest, endangering the lives of the sherpas and the other trained mountaineers on the climb. Climbing Mount Everest should be something you work your way up. It certainly isn’t a starter mountain. Of course, the wealthy person’s story is all that is really important. The poor people that have to rescue the stupid mother fuckers are just a footnote.

And what a story it is. Billionaires in a missing submersible. The press went crazy over this one. There were countdown clocks of when exactly the oxygen would run out for the people trapped. Stories from previous submersible passengers dredging up their horror stories and how they knew some disaster like this was imminent. There were engineers discussing the poor quality of the materials used in the building of the submersible. 24/7 reporting on the fates of these 5 people while, at the same time, the Greek Navy was trying to save hundreds of desperate refugees floundering in the Mediterranean. You will be excused if you didn’t know about this particular disaster as the coverage wasn’t quite the same for the poor immigrants. Funny how the drowning billionaires trump the drowning immigrants but not particularly surprising.

Then there is the money. $250,000 to see the wreck of a ship on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. $65,000 to climb Everest. That’s a lot of money and these people can afford it. Which is incredibly disappointing if not anticipated behavior. I thought one of the benefits of low taxation for the wealthy is that they would use their excess cash to invest in their businesses thus helping everyone. That they are spending their money on these expensive thrills is unsurprising evidence that they are not good stewards of their own money.

And this is not an isolated incident. They spend billions on space travel and losing law suits, on giving money to other wealthy people, on hush money to cover up their crimes and on buying fake vintage wine. Just like the poor, they waste their money on crime, sex, thrills and drinking. The price tag they are paying is just a bit more. This is the problem. To be told that we can’t afford to help the poor is a lie, the world is afloat with extra money. It is, however, being used at the whim of people who have too much money and not enough sense. The outrageous sums these people have paid for their fun would be better spent on giving every poor person in America some housing which included a life time supply of cigarettes and alcohol.

In any case, spare me the lecture on the rich being good stewards of money. I don’t believe it.

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So Elon Musk has lost between 180 billion and 200 billion dollars. That is a lot of money. I thought the assumption regarding billionaires is that they are good with money and will spend it wisely so that their money will trickle down to the rest of us. Musk bought Twitter and exploding rockets. The Twitter sale is particularly interesting because almost as soon as he bought it, he decided he didn’t want it and did everything he could to undermine the deal. Unfortunately for Musk, he screwed up and is now stuck with Twitter. Then there is the exploding rocket, another good investment although we are told by Musk supporters that an exploding rocket is actually a good investment because we learned something about what we can and can not do. Maybe but I think NASA has been sending rockets into space for some time without mishaps, so perhaps a little consultation with them NASA before the next experiment is in order.

Given all of these expensive mishaps with their money, you think that I would be used to feckless billionaires by now but Rupert Murdoch’s pay out to Dominion of 787.5 million is another shocking example. Dominion was rightly irritated with Fox News for suggesting their voting machines were fraudulent. Fox News had ample evidence that this was incorrect however management decided that their audience didn’t want to hear the truth and that if they were told the truth they would get so upset that they would stop watching Fox News, so they decided to continue spreading the false news or, as we used to call it back in the good old days, lying. Dominion, especially after proving that Fox News was spreading a lie and knowingly continued to spread the lie, filed suit.

After a brutal onslaught of evidence proved all this malfeasance, Fox decided to settle with Dominion for nearly a cool 800 million dollars. Money, I would say, that was ill spent but OK anybody can make mistakes even a man who was born into a newspaper family and worked in publishing since the 1950’s, I don’t know, I suppose he could be unfamiliar with the idea that you can’t knowingly lie in your publications. Definitely an easy mistake for such a seasoned professional. Completely understandable.

Except this isn’t a one time error, there are future law suits. Murdoch even recently paid off Prince William. The idea, as I understood penalties and pay offs, is that the guilty party pays stiff penalties in order to teach them a lesson. But Murdoch apparently has so much money that he doesn’t have to worry about shelling out all of this money and, so as an extra added bonus, he doesn’t have to learn a lesson either. To make matters worse, these settlements are tax deductible as a business expense so speculation is that after Murdoch takes these deductions, he will recoup some of the 787.5 million. Imagine that, the American tax payer is actually paying part of Murdoch’s settlement.

It irritates me that billionaires get off the hook this way. The conservative press is always quick to point out welfare fraud when some poor wretch buys cigarettes and alcohol instead of using his welfare money on broccoli and carrots. You see, they say, the poor can’t be trusted with more money but nobody raises much of a fuss when a billionaire gets caught rigging the system. Murdoch needs to stop lying. How will he ever learn his lesson if we keep letting get away with it. Personally, I would much rather give 787.5 million to the worst welfare frauds in the country, the most unworthy gin drinking, cigarette smoking, Cadillac driving bums than for Murdoch to go unpunished. At least the poor frauds will pump money into the economy by spreading the money around to local businesses instead of paying off princes, ex-wives and coverup legal settlements.

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Apparently Jeff Bezos has billions of dollars to burn through and is looking for people to help him. He just donated a $100 million to Dolly Parton. It is presumed that Parton will help Bezos distribute his extra money to worthy charities. Given her history, I believe that she will. Parton has proven herself a generous woman as she is credited with giving Vanderbilt Medical Center money in order to help find the COVID vaccine.

But, with absolutely no animus towards Parton, why give her even more money to give away. She has so much of her own money that she is already giving it away. So Bezos gives her even more to give away? Whenever I hear about money transfers like this I have to ask, why not take this money out in taxes and let our legislatures determine where it goes. The money is there. The rich are giving it away. They clearly don’t need it for their business. Why let billionaires decide where the money goes?

I can hear people say the Government will only waste it. Perhaps. But there is a fundamental difference here. A Republican led government could put the money to tax breaks, bringing down the national debt, or helping energy companies find oil. Democrats can use it on providing better social services. The key here is that in both cases a number of people are looking at the public good and making a decision that they think is best for the country. I might disagree with the decision but I feel better about a legislative body looking into it than having a single billionaire deciding on a whim.

I mean what if Dolly wants to talk to the animals? Based on her desire, she drops the $100 million into charities that work with humans trying to talk to animals. A noble enterprise I am sure, but is it really the best use of money when we have so many other pressing needs? And, more importantly, why leave this decision to one citizen. And really why does any citizen have so much money that they are giving away $100 million to another wealthy person.

Since Bezos has $100 million to give to Dolly Parton, it mean he can pay more in taxes without a detrimental effect on his life or his business. He is giving it away already. I say if you are giving away $100 million you are begging to be taxed more. Let’s do it.

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If nothing else, Jeffrey Epstein’s death has uncovered the pervasive rot in American society. Unfortunately for him, he was a person so loathsome that nobody really cares if he committed suicide or was murdered.  He deserved to die.  Most people are happy to have him dead, buried and forgotten.

The problem is that the man had evidence which could implicate leaders of the Democratic Party, the leaders of the Republican Party, the British Royal Family and Captains of Industry. Very important people were in the crosshairs of the cops and the American government failed to protect their prime witness in a high security prison no less.  Every fail-safe procedure available in such circumstances failed. A man on a suicide watch commits suicide. The technology failed. The staff failed. And Jeffery Epstein decides on this day when all the fail-safes were failing to commit suicide. A remarkable coincidence, don’t you think?

Any half way sentient being would find this a little difficult to believe. Yet, this is what we were told and this is the answer we are letting the powers that be get away with. I was really offended that a better explanation wasn’t provided. I mean come on. Really. This is your explanation. Nobody believes it. And I mean nobody. It is an insult to the American Public that it is being offered as the definite result of an extensive investigation.  

Then it slowly dawned on me that this wasn’t about giving a somewhat believable explanation about what happened, they don’t care if anyone believes their story. The powers that be saw a bigger problem.  They wanted to warn people away from investigating Epstein’s death. If you want to find out what happened to Epstein, you are putting your life into danger. We killed once and do you really want to take a chance that we won’t kill again?  You have been warned. I don’t know about anyone else but message received.

You can tell it was important to the powers that be because it took staggering levels of corruption to pull this hit off. A billionaire just doesn’t die in prison without a lot of buy in from powerful people. I imagine a group of men in a gentlemen’s club, smoking cigars and drinking fine whiskey,  passing the hat around to get enough money to deal with the Epstein problem.  Nice guy, great parties but we can’t take a chance with the old scoundrel, every one pony up $100,000 and we can give the old boy the send-off he deserves.

Two low level prison employees have taken the fall although it beggars belief that these two were the only ones involved. The right person had to get into the prison. The right people had to be guarding. The right tech people had to turn off the right equipment.  Money men and lawyers had to move money to the right people so that the right strings were pulled. A lot of people, up and down the food chain, were involved in ensuring Epstein met his fate. But since it didn’t really matter that anyone believed what happened or, God forbid, take responsibility for what happened, the two prison guards supplied enough rolling heads to finish off the story.

After seeing this crime spree from our social betters, I find it particularly irksome that Americans still cling to the notion that the rich are good stewards of money. They are, quite obviously, not. Think about the cash it took for Epstein to create his pedophile island, find underage women to fly over to his island, fly over his guests so they could partake in the amusements pedophile island had to offer.  Think of the money spent by Epstein to defend his crimes in court.  Think of the money spent by Epstein’s friends to silence him. As far as I am concerned, we would all be better off if the government taxed Epstein and his ilk and the money received was spent giving every skid row bum in the USA a six pack of beer and a pack of cigarettes. Perhaps some girls would have been saved from the indignity of becoming prostitutes for the world’s power elite.

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The most interesting tidbit regarding the news about Steve Wynn sexual harassment accusations is the $7,500,000 payment to one of Wynn’s accusers. He is denying the rape/sexual harassment charges but not the pay out. I am assuming the payout then is real. He wanted to avoid the embarrassment of go through the criminal justice system, so, having an extra 7.5 million dollars to throw around, he bought the woman off.

I would invite Senator Grassley, who thinks the rich should get more tax breaks than the poor because the poor will only spend it on alcohol and women and not invest in making their businesses more competitive, to ponder this awful transaction. This money isn’t going to be job creating or investing in some grand entrepreneurial scheme; it is going to a victim of a crime, perhaps a felony, and to her lawyers. We could have distributed $100,000 to the worst welfare cheats in each of the 50 states and then put in another $100,000 to the worst welfare cheats in the 25 largest cities in the country and gotten more income generating dollars for the economy.

Let’s also face it. It probably isn’t good for Steve Wynn. When a person has that much loose change, he suffers under the illusion that he can get away with anything because he can buy off anyone. As we now know, that can get rich people like Steve Wynn and Harvey Weinstein into some very big and embarrassing trouble. If only Steve and Harvey had had less mad money, they might have found it in their best interests to behave and spent what money they had more intelligently.

I do think Senator Grassley is on to something however. It was only after reviewing my previous blog regarding the rich and taxes that I realized that Senator Grassley was correct that any extra money a man has seems to be spent on women and alcohol. Although he was only applying his rule to the poor, I propose it has a more universal application. I offer proof that the rich too spend their extra money on alcohol and women:

The amount Bill Koch paid for fake vintage wine. 400,000
The amount Bill Koch spent investigating fake wine. 35,000,000
The amount Steve Wynn paid to silence his victim 7,500,000

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Bill Koch, third and, I believe, poorest Koch brother, has a serious problem with wine counterfeiting. You see he buys vintage wine. You are unfamiliar with this problem? So was I. When I purchase wine, I am inclined to choose volume over quality. I would rather buy 4 OK bottles of wine for $20 then spend $20 for one good bottle. However Bill Koch is different. Way different. I mean way way way different. He prowls the auction houses looking for really good deals on vintage wine. He will spend hundreds of thousands of dollars for a bottle of wine.

Koch once bought 4 bottles of wine that were purported to come from Thomas Jefferson’s vineyards. He paid $400,000 for the 4, yes you figured it correctly $100,000 a piece for a bottle of wine. Unfortunately, the gullible billionaire discovered after purchasing the wine that the bottles were fake. Which is a little irritating because the only advantage, at least as far as I can see, from owning a bottle of vintage wine is, in fact, owning it. If it isn’t authentic, the taste of the wine hardly matters. Who wants to pay $100,000 for repackaged French table wine?

Well Bill Koch was, to say the least, angry and wanted to put a stop to these swindlers. Being a billionaire, he also had the resources to fight this important battle. He spent nearly $35,000,000 trying to stop these counterfeiters from continuing their fraudulent activities. He met with some success and now the FBI and the courts are bring these people to justice. Hurrah.

So if Bill Koch is using his own money to buy vintage wine and fight his defrauders. What business is of mine? Let me tell you.

There are people who believe that taking money away from the rich is preventing the rich from investing their money in things that will ultimately bring wealth to the whole society and lift poor people out of their poverty. If you tax this money then you are preventing these people from investing these poverty reducing business ventures.

I think Koch’s experience provides evidence that proves this thesis wrong.

Let’s start with purchasing the bottles of wine. The bottles were fake so the trickle down theory hardly is relevant here. There are no poor grape picker or winery workers involved in this story. There are some swindlers and some suckers but no one that is going to advance the cause of commerce.

Even if the bottles were authentic, taxing Koch and extra say 25 percent per bottle would not have prevented him from buying the wine. He still would have plenty of cash to spare on his vintage wine. The worst-case scenario is he might have to shave a bottle or two off the purchase but he can still afford to spend $100,000 on a bottle if he so desired. Again as these are vintage bottles, the grape picker and winery worker are long dead, so no real innovative ideas are thwarted here. If you want to shed a tear, it would be for the poor wretches who work at Sotheby’s.

Koch spends $35,000,000 dollars trying to find and prosecute these counterfeiters. Agreed that these are people engaged in a criminal activity and should be stopped. However the people who gain anything by stopping the counterfeiters are pretty much limited to private investigators and billionaires. This isn’t investment money for the development of commerce and industry. This is pure revenge on Koch’s part. He doesn’t like being swindled.

If, instead, the $35,000,000 were given to the worst welfare frauds in the country, the money would still be better spent. More electrical appliances, new cars, and new houses would be bought. More money would be put into the hands of people who would use it buying things that might stimulate the economy than, let’s say, a billionaire interested in vintage wine.