It's kind of analogous to a relationship. You don't need to, and won't, like everything about your partner. How can you expect anything different of your politician?
I think that's the problem exactly: "there's nobody good out there for me, therefore I'd rather be single" as if "single" was a choice when it comes to the city/state/nation you live in. You can't opt out of the rules, the money is going to be spent, and civics fundamentally belongs to the people who care the most. Chris Gregoire beat Dino Rossi by 129 votes. Al Franken beat Norm Coleman by 200 votes. In both cases that's like a single senior class spread across an entire state as far as margin. And those are state races. If you're voting for a city ballot measure on an off year, yours might be one of 500 votes. Want kids to have textbooks? Well, it's coming out of property taxes, which are paid by old people, who always vote. The people who just finished using a social studies textbook that still talks about North Vietnam? Yeah, they're waiting for Mr. Right. And that's why their kids will also learn that the US must prevail in North Vietnam. Because of the Domino Theory.
Yup, I’ve yet to figure out a way to get people to understand this because they normally just shoot back that I’m telling them to settle for the lesser evil instead of accept reality as it has always been. The amount of people who literally crumble when things don’t go perfectly according to plan is ridiculous and it’s those same people who don’t want to vote for fear of being let down.