They may be bastards, but at least they’re *our *bastards.
I worked in local government for about a decade. In my opinion, it is less corrupt than state and federal government, not because local government officials are made of tougher moral fiber than state/fed officials, but because the stakes are considerably lower in local government. Local government officials typically make decisions that involve far less money than state/federal officials, therefore, there is less interest in them by monied interests.
That said, the real estate and business community movers and shakers tend to either 1) be the local government officials or 1) be very, very close to government officials. There is nothing innately wrong with that. The local government officials make decisions that directly impact their businesses on a regular basis. The folks working at WalMart or at the grocery store, not so much. Still, the almost inevitable result is, if there’s a conflict of interest between the bulk of the voters and the business/real estate crew, most of the time, the bulk of the voters are going to lose, and they’re going to find out about it after the fact, because as stated upthread, no one attends local government meetings.
Lind’s Law has also been my general impression but I would also like to see some data.
I think the FCC auction process is probably less corrupt than auctions of public goods at the local level. I think zoning and real estate development is probably less corrupt at the federal level than the local level but once again, this is all anecdotal.
One crosses Sayre’s law at one’s peril…