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Comment by phendrenad2 | Hacker News Reader

Why is this surprising to anyone? When the government is corrupt, the laws are just a convenient cover for doing whatever you wanted to do anyway.

Secondly, which countries does the article mention? Nigeria, Pakistan, Georgia, Turkey, and Jordan. Such countries strain the definition of "government" let alone "law".

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> When the government is corrupt

Find me a government and I'll find you corruption.

Corruption and abuses of power exists in most countries, but the degree to which these abuses of power occur in Nigeria (hybrid regime), Pakistan (hybrid regime), Georgia (illiberal democracy turned hybrid regime), Turkey (illiberal democracy turned hybrid regime), and Jordan (hybrid regime) compared to their peers let alone Western countries is fairly well known.

The EIU, V-Dem, CPI, World Bank, and various other benchmarks highlight this as well.

Sure. The west call it "privatization" and consider it progress.

You are oversimplifying. There are degrees of corruption. Just like there are degrees of crime: running a traffic light isn't the same as shooting someone. This is not to dismiss corruption or breaking laws, but oversimplifying is a tactic used by authoritarians to create confusion in people who don't want to think too hard abit things. Marcos and Aquino, Amin, Putin... Trump is more like Marcos, not massive slaughter but oligarchs aren't even pretending to hide in the shadows. I'm sure US's good guy Jimmy Carter had some corruption but is no where mear Marcos.

Ok, but let's not pretend the US wasn't handing out cash hand over fist to private enterprise before trump popped up.

I would repost what I said again but you do not listen.

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