Reply #26: I'd agree that generally, American politicians . .

[msmcghee]

. . have more influence over other countries - because they affect more people with their decisions and foreign policies than politicians from countries that don't have as much wealth to pass around or military power to push. But, that would be true about any state's politicians - that their influence would be in proportion to that state's wealth and power and how much of that wealth and power they had access to.

I was questioning the implication in his statement that there is something intrinsically more evil about American politicians - than politicians from other places. I believe the words he used were "exceptionally dirty". That's a progressive meme that's quite common here. I was trying to see if there is any real basis for it.

How about you? From a LeftishBrit's perspective, do you think that American politicians are more "exceptionally dirty" than other politicians in the world? (To help, I'd say that "exceptionally dirty" would include the far end of the evil scale on things like general corruption, influence peddling, bribery and abuse of personal and state power.)