Meet the 'Assassination Market' Creator Who's Crowdfunding Murder With Bitcoins 291
schwit1 writes "As Silk Road emerged from the 'dark-web', other sites have appeared offering services that are frowned upon by most. As Forbes reports, perhaps the most-disturbing is 'The Assassination Market' run by a pseudonymous Kuwabatake Sanjuro. The site, remarkably, is a crowdfunding service that lets anyone anonymously contribute bitcoins towards a bounty on the head of any government official–a kind of Kickstarter for political assassinations. As Forbes reports, NSA Director Alexander and President Obama have a BTC40 bounty (~$24,000) but the highest bounty — perhaps not entirely surprising — is BTC 124.14 (~$75,000) for none other than Ben Bernanke."
Assassination Politics (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Assassination Politics (Score:5, Funny)
As well he should. That website's layout is downright criminal.
Re:Assassination Politics (Score:4, Interesting)
That page might be "downright criminal", however, it is not the messenger, it is the message, that counts.
That page was put up back in the mid-nineties. HTM code was quite limited. So, it ain't pretty. Neither are those who think that pretty means more than content.
BTW, Jim did not put up the page. I did, as the FBI was looking at both Jim and I (investigating), so out of respect for Jim, I put it up while he was in prison. I will keep it up simply to stick it in the face of the feds.
There have been over 600 visits to the page, today, mostly because of the link provided here. So, Jim's thoughts from two decades ago seem to still deserve attention.
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Yeah this is fairly old news. As far as I'm aware he's been in and out of prison for most of his life since proposing the idea in a fit of extreme libertarianism. Did someone actually go through with it?
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Credit Default Swaps.
You can include practically any terms you want in a swap. I'm sure the lawyers could write up a clause covering 'unplanned change in head of state' to cover an assassination. In fact, it would not surprise me if paper traded by major banks are covered for a sudden change in the Fed's governing body.
<Tinfoil_hat_mode>I would not be surprised if the mortgage backed security market collapse was triggered in part by an 'unfavorable change in the Administration' clause in some contra
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Agatha Christie: The Pale Horse.
You place a bet with an unscrupulous bookmaker that a certain person will live beyond the next month. When that doesn't happen, you have to pay the bet.
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You place a bet with an unscrupulous bookmaker that a certain person will live beyond the next month. When that doesn't happen, you have to pay the bet.
Isn't this called insurance?
"The good-hands people" around yer neck.
--
BMO
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If you bet that your own house burns down, it's insurance. If you bet that your neighbor's house burns down, it's a credit default swap.
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Actually with insurance you're betting that it WILL burn down.
The analogy back to the bookmaker would be a bet AGAINST survival.
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...triggered in part by an 'unfavorable change in the Administration' clause in some contracts...
Perhaps not in contracts, but in my time working in finance, I have seen investment strategies planned heavily on the outcome of a single election, considering ramifications for a few years in advance.
While I never saw anything as ridiculous as "sell all of $SECURITY if $CANDIDATE wins", I did encounter plans like "if $CANDIDATE wins, move into $SECURITY until $PROMISE happens, then move out of $LOSER1 or $LOSER2 as appropriate".
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because it's not cratering like the US dollar, the government has to put their money into something.
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Yes, he went to jail for various tax-related charges, and then again for violation of parole, and was released in March 2012. And now this website is online. Not that the two have any affiliation.
Re:what about the ads in soldier of fortune (Score:5, Interesting)
where you can find people willing to do mercenary work
I suspect that up to half of them are bogus, and the other half are likely scams. What's left is probably well out of Interpol jurisdiction, let alone that of the FBI (or RCMP, or {insert European national police force here} ), since you're probably going to do it in the borders of some craphole nation already torn asunder by civil war or rebellion.
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Soliciting a market for murder for hire is a lot WORSE than shouting fire in a crowded theater.
This is swinging your fist so far into your neighbor's nose that you're punching the back of their skull out.
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I don't think it's worse than that, because _if_ someone attempted very few would be harmed. Nor do I think it's the same by any comparative measure. Shouting "Fire" in a theater harms numerous people that are all innocent. In the case of an assassination attempt, most likely the guy who tried to pull the trigger, and perhaps a body guard or two would be hurt and perhaps the politician. An attempted assassination would be one criminal trying to kill another criminal (at least using the sample names in T
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tl;dr: We put humans life (politician, criminal, or not) on a pedestal. That's part of being a civilized Republic.
Re:Assassination Politics (Score:4, Insightful)
Everyone's guilty of something these days - if they want to deal with you all they have to do is look closely enough.
If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him. - Cardinal Richelieu
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That's because he used the handwriting sample to forge contracts with the devil that his agents would then "discover" while searching his enemy's house (the Church had its own extensive judicial system in those days). It's one of those phrases, like "let them eat cake", that has been twisted and distorted from its original context even if it is not wholly apocryphal.
[citation needed]
absolutely the dumbest idea ever (Score:5, Insightful)
guaranteed to get the whole government in on breaking the Bitcoin chain, as well as getting your ass parked in a Federal prison for a whole lot of years. it's so idiotic that it has to be a government operation to suck in idiots who are looking for jail time.
Re:absolutely the dumbest idea ever (Score:5, Interesting)
No, it's guaranteed to divest some foolish people from spare bitcoins.
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this post is sarcasm (Score:4, Informative)
What, no direct link to the site?
How is this disturbing? (Score:5, Insightful)
1) People send in money.
2) After a while the site closes down.
3) Person that put up the site earns a nice profit.
The only disturbing part is the guy did it so early, someone with real planning would of waited for the US Presidential election and then really brought in the money.
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This. A million times this.
I wish I had a bitcoin scam to stand up while they're still $hundreds a coin....
Why do people send cash to god-knows-where and just pray it ever goes where it's supposed to...
Re:How is this disturbing? (Score:5, Insightful)
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It is pretty straight forward how it will work.
1) People send in money.
2) After a while the site closes down.
3) Person that put up the site earns a nice profit.
Strike number 3, an replace it with:
3) Three letter agency that put up the site knocks on your door.
Seriously, how could you not consider this might be a honeypot for kooks?
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Except that the assassination doesn't actually have to take place.
Merely offering money to such is illegal. Even if no money has actually changed hands yet.
seems wrong... (Score:4, Interesting)
it seems wrong that such a site with a list of people to execute could exist. it brings the good old lynch mob in to the digital era. fun times. gov officials should not have to operate in fear of assassination.
yet. it is interesting that this is exactly what the us gov is doing with its enemies, building hit lists, ranking them, and executing.
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Government officials should live in fear of their lives.
Says the person living in fear of other /. users.
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Just today I heard about a soccer world championship from years ago. Where a player in the national team of Columbia made a big mistake, they found him dead the next day with 12 bullets in his body.
So it's definitely not only politicians which should be careful it seems.
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That was an accident, he fell on his pistol that fired all 6 rounds, then he reloaded it and fell on it again.
Stop trying to make it sound like something other than a very simple and common accident.
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It is pretty straight forward how it will work.
1) People send in money.
2) After a while the site closes down.
3) Person that put up the site earns a nice profit.
Yes, tick off a community of users whose defining trait is that like to hire hit men, that sounds like a wonderful business plan.
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But where would they hire the hitmen after the site has closed?
Finally (Score:3)
Re:How is this disturbing? (Score:5, Funny)
Or some bizarre ultra-libertarian performance art.
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Is there a difference between a really good scam and "bizarre ultra-libertarian performance art"? I think they meet in the middle.
THIS is "bizarre ultra-libertarian performance art (Score:2)
Or it's simply a honeypot.
Or some bizarre ultra-libertarian performance art.
Still wouldn't be as bizarre or outlandish as the time in 2006 that Loyalist Michael Stone attempted to enter the Stormont Assembly in Northern Ireland and assassinate the leaders of Sinn Fein, then claimed that it was "performance art" [bbc.co.uk].
How do you claim the prize? (Score:2)
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Or, you're just really good at gu
Re:How do you claim the prize? (Score:5, Insightful)
Seems to me that the creator of that site is shortsighted in how he or she confirms who the assassin is. Namely, that the assassin has to be able to specify the date of death prior to the death. That task if fairly easy for a large number of ways of committing murder. But not always possible. For instance.
1. Poison
2. Opportunity - Assassin may be in a position where he or she has multiple chances of contact with the target, but is unable to predict exactly when the contact would be suitable for the actual assassination.
Frankly, the motive of the site creator is rather foolish and childish. Given this paragraph in the original article:
Sanjuro's grisly ambitions go beyond raising the funds to bankroll a few political killings. He believes that if Assassination Market can persist and gain enough users, it will eventually enable the assassinations of enough politicians that no one would dare to hold office. He says he intends Assassination Market to destroy "all governments, everywhere."
it seems to me that Sanjuro is advocating world wide anarchy.
I personally, don't like most governments, however total anarchy is worse than the government we currently have. Frankly, we need something to hold in check the various sociopathic assholes that from time to time attack other people. We need public services such as fire, police, sanitation, sewers, water, etc. There's a lot of infrastructure that frankly needs a government. And even well balanced, social people from time to time will disagree with each other. And said disagreements will from time to time get quite acrimonious. Hence the courts.
Frankly, Sanjuro is either a nutcase, or a honeypot. In either case, it would be best to avoid him.
Im on the list (Score:4, Insightful)
I would be expecting the NSA to be cracking Bitcoin / TOR as we speak to prosecute people for material support of terrorism.
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I would be expecting the NSA to be cracking Bitcoin / TOR as we speak to prosecute people for material support of terrorism.
Cracking bitcoin wouldn't help the feds track down anyone. All it would let them do is print free money, which they can pretty much do anyway. Bitcoin isn't anonymous; it's pseudonymous. The NSA can, with no effort at all, find out your Bitcoin pseudonym. Then they just need to associate your that with your real identity, which they can do via their traditional means of spying on everything that happens.
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Not really. If you mine your own coins or get them through secure physical transactions (exchanging USB flash drives) they can be anonymous. Spend them via Tor and on something like this which does not require any of your personal information.
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Once you spend them, your transaction (and your pseudonym) become part of the blockchain, and you are no longer anonymous (but are still pseudonymous). That is, anyone who checks the blockchain can find the id of who sent the coins. Anonymity relies on whether you can stop anyone making a connection between your blockchain id (pseudonym) and your actual identity - and you're correct, this is where things like Tor come in.
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I would expect them to be mining with some large ass cluster to fund new black projects.
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Everyone is on the list.
Jail time (Score:2)
I bet that the owner of the site could be charged with "conspiracy to commit murder".
Re:Jail time (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm fairly sure they don't charge agents running a honeypot...
Re:Jail time (Score:4, Insightful)
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That might be considered incitement but when monetary rewards come into it then it crosses the line into conspiracy.I doubt any politician or reporter ever said "I will pay someone $X to kill Assange."
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"University of Calgary Professor" "Tom Flanagan, a former aide to the Canadian prime minister, has called for Assange's assassination"
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/40467957/ns/us_news-wikileaks_in_security/t/assange-lawyer-condemns-calls-assassination-wikileaks-founder/ [nbcnews.com]
Canada is part of the US by now, isn't it? Did the kids sew another star on the flag yet?
Of course he was "obviously talking tongue-in-cheek" and got quoted out-of-contex
Re:Jail time (Score:4, Informative)
Sarah Palin only said it in a wink-wink-nudge-nudge way, and he's a she:
https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2010/11/does-palin-want-to-whack-assange/ [go.com]
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Canadian politician, not US.
So what if... (Score:4, Interesting)
...someone starts a bounty on the site for "Kuwabatake Sanjuro"?
Yaz
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I always knew I'd find a way to get back at that small town meter maid.....
Oh, just pay the meters for other people and they'll completely flip out [freekeene.com].
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Curse her for enforcing parking rules and not letting you do what ever the hell you want.
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...someone starts a bounty on the site for "Kuwabatake Sanjuro"?
Yaz
He's not a government official. Neat self-exclusion. Also by not offering hits against corporate officers (way more interesting), he prevents a large amount of extrajudicial consequence from hitting him (governments are ostensibly bound by laws, corporations can operate in low-law zones). Perhaps, he figures, focus on proving an MVP [1], and then expand to more profitable markets once he has a reasonable amount of success?
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_viable_product [wikipedia.org]
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"The Assassination Bureau", starring Diana Rigg (Mrs. Peel) amoung others. The IMDB summary has the spoiler, but it's basically about the parent post, set right before WWI.
You Can't Blow up a Social Relationship (Score:5, Insightful)
Political violence doesn't work to actually implement social change. It only plays into the hands of authoritarians who rule by fear, in this case fear of you. Kill Bernanke, and they have a great propaganda tool against your cause. And they can replace Bernanke with no trouble. And you haven't actually done anything to harm the people whose interests Bernanke is protecting.
There is an excellent essay on the topic, dating from the 1970s, titled You Can't Blow up a Social Relationship [libcom.org]. From the preamble:
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Political violence doesn't work to actually implement social change.
Shooting JFK was effective in changing policy.
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Uh it was? https://www.google.com/search?q=kennedy+vietnam [google.com]
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Yes, it was. Looking at his history, it's hard for me the believe he would have let it go past '66 or so.
The assassination put some one who wanted it to be a win at any cost war.
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Political violence doesn't work to actually implement social change. It only plays into the hands of authoritarians who rule by fear, in this case fear of you. Kill Bernanke, and they have a great propaganda tool against your cause. And they can replace Bernanke with no trouble. And you haven't actually done anything to harm the people whose interests Bernanke is protecting.
I like to think I shouldn't have to say I am not advocating the assassination of Bernanke, but you never know around here...
That said, an assassination of Bernanke might actually raise consciousness of the whole, "Wait, huh, the Federal Reserve is WHAT?!?" issue. It'd dominate news cycles. The assassin's manifesto explaining how "evil" the whole thing is might get poured over on news channels that aren't Fox. Who knows.
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Also, the vast majority of people may just realized the Federal Reserve serves a very good purpose and chose to ignore kooks.
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""Wait, huh, the Federal Reserve is WHAT?!?"
since everyone knows that, I"m not sure why killing him would do, in that regard.
It would disrupt markets.
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Political violence doesn't work to actually implement social change.
Education by Liberals equals stupidity. American Revolution (to name one). Civil War (to name another). If there is such a thing as a "good war", then the ones fought for liberty are the ones worth fighting, lest you end up a slave to a tyrant simply because you believe the lie "Resistance is Futile".
Unless of course you are looking for an individual (or small group) who pulls off a coup of some sort. In which case, you'd be equally wrong. The Assassination of MLK Jr, while it (helped) affected change, it w
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Unless of course you are looking for an individual (or small group) who pulls off a coup of some sort.
Yes, that is the type we're talking about here. By the time you have a popular uprising, the social relationship is already destroyed.
In which case, you'd be equally wrong. The Assassination of MLK Jr, while it (helped) affected change, it wasn't the change the assassin was aiming for.
And that's exactly the effect the authors of the essay are warning against. Small scale political violence is counter-prod
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What if you blow up the authoritarians? Say, the cock brothers?
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And they can replace Bernanke with no trouble.
Like, they could replace Bernanke with this person [wikipedia.org], who has already been selected to replace Bernanke... (though not yet confirmed by the Senate)
It seems like a bad time to have Bernanke at the top of the list. What's the bounty on the new lady?
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Looking over what you quoted, seems to drive my point home, no?
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"Political violence doesn't work to actually implement social change. "
that's why the Americas are British, Hitler is still running Europe, and Japan has a a world power military.
POlitical violence is what cause the former democratic and liberal Mideastern countries to turn into religious theocracy.
Bernanke and Bitcoin (Score:2)
Searching for Ben Bernanke brings up as first news "BERNANKE: Bitcoin 'May Hold Long-Term Promise'
Business Insider - 4 hours ago
Ben Bernanke sort of endorses Bitcoin."
Do you think he knew of the bounty?
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Bernanke endorse US bonds. Do you think he endorses paying meth whores for $10 backstreet hummers?
Anyone Else Remember the Pentagon Futures Market? (Score:3)
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/3072985/ [nbcnews.com]
~Sticky
Oh right... Ben Bernanke, of COURSE. (Score:5, Interesting)
... only the guy who near single-handedly saved the world economy from total and utter destruction.
(YES, he did have a bit to do with the bubble in the first place... but that was mostly the previous free-market, deregulationist Fed chairman's fault.)
Of course, this assassination nonsense is a scam and a horrific idea. But sweet jesus, these anti-Fed demogogues are such self-denialist losers. Sure, let's go back to the gold standard so we can have a Panic every 15 years. Let's relinquish total control over our money supply and our economy for absolutely no reason. Let's just hand over our nation's economic advantage as the world's go-to currency... great idea... ...say the same idiots who insisted QE would lead to global hyperinflation (wrong), that the biggest problem our government has is the national debt (wrong), that nations need to tighten their belts during a recession (wrong), that there was no gold bubble (wrong), and that nothing bad would ever happen if we default... How many times do these people have to be proven wrong, over and over?
But I guess it makes sense that the ultra-paranoid sorts of people who would be attracted to the idea of bitcoin are the same ones who would hold some kind of insane vendetta against the Fed, totally missing the mark on who REALLY to blame for the near collapse and meltdown of western civilization.
The name Sanjuro Kuwabatake (Score:5, Informative)
For people who don't get the joke, "kuwabatake" means "mulberry farm" in Japanese (where you would raise silk worms).
"Sanjuro" is a standard alias for a 30 year old guy [wikipedia.org] (it literally means "30 year old guy", more or less).
PsyOps? (Score:2)
I wonder if this isn't an operation to sour the public on Bitcoin? I mean, not that it needs much to sour the folks here on Slashdot, but the common Joe/Jane on the street might need some Emmanuel Goldsteins to scream at for two minutes.
And with all the revelations of Snowden and Wikileaks, calling someone a "tinfoil hatter" has lost most of it's sting.
hmm (Score:2)
Summary ripped without attribution? (Score:2)
Summary appears to be ripped verbatim from zerohedge. Or did it originate somewhere else? It'd be nice if people would cite their sources.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-11-18/dark-web-exposes-75000-bitcoin-based-bounty-bernankes-assassination [zerohedge.com]
CIA funding? (Score:2)
business method patent (Score:4, Insightful)
For every assassination bounty hosted they should also host a corresponding anti-assassination bounty. The assassin would be paid the net pro-assassination value, that is, the difference between the two bounties, and the bounty hosting site would keep the remainder. For opposing interests of equal magnitude in a bidding war this would be hugely profitable for the bounty hosting site and also result in nobody actually getting assassinated. It would also be more equitable because it represents the opinions of both pro-assassination and anti-assassination sides, not just the pro-assassination side.
Though seriously, the entire subject is revolting. Almost every American, love Obama or hate Obama, love Bush or hate Bush, agrees that they do not want their President to be assassinated. Despite disagreements in American politics, there are essential fundamental core values which unite us all, and that we do not assassinate our leaders is one of them.
Great business plan (Score:2)
1) Create anonymous crowd funding website for dodgy activity people won't want to own up to (out of fear, like drug or murder prosecution). ...
2) Have people give you money.
3) Shut down site and pocket money.
Profit!
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You may want another recipient to collect the bounty while you do what you otherwise do not mind doing, or may even be inclined to do. The world is a diverse place.
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
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Oh I disagree. I would imagine the population there would be familiar with the Silk Road.
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Of course, Bitcoin probably doesn't go very far at the Terre Haute prison commissary.....
Oh I disagree. I would imagine the population there would be familiar with the Silk Road.
I think that's the Hershey Highway you're thinking of.
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... That you know of.
Re:The problem is collecting the bounty (Score:5, Informative)
The last few chumps who took shots at US Presidents all lived to talk about it.
Every successful US presidential assassination has resulted in the assassin's death:
Lincoln: The assassin, John Wilkes Booth, was tracked down by Union soldiers and killed.
Garfield: The assassin, Charles Guiteau, was executed by hanging.
McKinley: The assassin, Leon Czolgosz, was executed by electric chair.
Kennedy: The assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald*, was shot in the Dallas Police Headquarters.
*There are plenty of conspiracy theorists that disagree with this. However, if you're in the "he didn't act alone," but that he was the shooter, he was still killed. If you believe he wasn't the shooter, then whoever was remains unknown and wouldn't have the opportunity to collect their bounty.
Of course, if you do it in another country you might have a chance at survival. For example, the dude who threw a grenade at GWB in the country of Georgia received a life sentence because Georgia (the country) has abolished the death penalty, even though he did kill a Georgian high ranking agent when being apprehended. Of course, if he had been successful the US may have intervened and killed the guy. Either way, at best he would have had to enjoy his bitcoins from a Georgian prison.
So how could you get away with surviving it, yet be known to have done it so you can collect your bitcoins?
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Is that what I think it is? They aren't simply content on using slave labor anymore in prisons, they're also turning the slavers into consumers for double the profits?
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I'd rather not use one. According to the ads, deodorants are sexy as hell, and sexiness and prisons are disastrous bedfellows.
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Actually by killing someone important you'd probably be more likely to live these days. They'd want to know if you were working alone, so you'd end up in some black site across the globe being tortured.
After that was over they might kill you, or more likely make a public example out of you.
Re:I'm so sorry. (Score:5, Funny)
Perhaps they should crowd-fund it to get higher bounties.
Ya, I saw something on Slashdot [slashdot.org] about that.
Re:Once Again Missing Perspectives (Score:5, Insightful)
But compared to these people, the worst in American government are like boy scouts
Not really. One example you gave was "anyone from a Mexican drug cartel". But mexican drug cartels are only dangerous because drugs are illegal. Those who vote to keep drugs illegal are just as responsible for those deaths as the cartels are. Further, they're responsible for every death caused by impure drugs, or drugs of unknown concentration.
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Not only that, but even if we take the deaths and horrors the US government is directly responsible for, by actions which are violent in nature (so I'm excluding both inaction and disastrous economic measures, for the purposes of this comparion). they beat the mexican cartels pretty easily. Look at the number of dead and wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan. Look at the US prision system: almost 1% of its population is behind bars - that's more than 2 million people. Working people, producing armaments and other
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Straw man*. Just because I said the US goverment is arguably worse does not mean I'm saying other criminals are innocent or any less bad. This isn't a sports match, one "side" doesn't have to "win". And we'll have to agree to disagree on the whole "Afghanistan was necessary" thing and on the classification of what the American military did. Their actions weren't only "criminal negligence", they were straight up war crimes by definition.
*That would be misrepresenting some else's argument, like you did to min
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The problem with your list, is that without exception, every one of them has a well-established and documented reputation for hunting down and killing those who target them for assassination.
So please! By all means, go for it. I'd ask you to tell us how it went, but somehow, I don't think we'll need you to tell us?
We'll find what's left of you on the 6-o-clock news.