A culture of corruption is pernicious because it is not just a deviation from government in the public interest; it is also the destruction of the state’s democratic legitimacy. It undermines the necessary faith that the representatives of the people are acting in the interest of the people.

A Trump Cabinet secretary violated the law when he told TV viewers this week to buy Tesla stock, but it's not clear that anything will be done about it.

"This is a test for MAGA types and the populist right to see whether they allow themselves to be lied to flagrantly by elites trying to manipulate them," Drop Site's Ryan Grim wrote in response to Andreessen's comments. "The CFPB put out a legitimately good rule that went after banks over debanking users based on political views. Yes, a populist left-wing CFPB head stood up for the rights of conservatives."

"Now VCs and Musk, who don't like the CFPB for other reasons, are straight up lying to whip people into a frenzy and defang the CFPB," Grim added. "The message: They think you are stupid and can't read and are going to make your life worse in order to enrich themselves."

“He’s behaving as if he’s a co-president and making sure everyone knows it,” one source said, adding that Musk is “sure taking lots of credit for the president’s victory. Bragging about America PAC and X to anyone who will listen.

“He’s trying to make President Trump feel indebted to him. And the president is indebted to no one.”

The Pandora Papers documents — more than 11.9 million records from 14 offshore entities, including law and wealth-management firms — illuminate a hidden world that has allowed government leaders, a monarch, billionaires and criminals to shield their assets.

so Trump's personal lawyer is a foreign agent but it's okay because he's lobbying foreign governments, not his own, in ways that are interpreted as repressing "foreign partners and foreign investors"

"Giuliani said he was hired to send the letter by a global consulting firm run by former FBI director Louis Freeh. He declined to say on whose behalf Freeh’s firm was working or how much he was paid.

This summer, Giuliani told The Washington Post that he was working with clients in Brazil and Colombia, among other countries, as well as delivering paid speeches for an Iranian dissident group. He has not registered as a foreign agent with the Justice Department on behalf of his overseas clients, saying it is not necessary because he does not directly lobby the U.S. government."