Obviously, a US Embassy abroad is unlikely to write a cable about US government corruption. Go through the cables yourself and see if you can find one about Joe Biden monopolizing the juice industry in the US....

I just realized something...I hate the far left as much as I hate the far right. here's the deal...if you identify yourself strictly as a liberal or a conservative...then you, my friend, are an Idiot, and stand in the way of progress. I mean, yeah, our government's not perfect, but for christsakes, we are NOT even close to being as bad as some of these other countries. i mean, ARE YOU KIDDING ME! Have you ever been to Honduras? or Mexico? or Guyana? Or Romania? or any country on this list? ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

People in this country need to chill out. trust me when I tell you that we are doing fine...we've got work to do, but WE ARE NOT TUNISIA!!!!! My god! Go get an education.

You're right, we're not Tunisia. We're worse. Yes, the corruption here is better concealed but much more far-reaching. You do realize, don't you, that Wall Street's fraudulent and incompetent attempt to securitize junk MBS's, leverage them to the hilt, using their bought-and-paid-for legislators to do so, and sell them to suckers around the world, was the precipitating event of this global financial crisis? And of course, our corrupt ratings agencies, S&P, Moody's, Fitch, agreed to rate everything AAA so they could continue their lucrative relations with the investment banks. Goldman Sachs helped the previous Greek government hide its endemic fraud. Our banks are among those that the Irish tax payers are now bailing out. WE ARE THE CENTER OF CORRUPTION IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMY.

By the way, how did the author manage to do an entire section on Nigeria without once using the word "Shell"????

And though we may be "shocked" by the corruption of the Azerbaijani leadership, somehow, we've found a way to keep them as a close ally.

I am an American, since I was born in Guatemala and America is my continent; sometimes I wonder how come people from the United States, get such reactions like yours.

Sure the US is a great country, just like many others. But the problem with the US its the sense of "special boy" that a lot of its citizens have; I mean, a lot of ppl think they are the role model (hence you should preach total non-corruption, which the cables clearly show you dont), you sell yourselves as the country that brings freedom (when sometimes the case has been the contrary, hence Clinton's apology to my country to taking our president out of power in a CIA-led coup in 1954 -look for Jacobo Arbenz-). And I could go on and on.

My point is that for example, the Pope HAS TO BE A VERY GOOD HUMAN BEING if he wants to pretend to lecture others. I dont know if he is, I dont even care, but he sure preaches a lot, so he should be a role model. The US is not what it says it is.

The US preaches freedom and democracy to other nations, so it puts itself in the line of criticism. Its normal, its even fair of you think about it.

Sadly, in the last decade, the US has done way to much to make the world notice the double standards it has been applying: fighting for freedom but supporting dictators (when its suitable to US interests). Naughty, naughty. At the end of the day, the US is as good or as bad as any nation... My disappointment too.

Read a bit: Iran and Mosadeq, Guatemala and Arbenz, Chile and Allende, Nicaragua and The Contras, Panama + THE CIA + Noriega, Haiti since 1920's (or even earlier I think), Greece and the 1949 coup, Golf of Tonkin, Pentagon Papers, geez, its too much, you might go crazy. But dont worry, like you said, all the countries are corrupt, including yours. Its just that yours thinks its not... or at least you seem to not see it.

Original poster, believe it or not but America really isn't that corrupt compared to perhaps even the majority of the world.

However, just because corruption is openly known (you can easily find out how much lobbyists spent on each US politician and who donated how much), it doesn't mean that the country is not corrupt.

The thing is, regardless of the transparency the world is run mostly by the 1% elite. In democratic nations laws are designed with loopholes to benefit those in the know. In authoritarian nations there are unspoken laws which benefits those in the know. Either way the rich will get richer.

You guys made an awwwful lot of assumptions about me. The fact is, yes we have corruption, I have NEVER denied it. Every country has corruption on some level. Here's a clue however, corruption within private enterprise is different than corruption in government. Corruption in business within a capitalist economy is to be expected...people want to make money, and we want them to make money, thats how you grow your economy...some corruption is to be expected. as long as it is not widespread in government. The problem is, our companies go around the world and FIND corrupt governments that will bow to their every whim if the simply pay them off (shell/ nigeria etc.). This does not mean that the U.S. is corrupt. This means that we have some less than honorable people running some businesses who deal with other less than honorable people.

oh, and the pentagon papers is NOT corruption...it's classification...there is nothing corrupt about it. We were in a war and we did some nasty things to try and win it...that's not corruption, that's war. No one was taking money or anything, it was really about a set of military orders...no corruption.

I am not one of those people who thinks that America is better than everyone else, I just want to be realistic...America is doing better than most on almost every level. Lets face facts, we are doing ALOT better than guatemala, where I have lived, and where it is VERY corrupt to the point that almost noone I knew there (locals) trusted police because they had all been robbed by them. Same in Honduras where H ave also lived, and many places in South America, Mexico...look, it might make you feel better to think that we americans like to talk about how great we are without it being true...but the fact of the matter is, compared to most places in the world we are doing great. We are far from perfect, but for the 3rd most populous and most diverse country in the world, the fact that we are as stable and comfortable as we are is amazing. Corruption is not bad in the U.S. at all. it could be better...but in the end, it's NOTHING like the rest of the world. if you refuse to believe that then you are blind, probably a hard core lefty, and incapable of making an unbiased judgement. lets be realistic

You are right, this polarization is fake. Liberal or conservative is stupid. Liberal means that they allow more freedom and are easy going. Conservative is supposed to be financially conservative, but it is not, as evidenced by the 6 Trillion rung up during the Bush administration to the deficit and the fact that most of the budget deficit was rung up during Republican administrations. How can people believe the Republicans when they are actually the big spenders, especially when it comes to big banks and Wall Street firms that have stolen billions from customers and then got bailouts by Bush?
On to the subject. It might not be that we live in these other countries that get this aid, but we are the biggest aid donor in the world. We claim that we give the aid to help the people, but we never see to it that the people get it. We actually give the aid so that the leaders can steal it and sell it. Our government makes a deal with these crooked leaders who steal it all and then they do what the US wants them to. This is documented and wiki-leaks will probably show that in a large way. It used to be great to live in this country until it declined in every way in the last 40 years and became corrupt to boot!