Top 10 Reasons Why the Grass is Always Greener on a Politician's Lawn
by Maggie Van Ostrand
America is a nation that began with George Washington not telling a lie, and devolved into a nation with presidents from whose lips lies fall faster than a home run on steroids.
Politicians may call them "misstatements," or "inexactitudes, or even "calumny" which forces the citizens to the dictionary, but it's lying any way you slice it.
Political TV ads are starting more than a year before the presidential elections, doubtless to allow sufficient time for water and dirt to mix, supplying candidates with the mandatory mud for slinging.
One uppity candidate is imprudently showing cleavage, another is extolling the virtues of political inexperience, and still another is cagily collecting acting residuals while simultaneously soliciting campaign financing.
One hand shakes a finger at us and decries lobbyists, while the other hand is waiting for the bribes. Oh wait, sorry, that's what we call it when it's done in other countries. Washington calls it "perks."
All this activity makes us wonder why anyone would want to go into politics today, where if a cocksure senator decides to play footsie in Fargo, his actions will be noted worldwide forcing him to think about resigning. We have the answers.
The Top 10 Reasons why anyone goes into politics these days are:
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1. They want a bridge named after them.
They don't care if it's in Alaska or even if it actually goes anywhere, they just want their name someplace permanent. This is equal to applause for an actor, except that with an actor, you actually get something in return while the performances in Washington are mainly for each other.
2. They want traffic-free transportation.
They like those little U.S. flags stuck in the front of their chauffer-driven limos, police escorts from point to point, and those dark windows to keep the potholes out of their sight. That's how they can remain blissfully unaware of the country's anticipated infrastructure collapse.
And they love that they'll never get a ticket, even if they don't wear required seatbelts or stay within the speed limit.
3. They like to get a fat paycheck for their lifetime, even after leaving office.
Congressmen, whose annual salary is $165,200 (up from $75,100 20 years ago) get up to 80 per cent of that amount. While it's not exactly the "golden parachute" given by corporate America to its crooked executives when they leave, it's more than we the people can ever expect.
If you were Speaker of the House at $212,100 and you retired, as of 2007, you'd get just under $170,000 per year. Unless …
… you followed the example of 43 per cent of congressmen who became a lobbyist after leaving office (and that's just since 1998). Now we're talking possibly millions of dollars. They probably tell themselves that at least they wouldn't be wasting those political contacts they made when they were representing the people. Remember the people? We're their employers. They work for us. So how come they can vote themselves raises without asking the boss?
Colorado's former congressman Ray Kogovsek (1979-1985) had never made more than $20,000 a year before being elected to the House in 1978. Says he: "My standard of living improved when I came to Congress. I got used to it. It's important that Ray Kogovsek provide college educations and a comfortable living for his two daughters and wife." After leaving office, he was hired by two Colorado water districts to lobby for a project he had endorsed as a member of the House Interior Committee.
4. If they're running for President, they get protected by Secret Service bodyguards. So do all their family members.
It's just like they already were the president -- or the vice president, a past president, or visiting big shots, all of whom are entitled to this expensive protection.
Presidential candidates are treated very differently once they declare their intention to run for office; we the people just pay for it. Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan said he expected to spend $88.5 million next year for bodyguards and bomb-sniffing dogs to protect the 2008 presidential candidates. That's on top of this year's $21.4 million, bringing the total for this election cycle to $106.6 million, up from the $73.03 million spent when President Bush and Vice President Cheney ran for re-election in 2004.
And that's not counting the amount spent on those sunglasses the Secret Service bodyguards wear. Even Clint Eastwood had them on. ("In The Line of Fire.")
5. They like polls and saying things written by a professional speechwriter with a gift for spinning words. The speeches invariably say they will do whatever it is that the polls tell them we want to hear. They always seem to leave out the part about how they'll say anything to get elected.
Everybody knows that Lincoln spoke the words "Four score and seven years ago … " Lincoln wrote that himself. Whatever happened to electing people smart enough to say what they mean and not what someone else tells them they ought to mean?
6. They like not being affected by things that affect we the people.
They tell us to conserve water and yet politicians' lawns are always green.
Some politicians warn incessantly about global warming and greenhouse gasses, as they fly off in their carbon-imprint-making luxury Gulfstream private jet. Perhaps there would be less gas in the air if politicians kept their mouths shut.
7. They like reassuring people that all is well. They don't have to mean it, they just think they ought to say it.
This was especially effective during Katrina when the government said it was coming to the rescue and we believed them. Two years later, we are still waiting.
We've also waited six years for bin Laden to get caught. They told us they'd get him. We believed them.
8. They like to talk about health plans.
They're secure because there's enough vaccine for them, but the rest of us better not get small pox or anthrax or TB. Three years ago, there wasn't enough flu vaccine to go around. There still isn't. What we do have, we buy from other countries.
Maybe we actually do make vaccines but send them to China instead.
9. They like to supply the people with a false sense of security with their "Do Not Call" list. This was supposed to prevent telemarketers from calling us at every inconvenient moment of the day and night, and faxing us non-stop.
How clever they were to exempt political solicitations. Nobody can call us up asking for money … except them.
10. They like to insist that the decibel level of television commercials is no louder than the program the commercials interrupt.
Any TV viewer who repeatedly pushes his mute button because he cannot stand the screaming commercials will dispute that statement. What we are told and what we see and hear for ourselves is rarely the same.
There must be many firefighters in Washington, what with all the congressional pants on fire.
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Sometimes though, a politician can inadvertently let the people know how smart they aren't. Take Larry Craig who has been in the news a lot lately. The senator apparently did not know that he was protected by the Constitution's Article 1, Section 6 which states “Senators and Representatives shall be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same.” (The only exceptions are treason, felony and breach of peace.)
Since the senator was enroute to Washington, and had voted on the evening of the day he was arrested, the arrest and subsequent questioning were, technically, unconstitutional. If the senator had told this to the arresting officer, the cop would have had to immediately release him and no charges could legally have been filed. We don't have to be told what a politician does in the bathroom. We already know what they're full of.
If only the Constitution could be amended to state that in order to run for office, a person has to mostly tell the truth, be highly principled, and morally incorruptible, it would be a privilege to vote. In the hotly contested 2004 election (Bush-Kerry), a mere 55.3 per cent of registered voters actually voted, compared with 63.1 per cent in 1960 (Kennedy-Nixon).
Professor Thomas Patterson of Harvard University stated in "The Vanishing Voter," that "… the period from 1960 to 2000 marks the longest ebb in turnout in US history. Turnout was nearly 65 percent of the adult population in the 1960 presidential election and stood at only 51 percent in 2000. In 2002, turnout was 39 percent in the November election and a mere 18 percent in the congressional primaries."
We the people know why we're not getting out there to vote, and it has very little to do with erratic machines, hanging chads, or hovering pollsters. It has to do with the politicians themselves.
Candidates once ran for office because what they stood for benefited the people. Now it appears they run for office for the reasons stated above.
Oh, and The Big One: personal power.
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