Ray McDeere in Brushy Mountain Prison

Americans invented a word for bribery so it would stop sounding like bribery. They called it "lobbying." A pharmaceutical company that spends $300 million purchasing the votes of legislators who will then block drug price regulation is not, in American law, corrupt. It is "civically engaged." A defense contractor that pays a retired general $500,000 a year to advocate for weapons contracts, contracts the general previously approved from the government side, is not a conflict of interest. It is "private sector expertise." A senator who receives $2 million from the insurance industry over a career and votes against universal healthcare every single time is not bought. He is "fiscally responsible." The genius of American corruption is not that it is hidden. It is that it is legible, documented, publicly filed, searchable on the internet, and still not called what it is, because the people who would name it are the same people cashing the checks, and the people watching it happen have been trained to call it "democracy." At least when a Nigerian official takes a bribe, everyone in the room knows what happened. In Washington, they hold a press conference about it.