I think that my views on political corruption are more like those of Alexander Hamilton as quoted in this post by Jay Cost than it is like Jay’s. Take my home town of Chicago (please!).
The late Mayor Daley didn’t call Chicago “the city that works” because it was free of corruption. It was because public corruption was the lubrication that enabled the city’s competing factions to coexist peacefully. Our problem in Chicago isn’t corruption. It’s greed and stupidity. Chicago just doesn’t have the ability to allow public officials or public employees to live like the contemporary equivalent of the Swifts and Armours and they’re chafing under that restriction. There’s a saying from an old folk tale that covers the situation nicely: killing the goose that lays the golden eggs.
