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Nonilex
Nonilex
@Nonilex@masto.ai  ·  activity timestamp 5 hours ago

Those movements didn’t last. The backlash against them nevertheless fed a Trumpian nostalgia for the good old days, when #SexualAssault & #PoliceBrutality were easily rationalized or not even discussed. This…helps explain the extreme response to the call for #accountability — many powerful bystanders behaved as though they had narrowly survived Robespierre & the guillotine & worked to prevent such movements from ever emerging again by trying to censor #speech associated with them.

#US #law

Nonilex
Nonilex
@Nonilex@masto.ai  ·  activity timestamp 5 hours ago

An echo of that earlier outrage followed the revelations of the #EpsteinFiles, though this round has so far been diverted into mutual partisan recrimination, more than the focus on institutional changes that characterized those earlier movements.

This is not to say that the rich & powerful are never held to account. #BobMenendez is one counterexample, & #Epstein himself was a #billionaire who died in a jail cell, after all.

#US #law #accountability #power #plutocracy

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Nonilex
Nonilex
@Nonilex@masto.ai  ·  activity timestamp 5 hours ago

While #Congress & the presidency have been working hard to raise the #ExecutiveBranch above the #law, #SCOTUS has done its part to ensure that laws against #bribery & #corruption are near-unenforceable. With a series of rulings on #CampaignFinance, the #JohnRoberts Court has ensured that the #rich can try to buy #elections without formally breaking the law. As a result, #politicians are #indebted to a few hundred #billionaires who drop unholy amounts of cash every #election cycle.

#US #power

Nonilex
Nonilex
@Nonilex@masto.ai  ·  activity timestamp 5 hours ago

Getting convicted of #bribery in the #US requires some serious effort—take fmr Democratic Sen #BobMenendez of NJ, who was convicted of selling influence on behalf of local businesses & the country of Egypt after being caught with gold bars in his house. When #Trump first took office, he paused enforcement of foreign bribery cases entirely—but there are some signs that he intends to revive such prosecutions as a #weapon against his enemies, in the mold of the Hungarian #strongman Victor #Orbán.

https://masto.ai/tags/Orb%C3%A1n
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