Letter: Different take on political experience

EDITOR,
I read your April 6 article (“McPherson touts experience, connections in 5th District campaign,” Page 7) featuring Bruce McPherson. I agree with many points he made, specifically with respect to examples of how our government machine frustrates and lets citizens down. I draw a different lesson from this reality: A career politician who contributed actively or passively to the problems, and who relied on “going along to get along” to build a political career and network of contacts, is to a degree responsible for the problems and is proven ineffective at confronting them. As affable as he is, this applies to Bruce. Conversely, though citizen politicians fresh to the process do not have the connections Bruce counts as an asset he would bring to the 5th District, they also do not have a record of comfort with government’s dysfunctional behavior, nor political debts to their connections. Citizen candidates who have had to contend with an unhelpful, even adversarial, government will be more likely agents for improvement to entrenched political forces and the priorities of citizens.
David Main, Boulder Creek