Corruption![]() When Billionaire Government Contractors Are Also Media Moguls (4/7/2025)Six Weeks In, This White House Is On Its Way To Being The Most Corrupt In U.S. History (3/6/2025)Jamie Raskin Gives The Best Description Of Trump Corruption You'll Hear (2/16/2025)High levels of corruption are not only a cause of democratic failure but an effect of decadent institutions. Thus the path to controlling corruption – through robust accountability, the rule of law, and a vigorous civil society – is also the path to sustainable democracy. Larry Diamond the way the Supreme Court got rid of campaign finance reform and allowed open, unlimited secret buying of elections is the height of corruption. Top Ten Signs the US is the most Corrupt nation in the World Juan Cole 02/22/2018 “Arguments in defense of the centralization of power and rising authoritarianism are always different, but the results are always the same: corruption, stagnation, dictatorship, repression, violence.” Gary Kasparov
There is evidence that high levels of wealth inequality, as in the US, are highly correlated with corruption. (1, 2) America is ... the international kleptocrats’ favorite place to launder money. In a 2011 forensic study of grand corruption cases, the World Bank found that the United States was the leading jurisdiction of incorporation for the entities involved in the money laundering schemes. “The money is coming from everywhere,” says John Tobon, head of the Department of Homeland Security Investigations in Miami, where its Foreign Corruption Investigations Group is headquartered. This should not be the case if the U.S. AML system were fit for its purpose. Money Laundering for 21st Century Authoritarianism by Ben Judah The Supreme Court, by adopting an a historical and improperly narrow view of corruption, has shut down an exploration of the very real threat that unrestricted campaign spending actually posses to our democracy....corruption, broadly understood as placing private interests over the public good in public office, is at the root of what ails American democracy. (from David Cole's, New York Review of Books review of, Corruption in America: From Benjamin Franklin's Snuff Box to Citizens United: Zeyphyr Teachout.) Whatever the explanation, something has clearly changed; there’s a lot more obvious corruption at the top than there was. And the costs of that corruption, I’d argue, include a process of demoralization. Kids used to look up to public figures, sports stars in particular, as role models. Do they still? Can they, given what public figures will do if the checks are big enough? Paul Krugman (6/16/2022) NYT "Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of today." ~ Theodore Roosevelt Centralization of power in the executive, politicization of the judiciary, attacks on independent media, the use of public office for private gain—the signs of democratic regression are well known. The only surprising thing is where they’ve turned up. As a Latin American friend put it ruefully, “We’ve seen this movie before, just never in English.” Foreign Affairs: Is Democracy Dying ? Trump halts enforcement of US law banning bribery of foreign officials (2/10/2025)Trump made up to $160 million from foreign countries as president (4/13/2023)Committee on Oversight and Reform Letter to Jared Kushner. (6/2/2022)Why did the Saudis invest $2 bn with Jared Kushner? (4/12/2022)Trump Org Made $1.7 Billion While Trump Was President, Much of It From Taxpayers (11/30/2021)6 Ways Trump Has Sold Out America (10/31/2019)Profiting off the Presidency: Trump’s Violations of the Emoluments Clauses (10/1/2019)Who Has Donald Trump Pardoned? Full List (12/2/2024)Donald Trump Has Hit the Corruption Trifecta (11/10/2019)Betsy Devos’ $225 million in outside income is only the tip of the iceberg. (3/22/2021)Trump’s Corruption: The Definitive List (10/28/2018) NYTTop Ten Signs the US is the most Corrupt nation in the World (02/22/2018 Edn.) Juan ColeWhy Corruption Matters (11/28/2016)
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