> Are there any other countries besides China where we doubt nearly any "fact" they produce? What causes this? Its incredibly odd to read an article where the g

> Are there any other countries besides China where we doubt nearly any "fact" they produce? What causes this? Its incredibly odd to read an article where the government makes a claim and then follow it up with a claim from someone else that is entirely different. IIRC, Soviet and Eastern Bloc statistics were regarded with similar skepticism. I would imagine the same would be true of any dictatorship where information is subject to strict political control. Without reduced capability of independent verification, distortions can multiply out of control (http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-themocline-of-truth/ http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-t...). In China it's apparently so bad that not even the government trusts its own GDP numbers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Keqiang_index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Keqiang_index).