Politicians are going to tend to be corrupt and full of shit by the simple nature of the job, every election is like a beauty pageant, what gets people to vote for a candidate is not necessarily brains or qualifications. If a tall candidate who is unqualified and kind of an ass runs against a short candidate who is remarkably qualified and not an ass, the tall candidate just by merit of being taller (and thus seeming more credible) probably has a sharp advantage. If the qualified candidate is under 5 feet tall it’s pretty much a sure win for his glue-sniffing opponent.
So due to our psychology-rather-than-intellect approach to voting, politicians who can get elected on looks or with emotional hooks without the need for substance or nuance are often as intelligent and capable as miss teen south carolina. When asked for a comment over a year later on what went wrong btw she replied that she had an “outer body experience” – I couldn’t have put it better myself. Note also that the crowd readily applauded rather than giggling hysterically or staring slack-jawed which would be more appropriate responses.
But yeah, our political system sucks. But I wanted to point out that while democrats and republicans both suck in their own unique and special ways, the republican party has become the personification of the type of politics I mentioned above. Because while this kind of corruption happens on it’s own as a byproduct of human failings, the republican party leadership actually strongly encourages it by enforcing a uniform party platform and appealing to a very narrow base of corporate donors promoting their economic interests and evangelicals voting based on social issues like abortion, gay marriage etc. This isn’t just how the cookie crumbles, it’s actually enforced by the party. There is no room for disagreement or original thought in the republican party, they marginalize anyone who breaks with the political strategy of the leadership (think ron paul) and actively fund people to run against the ones that step out of line. As a result the elected republicans in america are made up of 1) the occasional nuanced, intelligent candidate who has to conceal or lie about their positions to get elected and go along with the party if elected, which doesn’t seem to happen often, 2) corporate whores who promise to sell america to the highest bidder in order to get campaign contributions, and 3) 1-dimensional people whose appeal is mainly superficial (and often inane) but who have the right stance on conservative social issues – these tend to be the most vapid candidates of the three.
I looked at the republican field and wondered who I would vote for if I had to pick one of the plethora of candidates that have alternately lead in the polls, and I concluded the one I’d probably vote for is the guy who believes in magic underwear. That is the lesser of twelve evils.
Republican candidates by merit of this narrow, uniform strategy don’t even hardly have to have a platform because they only seem to care about the concerns of those two groups – evangelicals and corporations (and they seem to be simply using one to help the other). The last two elections the republican candidates had no energy policy besides “give the oil companies whatever they want”. Or to quote the McCain camp, “drill baby drill”. Getting us independent of mid-east oil and balancing the budget and reforming healthcare and other routine maintenance of our civilization is an afterthought because unborn babies are going to die and men will make out with each other and barrack obama and his “czars” will raise your taxes unless you vote republican. The republican electoral strategy is, more often than not, “fear fear fear fear tax cuts.”
I am honestly not partisan, I would gladly vote for a republican if they were the better of two choices. But the party, by appealing to fundamentalism, fear and the self-interest of the top 2% exclusively for so long, has become a party populated almost entirely with fundamentalist, paranoid and wealthy constituents. They’ve driven independent thinkers and intellectuals away from the party entirely because they’re harder to win over, there’s no one emotional button you can push to make 20 million of them vote for you automatically. You actually have to have an intelligent response to countless nuanced questions and really know your stuff. One symptom of this is that there is no such thing as a liberal republican anymore, but there are plenty of liberal and conservative democrats.
The slackass approach of consistently only ever going for or showing interest in the low-hanging fruit (by which I mean constituents who are the most numerous and easiest to win over) and attacking anyone who steps out of line really isn’t doing the country any good, and what probably started out as an electoral strategy is now actually what the party has become. The tail is now wagging the dog.
Anyway, just what I was thinking about today.
agnophilo 
Someone on a forum I used mentioned that the gradual decline and marginalization of the Republican party could lead to another “Era of Good Feelings”, where only one party (I.E. the Democrats) has any real power or credibility. Quite frankly, if they elect someone like Bachmann, they might actually help this to happen.
@TheThinkingPerson – They elected bush twice.With the republican base having a monopoly on idiots I don’t see it happening anytime soon. Maybe if more people in the middle wake up.
It slays me, it really does. In the UK right now (not that I’m living there but it is where I hail from) even the leader of the Tories, the CONSERVATIVES, just declared his support of gay marriage… or at least same-sex civil unions. He also condemned without hesitation homophobic remarks made by some of his party’s more old-school back-benchers. Yet in the US you have a panel of people standing before their voting base saying nothing over the jeering of a gay solider, a soldier who is part of the military complex they themselves would otherwise be building a platform of support under and condemning anyone who expressed even a hint of anti-war sentiments as “not supporting the troops!” You have a similarly noncommittal response over the approval of uninsured being left to die. You have men and women aiming for the most powerful job in the world who blatantly deny and ignore scientific fact. You have those who are meant to be upholding your constitution actively defying it as they attempt to court their under-educated, over-religioned base. You have half a nation seemingly believing your current President, who is a Centrist at the very most, is a covert Communist Muslim Insurrectionist or something like. I don’t like how my country is doing right now. I don’t like the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition govt. I loath the hatchet job they’re doing with the NHS and the civil service in general. I have even refused to move back home to the UK until they’re gone from power. But one look at the Republican candidates and old Davey Cameron really doesn’t look that bad at all. As I told an American friend who professed to be a “Moderate” it’s all relative. Her idea of a “Moderate” was way too conservative for my Liberal Lefty European self. And America’s conservatives are basically my idea of complete fucking head-cases!!
The abortion issue was one of the only reasons I ever voted republican. In addition to wanting less govt. But I am disgusted by both parties now. I have much more respect for Obama than I did initially. He really has impressed me not so much by what he has done, but his enduring through adversity.
Hahaha ” outer body experience”
But the party, by appealing to fundamentalism, fear and the self-interest of the top 2% exclusively for so long, has become a party populated almost entirely with fundamentalist, paranoid and wealthy constituents.It has, without any question, it has.
Are some candidates just a puppet shell? Perry will probably come up with some better advisors and win the nomination.Still a lot of great people have great advisors and cabinet so it is still hard to simplify that the next leader will be a failure.I may be liberal but still I got to hand it to surprises that can’t be predicted.
Just curious, which Mormon are you referring to? I’m hoping it’s Huntsman. I personally like him and Ron Paul (“like” being relative to the other candidates… Huntsman for standing out in one of the early debates and being pro-science, and Ron Paul for having the cajoles to stand his ground on issues that the other candidates pussyfoot around, like Bush taxes and wars.
you do also realize that before even running for office almost every single republican signs the Grover Nordquist pledge. it’s a pledge that preempts the oath of office they take once elected to Congress or the White House. shocking yet true. then there are the out and out lies. remember “Healthcare reform will pull the plug on grandma”? if you’re referring to Mitt Romney this should be interesting. one of Bush’s economic advisers who pushed Bush into tax cuts while we were trying to pay for two wars left the administration and was hired by Goldman Sachs where he got fully behind credit default swaps, the financial instruments that largely caused the collapse of our economy in 2008. Romney picked this man as his future economic adviser. another adviser Romney picked is a head of Blackwater, the private mercenary firm that ripped off taxpayers and created problems for the U.S. military in Iraq.
The home of sociopaths. dems are pathetic worthless politicians and they don’t stand a chance against a sociopath … de republican . we is done for.
If politicians tend to be corrupt why do people believe that government can solve social problems?
@RoaminCatholic@revelife – Not everyone who works in government is a politician, and politicians, in my sight, are corrupt because they can afford to be. They grease the wheels, however poorly, and when you’re necessary you can be any number of other ridiculous things and no one will knock you off of your pedestal.
@Babylons_Crowing – Every job in government is created by politicians. If politicians are corrupt, the jobs they create do corrupt things even if the people who work those jobs may not be corrupt.
@RoaminCatholic@revelife – Are you suggesting that there is some heretofore undiscovered transitive property of corruption in the workforce? Jobs need to be done, and some jobs require more capital to do than others. The same rules that corrupt politicians corrupt corporations and businesses as well, it’s the nature of money and the nature of power. Doesn’t stop our roads needing to be paved. What’s your proposed alternative?
@Babylons_Crowing – I suggested nothing. I simply applied logic. If politicians are corrupt, they will design corrupt government. The people who go to work for government may or may not be corrupt.
@RoaminCatholic@revelife – It’s not that simple, there’s more to it than that. Politicians are more than the machinations of government; government is more than the machinations of politicians. But, I believe we’re done talking now.
@Babylons_Crowing – But it is just as simple as that. Where does government come from? It comes from politicians, not the Easter Bunny or Santa Claus. And every bit of government is the result of legislation that is passed by Congress which is composed of politicians.