The Crime of Telling the Truth

Alternate Title = The Crime of Telling the Truth!!!
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johnkarls
Posts: 2034
Joined: Fri Jun 29, 2007 8:43 pm

The Crime of Telling the Truth

Post by johnkarls »

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I am qualified to attest to what follows in this essay – (1) having served as Senior Tax Counsel and Director of Worldwide Tax Planning for Texaco Inc. 1974-1987 when it was a Fortune 10 company (responsibilities included supervising the Texaco employees responsible for lobbying numerous pieces of US tax legislation, many of which “yours truly” drafted); (2) having served as Chief International Tax Partner (Technical) for Ernst & Young/NYC 1988-1997; (3) having served as Chair of the American Bar Association Tax Section’s Committee on Foreign Activities of US Taxpayers 1994-96 (the country’s top 300 international tax lawyers with 22 working subcommittees) and previously chairing several of its subcommittees; and (4) having been an Investment Banker (aka Merchant Banker in Commonwealth Countries) since 1997.

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As can be seen from the three reference materials in this section of the Bulletin Board, there is considerable tension between an outright bribe of a public official and the Constitution’s First Amendment Freedom of Speech and its Right of the People to Petition the Government.

Indeed, the US Supreme Court has struck down as unconstitutional abridgments of “free speech” and “right to petition” many of the legislative attempts to limit and/or regulate campaign contributions – leading many commentators to remark that only wealthy candidates who can finance their own campaigns for public office are really free to do “what’s right” rather than follow the dictates of the “special interests” who provide the massive amounts of campaign contributions now required to run successfully for public office.

A related area into which this essay will not stray too far are the 527 Organizations – co-called because they are defined in Sec. 527 of the Internal Revenue Code. They are organizations that are supposedly “independent” of a particular candidate – that is, they are supposedly a group of citizens that spontaneously organizes itself and decides to exercise its “free speech” and “right to petition” by making expenditures for campaign advertisements, etc., on behalf of candidate(s) that they favor. Although this is supposed to be a “Look, Ma – No Hands” routine, one current major presidential candidate has taken a great deal of criticism from the media for the statements and positions of a “527” that is headed by his former campaign manager.

For a brief write-up of the Federal Election Commission’s refusal to regulate 527’s (presumably on the grounds that the US Supreme Court would invalidate anything the FEC attempts), see for example www.independentsector.org/programs/gr/FECopinion.html. And for a brief write-up of a recent attempt to legislate restrictions on 527’s that would withstand Supreme Court scrutiny, see for example www.independentsector.org/programs/gr/527bill.html.

But back to the main point.

How do individual citizens or groups of citizens (including labor unions on behalf of their members who may or may not approve of the union’s political activities, and including “Political Action Committees” (“PAC”’s) of corporate employees and/or shareholders who voluntarily contribute to the PAC) exercise their “free speech” and “right to petition” without being prosecuted for bribery???

And how do such citizens or groups of citizens protect themselves from being prosecuted for bribery if they succumb to the extortion of politicians who often threaten to take actions that are adverse to their interests until campaign contributions of sufficient size are made???

As can be seen from looking at the discussion of “Bribery of Public Officials” in the US Department of Justice’s “Criminal Resource Manual” for its US Attorneys and Title 18 US Code Sec. 201 with which it deals – both of which are reproduced as separate items in this section of the Bulletin Board – the question is “linkage” or whether the “campaign contribution” is given for the desired action or inaction.

And although DOJ’s “Criminal Resource Manual” doesn’t admit it, all of the U.S. Attorneys for whom it is designed know that the paramount issue in court is whether the “linkage” can be proved.

At this point, you might wonder why citizens need “lobbyists” in order to convey the citizens’ “free speech” and exercise the citizens’ “right to petition." And why most “lobbyists” are former politicians who occupied important positions (committee chairmanships or positions in the Senate/House leadership).

The answer, of course, is that the politicians don’t want to have to deny the requests of (and thereby offend) ordinary citizens who are so ignorant they might leave evidence of the “linkage” or so ignorant that they don’t even know “how the game is played”!!! Politicians insist on dealing with “professionals” with whom they can freely express how much of a campaign contribution (or, for example, how much of a donation to their wives’ favorite charities) they require and feel confident that no evidence of the “linkage” will exist. To put it crassly, a former committee chair and her/his former underlings “have enough on each other” that like scorpions, they could destroy each other if they wanted so there is a firm basis for them to trust each other – and they know “how the game is played” so there will be no evidence of “linkage”!!!

That provides the necessary insulation for the pols.

But what about the lobbyists themselves??? Every so often, there are news reports about them being carted off to federal penitentiary.

And that is where the lobbyist earns her/his money.

S/he is the one who is exposed to dealing with the citizens or groups of citizens who want to exercise their “free speech” or their “right to petition”!!!

And, if s/he chooses to assume the risk of dealing with an unsophisticated group that doesn’t know “how the game is played” then s/he has the tricky task of explaining to them “how it is played” and that it is essential that “no fingerprints be left”!!!

Rarely, though occasionally, the evidence of “linkage” will come from written communications between the lobbyist and her/his clients. More often, it comes from written communications between the client’s representative who met with the lobbyist and the person(s) to whom that representative reports. And once there is “blood in the water,” US Attorneys are very good at taking depositions from everyone concerned and finding quite a few “players” who will “roll” on the others to avoid “spending their retirement years in Leavenworth.”

But on those rare occasions when the lobbyist has been indiscreet, or their clients have left evidence of “linkage” and go to jail – the real crime was the crime of “telling the truth”!!!

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