SEC's Agora-Phobia (Agora - publisher of The Daily Reckoning and Mogambo Guru charged with fraud)

New York Post ^ | April 21, 2003 | Christopher Byron

[Chipata]

"I just sent them the headline and a link to the page on FreeRepublic and asked for an explanation and comment."

Given the evidence you have been presented with that's rather like writing to Hitler to find out whether he's really anti-Semitic.

[Chipata]

"So to it is with commercial speech -- with the market. In fact with the absence of the pulpit from our political lives, from participation in political speech, commericial speech is that much more important to POLITICAL expression. You cannot restrain commercial speech in the realm of ideas and subjective constructs without causing harm to Liberty."

No doubt you also enjoy yelling "Fire!" in a crowded theater.

[bvw]

What is your intereest in this case? Do you or did you work for or with the SEC? Did you buy the newsletter? Are you a lawyer or other actor considereing a claim against the newsletter publisher? Do you work for a competitor? What is that chip on your shoulder?

[bvw]

Non-sequitor. Wonderful way of discussion you have there. Really moves things forward, eh?

[Chipata]

"What is your intereest in this case? Do you or did you work for or with the SEC? Did you buy the newsletter? Are you a lawyer or other actor considereing a claim against the newsletter publisher? Do you work for a competitor? What is that chip on your shoulder?"

It's far more pertinent to ask why you are defending the indefensible?

N.B. The above is a rhetorical question. There will be very few posters who won't be able to guess at the reasons why you appear to have such a personal interest in the wrong side of a fraud case.

[arete]

Given the evidence you have been presented with that's rather like writing to Hitler to find out whether he's really anti-Semitic.

I think that you have a hidden agenda here. Not sure what it is. I just happen to think that it would be nice to hear from the other side especially when it involves accusations of fraud. I don't see what you are so worried about. I expect that they (the publisher) will just deny the charges and refer me to some legal beagle law firm that they hired. Daughty's comments might be interesting though.

What's with the Hitler reference? Seems to be a lot of that going around lately.

Richard W.

[Chipata]

"Non-sequitor"

Actually it's not a non sequitur at all. Try Holmes' judgement in Schenk vs the United States for further illumination.

[Chipata]

"I think that you have a hidden agenda here. Not sure what it is."

If only you could look in a mirror. Do you also have relatives who still believe the earth is flat? Do you?

[Chipata]

"What's with the Hitler reference? Seems to be a lot of that going around lately."

A variation on a theme: That's like writing to Chirac to find out whether he's anti-American. Capiche?

[arete]

You think maybe that the Daily Reckoning and the Mogambo Guru are tools and agents of the French government intended to undermine our economic system? Is that it Sparky?

Richard W.

[Chipata]

"You think maybe that the Daily Reckoning and the Mogambo Guru are tools and agents of the French government intended to undermine our economic system? Is that it Sparky?"

Oh Lordy. How many years of school did you actually make it through? And bears are usually so smart as well. Oh well, I guess there's a rotten apple in every barrel.

[bvw]

It surely is. "Fire" is clear to all to cause panic and harm when yelled in a crowded theater. It is far from fraud, eevn a clear fraud where some Joe promises to deliver a dozen roses to Shirley and instead delivers a photo of 12 roses.

But hey, just like the nanny-stater SEC, you are "expansive" in your use of ideations!

My advice to you is tie your own shoes and teach others to tie theirs. Don't wait for the nanny-state to provide you with offically approved shoe-tiers. You CAN tie your own shoes, and Liberty demands that we do so, that we also throw down those who would say we can not for fear of tying a granny knot.

[Chipata]

""Fire" is clear to all to cause panic and harm when yelled in a crowded theater. It is far from fraud, eevn a clear fraud where some Joe promises to deliver a dozen roses to Shirley and instead delivers a photo of 12 roses."

I really do understand that the extention of a legal principle beyond the original substance of a particular case is almost certainly beyond you, but do try it. I know you'll fail in the attempt but you will feel much better for it, I can assure you. "A mans reach should exceed his grasp, or else what's heaven for?"

[bvw]

Chippy, I have to go tie some shoes now. Maybe I'll return to this discussion, maybe not. Be good.

[bvw]

Let me take this out towards the periphery, for that way gains some perspective.

Have you ever traded baseball cards, or comic books?

[ninenot]

yeah--and like I, you are now entitled to plead "all my cash is tied up in short-term debt."

I am acquainted with an MD who was BRAGGING about buying Lucent on the downward trend about 2 years ago.

He hasn't spoken about it much ever since...

[arete]

I am acquainted with an MD who was BRAGGING about buying Lucent on the downward trend about 2 years ago.

I was lucky. I got in it and right back out before much damage was done to me. No one was ever held accountable for that scam. It was all smoke and mirrors and not even an investigation. Too many of Wall Street's own involved in that one I suspect. Enron put the whole Wall Street corruption machine on the front pages and the authorities were finally forced to actually get off their rears and do something while crooks like Rich McGinn walked away free as a bird with millions and millions of investor money.

Richard W.

[bvw]

Hmmm .. does Merril Lynch get as comparatively rough a treatment? I mean, the whole of all stock advice (by the whole I mean 99% or whatever huge percentage it is) that is published by authorized sharks and SEC certified toots is as fraudulent. By that I mean a Merrill reccommendation carries an sense of authority and trust far greater than a small newsletter -- more perceived gravitas, whatever. For a Merill "Analyst" to misdirect -- completely within the law, by giving a high rating to some company ends up stealing more dollars from the pockets of weak and meek. Yet for all purposes unfounded analyst reccommendations are published every day by big firms. They are not scruntunized by regulators for absolute accuracy and should not be. Yet a small indepedent firm is whacked on. This SEC hit is not a an action to restore some injustice.

This is just a play for turf by a elitist-socialist agency that gets in the way of the best fix and fraud preventer of all ... a free market. Freedom of the marketplace is especially needed in the realm of ideas, of opinions. of marketing claims. The reason is that the "ownership" of ideas is expansive. Regulation of speech is a form od ownership of ideas. "Ownership" of ideas always acts to prevent free use of those ideas, and then by expnasion nearby ideas, and competing ideas.

Thus by having "regulators" shut down commercial speech in free markets -- all speech, not just the forms a regulation is laid against, become hampered. And it is ideas that drive all markets.

[arete]

Wall Street likes to point to the differences between their own approved and accepted crooks (Jack Grubman) and all those other unapproved crooks. It is kind of having an independent muscle in on the mafia's territory. In this case of course, the mafia members and territory is government protected. They pay good money to the politicians to keep it that way.

Richard W.

[bvw]

Despite all the King's Horses and all the King's Men (I mean some are really men and not just horses-asses) of the SEC protectorating every meek widow and orphan in the "BEST REGULATED" market ever we still managed to have the greatest financial fraud in history by far (far exceeding the tulip mania, the John Law money scheme, the South Sea Company, Florida Land speculation, the Public Utility and Investment companies of the twenties, etc. etc.). That would be ENRON, Global Crossing and THOUSANDS of other fraudulently run or bookkept yet publically registered stock comanpies -- including those in the Too-Big-To-Fail class, And in the shocking fall of the NASDAQ nigh every dang widow and orphan lost their endowments.

Yet Chipata says the SEC's persecution of free commercial speech counts for Justice, when all it is is a continuation of the same poisons that have already brought the patient to his deathbed with faint pulse.

We desperately NEED to return to a open free market in stocks and stock marketing. To shutter the SEC, letting the equity courts bear the load for civil cliams of fraud. To allow innovators, dreamers, charlatans and the HONEST to compete in open market. In a perverted market like ours, the honset are shut out.

Abolishing the SEC is a cure. It is the SEC that is the mightiest and most harmful of frauds.