Does China Have "Allies"?

It's a story. We've all heard a thousand times a perfectly normal, widely liked, completely unobjectionable person experiences a rapid and positive change in their station. Maybe they come into a lot of money, maybe they're granted some huge promotion, maybe they're elected into public office, and all of a sudden they turn into an a**hole.

Their time, once freely given, must now be scheduled, and only if you're important enough to deserve a meeting. Their support, once shown to their friends, constantly without expectation, now must be bought or won through glad-handing or constant flattery.

Sometimes, by the end of the story, that wayward character learns their lesson, and sometimes they don't.