Martin Hotze wrote:

does this only happen at national level or also on state or county (or even
community) level? are there no independent/liberal/green/... mayors or other
important people in the US?

I've seen a few 3rd-party candidates for local offices here in New Jersey. I've not
seen one win election in my area, but sometimes they do run for office.

With the possibilities for income from graft, the local offices here are frequently
hotly contested. In the last election, the hottest contest by far was for a
Middletown council seat. The son of one of the NJ legislators wants to get a variance
to allow him to build a massive set of commercial businesses (he calls it a "Town
Center") sort of like a spread-out mall and the council opposes it. So he had his
daddy working hard to get one of the councilwomen deposed. As it turns out, it almost
cost his daddy his office.

George Patterson
If you want to know God's opinion of money, just look at the people
he gives it to.