Biden

Until yesterday my knowledge of Presidential contender Biden was very limited. I thought that he was responsible for making the state of Delaware into a tax haven and that the presence of his son on the board of a Ukrainian energy company was odd. Not a terribly satisfactory place from which to start an impeachment of the sitting president.

But I have now read the article at reference 1 and looked at those at references 2 and 3. Much better informed.

Biden, at 77, is old to be contender. Having been a contender since the mid 1980's, after he had made the Senate under thirty, a very early age. He seems to have hoped to take over the Kennedy mantle and found a political dynasty of his own - a hope not founded on wealth as he was not very rich at this point - and even now is still not very rich by the standards of the US, earning maybe $10m a year but with maybe just a modest $5m on his balance sheet. Perhaps he has some stashed away, somewhere out of sight.

Part of this contention was based on his assumption of Irish Catholic ancestry. Apparently this is a good, hostility deflecting, wheeze in the US if you are rich, white and male. You must be one of the good guys, coming from a minority religion and from a race so badly knocked about by the Brits. The fact that his father was one, notwithstanding. He is also apt to claim a fine record on matters like civil rights and the Vietnam war, when in fact he laid low on both at the time it counted. And at least once he was caught out recycling his speeches from others without proper acknowledgement.

There is also a bond with the Kennedys in that tragedy has stalked his life, costing him his first wife, a daughter and a son. Tragedy which is real enough, but which is also played to make him the one who understands, the one who understands the pain and grief that is all around. He is also a very old fashioned, touchy-feely sort of politician, which has got him into a bit of trouble of the me-too variety.

Turning to reference 3, it seems that there are two sides to the tax haven story. The first side being that Delaware has worked hard to be corporation friendly, with up-to-date, accessible commercial law - with part of accessibility being timeliness. Something that is not available in most of the other states of the Union. The second side being that while corporation tax in Delaware is not particularly low, there certainly are other attractions. Like anonymity and non-payment-of-tax favourable treatment of royalties. With the result of all this being that over a million corporations are registered in a state with a population of rather less than a million.

All of which is interesting, but leaves me more or less where I started. Unimpressed that this might be the best the good guys in the US can pit against the bad guys.

Reference 1: The designated mourner - Fintan O'Toole - 2019. NYRB, January 16, 2020.

Reference 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Biden.

Reference 3: https://priceonomics.com/is-delaware-a-tax-haven/.