Comment by trhway
6 months ago
What i like about US is that compare to other countries (like for example Russia where i'm originally from) there is almost no lying and cheating here. Instead there is a respect of the law and an army of talented creative accountants and lawyers. Remember that stale "multi-used" sandwich served with the drink which by virtue of its existence converted drinking establishment into a food serving restaurant? Not being an accountant, i'd just speculate, out of sheer fantasy, that some hardware chip/gadget added to your software may similarly convert your software development into hardware/gadget one.
I'm not sure I buy into this. Sure, compared with Russia it's probably a lot less, at least in terms of being something everyday people engage in. But in terms of comparing with countries like Germany or Sweden I don't know.
Here's some food for thought:
* Global financial crises: Banks were paying (bribing) ratings agencies to rate junk bonds AAA.
* Savings & loan crisis: widespread fraud & insider abuse.
* Bernie Madoff: Ran the largest Ponzi scheme ever, with an estimated fraud total of $65B raking in $17.5B in invested cash.
* Enron: straight up accounting fraud sprinkled with intentionally causing brownouts in California to pad their pockets with a side bonus of making Gov Davis unpopular & get him recalled (Enron was closely aligned with the Bush administration).
* Nixon straight up using psy-ops against Democrats & finally trying to burgal the DNC offices.
In terms of stats, the FBI does a few hundred bribery and corruption cases annually. Are they good at catching white collar crime? Well such crimes regularly take more than 5 years to investigate.
And hell, some things that are basically lying and cheating are straight up legal. Usury is legal with minimal to no regulation of payday loans. Pyramid schemes are legal as long as you call it multi-level marketing.
The list goes on and on.
If the list doesn't go on and on that is a clear sign that corruption is being hid.
Could be a sign that the commenter was not willing to spend all his day writing, especially once his point was made.
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> What i like about US is that compare to other countries (like for example Russia where i'm originally from) there is almost no lying and cheating here. Instead there is a respect of the law and an army of talented creative accountants and lawyers
I thought you were being sarcastic here at first because, good lord, there is plenty of corruption here in the US (though those doing it used to care more about hiding it). The US, especially in its current state, is certainly not a place I'd describe with "almost no lying or cheating". I do understand that Russia is on another level, though, given the open assassinations and doing things like what was done to Navalny.
> I thought you were being sarcastic here at first because,
You've never been in Russia. There is no clear law abiding business there. That opens a lot of opportunities for those with some power. Corruption is one of them, selective punishment is another. I'm sure in most 3d world situation is not better, but they at least don't have laws to cheat and bribing isn't a crime.
You have no idea about corruption if you haven't lived it in a BRIC country.
The funny thing, is that people not from America say that there IS corruption, but at least it happens in the open. I think OP is saying the same.
>say that there IS corruption, but at least it happens in the open
How is that corruption?
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Because this is SO much better..../s The only difference in style is that the American billionaire will corrupt everything and still say it is for your own good.
You forgot putting a dead guy on trial.
> almost no lying and cheating here
Are you living in an alternate world?
No, he's saying that people respect the law, which they do. It's all about finding loopholes, and sticking to the letter of the law while working around the law to do whatever the law prohibits but doing it in a way that remains legal. This entire situation came up because of loopholes. A great way to offshore money was to spend it on software developed by overseas subsidiaries.
If you’ve never lived outside the US you have zero idea how bad it gets. It literally is an alternate world.
The amount of daily activities in the US that just work 99.999999% of the time that would have a corruption aspect in some other countries is mind boggling.
The closest analogy I can come up with is imagine if every money transaction involved cash tipping the parties involved. And that’s just the beginning.
Like tipping the licensing agent every time you had to renew your driver’s license or get plates. Or tipping the judge for a favorable judgement.
A growing number of activities in the US require tipping, so it's getting there.
Or are cynical Americans living in an alternate world, blind to how much better the rule of law is here than most other countries? The commenter's comparison was to Russia. When was the last time Putin lost an election?
I'd say we're slightly behind western Europe as far as rule of law goes, not really sure about the advanced east (Japan, Korea), and miles ahead of just about everywhere else (eastern Europe, Russia, Africa, China, etc). Yes, even with Trump in office, though he really makes me worry.
I mean, the sitting President was shilling cars on the White House lawn and runs an active meme coin bribery slush fund.
This is not slightly behind Western Europe. This is miles behind any developed country. China may be corrupt, but Xi Jinping hasn’t yet sold beans or cars via press conference.
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Why are these alternatives? I believe it is true that the situation in the US is better than many other countries (not most), and also that "almost no corruption" is false.
Being better than others really isn't the only thing that matters.
If you pursue excellence, you compare yourself against the best, not the worst.
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USA is pretty darn corrupt. Just because worse places exist does not make USA good.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index#2...