[Green_man]

right but corporate lobbying isn't the only way in which America is unique. Concerns about concealed research results could be very true, but that's an entirely different question than corporate lobbying. My position isn't that companies don't do anything wrong or aren't trying to influence policy, I'm just skeptical how successful political donations are at subverting democracy.

[shmerl]

In my opinion they are way too influential. Take a look at corporate sponsored laws that try to ban ISP competition and community / municipal broadband. Correlation between presence of such laws and corporate backing is very clear.