Review of a Review

[Duncan Frissell <frissell@panix.com>]

A new novel, "Black Money" by Michael M. Thomas was reviewed in the Sunday 
and Monday New York Times (both).  It concerns the money laundering of the 
proceeds from the retail pharmaceutical trade.

From the Monday review:

Black money, says a character ... is "money fleeing regulation, taxation 
or disclosure....Offshore is where it seeks and acquires anonymity.  Of 
course, you must not think of 'offshore' as having a defined physical 
geography, as an exotic setting for a Paul Erdman novel.  Offshore is no 
longer of our geography: it exists in what is called cyberspace, its 
cartography is digital.  You can be in the bar of this very hotel, and if 
you have a palmtop computer and a phone jack you can make yourself every 
bit as 'offshore' as if you were sitting on a Swiss mountaintop or a beach 
on Vanuatu."

Make that a palmtop and a wireless net link...

DCF

"If 5 billion people each have the ability to travel anywhere, buy 
anywhere, sell anywhere, invest anywhere, and communicate with anyone, the 
design of a control regime to rule them quickly becomes an NP complete 
problem." - DCF
--- WinQwk 2.0b#1165