Politics can be entertaining

To show that politics in this country are gradually turning into a bloodsport, I offer you an interesting little article I found today:

ATLANTA -- Politics can be rough, but usually there's no real bloodshed. Apparently things got out of hand at a Midtown Atlanta bar early Saturday morning. Lobbyist Peter Stokes, 25, attacked fellow lobbyist John Clayton, hitting him over the head with a beer bottle, slicing off part of the victim's ear, according to police.

The men were attending a party at the Spotted Dog on North Avenue marking the end of the legislative session. Stokes was arrested on felony aggravated assault charges and booked into the FultonCounty jail.

He made a court appearance on Monday morning and bond was set at $20,000. On the State Ethics Commission Web site, Stokes is registered as a lobbyist for Georgia Natural Gas, the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries, the Medical Association of Georgia, the Strollo Group, Verizon and a business called Pull-A-Part.

Is it any wonder things have led to this what with the downward spiral of politics since Bush Jr. became President? There is a bitterness to the whole process that only seems to worsen in times of corrupt administrations when those with money realize the opportunity open to them and literally lead to conflict as everyone tries to rush and acquire their piece of the influential pie.

I mean come on. We had the Abramoff scandal which tainted virtually the entire Republican Congressional body. We even had one Congressman claim that he was safe from prosecution for bribery because of separation of powers, saying with great relish that the courts shouldn't have any authority to prosecute him for taking bribes because it would set the precedent of the judicial branch having hegemony over the legislature. Sorry, but aren't elected officials supposed to be answerable to the very laws they create?

Those in power truly are becoming farther and farther removed from us. Sometimes I wonder if there isn't some sort of alien world these people come from. This fraction of citizens does realize that there are nearly three hundred million other people in this nation besides themselves, yes? They do know that this game called "politics" actually has far reaching consquences, yes?

Now, I’m all for lobbyists killing one another. They are the viruses that infect the body of national/local politics. The less of them the better. Who knows. Maybe this can be the opening salvo in a "miniature civil war". Let the PACs storm one another's bastions and consume the whole in PR Hell. Their annihilation can finally free up politicians' time to actually listen to their constituents.