Politicians who put laws on the books at the whim of a monied few special interests instead of listening to their constituents, and who insist on ceaselessly driving the wedge between rich and poor in their own back yard instead of pursuing policies that would lift up the whole country?
another word for that is 'selfish' - they are making laws, enacting rules and enforcing behaviour which their constituents did not really want, simply because it's something they wanted for themselves.
I don't want my politicians to have a perspective which only includes themselves. Unforutnately, its all far too common.
Absolutely. These do-gooders never consider the unintended side effects of their policies and end up hurting their own constituency. (Though the cynic in me thinks that they understand it perfectly well. They enact these policies just to score cheap brownie points.)
Bad behavior by politicians... who are practically at the mercy of special interests. AND bad behavior by many individuals who are always looking to cut corners* or are too irrational they end up forcing leaders to overstep their oversight boundaries.
I think you might be missing the conspiracy. Yes politicians are the ones causing the damage, yes they ultimately bear the responsibility. But you have to see how the interests of the rich are given a priority in any political system. Without the rich asserting their influence into politics, by persuading and demanding their interests in public policy, the politician is but a boring bureaucrat, neither making harm nor good. However with the rich conspiring with the politicians, the harm they do to the common people is ultimate.
I will not admire anyone who’s interests are looked after, compensated, subsidized, and payed for by our politicians. They are nothing but bastards, they deserve no praise for having been put in their place of privilege by circumstance and conspiracy.
Regan's "welfare queen" comes to mind. More recent examples were those against stimulus checks (but very much for PPP "loans"). Any politician who believes in means-testing, when the bureaucracy adds an overhead greater than the amount saved is arguably out to hurt the undeserving.
You can't deny the politics of retribution exists, because politicians only give oblique references to it; voters certainly believe it, hence one voter who complained about Covid shutdowns thusly: "He's not hurting the people he needs to be"
There are good, well-meaning politicians out there. They are often the ones most vilified by the media. The chief enablers of bad politicians are people who refuse to discern between good politicians and bad politicians. Enablers like you.
There exist a large cadre of politicians that consistently run on the platform that the government is incompetent and should not be trusted, win elections, and then go out of their way to prove it.
When I see a politician selling their constituents up the river to a special interest group that also happens to fund his re-election (or threaten funding of his opponents), I don't actually feel much different then if it were a regular quid pro quo corruption arrangement. It happens all the fucking time.
In fact, that they aren't breaking any laws when doing so makes me feel more incensed about it.
Agree that often politicians sell out their people and natural resources (the rights and endowment of future citizens) for short term gain. This is a natural consequence of politicians being inherently terrible people by and large.
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