Yes, but (importantly) degrees vary. The politics of working for an adviser chasing tenure are different from, say, running a SaaS, writing an ebook, or selling a plugin.
cqfd
See the edit above. You are saying two things must be equal because they are both non-zero. It's a very strange argument.
If you look at some parts of getting a tenure, they are without politic as well. Example: studying a subject.