> Americans seem to enjoy decent free speech but only so long as it doesn't meaningfully challenge the government
Trump's election was such a challenge. As we can see, the government failed to restrict freedom of speech.
> Recently the Americans' free speech rights seem to be degrading even further with media being ejected from the press room or sued by the president.
But it always happened. Moreover, media being ejected from the press room is not violation of the free speech, and there have been fewer court cases against the press from the government recently. I'm not saying that free speech in the US is absolute. Just that it is better protected than anywhere else and that it works effectively in the areas where it matters most.
> Other countries elect unpopular politicians, that's not really unique.
But we are talking about exactly the opposite: the election of popular politicians who are opposed by the current government. And this is quite unique.
In Europe, in such cases, such politicians are silenced, imprisoned, banned from running, killed, or results of elections are simply cancelled if people voted incorrectly. And in the rest of the world, the situation generally is even worse than in Europe.
> first person I've met to openly defend corruption, or the American word for it, lobbying.
Lobbying occurs everywhere and it cannot not occur. Even in the most totalitarian and communist societies, the most bloodthirsty dictators do not live in a vacuum and are subject to the influence of various isolated groups. So the attempt to separate lobbying from corruption is primarily aimed at reducing this very corruption.
> argue that money shouldn't be able to influence politics.
This is an impossible situation. Or rather, it is possible, but it implies totalitarian powers of the government. Because politics is by definition influenced by everything, and money is by definition a measure of things that influences everything. And the only option when money will not influence politics is when the government has the power to directly manage capital. In any other case, money influences politics.
So neoliberals who believe that money should not influence politics are stupid prototalitarian pigs, no matter what else they say.
> The PRC for a while had virtually 0 influence of capital against their government
But that's not true at all. At the time when capital in China had no influence on politics - literally millions of people died of hunger there. And later, the Chinese government gave capital unlimited power over some areas of public activity.
> The EU seems to often act against the interests of capital
There is no common interests of capital. Each individual capital has its own interests, usually consisting of eliminating all competitors and becoming a socialist government with a monopoly over all spheres of public activity. And if we look at Europe - without a doubt, this is exactly what is happening there.
> So it seems to me that Nazi Germany, Russia, USSR, North Korea are more political failures than economic ones.
This is exactly what I'm talking about: giving the government such enormous powers to influence all elements of the economy makes it completely unaccountable. Which is certainly a political failure.
> it was hardly a failure until it dissolved
I think here you are already starting to substitute concepts. What do you mean by failure? Soviet industrialization is a propaganda myth, the pre-revolutionary standard of living was achieved only in the 60s, tens of millions of victims of famine, millions of political executions. What do you mean by not a failure? Lack of accountability of government to the public? But then North Korea is a huge success, but you call it a failure.