Crony Capitalism

[InRareForm]

http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21598996-political-connections-have-made-many-people-hugely-rich-recent-years-crony-capitalism-may?vh=fc09b66f8cb9bf08faf64ae18a459ee44d3e1683&ts=1394990217

[boutons_deux]

"People want politicians who don’t line their pockets"

duh. what people want and what they get are totally different.

When the political candidates are either hand picked by wealthy, aka powerful, special interests and/or their opponents are pre-empted/destroyed by gerrymandering and/or special intere$t$ destroying, then people almost never get what they want.

Nearly every politician's ambitions for elected or appointed political office are really financial, self-enriching ambitions.

"Governments need to be more assiduous in regulating monopolies, in promoting competition, in ensuring that public tenders and asset sales are transparent and in prosecuting bribe-takers. ... That is something autocrats and elected leaders ignore at their peril."

:lol that doesn't apply to USA, probably only to a tiny %age of other countries.

The corporations and wealthy have so many $Ts now, giving them so much power to rig elections and political processes. They own and operate govts for their own enrichment.

eg, just this week, the gun industry intimidated even Dem Senators into rejecting Obama's appointee for Surgeon-General, an appointee that every major professional group had endorsed. It didn't help that Repugs call him a macaca, a non-Euro non-white.