Oh yes. Buying voters like checks notes “the opposition” is surely the way to root out corruption in business and politics. 🤮
I think the point to take away from this is that it’s weird that anybody is being bought, and weirder that only the people being bought are the ones doing the buying as well. Like one massive circle jerk of rich people extracting income from the people, giving as little as they can back, and just passing it between themselves.
Yeah. There are different kinds of corruption. Tammany Hall corruption, where individual voters did get paid, was definitely bad.
However, it was superior to the current model in at least one respect: the voter got something concrete for their support. These days, both sides ask you to vote for them and get nothing in return.
Votes were frequently bought in Mexico with gift cards, food, and sometimes straight up cash. It’s partly why the ineffective and corrupt PRI party held on to power there for decades. It’s best to just do away with bribery altogether.
