Juan Cole: Top 10 Signs the US Is the Most Corrupt Country in the World

[eridani]

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/276-74/34038-focus-top-10-signs-the-us-is-the-most-corrupt-country-in-the-world

hile it is true that you don’t typically have to bribe your postman to deliver the mail in the US, in many key ways America’s political and financial practices make it in absolute terms far more corrupt than the usual global South suspects. After all, the US economy is worth over $16 trillion a year, so in our corruption a lot more money changes hands.

1. The rich are well placed to bribe our politicians to reduce taxes on the rich. A nonentity like Donald Trump got filthy rich via tax loopholes, and is now trying to buy the presidency. The way the Supreme Court got rid of campaign finance reform and allowed open, unlimited buying of elections is the height of corruption. Note that despite his supposed “populism,” Trump never talks about the unfairness of our current tax system, instead dividing and ruling working and middle class Americans by stirring racial and religious hatreds. As it stands, 400 American billionaires are worth $2 trillion, as much as the bottom 150 million Americans. That kind of wealth inequality hasn’t been seen in the US since the age of the robber barons in the nineteenth century. Both eras are marked by extreme corruption.

2. Money and corruption have seeped so far into our media system that people can with a straight face assert that scientists aren’t sure human carbon emissions are causing global warming. Fox Cable News is among the more corrupt institutions in American society, purveying outright lies for the benefit of the billionaire class. The US is so corrupt that it is resisting the obvious urgency to slash carbon production. Even our relatively progressive president talks about exploiting all sources of energy, as though hydrocarbons were just as valuable as green energy and as though hydrocarbons weren’t poisoning the earth. All of the GOP candidates for the 2016 presidential election are climate change deniers, all of them in the back pockets of Big Oil, and this includes Trump.

[valerief]

1. K&R

6. The US military budget is bloated and enormous, bigger than the military budgets of the next twelve major states. What isn’t usually realized is that perhaps half of it is spent on outsourced services, not on the military. It is corporate welfare on a cosmic scale. I’ve seen with my own eyes how officers in the military get out and then form companies to sell things to their former colleagues still on the inside.

[99th_Monkey]

2. Gulag USA - 2.2 million prisoners in jail and penitentiary

7. The US has a vast gulag of 2.2 million prisoners in jail and penitentiary. There is an increasing tendency for prisons to be privatized, and this tendency is corrupting the system. It is wrong for people to profit from putting and keeping human beings behind bars. This troubling trend is made all the more troubling by the move to give extra-long sentences for minor crimes, to deny parole and to imprison people for life for e,g, three small thefts.

[Yorktown]

3. There are lots of countries far, far more corrupt than the US

[ronnie624]

5. The US legislative process is rotten to its core.

Campaign finance in this country is a system of quid pro quo, designed specifically to purchase influence in our laws. It is, by its nature, a quasi-legal system of bribery, with a completely false air of legitimacy.

[hunter]

7. The definitions are fluid. $$$ wise the U.S.A. tops all.

Culturally we are well trained to squeal about petty corruption -- the cop who will put away his ticket book for a handful of cash or a blowjob, the public health inspector who will overlook health code violations for a pitcher of beer and a meal -- but most of our politicians are bought in hundreds of different ways, legal and not legal. There are also many big revolving doors between the military and its contractors, or the regulators and the industries they regulate.

I've visited many towns in the U.S.A. that are rotten to the core, medieval and essentially feudal, with cruel corrupt law enforcement, and tightly knit families who control all significant economic activity, tolerating no interference by outsiders.

Corruption is corruption, legal or not.

[Snobblevitch]

9. What utter bullshit.

There mght be some parts of the U.S. as you describe, but to paint the entire U.S. with your descripstion is crap.

[bemildred]

10. What has always annoyed me the most about our politicians is how cheap they sell out.

How easily they take the little money offered and sell us all down the river.

[Yorktown]

12. I do not think you know the world well

How many foreign countries do you know?

[hunter]

19. I've lived outside the U.S.A. and have visited quite a few nations...

... not as a tourist.

I think the U.S.A. is very similar to Mexico in many ways, and not comparable to what we generally regard as the less corrupt "developed" nations, such as the top ten least corrupt nations of the "Corruption Perceptions Index" chart posted above.

We're not comparable in any way to Denmark, New Zealand, Finland, Sweden, Norway...

What we do have, without question, is the most highly developed propaganda machines.

For example, there is an astonishing history of police in various communities large and small actually stealing cars. This is one I pay attention to because we had a car stolen once, first by gangsters who used it in a drive by shooting, and then by police who asked to inspect it for evidence, and then promptly "misplaced" it. We made such a huge stink we eventually got it back.

But there are places where it's much more blatant than that. A DWB (Driving while Black) citation, or an arbitrary parking violation, say for temperorary no-parking zones set up after the car had been legally parked, and taken down again before the driver returned, can quickly escalate to the point where cars are sold at police auction, or has frequently happened in many communities with nicer automobiles, having the automobile ownership magically transferred to the police chief or other police officials.

And the U.S.A. is such a god damned racist and fascist place, that even when "ordinary" white people, working class to affluent, hear about such crimes by police against non-white and lower income poor, powerless, and ignorant white people, they will simply assume that the police "knew" something about the victims, and thus these police crimes were justified.

"Silent majority" white U.S. Americans are roll-over weenies programmed by the television news.

If the teevee news says there is no corruption, if teevee news watcher hasn't heard about the dozens of ways their political representatives are selling them out every fucking day, well then, everything must be fine.

[Act_of_Reparation]

21. Ever been to Azerbaijan? n/t

[hunter]

32. Um... um.

I've heard there is a rack of computers at the NSA named Kitty Carlisle.

Nope.

[Act_of_Reparation]

33. Oh, I see.

USA is teh corruptest because NSA.

You've given this a lot of thought.

[hunter]

38. Hunter shoots, he scores!

Should we compare the U.S.A. to places like Azerbaijan, or places like, oh, I don't know, Denmark, New Zealand, or Finland?

I pay no attention at all to corrupt U.S.A. media, so I'm guessing you are talking about this, as it echos through the noise machines:

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2015/09/01/journalist-who-investigated-corruption-in-azerbaijan-sentenced-to-7-years-in.html

http://csce.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=ContentRecords.ViewDetail&ContentRecord_id=1228&Region_id=0&Issue_id=0&ContentType=P

I'm sure it's got something to do with the current oil wars. The U.S.A. tolerates any sort of corruption so long as the oil trade supports the mighty U.S.A. dollar.

In any case, "Better than Aqualung" is not any achievement to brag about.

[Act_of_Reparation]

39. Oh, please.

I pay no attention at all to corrupt U.S.A. media, so I'm guessing you are talking about this, as it echos through the noise machines:

No, I'm not talking about that at all.

I'd paste a link, but I'm getting the distinct impression you don't subscribe to many academic publications.

[hunter]

51. Oh please. I'm drunk and I'm mocking you.

Be a good sport.

[geek tragedy]

31. Your last paragraph describes quite a few countries.

Honduras, Ukraine, etc etc

[MattSh]

8. And for a little balance...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transparency_International#Criticism_of_Transparency_International

And my own personal criticism. A whole lot of these western organizations generally rate countries of the west better than countries elsewhere. Add to that that a lot of the reason non-western countries rate lower is because of undue influence by outsiders, generally from the west. Some of these reasons are western backed wars, western backed terrorism, western backed corruption. A lot of it often comes down to; friends of the USA - good, and the less friendly you are, the worse you rank.

[bemildred]

11. I think a lot of them are donation rackets too. nt

[femmedem]

14. Other countries have a higher perception of corruption. But the OP talks about invisible corruption.

Media so corrupt that they knowingly feed us lies and distortions, which is only visible if you follow other news sources. A huge number of people incarcerated, invisible.

We don't generally have to grease the hands that grant building permits, etc. But the system is rotten, and the amount of $ involved is enormous.

[Yorktown]

18. Right. Invisible forces at work.

I'll tune in at the Alex Jones show and be right back.

[Octafish]

24. Try University of California Press

Angus Mackenzie: "Secrets: The CIA's War at Home"

Excerpts online: http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/CIA/Secrets_CIAWarAtHome.html

[Yorktown]

27. I read one of the stories

One Man Says No

Bureaucrats covering their *sses. And?

Bureaucratic pastime everywhere.

[RobinA]

35. Thank You

I mean, come on. Most corrupt country? A weeks vacation in Mexico will expose you to more corruption than the average person will see in the US in a year.

[a la izquierda]

37. Oh that's rich.

I've lived in Mexico and work there. My research is there, so I spend months at a time in various parts of the country. I've been stopped in military and police checkpoints. I've dealt with government bureaucracy. I've been in major cities and small towns. The type of corruption you witness is the same as here: petty politics at the very local level.
So no, unless you're a jackass tourist who draws the attention of cops, you won't see any corruption if you just do your thing.

The ignorance about Mexico around here is freakin' stunning.

[RobinA]

47. I Witnessed

a tourist pay off police at a "checkpoint" known for stopping tourists and shaking them down on the way to the airport. First time I ever saw a civilian hand cash to a uniformed police officer on a major highway in broad daylight.

A shopkeeper who thought I didn't see him dogging me attempted to shake me down in a souvenir shop by tossing a trinket on the floor at my feet and then accusing me of knocking it off a shelf. Threatened to call the cops and I told him Go ahead. The police were two blocks up the street having a smoke in the shade and either were never called or weren't interested.

Look, I liked Mexico and would return, but there's a level of scam there that we don't generally have in the US.

[Octafish]

4. 8. NSA Domestic Spying

8. The National Security Agency’s domestic spying was a form of corruption in itself, and lends itself to corruption. With some 4 million government employees and private contractors engaged in this surveillance, it is highly unlikely that various forms of insider trading and other corrupt practices are not being committed. If you knew who Warren Buffett and George Soros were calling every day, that alone could make you a killing. The American political class wouldn’t have defended this indefensible invasion of citizens’ privacy so vigorously if someone somewhere weren’t making money on it.

[closeupready]

23. Good insight. Wouldn't have thought of that, but you're absolutely right.

[Blue_Tires]

40. Because that never, ever goes on in other countries...

[Octafish]

44. It's not supposed to go on in Democracies.

We the People are supposed to know what the government does, not the other way around.

[Blue_Tires]

49. Name a democracy where it doesn't occur

because I sure can't think of one...

[Fuddnik]

6. Elections are about who gets the lions share of the booty.

On the federal level, it's goodies from the designated bribers on K Street.

On the state and local levels, it's jobs and positions for the Governors cronies, and how much they get from utilities, insurance, developers, and........

The media creates horse races for candidates who will have lots of money to spend on advertising.

We're so corrupt that we're a borderline failed state. A failed state defined by Chomsky as a state that cannot or will not protect it's citizens. Our citizenry are victims of predator capitalists. And our government protects the predators.

[djean111]

13. Perfectly right - Our citizenry are victims of predator capitalists. And our government protects the

predators.

And it is a fucking given that the politician with the most money should be the one that wins.
Corrupt to the core.

[raccoon]

15. I think this sign of corruption is especially significant:

5. That the chief villains of the 2008 meltdown (from which 90% of Americans have not recovered) have not been prosecuted is itself a form of corruption.

[Octafish]

16. Must mention or my fist will break: I brought that up in September 2008

Know your BFEE: Phil Gramm, the Meyer Lansky of the War Party, Set-Up the Biggest Bank Heist Ever.

EXCERPT...

The people who should pay for the bailout aren’t the American people. That distinction should go to the crooks who stole it -- friends of Gramm like John McCain and George Bush and the rest of the Raygunomix crowd of snake-oil salesmen. For them, the Bush administration -- and a good chunk of time since Ronald Reagan -- has not been a disaster. It’s been a cash cow.

[lonestarnot]

17. First two are never truer words. Didn't read the rest.

[Octafish]

20. Kick for Democracy.

If you really give a damn, you'll read and kick, too.

[closeupready]

22. +1. I have a good, hearty laugh during the news cycles where "most corrupt state" indices

are released, typically showing that the US is no worse than the UK. lol

That is one measure on which we are so obviously on the short list, that you realize even our democracy's WATCHDOGS (like those who compile these lists) are likely on the take.

[JEB]

25. K&R for exposure.

[Qutzupalotl]

26. Actually, Trump did say his taxes should go up

as well as those of others in his income bracket. Isn't that the same thing as talking about the unfairness of our current tax system?

Maybe he doesn't talk MUCH about it, but he has mentioned it.

[ananda]

28. He is so right.

Our economic system is SO corrupt.

[Amishman]

29. utter bullshit

Anyone who agrees with this drivel needs to spend a little time trying to work a business deal in eastern europe or China.

We're not even in the bottom half on corruption. Improvement is needed, but compared to a huge majority of the world we are a paragon of virtue in terms of corruption. I have never been asked for a bribe or forced to write in a family's members business as a party to a contract for any deals in the US.

[iandhr]

30. I am sorry to bring facts into the discussion

I know that on many issues DU is a fact free zone. (See CDS and ODS.)


But look at this report from Transpacy International



http://www.transparency.org/cpi2014/results

[raouldukelives]

34. Our country, our world, is only as corrupt as people make it.

I live in the most democracy, in America, that Wall St investors cannot block me from experiencing.

They have taken my democracy, my rights, my climate, my health care, my education, my freedom from unlawful imprisonment and my future.

Then, some of them still have the gall to say they care about democracy. That they care about the least. That they follow in the footsteps of Mother Jones or MLK.

If it wasn't so pathetic it would almost be amusing. If it wasn't killing us all for more for themselves that is.

[CanSocDem]

36. Ubetcha...!! (eom)

[Blue_Tires]

41. Over-the-top hyperbole like this only serves to discredit legit leftist arguments...

If it's wrong when the RWers do it, then the same should apply when someone who is supposedly on our side does it...

[Octafish]

42. Riiiight. Like the time Washington swore up and down Saddam had WMDs.

Back in 1991. Remember? Poppy George Herbert Walker Bush, courtesy of Hill & Knowlton, got us to go along with the first war for oil:



The Kuwait ambassador's daughter, committing perjury on behalf of the administration as she tells the US Congress she was a nurse at a Kuwaiti City hospital who saw the Iraqi soldiers take babies from their incubators and leave them on the cold, hard floor so they could steal the incubators for babes in Baghdad.

"If I wanted to lie, or if we wanted to lie, if we wanted to exaggerate, I wouldn't use my daughter to do so. I could easily buy other people to do it." -- Kuwait Ambassador

A princely sum might take care of any integrity on the part of some.

[Blue_Tires]

43. So the United States is the MOST corrupt nation on the goddamned PLANET?

You're going on the record as fully agreeing with that? Because if you are, I don't know what else to say...

FFS the U.S. isn't even the most corrupt country in North America...Don't believe me?

Have fun discrediting this: http://www.transparency.org/cpi2014/results


You know, if you did a quick search of the conservative punditsphere, you'll find a column stating the "Top 10 Reasons Why the U.S. is the Most Oppressive Nation for whites/Christians/conservatives/men/business owners/etc." You do of course realize that what Cole has spewed here is no different, right?

[Octafish]

45. Curse all you want. It shows how little your argument holds.

The United States is is the most powerful nation on the planet, yet the USA uses that power to enrich its already rich citizens through wars without end.

As for the traitors and banksters who run the show? They walk free. Need a link? Maybe a video is more your style (I noticed no one at Transparency.org had anything to say about it).

Gold Star mom Cindy Sheehan tried to bring the moment to our nation's attention. Few others, if anyone, saw fit to comment.

As for where American's entrepreneurial spirit of war came from: Poppy: Bush Sr told the FBI he was in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963.

[Blue_Tires]

50. Actually, my argument is quite solid

and you have done nothing to refute the United States' #14 ranking in the index for 2014...

If you want to argue it should be a bit lower, then fine... If you want to put ideology before fact and argue it should be on the BOTTOM, then good luck with that shit, Cap...

[niyad]

46. k and r and bookmarking for later.

[Octafish]

48. How the US Government Betrayed the Constitution and Invented an Imaginary Fascist One

by Juan Cole
Informed Comment, Oct. 24, 2013

The idea of having a strong Federal government was controversial in the early United States, and one of the ways Federalists reassured Americans that it wouldn’t become tyrannical was to append a Bill of Rights to the Constitution.

If a sheriff in a small town arrested a shoplifter and waterboarded him 54 times, the sheriff would go to jail. Federal officials? Not so much.

That attempt to prevent despotism has failed, because the Federal government and its various agencies have set aside the Bill of Rights as a dead letter, substituted for them a bizarre set of interpretations of law, and either avoid having the courts adjudicate their fascist fantasies or managed to have appointed to the bench unethical or authoritarian judges that will uphold virtually anything they do.

How corrupt our system has become is evident when even the New Yorker emphasizes that a secret Senate report found that torture in the Bush years was “unnecessary” and “ineffective.” Not that it was “unconstitutional.”

SNIP...

Coercive cruelty. Coercive cruelty was the hallmark of treatment of Federal detainees in the Bush era. That was what Abu Ghraib, Bagram and Guantanamo were about. Some prisoners were likely victims of manslaughter by coercive cruelty (it is hard to know when to stop).

CONTINUED...

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/10/24-5

Connect the dots and it forms a straight line through Cheney and Bush and the heart of corruption.