Axar.az presents an article, "All politicians are..." by John Samuel Tieman.​

I take this personally. This guy writes on Facebook, “Good people do not go into public office. Tax dollars are stolen. Let’s stop debating laws and start auditing politicians.” Really? Such comments are common. That’s the problem.

There are half a million politicians in the United States. That’s everyone from my humble office, a city council member who represents maybe 12,000 folks, to the mayor of Los Angeles. That’s a lot of people. A lot of different people.

Let’s start with this sadly common bit of cynicism. All politicians are always corrupt. Did I mention that there are half a million elected officials in the country? I don’t doubt that there are corrupt politicians. I would just ask folks to do the math. Take the number of cases of corruption you know of, let’s call that X, and put that over 500,000. So X / 500,000. Feel free to multiply X by ten.

I know a city council member who is a housewife. I know a mayor who is a Lutheran minister. I know aldermen and alderwomen who are teachers and psychotherapists. An engineer. A neighboring councilwoman has advanced degrees in Catholic theology. One guy is an airline pilot. There was a nun out east who was elected a state attorney general. The mayor of St. Louis is a mathematician. My city council has three PhDs and a doctoral student. Put simply, there are all manner of elected officials. And I’m not even speaking of the appointed officials.

I don’t want to gloss over the fact of corruption. I just want to say that it’s not as simple as all politicians are corrupt. I knew of corruption when I was in the army. I knew of corruption when I was a teacher. I knew a corrupt priest. Corruption is not a flaw of politics. Corruption is a flaw of human nature. Politics doesn’t corrupt the person. The person brings corruption to the office. And now we are back at – it’s complicated.

By the way, most elected politicians are required to be fairly transparent about their finances. In most cases, however, I’m not sure why anyone cares. I’m a retired teacher. Between my pension benefits, my social security, and my pay for my council duties – my city pays me $187.40 a month – I’m not sure why anyone cares. I’m hardly unusual. For the record, even for my tiny office, before I filed to be on the ballot, I was required to publicly record that my taxes were square with the state. I also had to report all campaign finances.

Money, money, money. I sometimes think that folks assume that there is a room at city hall, sort of like the Aztec treasure room that Hernan Cortez looted, that is piled high with tax dollars and gold ingots. Like the local big box store goes to pay its taxes by renting a U-Haul, piling the dollars into that cart, then dropping all that off at the Council Chambers. Let’s also be clear about a related matter. Most folks think that municipal finances are like a household budget. No. City finances are blindingly complicated. John and Mrs. Doe don’t have to hire a corporation to do a quarterly audit.

Lastly, the assertion, “Let’s stop debating laws …”. Really? Then why do we have government again? I have an idea that, for some people, their understanding of civics stops with the last class in that subject in high school. Those classes shouldn’t be the sum of one’s knowledge. They’re the starter set.

I remember the first time I was accused of being corrupt. It was my second meeting on the Council. Folks in government are just that, just folks, folks that have the full range of human attributes from good to bad. And if saying that all Blacks are gangsters, all Mexicans are lazy, all Jews are rich and greedy, all this is all that – if that’s prejudice, then saying that all politicians are always corrupt, then that still counts as prejudice.

If asked to typify elected officials, I often say two things. They’re friendly. And, two, they are dedicated to public service for the common good. Generally. With notable exceptions.

Like all forms of prejudice, there is a simple solution. Get to know folks in government. Get to know the process. Governments always look for volunteers for commissions and such. Come inside city hall and stay for a while. We’re just folks.