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Wake up and face the music
By Jillian Lazzaro, Staff Writer
Wed Mar 19, 2008, 12:37 PM EDT
Listening to the news lately, I can't help but wonder why anyone would want to be a politician.
I'm not just talking about the scandals, as the family of New York's Governor Spitzer watches its dirty laundry get aired very publicly; or the misfortune of a starry-eyed Illinois senator's name being dragged through the racial, ethnic, and just-plain imaginative mud. I'm not even talking about the unfortunate fact that in this wired age, no highly-publicized politician can make off-the-record derogatory jabs or off-color jokes; how unfortunate that no politician can enjoy anonymity as he jokes about his devastating eight-year bout of extortion and incompetence (google youtube, George Bush, and "Green, Green Grass of Home") or as she cites preposterous slander to implore an Arkansas school committee to agree with her anti-gay agenda (google youtube and Sally Kern).
No, surprisingly, the lengthy roll of recent shameful, dishonorable, and unpatriotic acts attributed to politicians is not what makes a career in politics unappealing; though badly behaving leaders seem to have become a trend as popular as belly-button piercing.
Nor is it the fact that while our highest elected politicians used to be educated and self-made lawyers, educators, or soldiers, today America's most-powerful leaders are oil barons, self-interested businessmen, and frat-boys.
No. I wonder why anyone would want to be a politician because of this: the insurmountable workload that is facing today's leaders. Never, since the institution of our Constitution, have we so wandered from the path. While the Chief continues singing jauntily of how his cronies disassembled everything that made our country unique, all for the benefit of their own pockets; while politicians continue to blame our country's problems on everything but their own incompetence; while multi-billionaires swing their Porches past dilapidated public schools; and while teenagers continue to download the newest American Idol's single about the American dream-come-true--the once reachable American dream will cease to be dreamy.
That's why I would have to be water boarded--which isn't so bad according to George--before I'd agree to run for a political office. I'd have to be blindfolded and fed Garth Brooks' songs on loop as they march me to a podium. But first, they'd have to tap into my personal telephone conversations and read my private emails, all to discover that I can be found, alone and defenseless, buying coffee at the Tedeschi’s on weekday mornings. Wouldn't be hard, because, as the current government deems they now have the right to monitor, strip search, silence, tazer, and torture anyone, whenever they want to.
Looking at the presidential campaign and current events, I can't help but think the three presidential candidates must be the most severe and unwarranted egomaniacs, to think they have the ability to conquer our woes. Or maybe, among them, one is the confident arrival of unearthly genius, although they've had a hard time convincing us of it. At least I hope so.
And considering the state of Massachusetts politics, with the sheer number of towns bogged down by more than $2 million-deficits, it's made me sure that I wouldn't want to be the person trying to figure out how to dig myself, let alone an entire municipality, out of that hole. Aspiring politicians, know this: it's going to take a lot more than experience, fresh ideas, or new faces to dig us out of this hole, especially since, as a nation, we’ve already dug deep enough to hit China.
