Stated vs revealed preferences. Saying you care and voting like you care are 2 very different things.
> I cannot understate how much I disagree with the idea that politics was somehow more sensible "back then".
How did every country manage to come to an agreement on phasing out CFCs? How did the US set up the EPA? And can you imagine proposing something like a public library system today, if it didn't already exist?
Politicians were equally (or more) corrupt, morally suspect, and duplicitous in the past. I just think that they also managed to pass more legislation about things that really mattered.