Notes from the Underground

Here's how the justice system really works, for those taking notes:  Ross Ulbricht's big mistake was that he was not a commercial banking entity, slapping envelopes swollen with filthy pelf into the proper palms, the usual route to legitimizing an ugly business. Had he remembered (or been able) to render unto Caesar, he could have avoided this whole sordid mess. When it comes to drugs and finance, the crime in question is never the crime itself, it's making sure the right scumbags have been appropriately greased.

I don't want to hear any of this bullshit about how Silk Road sold substances that ultimately killed people. HSBC laundered money for fucking cartels, who not only kill idiots secondhand with illicit substances, but murder people in the ugliest, crudest, most medieval manners you can conceive of. The judge who sentenced Ulbricht needs to read The Power of the Dog and get back to us on how this sort of thing protects anyone, saves a single life.

Look. There's some creepy shit on the deep web, no two ways about it. But it's not like anyone has done anything about it before. Only when someone started figuring out how to make not only his own money, but his own currency, did it become a problem. This should at least clarify what the priorities are.