>“I donated to both parties. I donated about the same amount to both parties,” Bankman-Fried told the crypto commentator and citizen journalist Tiffany Fong.
>“All my Republican donations were dark,” he said, referring to political donations that are not publicly disclosed. “The reason was not for regulatory reasons, it’s because reporters freak the fuck out if you donate to Republicans. They’re all super liberal, and I didn’t want to have that fight.”
he says he made donations based on covid policies. which republicans had covid policies that he would have agreed with? honestly this sounds like deflection, why should we believe it without any evidence?
So, take the massive fraudster at his word when he supports your pre-existing beliefs? Do you also believe that parties interested in supplying billions in funding contacted him just after he signed the bankruptcy paperwork, as he's also recently claimed?
Do you believe it is honest because it's something you want to hear? This is the single fundamental concept that con artistry boils down to.
Whenever anybody says "<something you want to hear>, I can't show you but trust me," the reaction shouldn't be to marvel at their honesty, it should be to smell bullshit and ask yourself what their angle is. I mean even when they're not a known conman and liar who just fleeced people out of billions of dollars. I feel this should go without saying but there are an incredible amount of people still lining up to believe this clown for some reason.
The news is that we are discovering that he wasn’t just funneling money to Democrats.
Even his public money was weighted towards Democrats 2:1…it’s not like he was publicly only donating to Democrats, but now it appears that overall he probably donated equally to both parties.
If you believe Democratic politicians were in league with the fraud, this would be a way to deflect attention from that I guess.
(to be clear, I don't believe that, and also see no reason he'd be lying. That doesn't mean there isn't one though - and he could also be lying for no reason)
His donations became a political hot potato so maybe they’re like “look, man, my hands are tied here so maybe if you can deflect some of this heat we can work something out.” Voila, millions of untraceable donations to the republicans.
It's some Supreme Court interpretation of free speech plus legislation. I remember Al Franken talking about this a bit in the context of a law requiring disclosure that he supported but was not successful.
Looks like the dynamic hasn't changed much since he talked about it.
It seems like a potential way to derail criticism coming from Republicans, doesn't it? Or perhaps make them look shady- this guy is an adept social engineer, after all
Because his Democratic friends told him to. They want to remove the label "Major Democratic Donor" from all of SBF's negative press. How do you not see something so obvious?
>“All my Republican donations were dark,” he said, referring to political donations that are not publicly disclosed. “The reason was not for regulatory reasons, it’s because reporters freak the fuck out if you donate to Republicans. They’re all super liberal, and I didn’t want to have that fight.”
Well, that's brazenly honest, I guess.