With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

[SerbobIV]

Why isn't it corruption? Because nothing is being bypassed and the ultimate judge of the DA's action -the demos- is not being kept in the dark. If they decide that a fast result is better than charging in full, they can. If not, the are entirely free to vote for someone else. The fact they trusted the headline and didn't bother reading deeper is neither here nor there.

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I have to vehemently disagree with this notion.

A Lobyist gets a law passed that billionaires are exempt from taxes. This is a law, theoretically supported by a constitution, but it is 100% corruption, so it is "constitutionally corrupt". That a billion dollar ad campaign convinced a population that it is somehow good doesn't change that.

 

[Steelplaza]

I have to vehemently disagree with this notion.

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Let's try it with a little something further removed from contemporary politics.

I'm in the Roman Republic and I just came back from a term as governor in a province, having engaged in all sorts of bribe-taking, theft, and abuse of local notables for my own profit. A tribune hauls me before the assembly to prosecute me for this; the nerve! Fortunately I'm now rich from all my illegal dealing, so I hire the great orator Cicero. Cicero gives a brilliant speech to the assembly about how obviously everything I did was totally legitimate, and even if I did abuse my office a little those non-Roman scum had it coming. By the end of the speech, the assembly is cheering at Cicero's masterful oration and vote to acquit me, even though it's clearly against their interest to be letting me get away with all that illegal shit and they know I did it.

Corruption or not corruption?

 

[SerbobIV]

Let's try it with a little something further removed from contemporary politics.

I'm in the Roman Republic and I just came back from a term as governor in a province, having engaged in all sorts of bribe-taking, theft, and abuse of local notables for my own profit. A tribune hauls me before the assembly to prosecute me for this; the nerve! Fortunately I'm now rich from all my illegal dealing, so I hire the great orator Cicero. Cicero gives a brilliant speech to the assembly about how obviously everything I did was totally legitimate, and even if I did abuse my office a little those non-Roman scum had it coming. By the end of the speech, the assembly is cheering at Cicero's masterful oration and vote to acquit me, even though it's clearly against their interest to be letting me get away with all that illegal shit and they know I did it.

Corruption or not corruption?

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Nah man, that is still blatantly illegal. A better example would be the end of rome when all the wealth was owned by the ones in charge, having made laws that stopped the systems that had previously kept those in power poor.

 

[Neruz]

I feel I should point out that something can be corrupt without being illegal; at the most basic level corruption is just dishonesty undertaken by a person or an organization for the purposes of acquiring benefits.

There is usually a lot of overlap with illegality because society generally takes a dim view of that kind of dishonesty, but as many modern institutions demonstrate it is entirely possible for the dishonesty to be completely legal, but in theory that doesn't actually mean it stops being corruption.