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US is slipping in the ratings
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http://news.search.yahoo.com/search?cs=bz&p=Corrupt+Countries&fr=fp-tts-701&fr2=ps
Logged onto Yahoo and found this. Out of 178 countries on this planet '70%' of then are corrupt. Somalis tops the list with New Zealand being among the least. I wonder where OZ fits in.
New Zealand just does odd things with/to sheep....
Otherwise it's just Hobbitses and Goblins.....;)
Hmmm..........time for a vacation, no I couldn't. 
What, it has been knocked off No 1 spot???? 
Well eff me, whoever dun that has just gotta be bad. 
Just think, all of us who live in varied locales can wonder where our governments sit in the ratings. Denmark also sits low in the ratings but India is way up there.
A better source would be this site which shows the complete ratings.
http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi/2010/results
Sad state of affairs in a lot of countries for sure. 
For many countries it is the inherited culture spanning centuries.... sad in any case.
A snapshot of a world gripped by greedy, power hungry mongrels bent on the Earth's ultimate destruction. There are times when I wish ET would show his face for real. Maybe then these idiots will look up and take notice. The only problem with that is once we kick ET's butt it all goes back to the same old shit. Either that or ET will kick our collective butts and then it all goes to hell in a hand basket anyway. What we need is a dedicated group of individuals whose sole goal would be to send all those greedy, power hungry mongrels to an early grave! Then what? Once done they become what they eliminated? A lose lose situation. I predict that it will not be too long before these governments, including my own, are either overthrown by the masses or collapse under their own stupidity. Anarchy is not far.
Nice to see OZ in the top 10 ... now if only we can get rid of the bankers.
Bankers are the bane of every society and should be sat atop fire ant nests after being doused in honey.
I used to think Milburn Drysdale of Beverley Hillbillies fame was funny... 'til I discovered that bankers really ARE that greedy.
Imagine the looks on their faces should one of them read these threads. I'd like to find a way to shame every damn one of 'em. Lawyers and bankers alike. The only thing that interests them is money and very little of anything else. I wonder if they'd do to their own families like they do to us common folk. Probably not. If the same happened to them they'd scream bloody murder.
To be honest, if a banker was reading the less than complimentary comments I and other have made in these forums, they'd just think: "Well at least I know I'm doing my job right. As for shaming them, you can only shame somebody with a conscience, somebody who happens to care, and bankers obviously don't.
I just read earlier that up to 30% of households in NSW here in Oz are skipping up to 2 and 3 meals per day just to pay their rent and power bills, that parents are consistently getting sick because they're going without bare necessities to feed and clothe their kids.
Here in Oz at the moment, the greatest villains are the power companies, jacking up prices by over 70% in 3 years and the CEO's/upper echelon giving themselves million dollar + pay rises. Trouble is, they're not the only ones after your dollar... they ALL want it. Fortunately, we do not run a car or have social lives that include eating out, cinemas or nightclubbing, etc. In fact, I haven't bought clothing in over 2 years now... what I have does me, and I look after it. Shaunna rarely buys clothes, and her tastes are inexpensive anyhow, so she doesn't spend a lot, either.
Most of our money goes on rent, food and utilities... and once in a while, what's left over we use for some of the nicer things in life that make it a little more enjoyable. PC's and associated accessories are usually my thing, but it'll be a tad beyond 2 years before I upgrade my rig. Well actually, I'm putting a bit of money aside each fortnight and I hope to be able to build an Intel i7 based rig about mid-year next year. I already have a few components so it'll be CPU, RAM and mobo mostly, and maybe a 400 series graphics card iuf the prices have dropped sufficiently.
Hehe, I just hijacked/pirated your thread and went way off topic. 
But back on topic, I'm still amazed that the "US is slipping in the ratings" 
Frankly, I thought nobody 'd ever knock 'em off top ranking. Still, times are a changing and there's been a shift of power and resources. With the recession and all, maybe the US can't afford to be as corrupt as they once were anymore.
Yup, that's what they oughta do! The Chinese have plenty of cash these days, and if I was the US, I'd lease the title of most corrupt to the Chinese until I could afford it again. Just don't sell it to them Kiwis... I mean, you know what they do to the sheep, and you wouldn't want yer most corrupt title back after they've done with it. You probably never get it clean again, no matter how much bleach you use.
I'd rent it myself, but on a disability I could probably only afford it for 30 seconds or so, and I'm not gonna get much tainted in that short a time, am I? Hmmm, maybe I could get a pension discount and rent it for 5 minutes or so. I could get a bit of tainting done in that time. I thought the first thing I'd corrupt would be Wall St, but then I dawned on me... somebody beat me to it.
Your 'going off topic' touched on a desire I've had ever since I laid my hands on my first computer. Back in 96 I worked in this service station. Gas station here ... petrol stop where you are? Anyway ... I worked the overnight and on a sunday night a crackhead comes up and wants to unload a Radio Shack electronics kit for $10. I took it off his hands for $5. took it home and started playing with it. Within a month I scratch-built a complete prototyping station. I made analog circuits, digital circuits and everyhing else you could or rather I could think of.
Long story short ... you still awake? Cool ... I built a digital lightshow that ran off an ordinary wallclock. I tapped three signal sources. Duh ... its only got three, seconds minutes and hours. Left and right channels, each on its own clock signal. Regular time (I don't know if your's is 60 or 50 hz) 60hz x 2 = 120hz. Split that left and right then split each one to 30hz going up or down using a series of counters and shift registers.
Longer story even shorter. My first computer was a home built using discarded parts, mobo sound and video cards, modem in an IBM case and a thirteen inch CRT. The OS was Windows for Workgroups or 3.0. I was hooked ... line and sinker. One of these days I'm going to build me a rig that will make all the others cry! I like to improvise, see what can do what when and how. 
Check it out ... ha ha ha I hijacked my own thread.
What is amazing is the ability for people to read something and accept it without questioning it's validity. Just saying.
Don't hate. That can start wars.
Oh. And I read it. There seems to be a few more people that read it also. The survey that is.
Go Canada Go 
Yeah, like Monaco didn't get a mention, and due to its small size, it probably has more people with wicked, naughty, corrupt, deviant thoughts per square km than any other country on earth.
I therefore retract my earlier statement that the US held pole position in the corruption stakes and I now intend to see if I can rent if off Monaco for and hour or two so's I can achieve a lot more.
As you can see, Philly, I took the whole thing with a pinch of salt and felt the best response was to lampoon it a little. Every country his its problems with greed and corruption, but to label one as being any worse than another is too hard and would only be speculation. Too much goes on in the world that we don't know about, and in some cases I think that's just as well. We have enough stress and worry in this modern era,without piling on more.
Well said Buddy. I think it's all based on generalized statistics like crime rate, censorship, propaganda ... stuff like that. But one thing you can't argue is what is reported in the news concerning certain countries like Iran, Somalia and little Dubai. Notice where most of it is. Europe, Africa and South America.
Don't forget the principality of Buggeroffimnotinterested. It may not mean much to you right now, but once I've leased that hour or two of corruption from Monaco, it'll be on the map with a vengeance. I'm gonna secede from Oz and create a principality in Brassall called Starkerville, where pretty much everything goes... if I think of it first.
Yup, by the time I've finished, Starkerville will be the most corrupt society in creation.... especially when I decree that all residents/citizens consume at least 2kg of curried cabbage per day. If that don't lead to Starkerville being the most corrupted society on Earth, I'm buggered if I know what will. I mean, seriously, what could be more corrupt than 27,966 residents digesting and expelling 444,727 tons of curried cabbage per week?
Yup, the more I think about it, the more I think renting pole position in corruption is the right thing to do.
You sir are a twisted, maniacal, iron-fisted, despot of the highest order. I salute you.
Why thank ye squire. 
Another country that barely rates a mention in the corruption stakes is The Vatican, a state of just 0.2 sq miles, and I reckon there has to be corruption coming out of the woodwork there. For a start, a lot of garlic is consumed there, so that has to put it very high up on the list, not to mention all the wine consumed during various church do's and the like.
I mean, c'mon, we all know that wine has the ability to make people behave badly after downing a glass or three, so that has to be taken into consideration as you evaluate the effect of going to confession, saying 3 hail Mary's and coming out absolved to start all over again. In fact, If I can't get a Papal inquiry into all this, I'm gonna see if I could borrow a bit to bolster my chances of taking out an award at the Mocca's (Medal of Ceaseless Corruption Awards) in 2011.
Better hurry. I hear supplies are limited to politicians, lawyers and wannabe despots only. Try the brown nose tactic, they love people who kiss up to them. And while you're down there light the fuse on one of the mini nukes you found under the porch next to the cabbage patch and stuff it up his/her rear end then run like hell.
I don't know where the US is ranked on dumbest nation, but I would guess that it is quite high. What people put back into power those who got the nation in such c r a p as it is now in the first place? A second chance to really screw things up? The right-wing voters are the easiest to manipulate, just say "tax cuts". These tax cuts are one of the factors bankrupting America now. Anyone who continues to defend the right-wing on these "policies" doesn't have a valid opinion, they're just greedy and stupid and no different than libertopians. I really got a laugh when I heard one politician proclaim that America already had the world's best health care. Yeah, the best money can buy and that is the problem when very few can afford it.
People with a different view than yours, on what is good for themselves, are not dumb scharchuk.
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