It is obviously and demonstrably not. We have outrageous amounts of corruption, up to the point that it's been outright legalized. The amount of pay-for-play in

It is obviously and demonstrably not. We have outrageous amounts of corruption, up to the point that it's been outright legalized. The amount of pay-for-play in our legal system and filthy regulatory capture by the regulated industries themselves in the US is incredible. The risk/reward situation is not balanced at all. There is such an obscene amount to be gained, and the only repercussion is to lose a cushy job. They get to fall back on a nice executive gig on the other side of the revolving door. Do we hold other criminals to those standards and lay out that kind of weak punishment? And even when it comes to being voted out, there's all sorts of gerrymandering and bad-faith efforts to obfuscate and soft-rig US elections. Everyone should absolutely vote, that much is true. You should always vote, even if you think it doesn't matter because they've successfully gamed the system. You still gotta vote to make it as difficult as possible to manipulate results. But voting alone is not going to cut it one day. Other civil efforts are needed to keep a democracy from becoming corrupt. A lot of people have bought into this myth that most civil progress is bloodless, but despite MLK and Gandhi's good efforts it has taken a lot of toil and death to make society even remotely acceptable and fair, to make it even superficially resemble a meritocracy. It didn't happen by itself or through voting. It took real work.