Bernie Sanders likes to make us all think that he only takes money from individual contributors. Beware! There is more there than meets the eye. Bernie Sanders takes money from large contributors he just hides it better than others. His little secret is that he really is not much better than any other politician.

The sources from which important information has been gleaned from his hidden past were taken from Open Secrets and from an important article written by David Sirota and Andrew Perez. Sirota is a well known author who has an impeccable reputation.

Bernie Sanders raised money not from your normal every day PAC but from associations during his campaigns for the Senate. These associations were attorney PACS such as the American Association of Justice, the National Association of Realtors,  a Credit Union Association, and farming, dairy and sugar associations. Unions have contributed mightily particularly the largest nurses union. During the current campaign Union support has been vital.

Other contributions over the years have come from ideological and single issue organizations such as the Human Rights Campaign, Planned Parenthood and NARAL.

There is nothing wrong with having accepted money from these organizations but it is ironic and a bit hypocritical that he campaigns by railing against the establishment but his contributors are definitely from the Establishment.

His current campaign has received not only money from Unions but individual campaign contributions that are listed under companies such as Alphabet, other wise known as Google, the University of California, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Kaiser Perm., Boeing, Intel and AT&T. The Google amount which represents an aggregate amount is substantial, $384, 516, while the University of California is listed with the amount of $216, 776. His lawyer cooperatives contributions came from Piper and Wolf Block.

The point is before we pass out sainthood to Senator Sanders we should know the facts and appreciate them for what they are and that is that he has received contributions from people other than small donors. His filing problems not withstanding I assume that all of this is above board. What I find troubling is his attempt to appear to be so perfect. All money received could be corrupting by its very nature, but we are not pretending that he is any different than any other politician.

Hillary has received money from Wall Street, but then again, Wall Street is one of her constituents and they would be tough to ignore. Yes, she has not divulged the content of her speeches but she is not pretending to be something that she is not.

But it would appear to be a bit dishonest or sanctimonious to claim that the money that Senator Sanders has been given has been donated without an expectation of receiving an audience or having some influence on the recipient. Politics is politics after all, and money is corrupting. If one were cynical one could say that it is better to support the crook you know rather than the crook you don’t know. And frankly Senator Sanders has been given pretty much a pass on being heavily vetted.

In Louisiana there once was a candidate, Edwards, up on criminal charges who once said to his constituents, vote for the crook you know rather than the crook that you don’t know. He won the election.

But let us give in to our better angels and assume that Senator Sanders accepted this money without any promises given for having received these donations. The fact is that he has received donations that came from people other than small donors.

His lack of coming clean with his taxes is another point of contention. Candidates for years going back to the 1970’s have presented their tax returns for review. What if anything is he hiding. Is he really a millionaire? Is he embarrassed by that fact or is he really hiding some investments that would be embarrassing.

The point is that no politician is perfectly clean. Each candidate has imperfections just like the rest of us. We are not electing a Pope.

Senator Sanders like many other politicians are individuals devoted to public service. They are people who do good work, working hard each day to improve the lives of each of us. But please do not pretend to be something perfect, it is not becoming.

We can not say that Hillary Clinton is not being more honest by submitting years of her taxes, being perfectly transparent for the eyes of any potential critic by revealing a lot about her through her taxes.

Is Bernie Sanders really who he pretends to be? Or does he have a dirty little secret that he just does not want to admit. It’s okay Bernie no one is perfect!