The Payson Stooges and the Politics of Hypocrisy
In small towns across America, local politics often mirror the national stage — full of bluster, hypocrisy, and backroom maneuvering. Payson, Arizona, offers a textbook example.
The town’s self-styled reformers — Mayor Steve Otto and councilmen Charlie Bell and Jim Ferris — campaigned as champions of fiscal restraint. They rose to power by railing against a 1% sales tax increase passed by the previous council to fund essential community projects — including a long-overdue public swimming pool.
They thundered about waste, big government, and “tax tyranny.” They waved Tea Party banners and promised to roll back what they called “reckless spending.”
But now that they hold the reins of power, the tune has changed.
Instead of repealing the tax they so loudly condemned, the Three Stooges of Payson have decided to keep the 1% tax — not to build community assets, but to redirect the money toward their own pet projects. It’s the oldest political con in the book: condemn your predecessors, then pocket their work for your own agenda.
One of the town’s honest council members put it perfectly:
“If you want to use that money, repeal the tax and then pass your own — show the public who’s really raising their taxes.”
It was a clean, fair challenge — and a political trap the Stooges may find hard to escape. Do they expose themselves as hypocrites, or betray their Tea Party base?
Across America, from Washington to the smallest town hall, the same pattern repeats: politicians preaching purity until power tempts them. The lesson from Payson is clear — watch not what they say, but what they do with your money.
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