The topic is obviously corruption in the US, which has been a democracy for 250 years.
In general, bad corruption is no surprise in an authoritarian country, as opposed to a democracy, and of course an authoritarian country has concentrated power by design.
> There was a point not that long ago when all the rulers of Europe were cousins.
This somewhat misleading. The King of England, for instance, has not been the "ruler" of England for hundreds of years.