A man walks into an antique store and starts looking around. Suddenly, he gazes upon the most stunning bronze statue of a Siamese cat. He asks the store owner how much he wants for the statue. The store owner replies "It's $200 for the statue and $2000 for the story that goes with it."

The man replies "I really don't care about the story, but I do want the statue." As the man is paying for the statue, the shop owner says "All right, but I guarantee you will be back for the story."

The man walks out of the shop and starts down the street carrying the cat statue. When he comes to the crosswalk, he happens to glance behind him and sees 3 or 4 cats sitting about 10 feet away, looking at him. He shrugs it off and crosses when the light changes. He goes several more blocks and, at another crosswalk, looks behind himself again. This time there are about 30 cats sitting there looking at him.

The man starts to get a little nervous and picks up his pace when the light changes. By the time the man reaches the pier at the end of the street, he has now been running for several blocks. He was running because every time he turned around, there were more and more cats behind him. He looked like the pied piper.

When he got to the end of the pier, he turned around once more and saw at least 2000 cats sitting there looking at him. There were so many cats that there was no way to get off the pier without going through them and he knew there was no way he was going to do that. In a panic, he turned toward the water and heaved the statue as far as he could.

Amazingly, all of the cats ran right past him and jumped in the water after the statue and never came out. The man, still shaking from his ordeal, immediately started running back to the shop. As he burst through the door, the shop owner saw him and said, "I told you that you'd be back for the story!"

"To heck with the story," gasps the man, "do you have a statue of a politician?"
 

After reading your story I was prompted to find a list of the most and least respected professions.  Here's one:

https://moneywise.com/life/lifestyle/the-most-dishonest-profession

I found another list and politicians were rated second to last barely beating out prostitutes.

I would like to ask some lawyer or businessman running for office why they lie, steal, cheat, bite, kick and gouge and spend thousands of dollars to hopefully get a job that pays less than they can earn practicing their professions.  And don't tell me you want to serve the people unless it's to serve them up to your donors.

Noel

Noel, many decades ago I read one of Heinlein's "Robot Series" books (I can't remember which one), but a description of the political system on one colony planet's human's had set up was discussed in detail. Under their democratic system, a "President" was chosen for a six year term. That person chosen had always needed to be dragged kicking and screaming into office... 😉

It reminds me of St. Martin of Tours, who was supposedly tricked into being ordained a bishop! 

St. Martin of Tours (catholicnewsagency.com)

Quote

Martin had not wanted to become a bishop, and had actually been tricked into leaving his monastery in the first place by those who wanted him the lead the local church. Once appointed, he continued to live as a monk, dressing plainly and owning no personal possessions. In this same spirit of sacrifice, he traveled throughout his diocese, from which he is said to have driven out pagan practices.

 

Fr. Bill, it looks like Heinlein found a colony that found a way to breed out avarice.

Apparently St. Martin did not want to become a politician and he knew that if he associated with the political hierarchy he would become one.  So he avoided them by remaining a monk.

The main reason I hesitate to support colonization of other planets is because they will just duplicate what has happened here.  Not the 'perfect' people that we send out to do the colonization but because of their offspring.  It won't take too many generations for them to become just like us.

Noel

7 hours ago, n4gix said:

Noel, many decades ago I read one of Heinlein's "Robot Series" books (I can't remember which one), but a description of the political system on one colony planet's human's had set up was discussed in detail. Under their democratic system, a "President" was chosen for a six year term. That person chosen had always needed to be dragged kicking and screaming into office... 😉

It reminds me of St. Martin of Tours, who was supposedly tricked into being ordained a bishop! 

St. Martin of Tours (catholicnewsagency.com)

 

In the British Parliament (and the Australian one) the Speaker (person who chairs the house) is dragged to his seat on appointment to office.  I understand it is because traditionally it was a very dangerous job and easy to lose your head.

https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/House_of_Representatives/Powers_practice_and_procedure/Practice7/HTML/Chapter6/The_Office_of_Speaker_

10 hours ago, harrry said:

I understand it is because traditionally it was a very dangerous job and easy to lose your head.

Maybe if that practice were to be reintroduced politicians would take greater care in how they behave and what they say.  Say a year in jail for every lie they told and every bribe they took.

Noel

Sorry Fr. Biil but - The Robot series is a series of 37 science fiction short stories and six novels by American writer Isaac Asimov, featuring positronic robots.

  Not that I don't love Heinlein, he's my number one favorite author. I discovered sci-fi in 1959 when I spotted "Have Spacesuit, Will Travel".

  But the Robot series was Asimov...

5 hours ago, Penzoil3 said:

But the Robot series was Asimov...

Well poo! I'd blame my advanced age and memory loss, but that just sounds lame. It's bad enough that I cannot remember the name of the book, but to get the author wrong as well! 🤪