Yes, incompetent, and not due to as of yet unknown payoffs to key officials. With that much money at stake, in a far less transparent world than we live in today, briefcases full of cash worked a lot better. How would you even deposit that today without some sort of money laundering scheme?
Briefcase cash is so gauche - you just hire them when they “retire” from public service. Much more proper and you don’t even need to explicitly offer - everyone knows how the bread is buttered.
Tell your parents to sell their house, but the contract includes lifetime tenancy and guaranteed maintenance and renovations. Surely that's not bribery.
It's not bribery if you just happen to visit a new friend's mansion in Hawaii any time you want a vacation.
Perhaps your spouse would be a good choice to be VP of Something Boring at this non-political non-profit charity. Isn't it nice that the employees of TotallyNotCorruptCo always make sure to donate so much money each year? Did we mention that the VP job comes with a car and driver? And can be done from home except for the fund-raiser galas. Totally not a bribe.
Microsoft didn't need to bribe anyone in the 80s and 90s because our country was still snorting that "woo hoo free markets fix everything" pixie dust. We weren't allowed to interfere with big business anymore. Clearly they knew what was best for us.
