Among employees at the consulting firm there were absolutely zero politics and it was by far the best crew of people I've ever worked with(author gazes wistfully off into the horizon). It was a group of very smart, somewhat cynical folks who really just concentrated on getting shit done. There wasn't a hierarchy or a career path. You were just a Senior Engineer charging by the hour. Things did get a bit weird when the owner hired a salesman to run the place for a while and he started over-promising and spending too much on marketing, but that problem sorted itself out fairly quickly.

I wasn't aware of any significant politics between us(account management, which I would say are sales, PMs, and the owner of the company) and the customers. There were political struggles inside big customers(i.e. DirecTV) when a VP would have to justify paying us, but that's not really something we got involved in. There were arguments over billing rates and such, but I wouldn't call that 'politics' it's just doing business. I consider 'politics' to be things like dog and pony shows, massaging peoples egos, playing one faction against each other, etc. There wasn't any of that.

It sounds like you were "an employee at a large/very-large consulting firm" as opposed to "1099 independent contractor one-man shop", and I would expect your experience to be the same as an employee.