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Comment by smoyer | Hacker News Reader

Well ... I guess I feel a little bit better knowing that today in The US we'll elect a rationally corrupt president instead of an irrationally corrupt president.

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I don't. "Rational" in this context just means more effective at screwing the country in favor of self-interest.

As an European, I sure hope the "rationally" corrupt president won't be elected. I fear that under her leadership chances for a war with Russia would increase and WW3 is not something I look forward to. If a war would happen because of US's interests in Crimea, we would take the hits.

well, under Trump, Putin can do almost whatever he wants, without strong opposition. I mean, we all heard his statements/plans.

pretty bad choice for europe too, arguably even worse

Putin hasn't been trying to increase his sphere of influence, unlike the US and the EU. Putin seems more interested in keeping up the status quo, which to me is a more preferable situation.

Think about it - how would the US like it if Russia would station it's armies in Mexico or perhaps do military practice in this country?

Note that the US has army bases all across the world and instability in many countries has been caused by US policy. Policy which seems to be guided mainly by business interests:

- https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/04/15...

- http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240527023038518045795605...

Wait, you don't consider entering Crimea to be increasing his sphere of influence? Even if you consider that justified, surely it's still expansionist?

Crimea was already solidly within that sphere, covered as it is by Russian military installations. It would be nice if the rest of Ukraine could enjoy the benefits of self-determination, but it isn't clear that increased USA involvement is the best way to achieve that.

> Putin hasn't been trying to increase his sphere of influence

What a peculiar thing to say.

I wasn't predicting the outcome of the election other than I'm expecting one of the major party candidates to be elected. What I'd really like is the opportunity to vote for someone I respect, trust and can follow. It seems politics seems to weed out those candidates in favor of the ones that will win at any cost.

People always seem to want a "decent" candidate but it always seems to me that even decent candidates get vilified. For example I personally respect Obama a lot (even if I don't agree with him on everything) but some people literally thought that he was the antichrist.

It is troubling how much people in the west are talking tough about Putin these days, isn't it?

Not particularly. Putin has a history of injecting himself into Western politics, so in turn, he has invited some talk to his own doorstep.

Remember the time in 2013 when he wrote an op-ed in the NYT addressed directly to the American people? http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/09/12/opinion/putin-plea-for-...

Best not to discourage Westerners from returning a salvo of commentary, don't you agree? Especially considering that most of us don't have editorial access to the news pages that our countrymen read.

Yes, the cultural differences are massive. In South Korea, if a politician gets involved in shady side-dealings, people march out in the streets by the thousands to demand their immediate resignation.

In the US, the same behaviour will actually help you get elected (the corporations who own you will make sure of it). What Hillary Clinton did is the textbook representation of everything that has gone wrong in our society over the past 10 years.

I think Trump is horrible as well but if I was American I'd vote for him anyway out of protest.

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