Hacker News Reader

Comment by throwme_123 | Hacker News Reader

The US is actually one the most corrupt countries on earth.

What makes it worse: They always try to give lessons to the rest of the world, but meh.

The result is here: Record homeless Americans, drug addicts in the streets, health crisis, education crisis, while the ruling elite (it's even more hypocritical when it's the left like Yellen) gets even richer. Time for a revolution maybe.

View on HN

> The US is actually one the most corrupt countries on earth.

That's an enormous allegation. But I don't think it holds up.

The US has corruption, but actual bribery is rare, and the reason we're so outraged is because we have the attitude and expectation that no one should be corrupt. This is like saying "I wouldn't want to live in a bright room - I'd see a roach or two! I'd rather keep the lights down low."

There are hundreds of millions of dollars of bribes exchanging hands every year: https://www.opensecrets.org/political-action-committees-pacs...

PACs are the method of bribery in American politics. Anyone can contribute in unlimited amounts. The other is donations to foundations owned by the politician, and of course speaking fees.

You perceive these as bribes, but you can also perceive them as exactly what they are called. Political Action Committees, a group of people/companies who have a common political purpose, spending money towards that goal.

PACs spend a lot of their money simply doing things that help a candidate. Do you want to make it illegal for groups of people whose funding is opaque, to do anything that benefits a candidate? If one guy puts out a lawn sign for his favored candidate, it's free speech, but if a few neighbors pool their money and rent a billboard, now it's a corrupt PAC engaged in bribery?

PACs definitely have problems and are sources of abuse, but simply calling them bribery is so over the top it's ridiculous.

If you think that "hundreds of millions of dollars" is actually supporting the assertion that the US is the most corrupt country in the world... well, clearly, some perspective is needed. My home country, morocco, which is comparatively way poorer than the US, has a corruption industry that probably goes into the low billions of dollars a year. And that's assuming superpacs are actually a form of corruption, which is very, very debatable. Even EU farming subsidies probably qualify for the term more than superpacs.

> Time for a revolution maybe.

Just a heads up you're running a fine line with comments like that... don't be surprised if the alphabet boys label you a "domestic terrorist".

Those types of issues are mostly handled by local & state governments, which vary wildly in corruption from locality to locality. So many eyes are on the federal government while some city governments have much crazier things going on that have more of an immediate impact.

Yellen is center-right, not left.

No way. Maybe at one time, but her comments in recent years put her way out of that category.

The U.S. has moved so far to the right the last 50 years that it has distorted the electorate's idea of what 'centrist' means. Regan believed the tax on capital ought to the higher than the tax on labor. Bush Sr. supported cap and trade when it came to acid rain. The EPA came about during Nixon's Presidency.

I don't know about the last 50 years, but in the last 15 years U.S. is moving rapidly to the left.

The U.S. is not moving rapidly to the left. Your perception is being skewed by how far to the right the U.S. is in comparison to other OECD nations. The Republican party is far more right wing than any other major comparable party in the OECD.

U.S. is rapidly moving to the left, that is a fact. It doesn't matter what other countries do.

It is not a fact. You are wrong on this. What meaningful left leaning policies have been implemented in the U.S. in the last 15 years?

Obamacare was a Republican idea designed by the Heritage Foundation in the 1990s. It was first implemented by Romney when he was governor of Massachusetts. There is no universal health care, there is no universal paid time off, there is no universal access to pre-school, there is no universal maternity leave, there is no universal sick leave, higher education is still extremely expensive at the point of usage, bankruptcy laws are still draconian, still no legal or law enforcement reform.

> Obamacare was a Republican idea designed by the Heritage Foundation in the 1990s.

I may be misremembering, but I think the basic outline was first proposed by an health insurance industry trade group during the debates over President Clinton’s proposed healthcare reform, and was popular with Republicans as an alternative, and the Heritage Foundation version was a further elaboration.

But, yeah, very far from Left.

Is this a statement about continental drift maybe?

Otherwise, citation needed, your feelings aren't facts.

"That which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence."

Reply on news.ycombinator.com