Trump rally in Tulsa causing an earthquake and demonstrating a case study

[unity100]

I was just commenting that the Soviet system was, among other things, resoundingly corrupt (not unlike comparable Western governmental systems).

Thats also false, and it descends from Cold War Anglosphere propaganda.

What is 'corrupt'...

A state/public official, using the power s/he has been given by the people to serve them, to enrich himself or herself instead. That's the definition of corruption used in Anglosphere propaganda.

Yet, when you check Eastern Bloc countries, you see majority of the administration members living slightly better than their compatriots. If a citizen would gain rights to a car in X years, an official gets a slightly better car in Y years. That's the extent of 'privilege' in such societies.

Or, officials were able to access caviar and champagne whereas the people had to... well, eat other types of meat/fish and drink wine.

What a propaganda failure on part of Anglosphere establishment - the moment you get to the bottom of it:

So, the people in Eastern Bloc were eating slightly worse than their public officials, but yet they were still eating and eating well.

In contrast, behold the below picture:

http://metro.co.uk/2013/01/30/tamara-ecc...r-3375162/

https://www.cnbc.com/2016/12/13/americas...unger.html

That's the 'free' and 'non corrupt' modern capitalist society.

Its not even a public official in the above picture. So there is no corruption. Tamara is just a beneficiary of the corruption.

The actual picture of corruption is much worse, because corruption is totally legalized under the name of 'lobbying'. For it has been legalized - lo and behold, you dont have corruption!

Instead, public officials are appointed from among the private enterprises by representatives and presidents funded to offices of power by the very private enterprises themselves.

Entire US administration is a revolving door. Corporate executives are appointed as regulators responsible with regulating the very corporations they come from. And then they go back to those corporations when administration's term ends.

http://legacy.buzzflash.com/commentary/i...deductible

https://www.citizen.org/article/slowing-...ving-door/

That's how you end up with food companies being able to call pink unknown goo 'food', healthcare companies get away with denying healthcare and many more.

And that enables your average Wall Street broker to be able to pop $10k champagne every night. The excess of the actual owners of the system is well known - from the above case of Tamara to Bezos' mansion with 28 toilets...

That's corruption. But you legalize it and you dont talk about it, and voila - you dont have it.

You talk about what minor problem exists in others' societies instead.

Corruption exists in such societies because corruption is a crime in such societies and it is undesirable. If they just legalized it like US did, corruption would not exist then.

I have been at a loss to understand intelligent people buying into the political system. I have a few friends who are absolutely rigid about being democrat or republican—intelligent people—who insist upon "other" party being wrong or bad, and defend their own party. It's mind-boggling to me and seemingly useless to engage with. I agree 100% that it is divisive, which seems self-evident.

Part of it is due to the necessity to keep the "just world" fallacy so that they can continue functioning in the society by believing that it is a fair and acceptable society.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis

Otherwise they would feel helpless in the face of a society that was unjust and they would have problems to function.

And some part of it is just because some people are sufficiently selfish. They would not directly admit that they are ok with prospering at the expense of their fellow people, so they rationalize/justify it through the means available in the modern system's narrative.

Case in point: The lobbyists, shareholders, politicians who justify the current murderous healthcare in US as 'choice'. Of course, denial and lying are also involved.