Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread • Hacker News Board

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#301

Post by yanhangyhy » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 7:42 AM UTC

Its not only the us people. It also change the pro-us or pro-west people's view from countries like china.

Before Trump, people still believe USA is a great country even with so many flaws. Its still has a good reputation.Trump changed everything. He is not a bad leader, he has thoughts, but he cannot implement them with caution. And he destroyed USA's reputation, maybe forever.

Its hard to imaginy the greatest democracy' country, the president is manipulate the stock market, publicly, humiliating his friends country, or vaseel state. When the pro-USA people in china talks how great the USA is and China shoud learn from it, the comments is no longer agree anymore, most of them are mocking.and thats what the younger generation will grow up with, the mindset is: yes china is not perfect, but its way better than the shit countries like USA.

You can see the change in the numbers of graduates return to china after college, its used to be low, not its near or >90%.

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#302

Post by DarmokTanagra » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 7:44 AM UTC

aprilthird2021 wrote: post #248

DarmokTanagra wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Corruption in the US went from proxying bribes through layers of shell corps and lobbyists to just buying Trump coin. It has always existed, but it is absurdly easy now and happening in plain sight.

Can you prove any corruption from another President similar to one very obvious case of corruption, where the UAE invested in a very clearly scam crypto company run by Trump's family (who have no crypto expertise) and then very soon after got contentious export licenses for Nvidia chips?

Grant and Harding are famous for being personally corrupt.

Nixon resigned to avoid impeachment for political corruption.

Reagan colluded with Iran to prevent the release of hostages during Carter's re-election campaign and later sold them weapons to bypass congressional oversight.

These are just a couple well known examples at the presidential level, I am sure that for every one we know about there are dozens if hundreds of similar examples.

Go further down the scale to the congressional, state, city, and municipal levels and you encounter even pettier levels of corruption where you can buy votes for 5 figure construction contracts or just simple cash handoffs.

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#303

Post by blooalien » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 7:50 AM UTC

defrost wrote: post #282

blooalien wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 35% approve I also gotta wonder what percentage of this group is amplified beyond reality by bot armies and hostile foreign actors. There can't really be that many people so completely detached from reality, can there?

> so completely detached from reality isn't really the crux of the problem with modern day USofA, more and more people are completely attached to their algo tuned bubble , curated for them by the data scientists of . It's not just the hostile bot armies of foreign actors tugging on the strings of perception, the distortion is coming from inside the borders.

> ... algo tuned bubble, curated for them by the data scientists ...

> ... the distortion is coming from inside the borders.

Yeah, this really does contribute significantly to the whole problem. It's all kinda terrifying really. Like living in a waking nightmare.

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#304

Post by blooalien » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 7:54 AM UTC

mitxela wrote: post #277

blooalien wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> On the flip side, let's keep pointing to all the specific Trump examples. "They" (the cult that worships Trump) would simply presume "TDS" over such an idea, but the fact here is that Trump absolutely is "off his rocker batshit insane" (to a degree we've not seen before in any U.S. president yet), and anyone who claims that he's "good for America" is just as (or more) insane than he is (or they genuinely do hate th…

What can a single person legally do about corruption though?

> What can a single person legally do about corruption though?

These days not much it would seem. :(

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#305

Post by pjc50 » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 7:56 AM UTC

mitxela wrote: post #277

blooalien wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> On the flip side, let's keep pointing to all the specific Trump examples. "They" (the cult that worships Trump) would simply presume "TDS" over such an idea, but the fact here is that Trump absolutely is "off his rocker batshit insane" (to a degree we've not seen before in any U.S. president yet), and anyone who claims that he's "good for America" is just as (or more) insane than he is (or they genuinely do hate th…

What can a single person legally do about corruption though?

The big cheap lever that everyone has is voting, and using whatever social leverage you have to get people around you to change their vote.

Primary legacy democrats. In NYC, the primary was the real election. Then vote in the replacement Democrat. Replace any Republican in any elected positions, then start taking a closer look at the local D machine.

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#306

Post by pjc50 » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 7:58 AM UTC

aprilthird2021 wrote: post #248

DarmokTanagra wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Corruption in the US went from proxying bribes through layers of shell corps and lobbyists to just buying Trump coin. It has always existed, but it is absurdly easy now and happening in plain sight.

Can you prove any corruption from another President similar to one very obvious case of corruption, where the UAE invested in a very clearly scam crypto company run by Trump's family (who have no crypto expertise) and then very soon after got contentious export licenses for Nvidia chips?

Does Iran-Contra count?

Note that it set the terrible precedent of the President pardoning high level crimes.

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#307

Post by pjc50 » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 7:59 AM UTC

potamic wrote: post #263

aprilthird2021 wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prove him wrong. Show us documented cases of corruption from, say Obama, or Biden, or Bush Jr. And then we'll compare it to the documented cases of Trump corruption, starting with his 2 crypto pump-and-dump schemes and his family's fake crypto company (3 already very brazenly open ones and there are more!) and let's see if you can pull similar for any of the previous presidents of the 21st century

What about the whole WMD debacle? Isn't it widely considered to be an act of corruption? And bailing out bank shareholders during the '08 financial crisis.

Did shareholders get bailed out? Which bank? The UK and Ireland bailouts did not do that.

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#308

Post by watwut » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 8:00 AM UTC

majormajor wrote: post #261

dabinat wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess it’s more accurate to say that corruption didn’t start with Trump (he wasn’t even involved in politics when Citizens United was happening, for example). The US has been marching in that direction for a while. The difference now is the openness and also the scale. If a president does one bad thing the press will dig into it, committees will investigate, etc. But what if the president does 20 bad things every s…

> The US has been marching in that direction for a while. It's trivial to remember corruption issues from 100+ years ago (I learned about one in middle school with Teapot Dome and political "machines", and those are hardly the full extent) so this is another one of those cliches that is easy to claim but is never proven. There's always some. Humans gonna human. But that doesn't mean either (a) there's always a high a…

Like common, we have both data and examples of both clear corruption and money in politics.

And we have public legal changes, multiple by supreme court, that make corruption impossible to prosesute and more likely.

Yes, the trend was there for a while. And Trump can do what he does because the institutions and laws were eroded and already at the cracking point.

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#309

Post by tstrimple » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 8:03 AM UTC

0xDEAFBEAD wrote: post #269

tstrimple wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like you’re completely ignorant to US history post civil war. You seem to know nothing about the daughters of the confederacy. Know nothing about segregation and Jim Crow. You have no idea that conservatives fight to this day to maintain monuments to literal traitors to the country. Or that they still routinely fly the flag of traitors to the country. Or more likely you do know about all of that and agree with…

I know that stuff happened, but I don't think it's some sort of universal explanation for everything which happens in US politics.

I'm sorry you're too dense to see why "The Party of Lincoln" is defending the confederate flags and confederate monuments. They must just really believe in states rights except where it actually helps people. Sort of like the confederates who pretended to be about states rights while demanding other states return their "escaped property". And it doesn't explain everything in US politics. I never claimed your strawman. It explains US conservative's degeneracy. Their complete lack of shame or civility. They never had any.

Re: Record-High 89% in U.S. Say Government Corruption Widespread

#310

Post by tstrimple » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 8:04 AM UTC

0xDEAFBEAD wrote: post #286

Chermska1 wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The poster you responded to did not mention slavery, they mentioned the confederacy, which held a variety of views, many of which still inform the politics of many Americans today. Acknowledging this reality seems reasonable. Your replies indicate your disdain for appeals to the history of American slavery in political discussions, yet you were the one who brought it into the conversation, diverting the thread by ini…

This is bad faith hair-splitting. You know perfectly well what tshrimple thinks "Nuremberg trials" were needed for, or why they think confederates were "evil fucks".

They were evil fucks. Slavery was one among many deplorable things conservatives supported and still mostly support to this day. They also opposed women's suffrage. They opposed civil rights and fought to maintain segregation. They fought against gay rights. They fight against trans rights. They literally fight against any minority who might land on an equal playing field. Hey... guess who has been stating lately that women shouldn't be allowed to vote?

They are always the first to cast someone as an "other" and scapegoat for all of their problems. You're the type of person to hear "Haitians are eating their cats and dogs!" or "Mexico is sending us rapists and murders" and say "That guy has a good point!". It's pretty fucking gross and you're a clown at best for defending them.