To be a little more thoughtful on my previous point: when a politician says they don't like "politics" people tend to understand they mean pettiness, insincerity, power playing, etc, etc. Fair enough. But as often happens, the broadness of the language leads to dangerous creep.

Because real politics, the actual use of power and governance, the shaping of society, is of course very important and no one is free of it. And that shorthand collapses all of that, along with the phoniness and undesirable parts, in to one thing.

And that's exactly what some people want, namely technocrats, who don't want you to think of the legitimate use of politics as being legitimate. They want you to believe that the world is settled, there's no need for politics, we just need good managers.

The convenience of the language masks a deeper danger. It's the same with people who decry right wing "populism." What they typically mean is "demagoguery, racism, etc..." so why not just say that? Because they don't like democracy and calling these things populism aids that.

Another example, living in a rural state, is the way people hate out-of-staters. What they typically hate is people with a lot of money who buy up all the property or people who visit and are rude. That’s understood, but the shorthand opens you up to other forms of division.

Ultimately, I think trying to say “I hate politics too, but I like this other thing that I call governance” or whatever is a dead end. We need to say, “Poltics is not inherently bad, it’s important. It’s a source of hope and possibility. Let’s make it work for us.”