If anyone is trying to figure out where the money went and why food is so expensive, this might offer a few clues. Why does the US and other countries tolerate this kind of theft? Of course, when we have presidents who are worth $100 million within ten years of leaving office we don’t have too much room to talk. How do they get their money? NBC News:

If Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak is forced into exile, he is likely to have access to billions in assets. But if Egypt’s successor government tries to recover any of it, it will have a hard time, if history is any judge.

Estimates circulated inside the U.S. government, developed by various agencies, put Mubarak’s wealth at between $2 billion and $3 billion. How much of that total is outside of Egypt, and in what form, is uncertain. How much is recoverable is an even smaller fraction.

AP reported that some in Egypt believed Mubarak controlled $70 billion in assets, but U.S. officials dismissed that number as wildly exaggerated. They noted that Bill Gates, the richest man on the Forbes 400 list, is worth $53 billion.