this post was submitted on 22 Jul 2023
1520 points (77.8% liked)
Memes
45886 readers
1311 users here now
Rules:
- Be civil and nice.
- Try not to excessively repost, as a rule of thumb, wait at least 2 months to do it if you have to.
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
There's always worse. In the early 2000s there was a movement calling for a state referendum on abolishing a particularly stupid institution that basically allowed every Hungarian politician to claim as much expenses as they wanted, without limit or even a need to show receipts.
The movement was successful in collecting enough signatures, but the government just abolished the institution before the referendum, re-establishing it under a different name just months later, so the signatures didn't count.
Those signatures collected however show up for nominations for micro-parties no one heard about which divide the opposition vote. Mind that 20 years have passed, and many signatories are dead. The leaders of these micro-parties get public funds for campaigning, which they always steal, and the party is always disbanded before any serious investigation would happen. The government is okay with this.