Dark Web Dealers Voluntarily Ban Deadly Fentanyl (theguardian.com)

Major dark web drug suppliers have started to voluntarily ban the synthetic opioid fentanyl because it is too dangerous. "They are 'delisting' the high-strength painkiller, effectively classifying it alongside mass-casualty firearms and explosives as commodities that are considered too high-risk to trade," reports The Guardian. From the report: Vince O'Brien, one of the NCA's leads on drugs, told the Observer that dark web marketplace operators appeared to have made a commercial decision, because selling a drug that could lead to fatalities was more likely to prompt attention from police. It is the first known instance of these types of operators moving to effectively ban a drug.

O'Brien said: "If they've got people selling very high-risk commodities then it's going to increase the risk to them. There are marketplaces that will not accept listings for weapons and explosives -- those are the ones that will not accept listings for fentanyl. Clearly, law enforcement would prioritize the supply of weapons, explosives and fentanyl over, for example, class C drugs -- and that might well be why they do this. "There are also drug users on the dark web who say on forums that they don't think it's right that people are selling fentanyl because it is dangerous and kills a lot of people."

Comments

Re:there is no such thing as "dark web"

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently they still sell LSD.

Re:there is no such thing as "dark web"

[Vanyle]

Sure there is, i have seen plenty of spiders in the woods.

Time for a dark-darkweb

[Anonymous Coward]

For things too bad for the regular darkweb. I heard it's behind 7 proxies.

Re:Time for a dark-darkweb

[phantomflanflinger]

Time for an infra-black web, which you can only see by lowering your head and running hubwards into your monitor.

Re: Time for a dark-darkweb

[Anonymous Coward]

To be fair, most of what the media calls "the dark web" is more accurately the "gray web" or maybe the "underground web." Most of it is pretty easy to find with a minimum of effort, and there are search engines which do index it. Contrast that to actual dark networks, which are not indexed and not easily accessible at all.

Re: there is no such thing as "dark web"

[Anonymous Coward]

In general, there's a much lower abuse potential for psychedelics. These are drugs that aren't always even enjoyable. Often, those drugs are taken for therapeutic sessions or the purpose of gaining insight.

Nobody shoots dope to work with a therapist on their issues. You might have low dose clinics, but you take the dope to relieve the symptoms so you can be barely functional enough for counseling. Psychedelics offer an active benefit above and beyond sobriety for therapy. Also, they're not likely to result in harm in the way they're often used, in relatively controlled, familiar setttings, with others around to monitor youm

It's the dose that makes the poison

[An Ominous Cow Erred]

Fentanyl actually has a fairly wide therapeutic index -- i.e. the dose that offers benefit vs. the dose that causes harm -- so it's fairly safe (at least as safe as a highly-addictive opioid can be) as far as prescription drugs go. IIRC acetaminophen (Tylenol) is actually easier to OD on. The problem is potency and the fact that pill pressers are buying pure fentanyl and trying to meter out the microscopic doses using crude tools.

It's easy to measure grams of a substance, so if 1 gram gets you high but 10 gram kills you, it's not hard to press out 1 gram pills and tell people to never take more than 3 of them.

Now imagine 1 microgram gets you high and 100 micrograms kills you. In terms of therapeutic index, it's actually 10 times safer. If you could reliably press out 1 microgram pills, nobody would ever accidentally OD on 100 pills. The problem is that joe schmoe pill pusher in his basement cannot accurately separate out 1 microgram of a pure substance, so he wants up cranking out pills that have anywhere from 3-50 micrograms of ingredients. You wind up with a bunch of pills where 2 of them might get you nicely really really high, but then another 2 will randomly kill you. Couple that with some people having high tolerance due to longtime use while other people are just starting out, one pill might be enough to kill a first time user if they're unlucky enough to get that one where joe pill pusher's hands slipped when he was pressing it.

The solution would be for the labs producing the stuff to only sell it in dilutions of 0.1% or so, but the market doesn't want that because mr. fentanyl smuggler only has to get one shipment from China through customs to make a million pills if he brings in the pure stuff. This is actually fentanyl's awesome market-winning feature -- its potency minimizes the smuggling risk, and this is why it's taken over the market from heroin in the U.S. for low-budget opioid addicts.

Of course the real truth of the matter is that opioid addiction is a fucking curse and the best thing to do is never ever start, but unfortunately big pharma likes it profits and creates tons of future fentanyl users every time it writes a new painkiller prescription. Next time your doctor considers writing you a scrip for some of the good stuff -- say sorry, I'll just take an aspirin and maybe smoke some weed.

Re: It's the dose that makes the poison

[Anonymous Coward]

Excellent point on therapeutic index.

As an addendum to your dilution point, if you can't measure accurately at small scale, dilute it or cut it with something else, then measure at a larger scale where mistakes aren't as punishing. If you don't want an ultimately cut product, dissolve it in a solvent, then evaporate off the solvent, preferably recovering it for recycling.

Re: It's the dose that makes the poison

[An Ominous Cow Erred]

You're expecting responsible behavior and the maintenance of large quantities of dilute with strict quality control from some guy with unknown education working in a basement somewhere with no oversight, and a customer base that literally cannot say no.

He almost certainly doesn't *want* to kill his customers, but that doesn't mean he has the know-how and discipline to do a good job of it, and the shadowy nature of the job means you can't just go by yelp reviews.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[Actually, I do RTFA]

The problem with Fentanyl isn't Fentanyl pills... it's Fentanyl spiked heroin/whatever. Cause that lets them cut the underlying drug more. So, you have heroin of unknown quality and it's too strong.

Part of it is the various tolerances, but a bigger problem is the difficultly measuring (as you point out) and evenly mixing the Fentanyl into the drug. Also, it's so damn potent that trying to clean up drugs left behind by addicts, even with gloves, can aerosolize enough to kill people. Like cops or bereaved parents.

A big part of the solution is Fentanyl testing kits for illegal drugs, to prove they are pure.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[An Ominous Cow Erred]

Drug-detection kits should be sold in every drugstore, but that's not going to happen as it would be seen as somehow "enabling" drug use. The only detection kits the government will ever support over-the-counter are the kind that detect it only after a person has consumed them (i.e. too late to save the user, but good for persecution/prosecution of the user).

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[shplopt]

The potency is definitely a large part of the commercial appeal of fentanyl analogs - similar to the way beer gave way to liquor during prohibition - but I'd argue that an even bigger driver is that it's fully synthetic. Heroin, oxycodone, hydrocodone, etc. all rely on access to large quantities of poppy straw. Combine that with the proliferation of grey market Chinese and Indian labs and you've literally got a recipe for disaster.

There could be a time in the near future where it will be possible to "home brew" traditional opiates with genetically modified yeasts. I don't know how viable or realistic that scenario is, but it does sound like it will at least be technically possible very soon.

Meanwhile the FDA is spending a lot of time and energy trying to ban kratom, a plant which researchers hope will point the way to new analgesics that don't cause respiratory depression. Y'know, the thing that kills people.

Interesting times.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[Luckyo]

So enable every neighbourhood kid to be a Fentanyl pusher when his dad loses his job. That's going to help things.

Have you ever read about Opium Wars and what opiates that are freely available do to a nation? There's a reason why China is the key supplier of this stuff. They know from first hand experience how large nations are undermined. And it's in their geopolitical interest to have Western majors to implode on themselves just like China imploded on itself due to opium in 1800s.

Re: It's the dose that makes the poison

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, a documentary on the opioid crisis suggested that intentionally adding relatively cheap carfentanyl (rhino/elephant tranquilizer, more powerful that fentanyl) to heroin is explicitly done *for the purpose of killing customers* as a manner of advertising that a dealer's dope is not cut with less-expensive inactive ingredients. Perverse incentives are at play for both the supply and demand sides of this market.

CAPTCHA: entice

Re: It's the dose that makes the poison

[GameboyRMH]

Sometimes they do want to kill a customer, as an advertising tactic. They intentionally slip a fatal dose of fentanyl into some heroin for example, and sell it to a customer they can afford to lose. This death sends up a beacon, making other junkies think that this dealer has "the good stuff" on the assumption that it was purity/potency that caused the overdose and not intentional contamination.

Re: It's the dose that makes the poison

[Type44Q]

This is one of the few area in which I have zero experience... so why is it that I can tell you're standing right beside me??

Hint: it's the smell.

Re: It's the dose that makes the poison

[guruevi]

Therapeutics like these can't be diluted and subsequently recovered 'easily'. Hence why so many backyard drug producers end up killing themselves or blowing themselves up.

It's not 'hard' to buy the right stuff to measure correctly (you can buy them used for $1k, new for $10k), there is no controls or government watchdog to get the tools. Even the drugs themselves are relatively easy to obtain and 'lose' if you know the right connections and circumstances. But if you're smart enough to run an entire professional lab, you might as well go make $150-250k/year legally.

The primary problem is that you can't do it properly without a masters or PhD in chemistry and probably a host of other (sometimes vendor and drug-specific) training. You also need not just measurements but also test equipment and a whole host of checks and balances which at some point, you might as well buy the drug outright from a mass production facility.

Re: It's the dose that makes the poison

[Hognoxious]

That relies on the active ingredient being evenly distributed in the inert carrier, i.e. perfect mixing.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[demonlapin]

Fentanyl is a terrible substance. It has its uses, but they are very limited. It's an extremely short-acting drug, so it doesn't provide good long-term pain relief unless used in a patch, in which case why not use extended-release morphine? It's really good for the induction of anesthesia, because it blunts the painful process of being intubated but doesn't last so long that it keeps you from breathing at the end of the case. Other than that, I don't use it on my patients, and I'm an anesthesiologist.

Dilution isn't a bad idea, and it's what we do - hospital fentanyl comes in 50 mcg/mL, so for one gram of solution you have 50 mcg of agent. 0.005%. Easy to fuck it up, or make it uneven. Even if you recrystallize it yourself to get clean product... it's risky as hell. I'd pump myself full of naloxone (opioid antagonist) before I'd even consider working with the powdered drug unless it was in a fully sealed drybox or similar.

I knew one guy who used to shoot fentanyl - the hospital-grade, known-strength stuff. He'd start an IV on himself. He'd then squirt a vial of naloxone into a small bag of saline, and hook that up to the IV. Then he would pinch it off and shoot up. If he passed out, the naloxone would start flowing, and he'd come back to life... that's roughly the level of precaution required when you know exactly what you're getting.

Re: It's the dose that makes the poison

[HornWumpus]

The lethal dose is one physical grain (not the unit of weight).

But you're right, the junkies will figure out how to dose carfentanil by dilution. Just a bunch more will die first.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[HornWumpus]

The Chinese are nuts if they think half the labs production isn't going out the side door for domestic use.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[Luckyo]

They know. That's why anyone who does this stuff and gets caught gets the noose. Chinese don't fuck around with drugs and drug pushers that don't toe the party line.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[gweihir]

There is also the problem of newbies that want to get rich quick and have no clue how things work. These may sell ODs simply because they are clueless.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[pjt33]

Most of your post was informative and interesting, so thank you for that. But I disagree with the conclusion in the last paragraph. I learnt the hard way about 15 years ago that if you refuse to take strong enough painkillers for chronic pain the result is nerve sensitisation which means that the pain can continue for months after the root cause has healed. I'm currently being treated for a different chronic pain, and because of my previous experience I didn't hesitate when my doctor prescribed tramadol. However, I'm being disciplined in my use of it. When she tried lowering the dosage and the pain in the part of the day which wasn't covered began to be a real problem I asked permission before going back to the initial dosage. An earlier Guardian article about the opioid epidemic implies that part of the problem is people self-medicating an increased dosage.

Addiction is indeed a curse, but so is chronic pain. I think the correct conclusion should be to discuss changes in dosage with your doctor first, and if you experience symptoms of dependency when ending the treatment then go back to the doctor and ask about weaning off rather than going to the dark web.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[yes-but-no]

So you are saying someone else is reaping the harvest of big pharma. I'm sure big-pharma must be upset. They should find ways to write more n more stronger prescriptions and also ensure the law department does their job so the revenue stream keeps flowing-in and not to some poor smuggler.

Re:It's the dose that makes the poison

[demonlapin]

He was one of two fentanyl-using anesthesiologists I've known. The other used it to soak gauze pads and then stuck them between cheek and gum, like he was dipping tobacco. Certainly an easier solution, and it results in slower absorption.

The guy in this story eventually relapsed and lost his DEA license. He ended up getting a job overseeing the preop nurses that get the basic history and evaluations on patients coming in for surgery at a big university hospital - that way, he can still kind-of practice anesthesia, but no exposure to his demon.

Re: there is no such thing as "dark web"

[Anonymous Coward]

Fortunately, no one is preventing anyone from trafficking in those wares, if they so choose. They're just not helping you do it.

This is nothing new. Most pot dealers would balk at the idea of selling fentanyl.

makes sense

[Anonymous Coward]

The dark web doesn't have such a large economy because there is so many "evildoers" in the world, they are so large because tyrannical governments do things like make a wonderfully fragrant flower that grows with very little effort in very little time under almost any conditions out to be some sort of demon weed that must be eradicated.

Gangs only exist as a response to the fascist pig gang in blue.

The pigs wanna play war, and so, by government force, they get one.

captcha: antibody

No officer

[fibonacci8]

We're not dealing in fentanyl any more, honest!

Re:Societal ills

[An Ominous Cow Erred]

What if the user got hooked on opiods in the first place because his government-sanctioned doctor prescribed him drugs from a government-sanctioned pharmaceutical manufacturer?

It makes sense...

[SvnLyrBrto]

Drug dealers are not, by preference, killers. They're business owners. And they don't want corpses. They want repeat customers. And you can't go back for more if you're dead from an overdose.

Re:It makes sense...

[rogoshen1]

not to mention the unwanted attention a corpse will bring.

Now imagine the deadly potency of homeopathics...

[ffkom]

where the effect becomes stronger with dilution, so you can easily accidentally kill your patient when re-using any equipment that came into contact with some substance before.

Ok, just joking here, Homeopathy is fraudulent quackery, and of course there is no such thing as increasing effect with increasing dilution.

Re: there is no such thing as "dark web"

[sound vision]

There are actually a lot of people, almost everywhere, trying to prevent you from doing anything of the sort.

Re:Societal ills

[PPH]

That comes down to a failure of the healthcare/insurance industry. If you, as a doctor, prescribe opioids, then you should follow up 100% of those patients with post treatment care and counseling. To make sure they get off the drugs you gave them. If insurance companies and drug manufacturers were on the hook for such widespread coverage, perhaps they wouldn't be so quick to push their junk for any old complaints.

If I broke my arm and my orthopedist put it in a cast, I'd expect him to remove that cast in a few weeks. As a necessary part of my treatment.

Re:Societal ills

[An Ominous Cow Erred]

You might be less likely to want that cast in the first place if it were shown that casts resulted in mass uncontrollable mummification fetishes that caused millions of suffocations worldwide and tens of millions more people unable to function in society because they can't help but bind themselves in bandages and plaster to even stay sane for a day.

Re: there is no such thing as "dark web"

[ShanghaiBill]

Most pot dealers would balk at the idea of selling fentanyl.

That is good. We may not have politicians who act in our best interest, but at least we can count on the drug dealers to provide moral leadership.

Re:Near gibberish

[mirthful1]

Exactly what a bot would say ;)

Re:Irony

[Luckyo]

It's not that product is bad. It's that risk/reward ratio is getting too weighted towards risk.

Re:Societal ills

[ceoyoyo]

Physicians have really managed to dodge responsibility on this one. Opioids are prescription drugs; physicians are therefore the assigned gatekeepers, responsible for making sure the drugs they prescribe help rather than hurt.

And yet the media writes stories about evil pharma and physicians who say they didn't know opioids were addictive.

I'll bite...

[fibonacci8]

the drags [sic] on [sic] society

Fine, we'll begin with people who don't understand how to use the term "dregs of society" when the context presents itself. Any number of people in that category can be removed from the category by explaining the mistake. Not only that, but the problem can be resolved without resorting to unethical extermination.

reply

[gDLL]

Including waging war on other dark web sellers :)

Re:Near gibberish

[BankRobberMBA]

Nice!

Re:It makes sense... to not get killed, either

[cirby]

Not to mention, of course, that they're not in love with being executed.

This week's move by China (as a result of Trump pushing the issue in trade talks) to criminalize fentanyl puts a helluva lot of risk back in the made-in-China drug business, as far as fentanyl goes...

I think that is the REAL reason

[SuperKendall]

The news is that Dark Web dealers just decided to drop it, because reasons...

But the timing is such that it just HAPPENED to occur at the same time Trump had China make it a controlled substance...

Coincidence? No way.

Re:I think that is the REAL reason

[jrumney]

China also started banning precursors and Fentanyl itself more than a year ago, since then they've been working on adjusting the laws to cover analogs and cover more of the precursors. Trump wants to take credit for this, but China has its own reasons to ban a drug that causes as much destruction in China as outside.

Dark web bans

[BankRobberMBA]

The "dark web" didn't ban anything. Several markets on the dark web have banned fentanyl sales.

The markets are created and run by individuals or small organizations that facilitate sales (typically by aggregating the sellers together and providing/arranging payment and escrow services). These are basically the eBays of the dark web, like the original Silk Road site and its many successors.

The people running the markets have the absolute power to control what items or services can be bought and sold on their markets. For instance, many markets choose not to allow the sale of fully automatic weapons. Without outside regulation, you can immediately identify what market runners consider to be morally acceptable and what they do not.

Considering the investigative resources applied to the original Silk Road investigation, it is no wonder that the markets are showing some risk aversion.

Well aren't they special?

[AndyKron]

So they're doing it, not because it harms people, but because it's too risky for them. Well aren't they special?

Apologies

[nehumanuscrede]

The dealers are only looking out for their business model, nothing more. They have come to realize that dead users doth not repeat customers make.

This will sound cold but I have a hard time generating any sympathy for those who OD on opioids or any drug tbh.

If you're dumb enough to trust a substance purchased in a back alley or street corner from your local model citizen drug dealer, well. . . . Darwin has a law you should familiarize yourself with.

Even legitimate drugs have their risks and, if you bother to read the side effects, you might think twice about taking those as well.

My docs want me to start one whose potential side effects include:

Blood clots
Stroke
Heart Attack
Cancer
Death

I think I'll pass thanks.

The opioid epidemic will sort itself out especially if mixing an insanity level drug like fentanyl into the products being sold.

Eventually they're going to run out of drug users.

Live ones anyway.

Re:Apologies

[Actually, I do RTFA]

So, you don't understand probabilities. Because you listed a bunch of "potential side effects". But if those happen 1 in a billion times, and they solve a real problem (fix a condition that makes your life miserable, or just cuts your risk of heart attack in half) it's more than worth it. By focusing solely on possibilities, and not probabilities, you're making your life worse.

You also have no idea how the drug crisis started. People didn't start with heroin. Most times, they got addicted to oxy or something else prescribed, then moved to street drugs when their doctor wouldn't refill their prescription or because heroin is 1/10th the price.

Re: Near gibberish

[HornWumpus]

Sure, but they lose any common carrier protections when they do.

Should anyhow, otherwise: Why not?

Re:Chinese just made fentanyl illegal thanks Trump

[jrumney]

The supply didn't dry up, it has moved across the border to Myanmar. It is in no one's interest to kill their own customers. I think this rather than fear of law enforcement (law enforcement attention is going to be attracted by trade in any drug) is what is really behind the ban.

Re: Near gibberish

[cwatts]

Where is the "unintelligible gibberish" filter?

Re:there is no such thing as "dark web"

[Narcocide]

For the most part you sound like a raving lunatic, but I happen to agree with you about the AOL thing.

Not so simple for high-potency compounds

[Wdi]

Perfect solid mixing is practically impossible with non-professional equipment. It starts with requiring all grains to be far smaller than the lethal dose, and no accumulation in layers, nooks of the apparatus, etc. Liquid mixing is better, but also more complicated on second sight - i.e. you should use a clean room to exclude dust particles which could selectively adsorb the active substance in lethal concentration, and then end up in the pill. Not exactly the type of set-up you would expect in a backyard operation.

Re: But Poohbear's Heroin A-OK

[Luckyo]

That's not how Chinese system works. They literally don't have ruling families on a principle. If you're a member of the elite, your children just get a shot at ruling a small township in the middle of nowhere.

After that, it's almost all merit if they want to advance, which is why they largely lack actual dynasties. And if you fuck with drugs beyond what party leadership approves of (i.e. sabotage of geopolitical opponents) and someone high up finds out, it's not just noose for you. It's exile from party leadership for the father. You're certainly allowed to do dirty things for the state, which is viewed as patriotic. But the moment you turn that against the interests of the state and someone high up finds out, you're just fucked.

Tylenol is NOT easier to OD on.

[denzacar]

Acetaminophen/Tylenol/Paracetamol is NOT easier to overdose on.

Fentanyl has an LD of 3.1 mg/kg in rats, and 0.03 mg/kg in monkeys.
Tylenol has an LD of 338 mg/kg in mice (oral); 1944 mg/kg in rats (oral).

I.e. It is much easier to OD on fentanyl. BUT... and this is the part people don't IIRC...

There ARE more OD's on tylenol than on fentanyl... primarily cause it is so common and cause a lot of those happen with small children, due to their weight ratios being more favorable for an overdose.
BUT... and it's a big one... nearly all those overdoses on tylenol ARE NOT FATAL.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-en...

Paracetamol overdoses

About 50,000 people are admitted to hospital each year in the UK due to overdosing on paracetamol
According to the Office of National Statistics 219 deaths in 2016 were linked to paracetamol, up from 182 in 2012
Pills are usually 500mg, and over-the-counter purchases are restricted
The British Medical Journal says any dose of more than 4g or 75mg/kg over 24 hours for an adult is classed as an overdose
Overdosing on the drug can seriously or fatally damage the liver
Intravenous acetylcysteine is used to treat overdoses and treat hepatotoxicity

Also, if you're munching 500mg tablets four times a day to kill the pain or fever, you're already half way to what constitutes an overdose - though it is clearly FAR from an LD, even in mice.
I.e. People are "overdosing" on tylenol in a very "better safe than sorry" use of the term "overdose".

Meanwhile, DEATHS from overdosing on fentanyl in the US and its analogues has gone up from ~6000 in 2014, ~10000 in 2015, ~19000 in 2016 to ~29000 in 2017.

But have no fear. Trump has the best vaguely human-shaped leftover protoplasm working on it.
And it has already found the cure! Amazingly - it's ice cream and fries! Whodathunkit!

It's really tragic actually...
To think that thousand of lives could have been saved if only someone got those people to a McDonald's in time...
Who knew it was really that simple?

The real reason

[DaveV1.0]

Their customer base is shrinking due to deaths. They don't have consciences, they have business reasons only.

Awwww.....

[CyberSnyder]

That's really sweet of them.

Re: But Poohbear's Heroin A-OK

[HornWumpus]

Bullshit. The members of the communist party (the chinese elites) just don't get their hands personally dirty and hence virtually always skate. Just like the Bushes, Kennedys and Clintons in the USA.

Chinese 'anti-corruption' programs are just the leadership turning over and installing their own corrupt bureaucrats.

Re: But Poohbear's Heroin A-OK

[Luckyo]

This is projection of your values on people who hold dramatically different values.

It renders any conclusion you draw wrong, often to the worst kind of wrong. To the opposite of correct.

Re: But Poohbear's Heroin A-OK

[HornWumpus]

Bullshit. How is it that all the children of Chinese central committee members are 'owners' of multimillion dollar businesses?

Re: But Poohbear's Heroin A-OK

[Luckyo]

Because that's how Chinese system works. Literally, read what I described above. You're observing correct fact through a lens of a wrong culture, and coming to conclusions that are diametric opposite of what is actually going on.

Perhaps the best descriptor is the old Cold War adage. "In the West, he who has money has power. In the East, he who has power has money".

Re: But Poohbear's Heroin A-OK

[HornWumpus]

You start by saying they lack dynasties, now dynastic behavior is just how the Chinese system works...Make up your mind.

Power and money are always intertwined. Neither side is as you described, rather both are very much the same, under the bullshit.

There are clearly powerful chinese people that own the labs, they will never go down for the drugs that leak out the side doors into China. Those drugs aren't even illegal today.

Re: But Poohbear's Heroin A-OK

[Luckyo]

You keep stumbling on your blindness due to the lens you're using. "Ownership" has completely different meaning in China compared to US. You act as if "owning something" is even remotely similar in China to what it is in US. It is obviously not. In communist systems like Chinese, state doesn't guarantee private property. It merely temporarily cedes control over it to private citizens, and this is subject to state's whim to take back at any time. That is why in the adage I mention, "in the East, he who has power has money". Having power brings money, but having money not only doesn't bring power, but has a significant chance of costing you everything if you don't toe the party line.

Which is the exact opposite to the Western system, where state acts as an absolute guarantor of private property, to the point where state has to burden itself to the extreme to be able to confiscate anything from private citizen. Hence "in the West, he who has money, has power".

I'll reiterate my initial point one more time. In China, if you're a son of important party functionary, you get a chance to rule some small township somewhere. As according to adage I point out above, that comes with stewardship rights, which you confuse for something like ownership is in the Western system. But if you want to advance from that, you need to show merit. Your township needs to appear to thrive to your immediate superiors. If you fail to do it, that's it. No amount of daddy's intervention will save you. In fact, your father will suffer harshly for having incapable offspring, as that will cause him to lose face, which is why party functionaries take educating their offspring extremely seriously to the point of sending them across the world to get educated before allowing them to get on the track for political leadership.

Which is why proponents of the Chinese system can proudly and correctly state that they're the most technocratic system full of most intelligent and meritocratic people in the world. And their system is a great argument against technocracy and intelligence as the sole, or even primary merits to look for in entirety of leadership.

Re: But Poohbear's Heroin A-OK

[HornWumpus]

Having power brings money everywhere. Duh. The Clintons have never delivered any legal market value (as opposed to influence market), but they are multimillionaires. The last Kennedy to do anything useful was Joe Sr. (Joe Jr did too, but he died in WWII, Joe Sr was most recent.) But powerful, so rich as fuck.

It's not that different under the bullshit. There is no 'absolute guarantee of private property', you must have imagined that.

Money is power and power is money, everywhere. Don't kid yourself. Even in the west, to truly secure a dynasty worth of money, you have have to secure political power.

You can hear the 'that's a nice industry you've got there, sure would be shame if something happened to it' extortion in congressional hearings, once you know to listen for it. Funny how Microsoft started contributing millions to politicians of both parties, after it was extorted by the feds. Facebook is no doubt way ahead of MS.

As to you claim that Chinese 'power children' have to start with some town and earn more honestly, BULLSHIT! They are ALL taking all they can grab with both hands.

Re: But Poohbear's Heroin A-OK

[Luckyo]

>Having power brings money everywhere

This is literally false. Even a cursory observation of Western political system tells you that while power flows from money, money does not flow from power. It is evidenced by desperate fundraising drives of most incumbents who aren't wealthy from other sources. Power doesn't give them money. In fact, should they wield political power against interests of those with money, their careers end swiftly.

Which is the exact opposite of what happens in totalitarian communist states like China.

Regardless, I see that you're far too invested in your world view to be able to look at things objectively. I've said my piece. Take it for what you will.