This post is a response to a question initially posed on Quora. and can also be accessed https://www.quora.com/profile/Antonio-Amaral-1/

I believe it’s less rare than cynical minds might think.

Too many people can’t see past their biases to know the difference between a politician’s words and their internal recreations of the meaning of their words.

Too many people, for example, will repeatedly utter how Joe Biden destroyed the economy while professional economists across the board praised it as one of the most successful economies in decades.

Too many people are still incapable of acknowledging the reality of the last election being one of modern history’s most secure and scrutinized elections. They will still adamantly insist that the election was stolen.

They will hang onto the words of a convicted felon who should be rotting behind bars and overlook his public money laundering schemes for overpriced watches and sincerely believe he has the best interests of the struggling class in mind.

They don’t even care how badly he bloated the debt by redistributing wealth to the plutocrats who are steadily taking over the global economy.

They would rather demonize their political opposition as “globalists” while doing the job of playing defence for the actual globalists.

None of them will stop to pause and consider the rationale of their position within any objective perspective.

Everything about their position hinges on tribal identity, and they can’t be wrong about their beliefs because it would mean the criticisms about their toxicity are truthful and correct. They desperately need mental health assistance in the same way that most people who have undergone interventions by their loved ones were deemed in desperate need of professional help.

The problem of corruption in politics is not and never has been a problem with the politicians themselves in a democratic nation where the people vote for who they entrust to manage their affairs on their behalf properly.

The evidence is beyond evident in distinguishing between politicians who at least try to truly represent their best interests and those who parasitically drain their constituents of their value while sending them deep into a pit of poverty.

I don’t even need to post a comparison between states that shows which politicians and parties best represent the needs of the people. It would be pointless to do so because their mental filters will dismiss all evidence as “fake news.”

The problem is not that politicians are dishonest but that the people who elect them cannot discern between honesty and dishonesty. That means that a significant proportion of the population is fundamentally dishonest.

If we are sincere in our desire to fix a perceived problem with dishonesty in politics, then we must be earnest in fixing our problems with being dishonest people at heart.

If we don’t don’t want dishonest politicians, we must stop being dishonest ourselves.