GOP eyes seizing mansions, yachts of corrupt executives

Washington Times ^ | 7/27/02 | Dave Boyer

[kattracks]

House Republican leaders, heading home to face voters anxious over retirement security, announced yesterday they will introduce legislation to seize the mansions and yachts of corrupt corporate executives.

"We need to do more to strip corrupt corporate kingpins of their ill-gotten gains," said House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, Texas Republican. "We're taking the mansion. We're draining the accounts. And we're coming after the yacht."

[Brad’s Gramma]

. "Nothing is more pitiful or more funny than a flock of repentant politicians in full flight," said Rep. David R. Obey, Wisconsin Democrat.

Yep, ya ought to know all about that! You, sir, from what I hear from relatives aren't the epitome of virtue yourself!!!

[j271]

Isn't this just trading our property rights for political capital to be spent in the mid-term elections?

[dennisw]

GOP eyes seizing mansions, yachts of corrupt executives

Looks like a plan to me. And drag the perps to their arraignment in handcuffs. The public will love this and so will I. This  is how you win elections!

[Carry_Okie]

What is obvious about all of this is the time line:

Bush takes office in late January. He spends the first month fixing up a deliberately trashed White House and dealing with Jeffords' defection. He spends the next three months trying to recover from the late start due to the SNAFU in Florida and unprecedented stalling on his appointments in the Senate. By that time it's July. Two months later there's a war going on.

Now, even if all this malfeasance was Bush's fault and he started setting it up the day he got into office, it still takes a year for it to be accomplished, and another three months to be accounted and reported. Working backward from today that means he somehow managed to get everything in place for these scandals to happen in a matter of a couple of months after taking office.

It's not amazing the Slave Party thinks that they can make it stick with all the help that they'll get from the media. It IS amazing the GOP is so stupid that they will probably let the thugs that DID set this up get away with it.

[Bandolier]

Hmmmm, If I declare bankruptcy, they can take my toothbrush, and sell it at auction.
The Congress has decided that bankruptcy laws need to get tougher.

I think the rich f*cks need to be deprived of their yachts.

[jenny65]

"So, we seize assets so that they don't run off to the Caribbean or off to trial lawyers, that they stay in a bank account so that they can be allocated to their rightful owner."

Well, as long as the investors and employees get first crack at it (and I mean 100%) and not the government, I'm all for it. The government should not get one red penny of the proceeds until the true "rightful owners" are paid.

[Jonathon Spectre]

Just call them "drug offenders", then you can take whatever you want without the inconvenience of a "trial" or "charges".

[Post Toasties]

With measures such as this, Republicans should come to be known as the Party of Corporate Responsibility.

[GretchenEE]

lawmakers said it will contain provisions to seize assets of corrupt corporate executives, prevent those assets from paying the fees of lawyers in such cases

Now that's cutting into the veins, it is, and about darn time.

[Timesink]

Isn't this just trading our property rights for political capital to be spent in the mid-term elections?

The "sink your cash into construction of a giant mansion before the bankruptcy court or criminal trial judge can take it away from you" trick was never anything more than a loophole. If you stole hundreds of millions from individual investors and their pension funds, you are a criminal. Criminals lose most of their rights.

[Jesse]

Bad idea.

I have no problem with criminal charges against corporate executives who commit fraud, and then seizing assets, but I have a big problem with giving the government authority to seize property "just in case" or because someone "might" be guilty. Where is a 15 million dollar mansion going to go, anyway. Unlike drug dealers, the assets of white collar types are going to be much easier to track. After these big scandals are gone, the law will still be on the books, and it will be abused.

Just like the PATRIOT act, this is an election year stunt which is unnecessary and which will have unintended, bad, consequences.

[kattracks]

I guess so, if you're a crook who has bilked thousands of people and have gained from it.

[Red Jones]

I read recently that government had in the last 20? years modified laws to allow different ways of doing some accounting procedures and that these systems offered great temptation to the business class. Now that some of them took advantage and created a catastrophe we are all shocked. They must rush forward and arrest the guilty now.

It sounds like a replay of late 80's s&l crisis.

[Askel5]

I'll be darned! The plot's picking up in this year's Morality Play for the August summer news slump. The confiscating of mansions and yachts is so much more Dramatic than merely cranking the cash the State intends to collect in penalties.

Our annual dose of Character Training comes like clockwork thanks to scandals that shoot up like summer water spouts ... slim little whips threatening destruction This way or That but sans the staying power of a hurricane or the indiscriminate path of a tornado ... just a tight spin high and steady enough for all to see.

(Though it's true sustainable Show Trials will allow the Dems a Lord of the Flies dance and pounding of chests sufficient to circle GOP faithful wagons gone astray with CFR, ESCR and assorted other disappointments. Could be an upside in all this ...)

A pity this particular Morality Play on Corporate Governance hits so close to home -- as opposed to the Little Elian or the Condidit soap operas. Nothing like rocking the Retirement boat of the mutual fund Collective of the masses to put the fear of God in 'em, though.

Someone -- the State, maybe? -- should save us from the Five-Year-Plan, slash and burn CEO's who held the Stockholders' Black Line steadily Progressive by whatever means necessary.

The concept's a bullseye! I think folks are gonna relate to taking from the Rich to ... to ...

(They're gonna give these yachts and mansions to the poor, right? Return the property to the "rightful owners" whose wealth was stolen? Or does the GOP tale of Robin Hood end with the State's getting to keep and/or sell the property somehow?)

[Kerberos]

"Just call them "drug offenders", then you can take whatever you want without the inconvenience of a "trial" or "charges".

"Mr. Baker said he hopes the legislation will give the SEC seizure powers much like the Drug Enforcement Administration"

Yep, looks like the forfeiture laws from the WOD are going to get to spread their wings a little here. I am absolutely amazed by the number of people on this board that are more than willing to flush their Constitutional rights down the toilet if they, in the most remote way, believe it will solve the immediate problem in front of them.

[Timesink]

Yep, ya ought to know all about that! You, sir, from what I hear from relatives aren't the epitome of virtue yourself!!!

Looking at his opensecrets.org profile, he appears to be a TOTAL whore to the Wisconsin union cabal. Almost every one of his top 20 donations is some union.

[Kerberos]

"If you stole hundreds of millions from individual investors and their pension funds, you are a criminal. Criminals lose most of their rights.

The rights of the accused, as provided for by the Constitution, are not solely for the benefit of the person being accused. They are to protect all of us, a fact that is unfortunately lost on many.

[Timesink]

Yep, looks like the forfeiture laws from the WOD are going to get to spread their wings a little here. I am absolutely amazed by the number of people on this board that are more than willing to flush their Constitutional rights down the toilet if they, in the most remote way, believe it will solve the immediate problem in front of them.

We don't know yet whether the SEC seizure powers will be as screwy as the DEA's. We know the DEA's a bunch of gun-toting thugs. But the SEC is nothing but a bunch of underpaid lawyers and accountants.

[Timesink]

The rights of the accused, as provided for by the Constitution, are not solely for the benefit of the person being accused. They are to protect all of us, a fact that is unfortunately lost on many.

I thought (obviously incorrectly) that it was implied that a "criminal" is one already convicted, not merely indicted.