0598 - Congress

While we admit that research is not complete, we have paid careful daily attention to CNN and PBS, and have read the weekly news magazines (those in English), and it appears that the people in all parts of the world are quite unhappy with their elected officials. In the U.S., of course, the polls come out regularly, and the members of the Congress are found disrespected at the same level as used car salesmen. Elsewhere, in England Tony Blair has fallen in esteem, and in Germany, India, and the broad globe, whoever is running things is not getting good reviews. Today, we do not disagree with the popular wisdom, we inquire once more why anyone in a democracy should put up with, say, Tom DeLay. To ask it crisply: Why?

It is stimulating to cry “Throw the rascals out!” and we have rascals to throw, but does not history teach that the new guys that come in often deserve equal pitching-out? It is also true, though, that the new rascals usually have different rascalities. Hence, the cleansing is ... well, cleansing. To select a simple example, Saddam Hussein was a truly evil fellow. Yet, to judge from the current state of Iraq, there are a-plenty of equally evil types willing to blow up a school bus for their own twisted purposes.

So far you may be nodding agreement, but you have heard nothing novel. Well, then, consider whether the really bad actors are not the fellows who claim to be doing God’s work. That pompous fat Shiite Mullah in Baghdad is quite willing to kill in service of his religious claims. In Washington, we had a recent flagrant example of Bro. DeLay suddenly getting religion and asserting the right to approve the disposal of the remains of a woman a dozen years dead, and then shouting that “Activist Judges” would pay for interrupting his posturing. That was the House of Representatives, of course, but a Senator named Frist is now claiming the mantle of holiness with some ridiculously convoluted arguments about what can be done with discardable human eggs.

You know, Readers, it is not hard to recognize good people in political office. They don’t claim divine blessings on their petty machinations, they don’t cheat and bully, and from time to time, yes, they even oppose the pilfering of the public treasury for their political gain (called “pork”), and they do not take expensive golfing trips paid for by lobbyists. In the Senate, a fellow the OO admires – but doesn’t always agree with, opposes pork, phoniness, and often speaks the unvarnished truth. His name is McCain, of course, and he is again being spoken of as Presidential timber. Frankly, we don’t think he has a chance, but you never know who the American public will take to its irrational bosom, to coin a phrase that we shouldn’t have coined.

On the subject of truth, we might barely believe that the present incumbent of the White House was misled by bad intelligence (we mean spying, not the kind of intelligence that is often discernibly lacking in Washington). But, assuming that the misleading about WMDs in Iraq was not instructed (an assumption quite likely contrary to fact), when the head of the CIA was given a high medal for screwing up to the max, the spectacle was disgusting. Is there no pol who will say: “I was wrong” instead of giving medals to the incompetent? And speaking of incompetence, what is this spectacle of the cartoon character John Bolton proposed as ambassador to the UN? You could find better any day of the week on the streets of The Valley – that’s the Capital of Anguilla – and please do so. Senator McCain: please note before voting.

Next time: Size [OO #599]

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