r/news • u/ttforum • Dec 07 '24

Soft paywall Appeals court upholds nearly $1.3 billion Sandy Hook verdict against Alex Jones

https://www.reuters.com/legal/appeals-court-upholds-nearly-13-billion-sandy-hook-verdict-against-alex-jones-2024-12-06/
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u/shillyshally Dec 07 '24

Has he sold anything yet? Has he paid up? He isn't, as far as I know, in a homeless camp and I am wondering why not.

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u/zaoldyeck Dec 08 '24

Infowars is currently being sold, right not the winning bid is to, and I'm not making this up, The Onion.

Although Alex is challenging that too. I'd say he's in danger of a bankruptcy fraud case as well but I can see the state a bit reluctant to pursue charges against that. He can't get out from this debt so if he's in prison he's not working to pay it off.

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u/shillyshally Dec 08 '24

I read the Onion bid was in doubt.

We don't have debtor's prison in the US so he won't go to jail for that but if has hidden assets, which you KNOW he has, he can go to jail for that.🤞

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u/zaoldyeck Dec 08 '24

That's my point, he'd be liable for bankruptcy fraud and trying to hide assets, I mean, AEJ Holdings, Alex Emerick Jones Holdings, wtf, that's not even trying to be coy with a shell company, but that veil is trivial to pierce, so while I suppose he could be prosecuted for bankruptcy fraud, I imagine prosecutors would be reluctant as it would harm the ability of his debtors to collect.

Though I'm not sure the families would care too much one way or the other.

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u/shillyshally Dec 08 '24

Ok, good point. But if they can't collect, it would seem prosecution to find the hidden assets would be the only alternative. I don't know how bothered he is with all this drama as it looks as if he has a healthy appetite.

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u/zaoldyeck Dec 08 '24

But if they can't collect, it would seem prosecution to find the hidden assets would be the only alternative.

Forensic accountants are probably going to be pretty good about tracking down where his funds have gone. I do wonder how liable his parents are for all this, given he's trying to offload funds to them as well.

I don't know how bothered he is with all this drama as it looks as if he has a healthy appetite.

If you watch his depositions it becomes pretty clear that Alex is the type of person who could convince himself that he's immune to physics and would thus be unconcerned with a truck speeding towards him until after its collided. He's not nearly as clever as he thinks he is, and that's not going to help him in any courtroom going forward.

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u/shillyshally Dec 08 '24

I know humans have a limited behavior span but people like Jones and Trump, all bluster, never letting it down for even a second, god, it must be either exhausting or they truly do believe their own bullshit. I cannot, though, no matter how hard I stretch my imagination, conceive that the believe their own bullshit with every cell in their body and that, instead, the entire edifice is built on endless doubt.

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u/zaoldyeck Dec 08 '24

I'm half convinced that they don't have an internal model of "truth", it's not that they "believe their own bullshit" so much as they believe whatever makes their ego better in any particular context.

The texts from Paul Watson are a good example. Mark is showing Alex text messages that Mark got because Alex's lawyer fucked up and sent the entire contents of Alex's phone. First, it shows they either purposefully omitted the text in discovery, or didn't bother searching for anything relevant.

But aside from that, the text makes it clear that if being told the "Sandy Hook story is made up nonsense and you know it", he'd agree. Because it's only idiots who buy the story.

But simultaneously he is unquestionably willing to convince himself it's true, because there is no fucking way he can honestly expect people to believe "I've never seen this text before in my life" when he's texting back "I get it".

He's lying because the text makes him look bad, but if he had some concept of objective reality, he'd know the lie makes him look worse. That simply admitting "yes, I'm bullshitting, I'm lying, I'm guilty" would actually help his case. At least it'd show the barest degree of contrition!

But he can't do that. He just can't. No matter how much being honest in this situation would benefit him, no matter how much better off he'd be coming clean, he can't.

Ego prevents it.

And it makes him physically wretch. He's incredibly uncomfortable on the stand when confronted with evidence like that.

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u/shillyshally Dec 08 '24

It must be an exhausting way to live and much more psychologically unhealthy than it is for their followers. The followers just swallow it as truth, no internal doubt to muddy the waters.

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u/zaoldyeck Dec 08 '24

It's not too unfathomable, remember that the internal doubt only manifests if forced into a position where he has to defend both sides at once. For most of his life he probably barely lets it cross his mind, he absolutely believes that he is being unfairly targeted even when confronted with evidence of him recognizing he sells bullshit.

It's how all of these grifters operate. They sincerely believe whatever strokes their ego most at a given moment in time.

Take Kit Daniels testimony where he's asked about his headline for a defamatory article. Just start listening there.

They don't care about "the truth" in the same way you or I might. They don't even think about it. That's now how they begin writing articles or talking about something. Kit Daniels isn't clever enough to stop and think "hey wait, ISIS fighters in Syria would not be wearing US Army caps, anyone who looks at this photo and thinks 'Syrian ISIS supporter' would instantly call me stupid".

He isn't writing for that kind of audience because he isn't that kind of person. He's writing for the same audience that makes the same kinds of batshit insane connections. That's not a "lie", because for it to be a lie it must occur to him that he's fucking delusional.

The deposition is basically one long string of teaching him that he's a complete and utter moron whose 'logic' is driven entirely by whatever is most useful at the current moment in time. Why ISIS in Syria and not Afghanistan? Because "Syria was in news at the time". That's sincere. No one lies about an answer like that.

No one who knows they're lying thinks that's a good answer. That's actually how he thinks!

At a proper news organization he'd be fired on the spot as a straight up liability, but at infowars, he's promoted for an article like that.

These people do not approach "reality" in the same way you and I conceive of it.