From: Rich Graves <llurch@networking.stanford.edu>
Date: Sat, 13 Jan 1996 18:23:19 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Offshore Banks and Asset Protection)
In-Reply-To: <ad1c4cad210210045dc1@[205.199.118.202]>
Message-ID: <Pine.ULT.3.91.960112180745.29691C-100000@Networking.Stanford.EDU>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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That's not what I wrote!!! :-)

On Fri, 12 Jan 1996, Timothy C. May wrote:

> I think the assumption that most of the ads in the back of "The Economist"
> are scams which will take your money is wrong. The banks will take your
> money, but most probably will return it on demand. And the seminar
> companies will in fact teach some things.

I did say "many," not "most," and I would assume that most if not all
stuff that The Economist carries is completely legit. I'd been thinking of
"other publications," such as the tax protester rags and my friend 
Clark's paper. 

> not inspire confidence. (In fact, the report that these
> back-of-the-Economist ads are "scams" is perhaps part of this
> disinformation/rumor campaign.)

Yep, I'm just an FBI plant. (Yes, I know -- or rather assume -- that
that's not what you meant.)

Be careful of this paranoid stuff, even as a joke. The tax protester
movement feeds on conspiracy BS. "The IRS knows that native born white
Sovereign Citizens don't have to pay Federal taxes, but they've paid off
all the Jew lawyers." There was a guy in misc.legal a while back making
this so-called argument. People were actually sending him money, and not
out of pity. 

Which is not to say that the guvmint isn't conspiring against us all, in
the larger and some specific senses. Just not quite like that, and it's
the wacky conspiracy theories that make otherwise intelligent people
discard others. (Some people still don't believe in Watergate. *I* didn't
believe the Feds could legally get a wiretap without a warrant until I 
was corrected here.)

> Like a lot of things, it may all be clearer once one has actually gone
> ahead and done something with these offshore banks. I don't personally know
> anyone who has, which adds to my uncertainty.

This falls under the category of Things That Only The Mega-Wealthy Clique
(of all races, politics, and sexual colors) Know. 

Which is a category that shrinks more and more by the day. Some people
actually used to believe in the Divine Right of Kings. We've come a long
way, baby. Keep it up.

-rich