So casino mogul & RNC official Steve Wynn is lobbying the president on behalf of the Chinese government. Amazing. https://t.co/Aqr1BQwHDV
— Neil King (@NKingofDC) October 23, 2017
From an American perspective, making Donald ‘Pissy Galore‘ Trump the James Bond stand-in pretty well guarantees a box-office failure. But in the booming Chinese viewing market, who can tell?
(All I know for certain is that it would be kharmic justice if every single individual name-checked in this story were to come to a bad end. But if anyone has better information, please share!)
The Wall Street Journal broke the story, which is some kind of indicator right there. (Since I don’t have a WSJ subscription, I found a screencap of the article, which may or may not have infected my laptop with unknown malware.)
The Guardian picked it up, today:
… The Wall Street Journal described a Chinese government attempt to put pressure on Guo Wengui, a real estate tycoon living in exile in New York, to halt his allegations of corruption in high places in China.
A group of officials from China’s ministry of state security, who entered the US on visas that did not allow them to conduct official business, visited Guo in his New York apartment in May, and used veiled threats in an attempt to persuade Guo to stop his accusatory tweets, which have a wide following in China, and return home. Guo shrugged off the pressure and made a recording of his conversation with the officials, part of which he posted online.
After that visit, FBI agents confronted the Chinese officials at New York’s Pennsylvania Station. The Chinese visitors first claimed to be cultural diplomats and then admitted they were security officials. The agents warned them they were violating the terms of their visa and told them to leave the country.
However, two days later, just before leaving the country, the Chinese officials paid a second visit to Guo, triggering a debate within the administration over whether they should be arrested. FBI agents were posted at John F Kennedy airport ready to carry out the arrests before the officials boarded their flight, but they were not made, after the state department argued it could trigger a diplomatic crisis.
Guo has filed an application for political asylum in the US, which is pending. But according to the Journal’s account, Trump called for Guo’s deportation in a discussion on policy towards China, describing him as a “criminal” at an Oval Office policy meeting in June, on the basis of a letter from Beijing accusing him of serious crimes…
The Financial Times had an earlier article about why the Chinese government is unhappy with Mr. Guo:
…China’s choreographed politics is not designed for public participation or questioning. But Mr Guo’s determined assault has questioned the reputation of Wang Qishan, the second-most powerful politician, and cast doubt on the integrity of the anti-corruption purge that Beijing claims is a success.
“In a country of 1.4bn, only my voice stands out. My greatest impact has been to allow Chinese to hear a different voice,” he says.That voice has accused anti-corruption investigators of shaking down people for money or sexually assaulting women in their custody while politicians sire illegitimate children and sock away wealth in trusts and houses overseas.
Mr Guo says he garnered such knowledge through his years as an insider in China’s seamy mix of politics and business, as a property developer who worked in partnership with the country’s dreaded state security forces.
Social media have allowed Mr Guo an unfiltered platform, although Facebook or YouTube have on occasion cut off his feeds. Western journalists have been frustrated with inconsistencies or lack of evidence for some of his claims — a concern shared by few among Mr Guo’s fascinated Chinese audience…
Mr Guo’s chief target has been Mr Wang, Mr Xi’s powerful whip, who has spearheaded the anti-corruption purge on Mr Xi’s behalf. Over the past two decades Mr Wang has served as Wall Street’s primary point of contact in the Chinese hierarchy…
LawFare, in its collaboration with the Brookings Institute, has a timeline:
… Guo—also known as Miles Kwok—has spoken out against corruption in the highest echelons of the Chinese government. In response, China issued an Interpol red notice for his arrest earlier this year. Chinese law enforcement launched 19 separate criminal prosecutions against Guo, including charges of bribery, kidnapping, corruption and rape. In early September, Guo applied for political asylum in the United States.
On August 28, Rep. Ed Royce, the Chairman of the House foreign affairs committee, and Sen. Marco Rubio inquired about whether VOA News was responding to Chinese government pressure when it cut short a live broadcast of an interview with Guo in April. After the VOA abruptly ended the segment, five employees at the VOA’s Mandarin service were placed on administrative leave. A VOA employee said that Beijing threatened the visas of several reporters in China.
A month later, the Washington Free Beacon reported on September 29 that the FBI was investigating a cyber intrusion into Clark Hill, a law firm that had been advising Guo on his political asylum application. According to reports, private investigators have linked the intrusion to China and South Korea. Shortly thereafter, an anonymous Twitter account began posting confidential documents, including Guo’s application documents. One post identified the names of two FBI agents working with Guo. Twitter has since suspended that account. Clark Hill no longer represents Guo…
My question is why Wynn and not Mark Brown or Sheldon Adelson, who Trump speaks with frequently…
— Linnoh (@NohYSLin) October 23, 2017
Wynn is the official finance chair for RNC. They don't even TRY to hide the graft anymore.
— P. S.™ R. I. P. (@Patrixmyth) October 23, 2017
Two things
1) this is astoundingly corrupt
2) this is what they mean by “America First” apparently https://t.co/7s3wM3SMsU— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes) October 23, 2017
I don’t think Americans are ready, psychologically, for how fast China is gong to overtake us as a world power on the current course.
— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) October 23, 2017
They're 100% ready to blame Obama. https://t.co/7QwHzulqfw
— Schooley (@Rschooley) October 24, 2017
Major Major Major Major
??
Adam L Silverman
The issue here is how the PRC made the approach to the President: through the RNC finance chair who has businesses within the PRC’s purview. And how the senior staff staved off the President’s response: by telling him that Guo was a member of Mar a Lago.
gocart mozart
The GOP needs to be ripped out by its roots and the ground upon which it stands salted so that nothing may grow again in its staid.
The RICO statute needs to be applied to a political party?
Anne Laurie
@Adam L Silverman: And how Trump — or at least the people around him who can rub two thoughts together — think this would be a better country if only “our” oligarchs had as much power as “their” oligarchs.
Or so I thought!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I tell ya, it’s getting so ya can’t turn around these day without tripping over the strangest coincidences
Adam L Silverman
@Anne Laurie: I’m not sure I follow you’re line of reasoning. Please clarify.
Mary G
@Adam L Silverman: He’s a crook…wait, a member of Mar-a-Lago?..a fine upstanding person! He pays me $250,000!
Adam L Silverman
@Mary G: Eez a puzzlement!
NotMax
The Great Leap Backward.
Thru the Looking Glass...
@gocart mozart:
Aw man… I’ve been saying that for like a year now…
MattF
Not a surprise. One supposes Trump got his information about Guo directly from Chinese officials– you know, the same officials that Guo is spilling the beans on. It’s not as though Trump actually knows anything about anything– he wants to do Xi a favor, make a deal. Not as much as he wants to do Mr. Putin a favor– but it’s a similar situation.
Thru the Looking Glass...
First Bill Browder… and now this guy…
Who’s going to turn up dead first?
And where?
Major Major Major Major
Wasn’t this fella an issue during the election? I remember some Times pieces.
Adam L Silverman
@gocart mozart: @Thru the Looking Glass…: What if we just let this Rico at them?
Adam L Silverman
@Major Major Major Major: That was Gulen. He’s Turkish. Lives in the Poconos. You really need to up your dissidents in exile in the US wanted by people paying Republican officials to send them home game.
MattF
@Major Major Major Major: I guess Wynn is the fixer. Every large, corrupt organization needs one. Although the RNC probably has… several.
Major Major Major Major
@Adam L Silverman: no, it was definitely a Chinese guy who also had this guy’s name who I’m thinking of.
efgoldman
I wonder if Mueller and his merry band have too much knowledge of too many crimes, and they’re spending lots and lot of time prioritizing.
ArchTeryx
@Adam L Silverman: The joke in my sci-fi club is that what the Colonial Marines were missing in Aliens were these froods. They’d have had the xenomorphs running away with their tail tucked between their legs out of sheer Whiskey Tango Foxtrot.
hilts
OT
h/t http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/23/media/bill-oreilly-misconduct-allegations
Millard Filmore
@Thru the Looking Glass…:
I hear private parties can bring RICO charges to the court system. Its not easy but it was discussed at the no longer updating site groklaw.com
Omnes Omnibus
@Millard Filmore: Have fun with that.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@hilts:
Billo might become an atheist. Fuck I hope not, we already get a bad enough name from assholes like Sam Harris.
Major Major Major Major
@hilts: Christ, what an asshole.
efgoldman
@hilts:
If there really was a god, that schmuck would be a smoldering cinder on the sidewalk in front of Fox
Millard Filmore
@efgoldman:
I thought he was constrained to look into Trump-Republican-Russian cross pollination. China may be beyond his authority to investigate beyond simply publishing the various facts he bumps into.
Major Major Major Major
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: Pretty sure it’s Dawkins, Maher, and Hitchens giving atheists a bad name. I know Harris has had his (much smaller) share of controversy but he’s actually a pretty insightful philosopher of mind.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
Why hasn’t the media at large talked about the danger Republican voter suppression, gerrymandering, and dark money etc efforts have on competitive multi-party democracy yet? They keep getting distracted by stupid shiny shit. The GOP wants a one-party state like PRI had in Mexico for 71 years and Putin has in Russia now. So few people outside political junkies realize this…
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@Major Major Major Major:
He sure seems to really hate Muslims.
Oh and I’m also planning on signing up for your Pathfork thing.
danielx
Oh, for the days when I hemorrhaged over the Bush Regency’s incompetence and corruption….I mean, they make Condi Rice look like Cardinal fucking Richelieu.
Major Major Major Major
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: All ready to go, I just deployed the soft launch version, be my guest. https://pathfork.herokuapp.com
(ETA: I know you use other online writing tools so I was actually going to solicit your feedback, thanks!)
I’ve read much of what he’s had to say about Muslims (which he takes pains to clarify is about some believers in Islam, not “Muslims” writ large), and I would absolutely disagree that he “hates Muslims”. He does have a tendency to bloviate from secondhand knowledge when he gets into an area where he isn’t an expert–Schneier tears him to shreds on profiling, for example–but he’s willing to engage on the topic. I try to stick to reading him for analytical philosophy, if at all. These days I mostly encounter him tangentially while reading better philosophers like Dennett.
His podcast isn’t half bad either, although electoral politics is another area where he bloviates.
efgoldman
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?:
Answered your own question.
rikyrah
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
????
Mike J
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: Anybody who talks religion professionally is probably an asshole personally.
GregB
For 300 million I can have a few guys stock that swamp with Whitefish.
-Ryan Zinke
Mike J
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Major Major Major Major
@Mike J: I would extend that to anyone who talks for a living.
GregB
For 300 million I can have a few guys stock that swamp with Whitefish.
-Ryan Zinke
Brachiator
During his recent 3 hour Congress Party speech,
From the Guardian
Guo is a major embarrassment to the Chinese leadership and directly contradicts their claim of competence with respect to weeding out corruption.
El Caganer
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: Because the Russian Connection is hot ‘n sexy. There’s a Sinister Foreign Power (about which you have few real facts, so you can spin the bullshit speculation at warp speed) and there’s a Great Supervillain in Vladimir (sort of a combo of General Zod and Professor Moriarty). If you’ve got material like that, who cares about State Senator Hogleg P. Sawbuck’s legislation requiring polling sites for the coloreds be located on one of the moons of Jupiter? I mean, it’s stuff that can actually be proved – you’d have to assign actual reporters – it’s local, mean, and grubby. Boring! Isn’t it more fun just sitting in your office concocting stories of master spies run amok throughout America’s governmental structure?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
paleo-conservative professor at the Naval War College
Steeplejack
(Reposted with naughty word fixed.)
The Wall Street Journal link in Neil King’s tweet at the top goes to the full story on their site, at least for now.
Of note:
Fuckin’ amazing.
Anne Laurie
@Major Major Major Major: Well after the election, but there was this post…
?BillinGlendaleCA
“It’s time for Dodger Baseball”.
Major Major Major Major
@Anne Laurie: god, maybe it was that and it just feels like it’s been over a year.
Jersey Tomato
@hilts:
I know a lot of guys are proud of their equipment and give it a little nickname, but I think O’Reilly goes too far when he calls his love muscle “God”.
barb 2
@Major Major Major Major:
re Pathfork
I’m outlining a book idea on Pathfork — I have for the November Novel marathon. I’m going at it cold to see if I can push the outline further than I did a couple of years ago. One good thing is that “Grammarly” works with Pathfork. Grammarly works with Chrome OS which I really like over Microsoft 8 — I won’t use Microsoft 10 ever. Chrome OS is fast without the nonsense.
burnspbesq
@Major Major Major Major:
Harris has also written some things that can be read as saying that genocide against people of faith is morally imperative.
lowtechcyclist
Sounds like they’re saying, “no, don’t give him to the Chinese for free now – if we hang onto him for the time being, we might be able to get something good in a trade for him.”
And those are the (relative) ‘good guys’ in the Administration.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@El Caganer:
Not exactly what I meant. Russia is still a very serious issue and Putin a revanchist threat to world peace and democratic governance everywhere. His actions put in jeopardy millions of lives as well as a potentially post-scarcity future where the world remains relatively stable the last several decades and technological progress continues as it has over that time period. I’m really pissed at him for his selfish short-sightedness.