Perhaps "We the People" get exactly the kind of leadership we deserve. After all, we regularly vote for politicians who have lied, cheated, stolen, and other wise gamed the system. More often than not, we learn about the crooked ways of our elected officials – and what do we do? We keep voting them back into office.

Sometimes the offense is so outrageous that a politician actually has to go. Take a trio of governors who have been in the news recently. Eliot Spitzer was the Democratic governor of New York until his resignation due to involvement in a prostitution ring. Rod Blagojevich was removed from office kicking and screaming in Illinois after he was charged with trying to sell Barack Obama’s senate seat. South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford ran off to Argentina to be with his lover. Under the media rules in effect during the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, Sanford should be forgiven, but those rules only work for Democrats named Clinton.

Sanford’s political career is likely over. But that begs the question: What’s worse – a politician who has an affair, or one that uses his office for illicit personal gain? The latest member of Congress to be caught in an extramarital affair is Sen. John Ensign, a Republican from Nevada. But there are plenty of members who are under a cloud of outright corruption, and they just keep right on serving.

U. S. Representative Charles Rangel (D-NY) stands accused of failing to report $75,000 income from the rental of his villa in the Dominican Republic. John Conyers (D-MI) has been accused by two former aides of using his staff to work on several state and local campaigns. They says they were forced to baby-sit and chauffer his children. Conyers has "accepted responsibility" for "possibly" breaking House rules. Yet, shamelessly, he still serves.

Back in the hotbed of political corruption that is Illinois, there are calls for the resignation of Sen. Roland Burris, who was appointed to Obama’s Senate seat by Blagojevich. Burris is accused of lying under oath and "negotiating" on the price for the Senate seat. But is Burris resigning? Not on your life! More likely, he’s out at the cemetery carving more accolades into his own tombstone.

We should also mention that Sen. Dick Durbin, the other Democratic Senator from Illinois, was revealed by Bloomberg to have made some iffy stock trades after coming out of a closed meeting with Treasury Secretary Paulson and FED Chairman Bernanke. Was it insider trading? We’d all like to know more.

Two members of Congress deserve special mention. Volumes could be written on the corruption of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Pennsylvania Congressman John Murtha – both Democrats.

Reid has been involved in every kind of shady deal imaginable. The Los Angeles Times reported that Reid introduced a bill that would have provide "a cavalcade of benefits to real estate developers, corporations and local institutions that were paying hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees to his sons’ and son-in law’s firms." A list of Reid’s ethical lapses would include improper acceptance of boxing tickets, improper reporting of a land deal, accepting contributions from a lobbyist that violated ethics rules, and improper use of campaign funds for Christmas bonuses.

And John Murtha may be even worse. The FBI is looking into his involvement with a lobbying firm run by one of his closest friends. Murtha has a well-deserved reputation for repeatedly "trading taxpayer dollars for campaign contributions," and for using his office to benefit his friends and family.

Surely, the Founding Fathers would not be happy. They saw political office as service to their country – not an easy way to get rich or to meet women. We need a better class of people to run. And, frankly, we need better voting skills. Where is the shame among our so-called leaders who become enmeshed in corruption? And where is the shame among those of us who keep voting them back in?