It’s 2020. Do You Know Who Your Government Is Serving?

America Has Been Conflating Politics and Business for Years—And if We’re Not Careful, We Could Go the Way of Post-Soviet Eastern Europe

In broad daylight, dozens of masked police and plain-clothed strongmen burst into the foyer of the swanky Sofiyskiy Fitness Club. It was May 25, 2017, and the posh gym—located in the heart of Kyiv, Ukraine, and known for its turquoise-tiled hot tubs and parade of celebrity members, like former world boxing champion-turned-mayor Vitaly Klitschko—was stunned. Towel-draped patrons and high-heeled staff scattered, as the mob overwhelmed the doormen, brandishing a bogus new property deed and demanding immediate transfer of the club’s ownership to certain elites connected with the country’s ruling authorities. …