Politics aside, he isn't a "little guy". He apparently holds the rank of master sergeant. That's a senior battalion-level role and somewhat political.
This isn't some random E-4 getting dragged.
Yes, there are some hard working NCOs and junior Os out there that make shit happen, but they are not the decision makers and make for great fall guys when shit hits the fan.
Not that it’s defensible behavior.
To be fair, that bar is quite a bit lower these days, but still..
Pursuing this case doesn’t mean they’re excluding other cases. If you read the article this case was very clear because he made amateur moves and didn’t conceal his identity at all.
This was an easy nab. All leaks should be pursued regardless of who did it.
A 400 million plane "donation"
I am guessing that you would not actually go all-in against a penny, and I’m curious to know what implied probability you actually offer. I will see your bet amount as an expression of your confidence level. If you say that you don’t bet, I’ll take that as an indication that you have no confidence, and believe the probability to be something above 50%
The Trump admin will not be held accountable for the blatant market manipulation and betting on internal info they engage in. That’s the smart “bet” metaphorically speaking. It’s a self enriching circus.
His salary this year was probably about $118k on standard pay scales. I’m not sure what your definition of little guy is, but to me that qualifies
(Not trying to be condescending to anybody here, that’s not far off my salary and I’d definitely call myself the little guy)
This is absolutely a low level soldier getting dragged.
Yesterday, people could justifiably say that betting on polymarket had essentially no consequences.
Today, we learned there can be consequences.
If in a year’s time this is the only person to ever be charged, that’s a different story.
He also made it all very obvious and traceable for them through the email addresses he used. From the report it doesn’t appear that he made any effort to conceal his identity or hide his tracks until afterward, by which time it was too late.
He wasn't a "little guy" but apparently his only mistake was not being high enough.
I know you’re trying to make a separate point about Congress, but it’s silly to try to turn this into a class warfare thing. Congress didn’t even have this information at the time.
> Today’s announcement makes clear no one is above the law
What others are saying, IIUC, is that no reasonable person believes an enlisted soldier (even a senior one) is above the law and that in fact there is a history of them being used as fall guys or scapegoats for people who do enjoy protection on the basis of their social class or government position.
Without this specific statement from the FBI director, then it would be "soldier gets caught doing bad thing" and the other part would be off topic. But the article itself introduces the idea of class and impunity.
> ...but it’s silly to try to turn this into a class warfare thing.
You can ignore the class warfare but the class warfare isn't ignoring you/your country.
It’s a hot take. It’s also a one off. You don’t have to strategize building the case law to then enable further investigations and prosecutions, a process which takes year and is beyond the internet’s attention span. (Silver lining: these takes are also mostly meaningless. Gears will grind on.)
Rule of Law means no one is above the law. In practice this is an aspiration (in the U.S. and everywhere else) but giving up on that isn’t going to make the world better.
I often think about how much we can trust history 20-30 years from now. It is hard to trust history from hundreds of years ago, either because it was written by victors or because there just isn't enough material in the first place. I suppose we have the opposite problem now (and in the future) - too much noise and junk, whole bunch of it generated by AI slop - where does one even start?
Then clear the docket because you're going to need a lot of investigators to even begin on the Trump administration.
Here's a recent article from the American Bar Association on the rampant and on-going f*ckery.
https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/resources/human-righ...
False, conspiratorial, dogmatic, juvenile.
The arrest and indictment of someone for betting on Polymarket - which has not yet been tested in court - is going to give huge attention and precedence to the likely illegal activities of some of Polymarket shenanigans coming out of the white house.
Edit: if this was political, it would be pushed in the other direction. This is the NY DOJ doing their jobs.
I don't think this is going to be Hacker News fascinating discourse, but the current USA administration is so openly, brazenly, continuously, gleefully corrupt; continuously fire people with ethics and competence and bring in the in-group of equally corrupt ; and have continuously been rewarded for that behaviour; that I feel the OP is merely observationally factual.
None of this remotely has to do with 'Conservatism', it's certainly not ideological, and it's likely not political either.
This indictment is going to cause a massive headache for White House as they have likely been involved in 'insider trading'.
This is actually regular Justice, finally seeing some movement, to cynically characterize it as otherwise, totally against common sense (aka it's bad for the WH) is just unsound. I think it demonstrates the kind of bubble a lot of people live in, which is maybe understandable in the current climate, where horrible behaviours have gone unpunished. But still. This is the story of a state doj doing their job.
This is a hugely negative thing for the Administration, as District Attorneys, SEC staff, etc. are going to be actively seeking how this could parlay into investigations and indictments of the people in the White House making Polymarket and other speculative bets just before government actions.
There are 100's lawyers reading that right now getting inspired on how they can take action to turn their investigative powers onto whoever those actors are aka family members or associates of those in the White House / Cabinet.
An investigation could be done at the State Level, away from the control of the DoJ, and, if it yields evidence, it wouldn't have to even make it's way through the courts in order to be political destructive.
The suggestion by the OP this has anything to do with ideology or the ruling power throwing one under the bus is ridiculous. Note that the ruling regime isn't above such a thing, but that's not what is happening here because it definitely does not serve their interests - it's the total opposite.
This could turn into a political nightmare that crashes the party.
Edit: if we want to be 'hopefully cynical' - recognize that this could absolutely be the vector that takes the man down, or even many of them. Imagine how many WH, Cabinet Members, family members could get investigated for this and under purvue of state investigators where the investigation can't get shut down.
Watch: Wilholt's essay consists of exactly and only one indefensible, rhetorical sleight of hand. Consequently, no one can honestly defend it. Attempts to do so are undeserving of serious scrutiny.
After tearing down a strawman, he claims high ground:
> The law cannot protect anyone unless it binds everyone; and it cannot bind anyone unless it protects everyone.
But you'll get a fair bit of support for Wilholt's so-called anti-conservative principle from a fair number of prominent conservative thinkers.
Many prominent conservative thinkers are not particularly big fans of Trump. They like portions of his initiatives and policies but not him as a standard bearer, because he does dumb, ill-principled stuff at odds with conservatism.
Peggy Noonan of the WSJ can't write two sentences without letting you know how much she disdains Trump, e.g.
This is the functional equivalent of a fictional character named Neggy Poonan saying "I really hate the Nazi's, but you know if I don't vote for Hitler the other guy will win"
Are people allowed to be self-made anymore?
For me personally, after years of planning and hard work, I once managed to secure myself about $40k of passive income from a blockchain in crypto; this lasted a few years but eventually the founders suspiciously abandoned the entire tech stack (for no reason) and switched to Ethereum; this destroyed the opportunity for me; literally lost that stream entirely. Now, recently, I was able to re-establish a passive income stream of about $10k per year from a non-crypto source; this is from an opportunity I took over 10 years ago... I'm worried about that being taken away somehow.
This isn't joe schlub making side bets here. This is a senior late-career enlisted in an extremely sensitive position violating all of their trust and authority to cash out big.