The truth will set you free ...
Jan. 20th, 2006 08:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ocvictor... but let's face it, the truth is a boring business half the time. The majority of politics is dictated not by grand, all-engulfing issues, but technical minutae that no one but complete policy wonks bothers to read.
The obvious conclusion being, more people in this country need to become policy wonks. If Americans had a higher threshold for boredom, Washington would be able to get away with less. I wouldn't say they need much, just enough to be able to watch the news on TV and say, "hey! That ain't right!" and no where to go look it up. The magic box you are reading this on gives you the ability to look up the boring math on just about anything happening in Washington, in a fraction of the time it took just a few years ago. Technology has given people every tool they need to be informed and lessened the need for third parties to convey that information. It's incumbent on people themselves to take the wonderful gift they've been given.
What got me going this morning was a note on Salon about the Washington Post ombudsman's commenting that GOP lobbyist and scandal superstar Jack Jack Abramoff "had made substantial campaign contributions to both major parties."
Readers acused her of trying to spin the Abramoff mess into a bipartisan scandal, as opposed to a Republican one. The furor was so bad that the Washington Post made the decision to shut down the comments section. (The screenshot linked to above is courtesy Democratic Underground, so you can read some of the furor.)
What I find instructive about this little mess is that both sides are right, and wrong. To be perfectly honest, Abramoff HAS funneled a good deal of money to the Democratic Party and Democratic candidates -- just a good deal less than he has to the GOP.
But it's not the money shoveling that's the issue. Let's change gears a bit. If a candidate is campaigning and says he's in favor ferret legalization, and someone says, "Why, I'm in favor of ferret legalization, too!" and gives that candidate $1,000, there's nothing illegal or unethical happening. Whereas, if a candidate says, "I oppose legalizing ferrets," then gets a check for $1,000 and then changes his position, that's grounds to see if something shady is happening.
Most of the Abramoff scandal focuses on Native American issues, particularly gaming. One of the reasons that the Dems probably get a pass on this is that, by and large, they've traditionally come down on the side of the party giving the money -- they've usually voted in the tribes' favor on the issues Abramoff was lobbying for, and probably would have done so with or without the money. It's when you're seeing politicians disinclined to act on the tribes' behalf doing Abramoff favors and changing votes that you have an issue, and on that side, it's all the GOP, all the time.
It's a fine-but-essential distinction.
Will I go so far as to say there's no one corrupt on the Dems side? No. I'm nonpartisan enough (and, uhm, still not a Democrat) and been a politics watcher long enough to know that would be absurd. Democrat or Republican, most of them are still whores, and if there was a buck to be made, I'm sure there are parties on both sides of the aisle more than willing to take it when they shouldn't have.
But even if there's a couple bad apples on the Dems' side, an entire chunk of the GOP orchard seems to be suffering a rot.
The obvious conclusion being, more people in this country need to become policy wonks. If Americans had a higher threshold for boredom, Washington would be able to get away with less. I wouldn't say they need much, just enough to be able to watch the news on TV and say, "hey! That ain't right!" and no where to go look it up. The magic box you are reading this on gives you the ability to look up the boring math on just about anything happening in Washington, in a fraction of the time it took just a few years ago. Technology has given people every tool they need to be informed and lessened the need for third parties to convey that information. It's incumbent on people themselves to take the wonderful gift they've been given.
What got me going this morning was a note on Salon about the Washington Post ombudsman's commenting that GOP lobbyist and scandal superstar Jack Jack Abramoff "had made substantial campaign contributions to both major parties."
Readers acused her of trying to spin the Abramoff mess into a bipartisan scandal, as opposed to a Republican one. The furor was so bad that the Washington Post made the decision to shut down the comments section. (The screenshot linked to above is courtesy Democratic Underground, so you can read some of the furor.)
What I find instructive about this little mess is that both sides are right, and wrong. To be perfectly honest, Abramoff HAS funneled a good deal of money to the Democratic Party and Democratic candidates -- just a good deal less than he has to the GOP.
But it's not the money shoveling that's the issue. Let's change gears a bit. If a candidate is campaigning and says he's in favor ferret legalization, and someone says, "Why, I'm in favor of ferret legalization, too!" and gives that candidate $1,000, there's nothing illegal or unethical happening. Whereas, if a candidate says, "I oppose legalizing ferrets," then gets a check for $1,000 and then changes his position, that's grounds to see if something shady is happening.
Most of the Abramoff scandal focuses on Native American issues, particularly gaming. One of the reasons that the Dems probably get a pass on this is that, by and large, they've traditionally come down on the side of the party giving the money -- they've usually voted in the tribes' favor on the issues Abramoff was lobbying for, and probably would have done so with or without the money. It's when you're seeing politicians disinclined to act on the tribes' behalf doing Abramoff favors and changing votes that you have an issue, and on that side, it's all the GOP, all the time.
It's a fine-but-essential distinction.
Will I go so far as to say there's no one corrupt on the Dems side? No. I'm nonpartisan enough (and, uhm, still not a Democrat) and been a politics watcher long enough to know that would be absurd. Democrat or Republican, most of them are still whores, and if there was a buck to be made, I'm sure there are parties on both sides of the aisle more than willing to take it when they shouldn't have.
But even if there's a couple bad apples on the Dems' side, an entire chunk of the GOP orchard seems to be suffering a rot.
