[nonethewiser]

>He sees it as a challenge to his legitimacy and China’s power

This right here is why “corruption” should be looked on with great skepticism. In an authoritarian government basic liberties we take for granted in the West are considered corruption. You know, like having a say in how people are governed. This is a high crime in a state with 1 party that cannot be replaced.

In that way, “corruption” can mean “not being loyal to the dictator.”

[vkou]

> In an authoritarian government basic liberties we take for granted in the West are considered corruption

Could you list some of those basic liberties? Are they the sort of liberties whose exercise involves taking half a billion in bribes?

---

Generally, basic liberties like showing up to a protest aren't considered corruption, they get called terrorism, or somesuch. A Texas judge just sentenced a dozen people to 30-70 years in prison for exercising them, by the way. Some of the people given 30 weren't even at the protest. Half this forum looked at that, and saw nothing wrong with it. I can only imagine that if they were born on the other side of the Pacific ocean, they would be card-carrying party members.

[Jblx2]

>Some of the people given 30 weren't even at the protest.

That by itself isn't a convincing argument. You can't plan a bank heist and be waiting at your safe house and say, "I'm not guilty of anything, because I wasn't in the bank!". The mafia guy doesn't get to say, "I didn't actually whack the victim, I just nodded to Joey, and he did the whacking".

You might be interested in:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_conspiracy

...maybe this is mostly a thing in common law jurisdictions? Maybe there is a lawyer here who can point us to a interesting history of conspiracy in common law vs civil law jurisdictions? Also of interest might be things like:

https://www.justia.com/criminal/offenses/homicide/felony-mur...

[vkou]

Thank you for giving a front-page example of the CCP's logic when it comes to dealing with protests and dissenters. Find one who did something illegal, hang the rest for conspiracy.

[guywithahat]

For anyone else curious as to what OP is talking about, I had to look this up:

> The protest was a late-night/noise demonstration (involving fireworks) against immigration detention policies. It turned violent when a shooting injured a police officer. Prosecutors described it as an "act of terrorism" linked to an alleged antifa cell; defendants and supporters denied organized antifa ties and framed it as protected protest activity

https://x.com/i/grok/share/87352ef0ac4b454aba924157c44f476f

It sounds like they arrived in tactical gear, started destroying property, and when cops arrived opened fire.

This seems like a bad example on your part, as the people opposing ICE are some of the most misaligned people in the country. That said, we have a right to protest in traditional public forms, you don't have a right to shoot up an ICE facility.

[vkou]

Only one person opened fire. He got 100 years. (I agree that he shouldn't have gotten a slap on the wrist for what he did, but I'll happily point out that killers serve less, if at all.)

The rest got 70. None of them had guns.

The guy who got 30 years wasn't even at the protest.

---

There is no universe where this is not completely batshit insane, but it's interesting to see you use the exact same logic[1] the CCP has in its crackdowns and pogroms to justify it.

The reason the sentences were so high, by the way, was because the judge took dozens of minor offenses and added the sentences for each. It's the equivalent of sentencing someone who stole a 12-pack for 12 counts of theft, or someone tagging 'FUCK ICE' for 8 counts[1] of destruction of federal property.

For some reason, the current regime does not hold its footsoldiers and other useful idiots to the same standard.

---

[1] Someone in a protest/movement/group did something bad, brand them all terrorists, and make sure that everyone's going to a 're-education' camp for what will remain of their lives.

[2] One for each letter, and another one for the space.

[guywithahat]

I think your confusion comes from the fact this wasn't a protest gone awry, it was an organized domestic terrorist attack. It was a small group of armed people in body armor who privately organized a domestic terrorist attack intending to cause damage and hurt/kill federal officers in an ambush. The only reason the officer lived was because Song's gun jammed before he could kill people and get away.

Certainly if this was a jihadist attack, a lifetime sentence would be appropriate. Why should it be different just because they're white?

[anigbrowl]

This guy carried out an organized domestic terrorist attack with help from others, actually killed someone as well as badly injuring another, and got only 41 years. Why the disparity?

The Federal Building where he murdered the security guard is just an administrative building; at least the people in Texas were motivated by the somewhat reasonable belief that they were attacking guards at a concentration camp.

https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndca/pr/steven-carrillo-sentenc...

[Jblx2]

>a concentration camp

Most people at these facilities can leave at any time, right? Just so long as it isn't back into the United States? They can return to their country of origin, or another country. I'm sure someone will offer a correction if this particular facility was holding people for other crimes in addition to their unauthorized alien status.

[vkou]

> it was an organized domestic terrorist attack

A guy deliberately drove his car through a street full of scattering protesters in my neighbourhood a few years ago, and when people tried to pull him out of it, he shot one of them, and then ran off, waving his gun (with a jungle-taped pair of mags inserted into it).

Was he a (disorganized) political terrorist? If these guys got 70 years for being at the protest, how many hundreds of years in prison do you think were warranted for him?

[copper-float]

Bringing guns to shoot people you disagree with, then shooting them and injuring them for doing their job is not a harmless demonstration. It's terrorism, and they deserve what they got.

[vkou]

Only one person brought a gun (singular). The rest didn't shoot anyone, nor was there any evidence that they planned to do so. They were convicted for being at a protest where one asshole brought and shot a gun.

He could have had the book thrown at him. As for the rest, if you seriously think that getting 70 years for being at a protest where one person shot a gun is appropriate, you have a lot in common with a Stalin-era Soviet judge.

[ClumsyPilot]

>> basic liberties we take for granted in the West are considered corruption

Like insider trading by congress?

Jokes aside, this is not how dictatorships normally deal with democratic activists? I don’t see how you can come to this conclusion u less you believe that corporations are people, election spending is a form of legally protected free speech, and corporations should vote in elections:

https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/delaware-court-upho...

[JumpCrisscross]

> Like insider trading by congress?

No. Like Kushner and Witkoff and Trump (and probably Hunter Biden) literally peddling influence for money.

[paytonjjones]

That may well be true, but that hardly applies to the current case of taking $325M in bribes

[nekusar]

US folks will contort to the extremes about any discussion of gross illegal conduct in China.

This guy took $325M in bribes, embezzlement, abuse of power, and money laundering. And he did this as a public servant for over 30 years.

I say good on China for attacking such brazen corruption so directly. Violating the public trust should be extremely harsh.

[trhway]

>And he did this as a public servant for over 30 years.

and it was discovered just now? May it be that he played exactly by the rules, the real rules, of the regime - corruption being among the foundational rules of it - and thus it was going for 30 years? And right now he just got his turn like it usually happens in totalitarian regimes. The regime will for show find an excuse to execute you if you got your turn, corruption is just the easiest one.

Also note that corruption is for the officials, state treason is for regular citizens. Same as in Russia. The regime wouldn't want to create impression of political disunity among the officials.

>Violating the public trust should be extremely harsh.

definitely. The only question why the comrade Xi is still not executed?

[ToucanLoucan]

> and it was discovered just now? May it be that he played exactly by the rules, the real rules, of the regime - corruption being among the foundational rules of it - and thus it was going for 30 years? And right now he just got his turn like it usually happens in totalitarian regimes. The regime will for show find an excuse to execute you if you got your turn, corruption is just the easiest one.

Yeah, that would be wild if any of that completely unsubstantiated conjecture, bordering on fan-fiction, was what actually happened.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

White collar criminals often get caught later in their "careers" precisely because they do it for years and years and years without being caught. They get complacent. They get messy. Each round of embezzlement leads to a larger body of evidence that exists somewhere that becomes more and more damning as time goes on.

> The regime wouldn't want to create impression of political disunity among the officials.

In this thread we have dozens of examples of political officials being prosecuted. I'd strongly suggest you park your McCarthyism, take a break, perhaps go for a nice walk.

[trhway]

You really don’t know what you’re talking about, don’t you? You’re from a Western country, right?

>White collar criminals often get caught later in their "careers" precisely because they do it for years and years and years without being caught.

You’ve definitely never seen the castles and fleets of exotic cars that government officials in those countries manage to get on their meager government salaries. Yet you post such authoritative comments …

[ToucanLoucan]

If you have evidence as to any of the wild conjecture you're posting, you're more than free to provide it instead of just lobbing out accusations as though they change anything substantive about the arguments being made.

[libertine]

Well it isn't much contortionism when you look at the big picture you'll find that corruption is an institution in some countries.

For example, you're making an effort to try legitimize the regime by framing a factual gross illegal conduct as a overarching policy.

But is it like that when you observe the whole structure?

How wealthy are the ruling elites? Or for example, how has IP theft policy changed?

Or we can reframe this: how do we tell the difference between a genuine tackle on corruption, from a weed out of the system with a public display?

You have plenty of cases in other corrupt regimes when they want to seize assets from someone the regime wants to push away: it's corruption.

Which again, they could be very well be corrupt, but they are corrupt because they're part of the regime.

You'll probably say: "Oh but the USS!!!" Yes, there's some level of systemic corruption there, just not an institution - yet!

[ClumsyPilot]

I like how you are unable to separate actual crimes from government policies you disagree with.

>> corruption is an institution

>> Or for example, how has IP theft policy changed?

Another country may decide to have no IP protections, that’s not a crime.

Furthermore Intellectual property is legal fiction, some people and countries don’t believe in it.

Apparently Anthropic don’t believe in IP either, they are stealing everything that isn’t nailed down, but cry wolf when someone does it to them. And they are asking for legal immunity on IP theft.

[libertine]

I'm not being unable to separate crime from policy, you're the one trying to dilute both as showing a signal to policy change.

If this was just a political action to take down just another corrupt official enabled by the government, how is this a good thing?

Well for a lot of countries protecting inventions with patents was a major trigger for development, so much so it became a cornerstone and you can even say an institution. So of course it would be viewed as corruption by any country with such institutions.

And it's not like China says it would never abide by IP, else they would have never got the investment that made them into what they are today.

But look further from IP theft, what about seizing assets from companies, or whole companies?

[nekusar]

Im assuming youre likrly from the USA.

Go look up the history of the USA and creation of copyright/patent/trademark was done, and how we dis-recognized all European claims. They were howling similarly.

Go look at how extreme patent law perverted and kept airplanes locked to the Wright brothers, and held down an industry, while other countries (many European as well) were at the forefront of avionics. Patents held the USA back until the US GOV eminent domained the patent freeing it for WW1 armament.

Or go look up why Hollywood was a thing. Again, patent laws on cameras, and eacaping to California was all about screwing over patrnt holders over royalties.

And sure, China didnt recognize our copyrights. Ok. And? We dont recognize theirs either.

[ClumsyPilot]

> So of course it would be viewed as corruption by any country with such institutions

It’s not viewed as corruption. US gov made numerous public statements condemning IP theft, and never even once classified it as corruption - it’s simply a different crime.

Furthermore, you suggested a benchmark is: “How wealthy are the ruling elites”

Well let’s see - the richest man in the world is American, 70% of 100 richest people are American, American has higher inequality than China.

By what robust quantitative measurement does this effort look less genuine than American one?

Are you accessing any objective facts or you simply are unable to accept that a country you are opposed to is making genuine progress?

[anjel]

Intro to "moral hazard"

[trhway]

As Stalin demonstrated even when you're totally loyal, you're still frequently made victim of the terror.

The point of totalitarian regime is that nobody should feel safe, nobody should have an agency. In particular the people shouldn't be able to obtain safety themselves even by the way of being totally loyal.

I have no doubt that that guy was corrupt like any other official there. Yet, he isn't punished for the corruption. The show needed another star, and he was chosen to be that star.

[pessimizer]

These are just weird fantasies that you're writing out, with absolutely no reference to any events that have happened in China. You seem to just be writing fiction, and assigning it to the Chinese. The Chinese are actually people, though, they're real. If you want to accuse them of unremitting evil, you should be able to talk about something they did in detail.

That does not mean that you should google "China bad" and paste a bunch of random urls in a reply, though.

What Cold War propaganda did to Western brains is tragic.

[trhway]

>What Cold War propaganda did to Western brains is tragic.

Some weird fantasies you have.

I grew up in USSR. So very well familiar with inner workings of such regimes.

[omicronxt]

> I grew up in USSR. So very well familiar with inner workings of such regimes.

Just wondering how old you are? 60? 70?

[D_Alex]

Did you feel safe, growing up?