He was the second biggest Democratic donor in the 2022 elections, and since he supports the Democrats, he doesn’t want them to suffer any reputational damage from their #2 donor being a notorious con man, so he made up a conveniently unfalsifiable story.
As for what advantage it grants him, just wait and see. Marc Rich got a lame duck pardon from President Clinton in exchange for his generous political donations, so maybe Biden will do the same for SBF.
> He was the second biggest Democratic donor in the 2022 elections, and since he supports the Democrats, he doesn’t want them to suffer any reputational damage from their #2 donor being a notorious con man, so he made up a conveniently unfalsifiable story.
I think these explanations benefit from persona tests: can you think of someone in your life whose political stance is meaningfully affected by either (1) SBF donating massive sums to the DNC (true!), (2) being a scam artist (true!), or (3) potentially having donated equally massive sums to the GOP (maybe!)?
Mine aren't, and I don't think most peoples' are either.
So your contention is that absolutely nobody would care if the Democrats in particular were heavily financed by white-collar crime? And that the Democratic Party doesn't care whether or not they're associated with an alleged, indicted criminal? That's facially absurd. Even if it wouldn't cause anyone to change their vote (which seems unlikely given the marginal-but-still-very-real swings in election results every two years), it would affect enthusiasm and engagement among people who would otherwise support the Democrats. Whereas with this lie about mysterious "dark money" donations to Republicans, most people who support the Democrats will just accept that claim uncritically and continue to support the Democrats because that's the story that minimizes their personal cognitive dissonance.
Also, you need to explain why somebody would donate equally to both parties in the first place, when both parties are engaged in a zero-sum game with each other for control of the federal government.
No: my contention is that nobody seriously believes that the DNC (or GOP) sat down and went "hmm, this is dirty money, but we'll take it anyways." Both do legal and reputational review, and almost certainly determined (correctly!) that both the law and ordinary people distinguish between "scammy but not openly criminal man in scammy industry gives money to politicians" and "definitely criminal man gives money to politicians."
Put another way: we have no special reason to believe that either the DNC or GOP leadership saw SBF as anything more than a convenient piggy bank. SBF in turn probably saw both as insurance, and time will tell on that.
> Also, you need to explain why somebody would donate equally to both parties in the first place, when both parties are engaged in a zero-sum game with each other for control of the federal government.
This is actually pretty easy to rationalize from the EA worldview: if you've convinced yourself that you can maximize good by maximizing your personal wealth (laws and norms be damned), it makes sense to maintain whatever regulatory framework (or lack thereof) enables you to do that. Giving money to both sides is a not unreasonable course of action in that context.
As for what advantage it grants him, just wait and see. Marc Rich got a lame duck pardon from President Clinton in exchange for his generous political donations, so maybe Biden will do the same for SBF.
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