Tough to blog well when your computer is in the shop, but I have to bring to your attention to a truly extraordinary story in Rolling Stone by Matt Taibbi on the Congress.
He calls it the worst ever, and just about proves it with his vivid depictions of corrupt, inept, lazy, stupid and all-around scummy Congressmen.
True, it’s possible Congress was worse back in the days of Joe McCarthy. But Taibbi points out that numerous Senators and Congressman in the sixties, seventies, and eighties effectively and independent represented their unique constituents; only in recent years has the body utterly collapsed into corruption, ineptitude, laziness, and self-embarrassment.
But what makes the story special is not the horrors in D.C., which have been reported before, but the Hunter S. Thompson-esque bluntness and zeal; in a word, bad boy Taibbi goes for it.
Here’s his description of Wade Cunningham, a former chairman of a House Intelligence Subcommitte, a man now serving at least ten years in prison for taking millions of dollars in bribes: "…a man who can barely write his name in the ground with a stick…"
Believe it or don’t. If you don’t believe a man can be that stupid, read this letter from Cunningham to the reporter who helped bust him from prison:
"As truth will come out and you will find out how liablest [sic] you have & will be. Not once did you list the positives. Education Man of the Year…hospital funding, jobs, Hiway [sic] funding, border security, Megans law my bill, Tuna Dolfin [sic] my bill…and every time you wanted an expert on the wars who did you call. No Marcus you write About how I died."
Kit Stolz 