I used to believe we voted for politicians like Tom Delay because they fooled us into thinking they were humble public servants. Then I thought it must be because most elections are a choice between the lesser of two evils and even Tom must have been the lesser of some evil at sometime, some where.
And then my study of politics led me to the Sartian discovery that as long as there has been democracy, arrogant pricks like Tom Delay have been getting elected to high office. And that can't be a coincidence. There must be some connection between the ying of the ballot box and politicians who think they have the biggest yangs in town.
Consider that cradle of democracy, ancient Athens. In 450 BC the most powerful politician in town was Cimon, who negotiated a treaty with Sparta that guaranteed a generation of peace. This was a good thing for most people but bad news for the ambitions Periclies, who couldn't hope to defeat the popular Cimon at the polls. So he had Cimon charged with embezzlement, dragged him into court and had him expelled from the city. Twenty years later, after Periclies had muddled Athens into a war with Sparta, the new golden boy, Cleon, had Periclies charged with embezzlement and removed him from power in his turn. Cleon was killed in the war before he could be scandalized out of office, but his replacement was the pure product of the Athenian political system, perhaps the most entertaining and scandalous and successful politician of all time - Alcibidies.
This rich little snot not only rose to the pinnacle of power but when he was charged with election fraud he simply switched sides. Within a few years he had become almost as politically influential in Sparta as he had been in Athens - even after he was caught climbing out of a Spartan King's bedroom window when the King wasn't home.
When the Spartans finally caught on to his shtick Alcibidies returned to his hometown, where the Athenians welcomed him with open arms, until they decided they still couldn't trust him and threatened to drag him into court again. Alcibidies spent the last years of his life as a close advisor to the King of Persia, Athen's mortal enemy. Alcibidies was living proof of half of Lincoln's parable; You can fool all of the people some of the time, and that is more than enough for a career in politics.
Next to Alcibidies, Tom Delay is a rank amateur, certainly more bumble than humble. Even in modern times Tom's arrogance and bullying aren't original. J. Parnell Thomas, the plump ex-chicken farmer seemed to have hit the political mother lode when in 1947 his House Un-American Activities Committee ( with help from the American Communist Party of course) made headlines by skewering ten Hollywood no-names for contempt when they refused to talk about their past pinko associations. But just two years later Congressman Thomas was sharing cell space with two of those pinko writers in Danbury Federal Prison. He had been caught padding his government payroll with his wife and daughter. Of course Congressman Thomas was too small time to have even dreamed of paying his spouse half a million dollars, as Tom paid his wife and daughter, but I guess that's what you call political inflation.
Then there are Tom's free trips to visit Russian oil executives and Scottish golf pros, paid for by a close friend and crooked lobbyist named Jack Abramoff. Listen, Jack Abramoff is a pimp compared to Bobby Baker.
Baker was so close to Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson they called him "Little Lyndon". Baker's golden parachute was the "Serve-U-Corporation", which bought vending machines from mobster Sam Giancana and then placed them with companies that had big government contracts that Johnson had arrainged in Congress. I guess that's how you pay for a big ranch in Texas.
I could go on for ever: Traficant. Julius Caesar . Newt Gingrich. half the La Borgia family, and Warren G . Harding. At some point in this dreary repetition of venal sins you've got to recognize that politicians being thieves, liars, jerks and arrogant pigs is just tradition. And then you might ask yourself what idiots keep hiring these people.
This led to the discovery of the First of Muston's Ten Laws of Politics; "If the voters actually wanted an honest politician they would have elected one by now."
So when you hear the results of the Republican white wash investigation of Tom Delay, please, judge him gently, the way the Washington Beltway crowd will judge him. And then throw his ass out of office - because that is also political tradition.