Running the drug money laundry is very profitable.
Laundering drug money through HSBC is as imprtant a job in the international drug trafficking industry as being a coca grower, or even a Cartel Honcho. And its got more perks. As we witnessed three years ago when Wachovia Bank admitted to laundering a stupefying $378 billion of drug money over a half-dozen years, nnobody goes to prison.
In fact, nobody even gets charged.
“‘Low-risk’ means don’t worry about the goddam drug money, got it?”
You can read more about it at former Assistant Secretary of Housing Catherine Austin Fitts tells all.
H/T to commenter John Thomas who left the CA Fitts link at A Market Correction
Comments
6 responses to “Running The Laundry”
Where’s the outrage at the losers that send their money to the cartels in exchange for a little temporary buzz, regardless of the hell that brings? In many parts of the libertarian world, it’s not the people buying drugs that fund the cartels, it is the fault of the people that don’t use illegal drugs and don’t want others to use illegal drugs.
If dope users would control their choices the cartels would dry up.
If we made the drugs as legal as they were in 1910 (heroin was over the counter. Cannabis was in the pharmacopeia) there would never have been any cartels.
You can try to control human appetites (alcohol prohibition) or you can allow them to be satisfied. The results you get will depend on what you want to do.
Opium in Nantucket 1782:
http://revolution.h-net.msu.edu/threads/crevecoeur.html
And yes Scott. The losers.
About 70% of female heroin users were sexually molested in childhood. Losers to be sure. They have definitely lost a lot. Care to restore their losses Scott?
I didn’t cause their losses, why I need to restore their losses? It is the weakness of character that they inflict on the rest of us in innummerable ways. And then they have the chutzpah to blame the non-users for what they do.
The exact same legalize it argument can be made about child porn, slavery, etc. Let’s blame every problem on the people that refuse to accept children will be used as sex objects, people won’t work for free, etc.
People make choices and they must be accountable for those choices. Instead libertarians shift blame to their usual suspects to ignore that they can’t organize and accomplish much. Instead their stoke and trade is the passive-aggressive whining like women.
The money comes from the drug buyers. If prohibition makes it more expensive to buy the drug users just fork over more money. Every single one of the drug users have neighbors and family that simply never use, yet we are supposed to believe that millions and millions of non-using other people are the exception so it must be legalized.
What’s the difference between NAMBLA and NORML? The topic of their obsession as far as I can tell. Both make the same argument, “people are going to do it so make it legal and blame the prohibitionist for my problems.
Scott,
So getting sexually abused at age 7 is a character defect? Interesting. Getting severe PTSD from being in a war zone is a character defect? More interesting.
It is prohibition that is doing what you abhor and I intend to appeal to those whose hearts are not as hard as yours to end it. Do your best to oppose me. Because I will beat you and all the rest of the Progressives (you do know that Prohibition is a Progressive idea don’t you) who oppose me.
I estimate that LOVE is a more powerful force than hate. But we will see won’t we. Try Colorado in November.
BTW 80% of Americans say Prohibition is not working and 50+% (and rising) are ready to legalize pot. After that I’m going after the hard drugs like alcohol and tobacco. What? Already legal? Well that will make my job easier.
Did I forget to mention the 70+% of Americans whose hearts are moved enough by the suffering of others to favor med pot? Well I just mentioned it.
it is the fault of the people that don’t use illegal drugs and don’t want others to use illegal drugs.
No, it is the very predictable fault of ridiculously high prices for basically worthless substances. We already have the same thing beginning to happen with tobacco. In New York, a pack of cigarettes is now $15, which presents an economic opportunity for criminals and terrorists. Is this the fault of smokers, for having “weakness of character”? How? Did the bad character of drinkers in the 1920s cause the crime problems associated with alcohol in that period?