"The one thing that has happened over the past 80 years to cause the Small Person Effect is that the system has been steadily rigged to enrich those small people disproportionately to their job. Getting elected to federal office has become a bit like winning the lottery. Instead of being a lowly public servant sacrificing potential gain for the good of the country, today's elected officials have made themselves kings, rulers and emperors for life, demanding perks reserved for royalty, flying on personal Air Force planes, chauffered limos, huge expense accounts, 5 star hotels, exemption from the laws they enact for the rest of us, a ridiculously lavish pension for short stint in office, the ability to legally profit from investments based on information that would put you or I in jail, and an almost guaranteed middle 6 figure income at a large corporation for "consulting" them on legislative issues after leaving office. Oh, there's more, too, lots more. So huge are the benefits of "public service" in the house or senate than a good number of them become millionaires in just a few years after getting elected. Where else can you get a job where you can vote yourself your own pay raises? Where else can you "redistrict" and rig your voting constituency to virtually guarantee perpertual re-election?
What this does, of course, is attract a class of people who are drawn by self interest. Ego, lust for power, and desire for wealth all converge in a person to form the perfect storm of the modern public servant. I believe that this is the reason they are so vicious and destructive to one another. The office they seek is much like Tolkein's Ring; the power it hold infects the soul of the one seeking and holding it. Of course, the type of person needed to withstand such attacks and to launch them at others must have a complete disconnect from their empathy for others. They mush be shut down emotionally to the point that the opposition can say the cruelest things about them and they just smile at the camera. The must be able to allow themselves to be treated like a product and managed by a team of handlers. They must be able to lie and really believe the lies, or at least rationalize them. They must be so convinced of their greatness and so enamored by the payoff that they will allow themselves to be dragged through a sewage trench of two years, having much of it splash all over their families and friends, see their every past mistake turned into national news, and be willing to spend 50 times more of other people's money to get elected than the job will ever pay. And we wonder why we're in such trouble as a country."
Here is the article to which this comment refers. I consider the comment more potent. (Though the article is good too.)
The Gunslinger
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